Beautiful Pictures

Produced with the 'processing' language, but most of all a keen artistic sense: http://complexification.net/



Thanks to Zimmer's latest post for the discovery.

...and the Big Cut&Paste

Turkish (self proclaimed) theoretical physicist accused of plagiarising papers.


According to Nature, the ArXiv removed their pubblications (70, 40 of which authored by one same guy - now that's a lot even for theoreticists), after ascertaining that they contained large sections from previous papers. two of the PhD involved had a host of papers in gravitational physics, but couldn't solve basic newtonian physics problems... Ugh!

The trouble began last November, when Salti and another graduate student, Oktay Aydogdu, underwent oral examinations for their PhDs. Although both had an extensive list of publications in gravitational physics, they struggled to answer even basic, high-school-level questions, according to Özgür Sariog brevelu, an associate professor at METU. "They didn't know fundamental stuff like newtonian mechanics," he says.

More worrying for me is that these people did actually publish their work on peer-reviewed journals, although Low Impact. Is this the kind of serious checks that publishers claim to offer when they oppose open publishing?

The Big Splash...

And the new Nature is out too, with a brief piece on how different sciences are homing in on the Dinosaurs' Asteroid Catastrophe, tackling it from various fronts and cross-fertilising each other with insights and suggestions on where and when EXACTLY this did happen.

I believe these links are freely available to anyone. If not, they should.

Climate changes, it rains more, snails die...

The new issue of Nature Reports: Climate Change is out.

Kind of confusing, in fact, to read in the same page of a species of snail going extinct because seasonal rains on the only atoll it leaves in are diminishing, while the next piece talks about increased rain due to Global Warming. Nothing strange, really, it only goes to show a point many scientist have made before: More energy in the atmosphere does not mean just hotter the year round, it means a more energetic atmosphere, therefore more storms, more rains, more extremes...

Like water in a bucket, which when still is flat, and when spun along the axis climb the walls following a parabolic shape, therefore higher on the walls and lower than still at the bottom.

So, may be the arid regions will become more arid, while the arctic regions will get even colder? I don't know. IANACS (I Am Not A Climate Scientist)

33!!!

I am 33!!!

The same age as Jesus Christ, yet I managed to avoid crucifixion, as a friend/colleague aptly put it.