If you were in North Myrtle Beach, here’s what your Christmas lights might look like.
North Myrtle Beach, 12/22/2008 - View #1 - 1024x768 JPG
North Myrtle Beach, 12/22/2008 - View #2 - 1024x768 JPGh
Archive for December, 2008
Christmas lights
Monday, December 22nd, 2008Fingernail growth
Friday, December 12th, 2008A little while ago, about 384 hours if you want to be exact, I was in the lab doing an experiment with some of my students. The experiment involved isolating proteins from milk, then doing some chemical tests to show that what the students had isolated was actually protein.
One of the tests the students used on their isolated protein was the xanthoproteic test. This is a simple test for proteins that works on proteins containing an aromatic ring, and involves the addition of a nitro group to the ring by reaction with nitric acid. If a protein or amino acid with an aromatic ring is present, the test will give a yellow color.
You may, if you’ve ever been in an introductory chemistry lab, heard your teacher warn you about nitric acid. In addition to causing you some pain, it will also turn your skin or fingernails yellow. This is the same sort of chemistry in the xanthoproteic test. Your skin and nails, after all, contain proteins.
Now, back to 384 hours ago. While I was cleaning up the lab after my students had left, I spilled a small amount of nitric acid onto the top of my finger. Sure enough, my finger turned yellow, along with a small part of the fingernail.
Here's the nitric acid stain. I originally spilled the acid at the point where my skin meets the fingernail. It's moved a bit, now.
384 hours after the spill, all the yellow skin had been replaced. But the nail has to grow out. We can find out how fast my fingernails are growing with a simple measurement.
Here's a (somewhat crude) neasurment using a ruler from the lab. The nitric acid stain has moved about 0.18 cm.
So, my fingernail has been growing at a rate of (0.18 cm) / (384 hr) = 0.00047 cm per hour. That works out to be 3.4 mm per month, which is right about what Wikipedia claims for the average rate of fingernail growth.
Now who says you never learned anything useful from chemistry?
You can’t fight dumb with more dumb
Wednesday, December 10th, 2008I’m something of a Linux advocate. I use Linux in my everyday work as an educator, and the only machine in my house that runs a Microsoft OS is the Xbox 360. So I found this mess linked by both Slashdot and Linux Today somewhat interesting.
If the linked blog post is accurate, a Texas middle school teacher confiscated a boy’s Linux discs because she believed that distributing the discs was illegal. That’s definitely ignorance on the teacher’s part. A typical Linux distribution can be freely distributed, and distribution maintainers typically encourage this sort of thing. That a Texas middle school teacher is not aware of this isn’t really surprising. And the teacher’s response to Linux distributions is quite silly:
No software is free and spreading that misconception is harmful. […] I along with many others tried Linux during college and I assure you, the claims you make are grossly over-stated and hinge on falsehoods.
After all, all that’s missing from here is “…I didn’t inhale.”*** Clearly, this teacher is in need of some education on what free software is. She’s clueless. But the response by the blogger who’s causing all the fuss is just as dumb.
Then again, being a good NEA member, you would spout the Union line. Microsoft has pumped tens of millions of dollars into your union. Of course you are going to “recommend” Microsoft Windows”. To do otherwise would probably get you reprimanded at the least and fired at the worst.
Keep in mind that this is happening in Texas, where teachers are prohibited by law from collective bargaining (or striking). Texas just isn’t a union shop, and it’s entirely possible that this middle school teacher doesn’t even belong to a union. And if she did, it’s unlikely to be one that could get her “reprimanded or fired” for using Linux.
Sheesh. You can’t fight dumb with more dumb.
*** The “I tried Linux in college” quote is the reason I still think the whole thing is satire, and should be posted on The Onion.
Keep ’em out of trouble
Saturday, December 6th, 2008While I was glancing at the latest America’s Health Rankings, I noticed that South Carolina had both the worst violent crime rate in the nation and the second-worst rate of high school graduation.
So how related to one another are those two factors? Here’s a simple X-Y chart, showing violent crime rates compared to high school graduation for all fifty states.
Violent crimes vs. percentage of 9th graders who graduate high school
While correlation is not the same thing as causation, this chart certainly suggests that more educated states have less problems with crime. That’s something to think about when it comes time to decide how much money to allocate to schools.
The most wonderful time of the year!
Friday, December 5th, 2008You can’t get very far into December without hearing it. No, I’m not talking about Mannheim Steamroller. I’m talking about the opening shots of the WAR ON CHRISTMAS!
Alongside a Nativity scene at the Legislative Building in Olympia, Washington, a sign put up by an atheist organization celebrates the winter solstice. But it’s the rest of the sign that has some residents and Christian organizations calling atheists Scrooges for attacking the celebration of Jesus Christ’s birth.
The sign says:
“At this season of the Winter Solstice, may reason prevail.”
“There are no gods, no devils, no angels, no heaven or hell.”
“There is only our natural world.”
“Religion is but myth and superstition that hardens hearts and enslaves minds.”
Maybe I’m just showing my age here, but I think that sign would be much cooler if it quoted some XTC lyrics. It’s pretty close to them already.
Edited to add:
I remember reading a book. In that book there was a rather strongly-worded phrase: “Thou shalt not steal”. I can’t recall the name of the book right now, but whatever it’s name – someone should really get these folks a copy and tell them to read it.
An atheist sign criticizing Christianity that was erected alongside a Nativity scene was taken from the Legislative Building in Olympia, Washington, on Friday and later found in a ditch.
I’m reasonably sure that book doesn’t condone theft.
Friday cat: Desire
Friday, December 5th, 2008Our cats all live indoors, and normally they’re very happy that way. But sometimes, I think the cats wish they could teleport themselves through the glass – if only for an instant
Desire (1024x768 JPEG image)
Death and taxes
Thursday, December 4th, 2008South Carolina has some rather … strange … priorities. We’re in the middle of a crisis in the state budget, and faced with cutting vital services that might help South Carolinians survive this recession. A big part of our problem is that we don’t have enough tax revenue to keep our necessary services up and running.
Business was — you might say — booming this past weekend, as the state’s first sales tax-free weekend attracted throngs to gun shops.
A tax-free holiday for guns? In this budget climate we really shouldn’t be having gimmicky “tax-free holidays” on anything. if you wonder how we in South Carolina got into this mess we’re in, here’s yet another example.
Or is the tax-free holiday on guns our legislature’s response to this?
South Carolina has the highest violent crime rate in the nation - again! (from America's Health Rankings 2008)
I guess it’s cheaper than funding the police and the prison system …
Hat tip to Snead – even if he does cheer for the wrong college football team.
Not really a mystery
Wednesday, December 3rd, 2008The Greenville News tells us about a report that says South Carolina’s colleges rate an “F” in affordability:
South Carolina got an “F” in college affordability on a national higher education report card released today, underscoring a concern cited by members of South Carolina’s Higher Education Study Committee.
Poor and working-class families must devote 34 percent of their income, even after aid, to pay for costs at public four-year colleges, according to the 2008 higher education report card, Measuring Up 2008, from the National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education.
We have high tuition here in South Carolina, and it’s gone up quite a bit over the eight or so years I’ve been teaching. Why tuition has been skyrocketing – and it’s gone up a lot not only among the four year schools mentioned in the article, but at South Carolina’s two-year colleges as well – isn’t really a mystery. Look at state funding. While college enrollment has been increasing, state funding for colleges has been decreasing. Even before the massive budget cuts we’ve been having in higher education this year, the budget for our two year schools was less than it was eight years ago. (I assume that four year schools have similar issues.) So what do schools have to do? Raise tuition to make up some of the shortfall.
It should not surprise us that when we shortchange higher education, we end up with higher education that is more inacessible to those of us most in need of a quality education.
Edited to add:
Apparently, affordability is not graded on a curve. In the original report referenced above, almost every state joined South Carolina in an “F” for affordability. Probably for the same reasons, too.
Night life
Monday, December 1st, 2008It’s nighttime in Atlanta.
Atlanta after dark - 1024x768 JPEG image