Monday Morning Quotations

Moving into the D's, we have a trio of the Darwin family expounding on science.

"There is a grandeur in this view of life." - Charles Darwin, English naturalist and scientist, 1809-82

"A fool... is a man who never tried an experiment in his life." - Erasmus Darwin, English physician and grandfather of Charles Darwin, 1731-1802

"In science the credit goes to the man who convinces the world, not to the man to whom the idea first occurs." - Francis Darwin, English botanist and son of Charles Darwin, 1848-1925

With a nod to Olympic patriotism, here is a Canadian quotation to change things up a bit:

"I see Canada as a country torn between a very northern, rather extraordinary, mystical spirit which it fears and its desire to present itself to the world as a Scotch banker." - Robertson Davies, Canadian novelist, 1913-95

Solutions to Puzzle Number 11

Well, it has been a week since the latest puzzle came out, so it is time for the solutions. I received puzzle responses from Scott, Robert, and Cornucrapia. I also would like to point out that Sarah impressively got the answer to 4 without any help from Google - who knew a physicist would be so awesome at zoology? Her solutions have not been listed below, however, because she lives with me and I am bad at not giving hints. I have reprinted the clues below with their solutions italicized below (and the media category in parentheses).

1.) At an Unknown Location
Lost (Television)
Solved by Scott and Robert

2.) The Manner in which I Became Acquainted with Your Most Recent Female Progenitor
How I Met Your Mother (Television)
Solved by Scott, Ian, and Robert

3.) The Misplaced Planet
The Lost World (Literature - I believe there is also a television show with the name, but I had Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's novel in mind).
Solved by Scott, Ian, and Robert

4.) Lampyridae
Firefly (Television)
Solved by Scott, Ian, and Robert

5.) Vigorously Cleans
Scrubs (Television)
Solved by Ian and Robert

6.) A Story About Two Population Centres
A Tale of Two Cities (Literature)
Solved by Scott, Ian, and Robert

7.) According to Your Preference
As You Like It (Literature - the obligatory Shakespeare title)
No one sent me a correct solution for this one.

8.) Personal Graphical Representation
Avatar (Movie)
Solved by Scott and Robert

9.) No Rural Region for Elderly Males
No Country for Old Men (Movie)
Solved by Scott, Ian, and Robert

10.) Overcook Announcement
Burn Notice (Television)
Solved by Scott and Robert

Well done to all the puzzle solvers.

Start of the Week Quotations

It is a slow start to the blogging week, commemorating the long weekend I have had and the lazy Monday I have thusly celebrated.

"An autobiography is an obituary in serial form with the last installment missing." - Quentin Crisp, English writer, 1908-99

"You campaign in poetry. You govern in prose." - Mario Cuomo, American Democratic politician, 1932-

"Christmas is the Disneyfication of Christianity." - Don Cupitt, British theologian, 1934-

And so ends the C's, and here is a sneak preview of the D's:

"How I love a colleague-free day! Then I can really get on with the job." - Hugh Dalton, British Labour politician, 1887-1962

Busy Day

Today is the 201st anniversary of Darwin's birthday, the Winter Olympics are starting, and I've got a whole mess of brains to co-register into a common space (a task which is proving far more difficult than it ought to be, considering how often published neuroimaging results are based on co-registered brains). I had planned to offer some commentary on the Olympics, but I wasn't able to find some of the links I wanted and now I don't think I will have the time to properly formulate my thoughts (perhaps that will come in a few days). I will, however, offer a brief tidbit of information that recently came to my attention concerning the city of Darwin, Australia.

Darwin is a lovely city, albeit suffering from an overabundance of humidity and, occasionally, the dreadful propensity common to many coastal tropical cities for inclement weather. When I visited Darwin as a child, however, I never even questioned how Darwin got its name. As I believe I have mentioned before, I was wildly into dinosaurs as a child and as such had quite a bit of exposure to de-facto acceptance of evolutionary theory. I was vaguely aware of some controversy when the idea was first introduced, but the fact that evolution was obstinately resisted by people living in the modern world had never even crossed my mind. Darwin, therefore, was a name I recognized for eminent scientific achievement and world-wide influence, and thus as fitting a name as any for a city. Apparently, however, Darwin was not actually named after Charles Darwin for his scientific achievements, but rather received its name because one of Darwin's former ship-mates was simply going down a list of old sailing buddies and naming places after each in turn. I guess it is just convenient that one of the most important cities in the Australian north ended up catching the most notable name on the list.

Puzzle Number 11: The Oblique Titles Strike Back

Clearly I didn't plan out my oblique title puzzle names properly, since The Return of the Oblique Titles preceded The Oblique Titles Strike Back. Oh well, hopefully my lapse in foresight will be overlooked by the great fun to be had in decoding the next set of titles. As before, these are a set of titles pulled from movies, television shows, and literary works (and, occasionally, more than one of those categories) and then obfuscated with synonyms and alternative definitions. I think a couple of these are rather challenging, so have fun!

1.) At an Unknown Location

2.) The Manner in which I Became Acquainted with Your Most Recent Female Progenitor

3.) The Misplaced Planet

4.) Lampyridae

5.) Vigorously Cleans

6.) A Story About Two Population Centres

7.) According to Your Preference

8.) Personal Graphical Representation

9.) No Rural Region for Elderly Males

10.) Overcook Announcement

Note: Anyone who gets #4 without looking it up has earned some profound trivial respect.

Note: Solutions can be found here.

Dirty Chemistry Humour

Similar to my post this morning, here is something that I forgot to put up when it first came to my attention a few days ago. Behold what is probably the most amazing image from an article abstract in years:


When I first saw this, I assumed it was a joke, but it appears to be from a legitimate article. So, to Sergio H. Toma, Miriam Uemi, Sofia Nikolaou, Daniela M. Tomazela, Marcos N. Eberlin, and Henrique E. Toma, I say well done.

Risk Intelligence

I meant to post a link to this last week after PZ Myers mentioned it, but then I wanted to try taking the test first which meant my post got delayed and then forgotten about for a few days. If you haven't already had a look at the Risk Intelligence test, though, I think it is worth going to (as far as internet intelligence tests go). The basic idea of the test is that you don't simply answer every statement with a True/False response, but rather with a percentage - 50% meaning you have no idea and think the statement as equally likely to be true or false, 100% meaning you are certain it is true, and 0% meaning you are certain it is false. There are 10% increments in between for all of those pesky facts that you are pretty sure you've heard somewhere else, but you wouldn't bet anything much of value on.

I scored a 78 - apparently that is a rather good score, but not as good as PZ Myer's 83. It would seem that I lack confidence in my responses (judging by the response curve given at the end). Of course, I don't know how much stock to place in any internet quiz, but I still thought it was an interesting project. Plus, whoever put it on seems to be gathering data, so you might be helping out someone's research by taking the test.