Saturday, January 7, 2012

Kimberly Brooks: Art, Physics and the Huffington Post

"The artist, with little or no awareness of what is going on in the field of physics, manages to conjur up images and metaphors that are strikingly appropriate when superimposed upon the conceptual framework of the physicist's later revisions of our ideas about physical reality. Repeatedly throughout history, the artist introduces symbols and icons that in retrospect prove to have been an avant garde for the thought patters of a scientific age not yet born. " - Leonard Shlain, Art & Physics" Chapter One: Illusion/Reality

This was the huge meme that grew inside my late father's head throughout my childhood. It spilled forth onto our dining room table, on walks along the beach during family outings, on napkins where he diagrammed what it would look like to sit astride a beam of light and how Einstein's Theory of Relativity corresponded with, say, Cubism and Marcel Duchamp's 'Nude Descending a Staircaise' and it spilled forth within the reams of paper that I edited, chapter by chapter of what would become his first best-selling book, throughout high school in and college.

Still in the chrysalis of his first career as a prominent surgeon, he started to give multimedia presentations about his ideas around the country. He always told the story of how I, his budding artist, would constantly tug on his sleeve during modern art museum visits while he flashed, to my horror, a slide of a 7th grade picture of me with a Dorothy Hamill haircut along with for Cezanne, Einstein, Picasso and Bohr. He said my thousand questions about why modern art was great when coupled with his own questions about his understanding of the new physics is what spawned the idea for the book.

Some lives are long and winding roads. When it comes to Art and Science, mine has been more like a Mobius strip or Escher's staircases or hands drawing themselves. Or perhaps more fittingly, the Magritte image on the Art and Physics paperback edition of a man looking at an egg and painting a bird.

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Science and art were woven like DNA strands through my upbringing. While my father appreciated and encouraged my passion and talent as a child, a common saying around the house was "You can be anything you want, as long as you're a doctor first." In middle and high school, along with art classes, I often attended Sunday morning rounds and an occasional operation. But in college, I also took Chemistry, Biology, Physics "just in case".

As a practicing artist I see a lot in common with my scientific counterparts. My studio is my laboratory where I'm constantly experimenting with new materials and subjects. I wear a really messy version of a lab coat splattered with paint. I 'publish' my findings in the form of exhibitions. I even conducted an experiment on myself while painting to dissect the the creative process, which I determined to have eight stages, in one my earliest essays for HuffPost. Of course whether or not my art is predicting the next major breakthrough in physics remains to be seen.

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Eighteen months ago, when Arianna approached me to create the Arts Page, I took it on as I would any art project and still see it as a daily canvas, always wet and malleable, always a laboratory of ideas to share with others. But the fact that the medium is photons instead of oil paint and courtesy of the World Wide Web, which, lest we forget, was created so that Physicists at CERN could communicate with each other, was never lost on me either.

When Arianna surprised me by asking me to help launch science section too, with Cara Santa Maria and senior science editor David Freeman, my mouth at first fell open but then my eyes welled with how much it made perfect sense. My father's greatest gift with Art and Physics was to make both subjects accessible to the everyone. I know that I, along with Arianna and the incredible science team including Travis Korte, Emily Cohn and Tavish Nanda, feel the same way. I will continue my involvement here by regularly featuring artists standing at the intersection of art and science, illuminating science thought art, opening with "Dark Matters". I'm equally thrilled and honored to have some of the greatest thinkers of our time blogging for us right out of the gate, including Dean Kamen, Physicists Lisa Randall, and Nobel Laureates Saul Perlmutter and George Smoot, III, and Buzz Aldrin.

In 1991, my father handed me the first hard copy edition of his first book, Art and Physics with the following enscription. In the act itself, he had become, or transformed from scientist to an artist. Today, I hold a mirror to that act or paint a bird and hand it to you.

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Lecture of Art and Physics

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Follow Kimberly Brooks on Twitter: www.twitter.com/artistkimberlyb

Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/kimberly-brooks/art-physics-huffington-post_b_1184482.html

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EU states consider delay on any Iran oil ban (Reuters)

BRUSSELS (Reuters) ? A European Union embargo on Iranian crude oil imports could take a few months to start because some EU capitals want a delay they say they need to shield their debt-stricken economies, diplomats said on Friday.

EU states have agreed in principle to an embargo on Iranian oil, part of the latest Western effort to ratchet up pressure on Tehran over its nuclear programme.

Details of how the ban would be imposed are being discussed in Brussels, with the goal of a final decision by month's end.

Diplomats said EU countries have proposed "grace periods" on existing contracts of between one month and 12 months.

Greece, which depends heavily on Iranian crude, is pushing for the longest delay, the diplomats said. Britain, France, the Netherlands and Germany wanted a maximum grace period of three months.

"There is a range of ideas from one month to one year with countries who are more dependent on Iranian oil pushing for more time," one EU diplomat said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

European measures against Iran's oil industry will complement U.S. sanctions announced on New Year's Eve that aim to make it impossible for most countries' refineries to buy Iranian crude.

Iran is the second-largest producer of oil, after Saudi Arabia, among the 12 countries in OPEC, producing around 3.5 million barrels per day.

COSTLY MEASURES

As tensions between Iran and Western governments mount, several EU governments have argued that economic considerations ought to play a role in EU sanctions at a time when Europe faces a debt crisis and deep fiscal austerity.

EU countries buy about 500,000 barrels per day (bpd) of Iran's 2.6 million bpd in exports, making the bloc collectively the largest market for Iranian crude, rivaling China.

The three biggest EU importers have serious debt problems. Greece imports a quarter of its oil from Iran, Italy about 13 percent and Spain nearly 10 percent.

Prime Minister Mario Monti said this week Italy would push for a gradual introduction of the embargo and would ask that deliveries to repay Tehran's debts to Italian energy firm ENI be exempted from the sanctions.

Other aspects of the prospective embargo are being discussed and a final decision is unlikely to be quick, diplomats said. Some EU capitals are suggesting the impact of sanctions be reviewed after a fixed period, with the possibility of suspending them if they prove ineffective.

The U.S. and EU sanctions have caused a steady rise in oil prices this week. International Brent futures were trading above $113 a barrel on Friday, a rise of more than $6 a barrel since U.S. President Barack Obama signed the new sanctions into law.

One area of disagreement in Brussels, diplomats say, is the possibility of imposing sanctions against the Iranian central bank, to match Obama's move.

Several diplomats have told Reuters it appeared unlikely, for now, that EU governments would agree to cut off dealings with the bank at the same time as they impose the oil embargo.

Some capitals have raised concerns, they said, that sanctions on the central bank would harm the chances of getting Tehran to negotiate over its nuclear work.

Talks over the programme remain frozen, with Tehran saying it aims to produce energy for peaceful purposes and not, as Western governments fear, to make weapons.

Turkish foreign minister Ahmet Davutoglu said on Thursday that Ankara has delivered a Western offer to Tehran to renew negotiations over the programme. He expressed hope that talks that stalled a year ago could be soon revived.

(Additional reporting by Julien Toyer and Ilona Wissenbach. Editing by Sebastian Moffett and Richard Meares.)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/eurobiz/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20120106/wl_nm/us_iran_eu_sanctions

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Friday, January 6, 2012

OilVoice: Nostra Terra Oil and Gas Company announces second acquisition of interests in Oklahoma http://t.co/zzycWtOQ

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What mystifies Stephen Hawking? Women

Science Museum via Reuters

Physicist Stephen Hawking has decorated his office at the University of Cambridge with "Simpsons" memorabilia - and a prominent portrait of Marilyn Monroe.

By Alan Boyle

As famed physicist Stephen Hawking turns 70, the subject that most occupies his thoughts is not how the universe arose from nothing, or how he's been able to live with neurodegenerative disease for so long. Here's what he thinks about most: "Women. They are a complete mystery."

That's the bottom line?from New Scientist's interview with Hawking, timed?to coincide with this weekend's birthday celebration at Cambridge.?The theorist is almost completely paralyzed due to his decades-long struggle with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or Lou Gehrig's disease, and had to provide his answers by laboriously twitching his cheek to operate a computerized speech-translation system.


Hawking also listed what he saw as his "biggest blunder in science" (his now-repudiated insistence that information was destroyed in black holes), the most exciting development in physics during his career (the discovery of the big bang's imprint in cosmic microwave radiation) and the potential discovery that would do the most to revolutionize our understanding of the cosmos?(discovery of supersymmetric particles at the Large Hadron Collider).

But it's his brief comment on women that attracted the most attention: How could it be that a scientist who has plumbed the deepest mysteries of the cosmos finds himself mystified?by women?

Live Poll

In your mind, which is the bigger mystery?

Based on the view most folks have of geniuses,?how could it not be?

The saga of the super-smart professor who is flummoxed by interpersonal relations, particularly with the opposite sex, is at least as old as Sigmund Freud (who famously wondered, "What does a woman want?"), Jerry Lewis' fictional "Nutty Professor" and the stereotype we have of Albert Einstein. It's as up to date as the TV astrophysicist?on "The Big Bang Theory" who can't say a word to women unless he's under the influence.

Somehow, folks?get a satisfying sense of karma from the idea that geniuses are socially stupid. But the stereotype doesn't really hold true, particularly in Hawking's case.

Like the real-life Einstein, Hawking has had an active romantic life, marked by two marriages. (Einstein's second marriage ended with the death of his wife and cousin Elsa; Hawking's ended in an ugly divorce.) Hawking's disease?does not affect his sexual ability or his potency, and the fact that he's fathered three children is evidence of that.?

"The disease only affects voluntary muscle," Hawking's been quoted as saying.

He's been called an "incorrigible flirt" and a "party animal who likes to dance in his wheelchair."?Having seen Hawking?playfully chase his grandson around a backstage room in his wheelchair?after a Seattle lecture, I can readily believe the "party animal" part. And having seen the way his?expressive eyes light up a room, I know?he can turn on the charm despite his disability.

Through the years, Hawking has had a special thing for Marilyn Monroe. A picture of the enigmatic blonde hangs in his Cambridge office, and?Hawking once told The Guardian that if he could travel back in time, he'd rather meet Monroe than the great physicist Isaac Newton, who "seems to have been an unpleasant character."

Even as he approaches the age of 70, Hawking seems to have kept his playful, pleasant, mischievous character. That may?help explain his latest comment about the mystique surrounding women, as well as his?own?mystique.

Here's a classic example: Actress Jane Fonda was clearly won over last year when Hawking came backstage after her performance in a play about a woman musicologist?in the early stages of?neurodegenerative?disease. "I took his hand and carefully uncurled the fingers one by one, wanting to see how they felt and looked ... soft, pale, safe," she recalled in a blog posting.

When Fonda asked Hawking what he thought of her performance, Hawking typed out a short response: "You were my heartthrob" ? which got a big laugh. Fonda came away starstruck.?"This man who cannot move or speak, can, nonetheless, comprehend the incomprehensible," she wrote.

Hmm ... Maybe women aren't such a complete mystery to Hawking after all.

More about Stephen Hawking:

Where in the Cosmos?

This year we'll be experimenting with a Cosmic Log Facebook series called "Where in the Cosmos?" WITCo will offer pictures from cosmic locales and ask you to figure out where the pictures came from. But our first WITCo picture poses a slightly different challenge: In honor of Stephen Hawking's 70th birthday, the Science Museum has commissioned a series of pictures showing the physicist in his office, surrounded by knick-knacks and pictures. One of the pictures is at the top of this item. We've posted another picture to the Cosmic Log Facebook page, but we need your help to figure out what the knick-knacks are, what the pictures on Hawking's wall show, and what the equations on his blackboard refer to. Head on over to Facebook, "like" the Cosmic Log page, and help us solve the puzzle by adding your comments.


Hawking's birthday will be marked on Sunday at Cambridge University with a symposium on "The State of the Universe," featuring talks from 27 leading scientists, including Hawking himself. The public sessions on Sunday will be streamed live over the Internet. There's also a scientific symposium that got under way today. Those sessions, which continue on Friday and Saturday,?are also being streamed.

Hawking retired from his post as a mathematics professor at?Cambridge in 2009 and is now director of research at the university's Center for Theoretical Cosmology. He also holds a distinguished research chair at?Canada's Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics. For an in-depth look at?his life, his work and his mystique, check out "Stephen Hawking: An Unfettered Mind," a new biography by Kitty Ferguson.

Alan Boyle is msnbc.com's science editor. Connect with the Cosmic Log community by "liking" the log's Facebook page, following @b0yle on Twitter and adding the Cosmic Log page to your Google+ presence. You can also check out "The Case for Pluto," my book about the controversial dwarf planet and the search for new worlds.

Source: http://cosmiclog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/01/05/9981931-what-mystifies-dr-hawking-women

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Thursday, January 5, 2012

ChadPergram: Reid on Cordray recess appointment: ?I support President Obama?s decision..."

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What's the odds on match-fixing at London Olympics?

One of the enduring wonders of modern life is the inability of policymakers to understand that actions tend to have obvious consequences.

Allow bars and pubs to open longer and alcoholism will increase. Encourage supermarkets to expand and local high streets will soon become dead zones.

Anyone with half a brain could anticipate these consequences, yet to politicians they seem to come as a terrible shock.

Over the past few days, there has been much hand-wringing about the effect of the new gambling culture on the Olympics.

London 2012 is apparently in danger of becoming not the Green Games, nor even the Austerity Games, but the Dodgy Games.

The threat of match-fixing is now more serious than that of doping or terrorism, says the minister responsible, Hugh Robertson.

Can he honestly be surprised? When a globally televised event becomes a medium for gambling, it is hardly a shock that a bit of dishonesty is likely to come into play.

With the sort of buck-passing that has become second nature to the current administration, Robertson has been quick to shift the responsibility to other countries.

It is those ruthless syndicates in south-east Asia and gangsters on the Indian subcontinent who are to blame, it seems.

Unfortunately, no country has been more enthusiastic in its encouragement of gambling over the past 10 years than Britain.

Under Labour's 2005 Gambling Act, restrictions on advertising were eased and casinos encouraged.

The Conservatives, less surprisingly, have seen gaming as one of the few money-making boom sectors in a recession.

It is a great time to be in the gambling industry. New technology brings betting into every home. Any suggestion that betting is futile and addictive is undermined by promotion of the National Lottery as a self-interested act of patriotism.

One only has to look at the feverish marketing of gambling - online, in the press, on various digital channels - to realise that its target audience is the poor, the hope-deprived and, above all, the young. Having a bet is promoted on TV and on the internet as a jolly, often profitable extension of the computer game.

There are zany graphics, jokey commentaries, the occasional celebrity. At half-time during televised football, Ray Winstone appears in an ad offering odds on who'll be next to score or the final result. Part of the attraction of the new gambling is that you can bet on virtually anything.

Politicians may intone that the days of the something-for-nothing society are over, and hedge fund managers gambling on the markets may be presented as the villains of the moment, but the great national gaming binge is telling another, truer story.

The problem, in other words, is not one of match-fixing, but of corruption of a stealthier, nastier and more general kind.

Source: http://rss.feedsportal.com/c/845/f/10725/s/1b8932cc/l/0L0Sbelfasttelegraph0O0Copinion0Cnews0Eanalysis0Cwhats0Ethe0Eodds0Eon0Ematchfixing0Eat0Elondon0Eolympics0E160A988650Bhtml0Dr0FRSS/story01.htm

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Wednesday, January 4, 2012

How Cosmic Rays Can Image the Throat of an Active Volcano [Video]

Features | More Science

Cosmic-ray muons that pass through Mount Vesuvius could reveal the interior structure, potentially indicating when the deadly volcano will next erupt. A video from NOVA


Mount Vesuvius from the air, 2007MOUNT VESUVIUS, the volcano that buried Pompeii, threatens Naples. Image: Courtesy of Pastorius/Wikimedia Commons

The volcano that buried Pompeii in A.D. 79 still rumbles deep down. Last erupting in 1944, Mount Vesuvius poses an ever-present threat to the Italian populations around Naples. Whether the volcano will erupt in Pompeiian proportions again is a question that preoccupies scientists monitoring it, as they hope to predict when Vesuvius will blow and provide adequate warning time.

One way to gauge the magnitude of an impending volcanic eruption is to determine the size of its "throat"?the internal tube through which magma travels upward to the surface. The larger the tube, the bigger the eruption is likely to be.

Hiroyuki Tanaka of the University of Tokyo reasoned that the throat could be "x-rayed" with energetic muons produced in cosmic-ray showers. The number of muons passing through the volcano would depend on the density of intervening rock, so measuring the number of muons passing through various parts of the volcano could yield a crude, 3-D view of the interior.

This clip from "Deadliest Volcanoes," by PBS's NOVA, provides a look at muon imaging. The entire NOVA program explores the threats from volcanoes around the world, including the supervolcano below Yellowstone National Park and the eruption threat in the U.S. Pacific Northwest. It airs on Wednesday, January 4, at 9 P.M. on PBS.

Watch Sneak Peak: Deadliest Volcanoes on PBS. See more from NOVA.

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Source: http://rss.sciam.com/click.phdo?i=4d73abc147c1fbc1d987fae24c0015a3

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