U.S. government suspends funding to East Anglia University
The U.S. Department of Energy has temporarily suspended all research funding to the University of East Anglia, pending its review of the climategate controversy.
Author: Robert Zimmerman
Goons in action part 2
Elite bigotry in college admissions
This analysis of college admissions practices reveals that colleges discriminate badly against students from rural communities, merely because they are from those communities. Key quote:
Participation in such Red State activities as high school ROTC, 4-H clubs, or the Future Farmers of America was found to reduce very substantially a student’s chances of gaining admission to the competitive private colleges in the NSCE database on an all-other-things-considered basis. The admissions disadvantage was greatest for those in leadership positions in these activities or those winning honors and awards. “Being an officer or winning awards” for such career-oriented activities as junior ROTC, 4-H, or Future Farmers of America, say Espenshade and Radford, “has a significantly negative association with admission outcomes at highly selective institutions.” Excelling in these activities “is associated with 60 or 65 percent lower odds of admission.” [emphasis mine]
Amazing isn’t it? If you grow up in a rural American community in flyover country, do well as a teenager by participating responsibly as a leader in the kinds of after-school activities popular in rural communities, elite American colleges are going to hold that against you.
The article also describes bigotry against whites and asians (for racial reasons) as well as individuals with a military background. It is worthwhile reading the whole article.
House releases their text of NASA budget
The House Committee on Science and Technology has released the text [pdf] of its NASA reauthorization bill. The committee’s short thumbnail description of the language suggests it is similar to the Senate language. A quick scan of the text also suggests this as well. I hope to take a closer look at both the Senate and House bills later this week and then give my take on both.
Life as it should be
An evening pause: Tomorrow will be the 41st anniversary of the Apollo 11 landing on the Moon. So, let’s start the week with a clip from the 1972 film version of Man of La Mancha to show why some impossible dreams are certainly possible. In this short scene, Peter O’Toole, as Cervantes, explains why he does not like to look at life, “as it is.”
Russians laugh at Obama goals
The head of the Russian manned space program thinks that NASA’s new goals of building a rocket and capsule for reaching an asteroid by 2015 to be “unreal.”
Modern media journalism at its worst
This story is a few months old, but I think it is important enough to post again, now. Go and watch the two videos at this website. The first is a report by Contessa Brewer of MSNBC about a tea party rally where, according to Brewer, there were “white people showing up with guns.” The second video shows you an uncropped image of these same gun-toting “white people.” Then I dare you to tell me that any of the news reporting by Brewer and MSNBC is trustworthy, especially considering they have done nothing to correct her patently false story in the months since.
Images of Boeing’s crew capsule
Boeing has released some new images and videos of its crew transportation vehicle, being built in partnership with Bigelow Aerospace using subsidies from NASA’s Commercial Crew Development (CCDev) program.
John Glenn meets with Obama
John Glenn is meeting with President Obama today. Considering Glenn’s opposition to Obama’s plans for NASA, I suspect he is going to spend some his time lobbying Obama about changing those plans.
A quick note on the past weekend caving
I just thought I should note quickly that my weekend cave trip was a spectacular success. John Harman, Pete Johnson, Nikki Fox, and myself surveyed almost 800 feet of beautiful and big virgin cave passage. I hope to have pictures soon.
Man, it is really fun to go where no one has ever gone before!
Plugging the oil leak
A headline that insists you read the story: Joe the Plumber (not that one) says he helped stop Gulf oil spill leak.
Metals in the inner galaxy
A preprint paper, published today on the astro-ph website but also accepted for publication in the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics, has confirmed what scientists have suspected about the dust and gas between the stars: As you travel closer to the center of the Milky Way galaxy this interstellar medium gets increasingly enriched with heavy elements. The scientists believe this is because the higher rate of supernovae in the inner galaxy sprays space with more of these atoms.
Since the field of extrasolar planets has also found that the more heavy elements a star contains, the more chance it will have planets, the new results above suggest that we will find more planets as we look inward towards the galactic center.