psychescientia

The Gift of Imagination

noreply@blogger.com (W. D. Craft) — Mon, 24 May 2010 20:01:00 +0000

TOPICS: imagination, education, sir ken robinson

… kids will take a chance. If they don't know, they'll have a go. They're not frightened of being wrong. Now I don't mean to say that being wrong is the same thing as being creative. But what we do know is if you're not prepared to be wrong, you will never come up with anything original.

— Sir Ken Robinson.

Investigating other topics, I was reminded of this TED talk by Ken Robinson on education and imagination.

We are educating people out of their creativity.

— Sir Ken Robinson.

Stimulating yet sobering thoughts for me as the parent of an 8-yr-old in public school (made more poignant having just returned from lunch with my wife and a discussion of some of the pros and cons about homeschooling vs. public school). But also provocative from the perspective of a college-level instructor.

Is it possible that 2nd grade at the local public elementary school is somehow ruining my 8-yr-old's creativity? The school organizes classes in music and art each week and the teachers incorporate imaginative, creative exercises and activities into their daily teaching/learning plans. The classrooms are organized to allow and encourage socialization and small group work. The teachers are enthusiastic, sincere, and encouraging. Even the PE classes sound pretty fun (though the students like to complain about them).

And yet there is a palpable squelching of creativity. A gradual erosion of the kids' natural love of learning (which I mix into the general concept of creativity).

So what's happening? Is it a problem, as Sir Ken Robinson suggests, of over-emphasizing the analytical? Under-emphasizing motion, energy, music, dance, emotion, physicality? Under-appreciating all the various modes of learning, under-appreciating the various modes of learning about, and interacting with, the world and others?

I think the problems are much more insidious and challenging to address. In fact, for U. S. elementary and secondary education, I have to laugh somewhat bitterly when I think of Robinson's suggestion that we over-emphasize the analytical. In a generic, theoretical sense, I recognize the truth of his observation that an alien visitor might think the whole logical endpoint point of our educational system/process is the creation of college professors; but that would only be the conclusion from aliens with really sloppy thinking after a very superficial analysis. If such aliens looked carefully at the consistent outcomes, year after year, decade after decade, I think they'd come to the conclusion that we are instead intent on crushing students' natural love of learning (quite the opposite of the effect desired for a college instructor), perhaps with the overall plan of controlling or at least homogenizing the students.

And this is where I think we hit Robinson's perceived squelching of creativity.

But it's not a process of educating people out of their creativity, except in some ironic sense of "education." It's not a problem of, or a result of, over-emphasizing the analytical.

Instead, it's a problem born of mind-numbing bureaucracy, a glacial pace set for the educational process, and a mixture of culturally entrenched negative ideas about teaching and learning, all at least in part due to a number of questionable assumptions underlying the attempt to mass-produce so-called educated individuals in the same way we mass produce clothing, cars, and other commodities.

We "educate" kids in our public school system, not by over-emphasizing the analytical, but by treating the kids like just so many cattle to be organized and controlled. The (eventual) college professors are the students who survive the process despite years of intellect-degrading efforts by such an educational system.

For me, the real point of Robinson's story about the dancer and dance school is not that we should teach everyone to dance. But that each person has his/her own unique abilities, needs, and ways to excel. Our public school system is not set up to acknowledge, encourage, or take advantage of such abilities. Nor is it an adaptive system that will ever evolve to do so. The system itself is essentially starved of imagination.

RELATED REFERENCES

Robinson, K. (2006). TED talk, available at http://www.ted.com/talks/ken_robinson_says_schools_kill_creativity.html

Robinson, Ken at http://sirkenrobinson.com/

TED biographical information on Sir Ken Robinson at http://www.ted.com/speakers/sir_ken_robinson.html

The Poetry of Reality

noreply@blogger.com (W. D. Craft) — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 22:50:00 +0000

TOPIC: science, science education, science popularization

Science is the poetry of reality.

— Richard Dawkins.

SOME RECENT (and not-so-recent) RELATED REFERENCES & LINKS

Bronowski, J. (1978). The common sense of science. Harvard University Press, ISBN 0674146514. Amazon.com link: http://www.amazon.com/Common-Sense-Science-Harvard-Paperbacks/dp/0674146514/

Dawkins, R. (2009). The greatest show on earth: the evidence for evolution. Free Press, ISBN 1416594787. Amazon.com link: http://www.amazon.com/Greatest-Show-Earth-Evidence-Evolution/dp/1416594787/

Dawkins, R. (2008). The god delusion. Mariner Books (paperback), ISBN 0618918248. Amazon.com link: http://www.amazon.com/God-Delusion-Richard-Dawkins/dp/0618918248/

Feynman, R. P. (2005). The pleasure of finding things out: the best short works of Richard P. Feynman. Basic Books (paperback), ISBN 0465023959. Amazon.com link: http://www.amazon.com/Pleasure-Finding-Things-Out-Richard/dp/0465023959/

Greene, B. (2005). The fabric of the cosmos: space, time, and the texture of reality. Vintage (paperback), ISBN 0375727205. Amazon.com link: http://www.amazon.com/Fabric-Cosmos-Space-Texture-Reality/dp/0375727205/

Hawking, S. (2007). The theory of everything: the origin and fate of the universe. Phoenix Books, ISBN 1597775541. Amazon.com link: http://www.amazon.com/Theory-Everything-Origin-Fate-Universe/dp/1597775541/

Krauss, L. (2007). Fear of physics: a guide for the perplexed. Basic Books, ISBN 0465002188. Amazon.com link: http://www.amazon.com/Fear-Physics-Lawrence-M-Krauss/dp/0465002188/

Myers, P. Z. Blogging at http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/

Porco, C. Profile on TED.com available at http://www.ted.com/speakers/carolyn_porco.html

Sagan, C. & Druyan, A. (1997). The demon-haunted world: science as a candle in the dark. Ballantine Books, ISBN 0345409469. Amazon.com link: http://www.amazon.com/Demon-Haunted-World-Science-Candle-Dark/dp/0345409469/

Shermer, M. (2009). The mind of the market: how biology and psychology shape our economic lives. Holt Paperbacks, ISBN 0805089160. Amazon.com link: http://www.amazon.com/Mind-Market-Biology-Psychology-Economic/dp/0805089160/ Symphony of Science at http://symphonyofscience.com/

Tarter, J. (2009). Are we alone? TED talk available at http://www.ted.com/talks/jill_tarter_s_call_to_join_the_seti_search.html

Tyson, N. D. (2005). Origins: fourteen billion years of cosmic evolution. W. W. Norton, ISBN 0393327582. Amazon.com link: http://www.amazon.com/Origins-Fourteen-Billion-Cosmic-Evolution/dp/0393327582/

Hamster Gadget by Adam Bowman

noreply@blogger.com (W. D. Craft) — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 03:37:00 +0000

I couldn't resist.

For more about Adam Bowman and some other very cool gadgets, see http://abowman.com/about/

Arthur Benjamin on Statistics

noreply@blogger.com (W. D. Craft) — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 15:31:00 +0000

TOPIC: math education

The relative importance of statistics vs calculus — something I've pondered many times as a part-time member of the math & computer science department at a small liberal arts college. Our general distribution requirements here demand neither calculus nor statistics, although of course our science majors end up at various levels of calculus, and some eventually include a thorough one-semester statistics class.

Would it be interesting and useful to re-organize some things and plan for a required stats experience?

RELATED REFERENCES

TBA

Misreporting of Recent Flu Vaccine Research: Headlines Sure To Spark Trouble

noreply@blogger.com (W. D. Craft) — Thu, 21 May 2009 14:01:00 +0000

TOPIC: recent flu vaccine research, science in pop media

A recent headline on ScienceDaily.com announces that "Children Who Get Flu Vaccine Have Three Times Risk Of Hospitalization For Flu," and sure enough a quick Google search on that exact title produces hundreds of hits, including respectable sites such as ScienceDaily.com and medwirenews and a title at the U. S. Dept of Health & Human Services site www.healthfinder.gov:

Hospitalization Rates Higher in Kids Who Get Flu Shots

and of course at anti-vaccine propaganda sites such as www.ageofautism.com, that site trumpeting that "Flu Vaccine Triples Child Hospitalizations."

Wait — what?

Where is all of this coming from?

It turns out that the headlines are terribly misleading, especially for a unscientific general population that (1) easily confuses correlation with causation and (2) doesn't understand the difference between an experimental study and a quasi-experimental (or even correlational) study.

Most of the material being published out there under these headlines consists of simple regurgitations (or sometimes only pieces of) a premature and irresponsible press release issued 5/19 by The American Thoracic Society in promotion of that 'Society's 105th International Conference being held in San Diego, the press release having been timed to coincide with the specific symposium in which the related research was first being presented.

Premature? Yes. The American Thoracic Society press release concerned research not yet ready for general public consumption, concerning research not yet peer-reviewed (except minimally for conference presentation) or published in a peer-reviewed journal and involving a relatively small and special population of participants.

Irresponsible? Yes, in part for the reasons mentioned above, but also for the breath-takingly cavalier attitude with which they threw out for pop-media consumption poorly-explained research results under a heading sure to catch attention and sure to appear to have widespread and profound public health policy implications. Add to that the fact that the press release was based on an already-poorly-written abstract with questionably-worded conclusions, and the news release becomes an incredible fiasco.

Here's the original press release:

News Release

FOR RELEASE MAY 19, 2009 at 1:30 p.m. PDT

FOR MORE INFORMATION, CONTACT:
Keely Savoie or Brian Kell
ksavoie@thoracic.org or bkell@thoracic.org
ATS Office: 212-315-8620 or 212-315-6442 (until May 13)
Cell phones: 917-860-5814 (KS) or 516-305-9251 (BK)
ATS Press Room: 619-525-6323, 619-525-6324 or 619-525-6325 (May 15 to 20)
Mini-Symposium time: May 19: 1:30 p.m. to 4 p.m.
Presentation time: May 19: 3:20 p.m.
Location: San Diego Convention Center, Room 3 (Upper Level)

Flu Shot Not Effective in Preventing Flu-Related Hospitalizations in Asthmatic Children

ATS 2009, SAN DIEGO— The inactivated flu vaccine does not appear to be effective in preventing influenza-related hospitalizations in children, especially the ones with asthma. In fact, children who get the flu vaccine are more at risk for hospitalization than their peers who do not get the vaccine, according to new research that will be presented on Tuesday, May 19, at the 105th International Conference of the American Thoracic Society in San Diego.

Flu vaccine (trivalent inactivated flu vaccine—TIV) has unknown effects on asthmatics.

“The concerns that vaccination maybe [sic] associated with asthma exacerbations have been disproved with multiple studies in the past, but the vaccine’s effectiveness has not been well-established,” said Avni Joshi, M.D., of the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, MN. “This study was aimed at evaluating the effectiveness of the TIV in children overall, as well as the children with asthma, to prevent influenza-related hospitalization.”

The CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) and the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) recommend annual influenza vaccination for all children aged six months to 18 years.

The National Asthma Education and Prevention Program (3 revision) also recommends annual flu vaccination of asthmatic children older than six months.

In order to determine whether the vaccine was effective in reducing the number of hospitalizations that all children, and especially the ones with asthma, faced over eight consecutive flu seasons, the researchers conducted a cohort study of 263 children who were evaluated at the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota from six months to 18 years of age, each of whom had had laboratory-confirmed influenza between 1996 to 2006. The investigators determined who had and had not received the flu vaccine, their asthma status and who did and did not require hospitalization. Records were reviewed for each subject with influenza-related illness for flu vaccination preceding the illness and hospitalization during that illness.

They found that children who had received the flu vaccine had three times the risk of hospitalization, as compared to children who had not received the vaccine. In asthmatic children, there was a significantly higher risk of hospitalization in subjects who received the TIV, as compared to those who did not (p= 0.006). But no other measured factors — such as insurance plans or severity of asthma — appeared to affect risk of hospitalization.

“While these findings do raise questions about the efficacy of the vaccine, they do not in fact implicate it as a cause of hospitalizations,” said Dr. Joshi. “More studies are needed to assess not only the immunogenicity, but also the efficacy of different influenza vaccines in asthmatic subjects.”

###

Session # C94: “Viral Infections in Childhood Respiratory Disease”

Abstract # 561: “Flu Vaccination in Asthmatics: Does It Work?”

It's interesting to look at the deterioration of the information as it flowed from Joshi, et al's original conference abstract, to the press release, then on to various pop media outlets:

Original title of Joshni, et al's conference abstract:
Flu Vaccination in Asthmatics: Does It Work?
(which, given the actual description of the research actually seems a poor title)
Then to this in the press release from the American Thoracic Society:
Flu Shot Not Effective in Preventing Flu-Related Hospitalizations in Asthmatic Children
Then to something like this in the mainstream pop-media (this one appearing on ScienceDaily.com):
Children Who Get Flu Vaccine Have Three Times Risk Of Hospitalization For Flu, Study Suggests
Then further mangled by less mainstream media to things like this:
Flu Vaccine Triples Child Hospitalizations

That last one of course now making it sound like the very existence of the flu vaccine is somehow leading to dramatic increases in child hospitalizations, which is utter nonsense.

So what's really happening here? And why does the first author Dr. Avni Joshi herself remark that the findings “… do not in fact implicate it [the vaccine] as a cause of hospitalizations” ?

In part, she is acknowledging what this study was NOT: the study was not an experimental study allowing cause-effect conclusions. In other words, the study was NOT something like that outlined in the figure below:

Given such a design, we might reasonably compare the conditional probabilities of being hospitalized with and without having earlier received a flu vaccine, something like

p(hospitalization | flu vaccine) vs. p(hospitalization | no vaccine)

Such an experimental design would allow us to fill in all of the cells of an incidence table like the one shown here at right:

But again, that's NOT the study Joshi and colleagues did. Instead we have the following description from Joshi and colleagues in their conference abstract:

METHODS: We conducted a cohort study of all pediatric subjects( 6 months to 18 years age) who were evaluated at Mayo Clinic, Rochester, MN, USA who had laboratory confirmed influenza during each flu season from 1999-2006 to evaluate the efficacy of TIV. A case control analysis was performed with the cases and the controls being the subjects with asthma who did and did not required hospitalization with the influenza illness respectively.

and this slightly elaborated description from the press release:

… the researchers conducted a cohort study of 263 children who were evaluated at the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota from six months to 18 years of age, each of whom had had laboratory-confirmed influenza between 1996 to 2006. The investigators determined who had and had not received the flu vaccine, their asthma status and who did and did not require hospitalization. Records were reviewed for each subject with influenza-related illness for flu vaccination preceding the illness and hospitalization during that illness.

So, to be clear: this appears to have been a retrospective study of 263 participants already diagnosed with flu, some of whom had received a flu vaccine before their illness, some of whom had not, and some of whom were later hospitalized for their illness. The design of the study looks more like this:

and instead of giving information about the probability of hospitalization if you get a flu vaccine, the results give us information (with limited generalizability) about the probability of hospitalization if you were vaccinated but still came down with the flu. The phrasing makes this sound like some arcane, subtle distinction, but the information being communicated is dramatically different.

The pop media headlines and coverage lead one to believe that getting a flu vaccine somehow triples one's likelihood of being hospitalized for the flu. That is wrong. Instead, the research being reported implies only that if you get the flu (and have serious enough symptoms that you go to a medical clinic to be checked out) despite having self-selected into getting a flu vaccine (which means you're already part of an at-greater-risk population in general) then you're more likely to be hospitalized than someone who was also quite sick from the flu but without having had the earlier immunization.

Some of the possible explanations for such a result lie with the special patients themselves, and this is why Joshi points out that the results do not imply that the vaccine causes an increase in hospitalization rates. The special patients who get a serious case of the flu despite being vaccinated may be special (for example) in having particular health difficulties already or some other constitutional predisposition for the illness, and/or the patients may be special in having contracted particularly dangerous forms of the illness.

RELATED REFERENCES

Children Who Get Flu Vaccine Have Three Times Risk Of Hospitalization For Flu, Study Suggests. (5/20/2009). Science Daily, accessed 5/21/2009 at http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/05/090519172045.htm

Flu Shot Not Effective in Preventing Flu-Related Hospitalizations in Asthmatic Children. (5/19/2009). New Release from the American Thoracic Society, accessed 5/20/2009 at www.thoracic.org/sections/publications/press-releases/conference/articles/2009/abstracts-and-press-releases/joshi.pdf

Heckenlively, K. (5/21/2009). Flu Vaccine Triples Child Hospitalizations, but Won’t Turn Them into Horned, Hairy Apes, say Experts! Age of Autism: Daily Web Newspaper of the Autism Epidemic, accessed 5/21/2009 at http://www.ageofautism.com/2009/05/flu-vaccine-triples-child-hospitalizations-but-wont-turn-them-into-horned-hairy-apes-say-experts.html

Joshi, A. Y., Iyer, V. N., Hartz, M. F., Volcheck, G. W., Patel, A. M., & Li, J. T. (2009). Flu vaccination in asthmatics: does it work? Presentation at The American Thoracic Society's 105th International Conference, San Diego, CA, 5/19/2009. Abstract available as part of the press release available at www.thoracic.org/sections/publications/press-releases/conference/articles/2009/abstracts-and-press-releases/joshi.pdf

Lyford, J. (5/21/2009). Flu vaccine fails to reduce hospitalization in asthmatic children. medwirenews, accessed 5/21/2009 at http://www.medwire-news.md/48/82539/Respiratory/Flu_vaccine_fails_to_reduce_hospitalization_in_asthmatic_children.html

RELATED RESOURCES

American Thoracic Society. http://www.thoracic.org/

CDC - Influenza (Flu). http://www.cdc.gov/flu/

Centers for Disease Control & Prevention (CDC). http://www.cdc.gov/

QualiaSoup on Open-Mindedness

noreply@blogger.com (W. D. Craft) — Sun, 05 Apr 2009 22:09:00 +0000

TOPIC: open-minded skepticism vs simple open-mindedness

Just recently discovered this nice video from QualiaSoup as I was browsing over at the Pharyngula website. The extended commentary there and at QualiaSoup's youtube site is pretty much what you might expect: lots of positive remarks, the usual non-sequitars and tangential remarks, and the occasional critical response being harshly attacked by the other commenters.

What I wondered, though, all the way through the video and as I scanned through the comments, was this: who watching such a video would come away changed? And who needing such change would ever watch the video?

These aren't just idle questions. My academic colleagues and I strive often to address pseudoscience and pseudoscientific beliefs/concepts in the classroom — raising questions concerning falsifiability, bias, systematic empiricism, etc., and encouraging the practice of open-minded skepticism. But I often wonder seriously about how much thinking we actually change out there, instead of possibly just being heard by the students who are already attuned to this way of thinking and just alienating the ones who really need the message.

RELATED REFERENCES & SOURCES

QualiaSoup at http://www.youtube.com/user/QualiaSoup

Pharyngula at http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula

Shermer, Michael (1997) excerpt from Why People Believe Weird Things: Pseudoscience, Superstition, and Other Confusions of Our Time (W. H. Freeman.) at http://www.skeptic.com/about_us/manifesto.html

ACM President Wendy Hall Appointed Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire

noreply@blogger.com (W. D. Craft) — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 21:13:00 +0000

TOPIC: topic here in lower-case letters

WENDY HALL, innovative and groundbreaking professor of computer science at the University of Southampton, UK, has been appointed Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire (DBE) by Queen Elizabeth II for "services to science and technology." Here's the text of the news release from School of Electronics & Computer Science at the University of Southampton:

New Years Honours - Dame Wendy Hall

Professor Wendy Hall, CBE, has been appointed DBE in the New Year Honours List for services to science and technology.

One of the world’s leading computer scientists, Wendy Hall is a Professor at the University of Southampton and was Head of the School of Electronics and Computer Science from 2002 to 2007. Her influence on the development of computer science has been fundamental not only in her academic work and the many successful research initiatives in which she has been involved, but also for the large number of prominent roles she has held in the scientific and technological community.

In 2003 Professor Hall was appointed President of the British Computer Society (BCS), the UK’s leading professional body for IT. In 2005 she became the first woman to be elected Senior Vice-President of the Royal Academy of Engineering, and in July 2008 she took up office as President of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM), the first person from outside North America to hold this role in the organization’s 60-year history.

She is a member of the Prime Minister’s Council for Science and Technology, and a founding member of the Scientific Council of the European Research Council. In November 2008 she was one of 25 European figures honoured for their contribution to Information, Communication and Technology by the EU. Among the many awards she has won is the Anita Borg Award for Technical Leadership (2006).

She is known throughout the community for her energy and vision and, in addition to her large number of commitments in areas of policy development, she continues to advance new research directions. In 2006, she was one of the founders of the Web Science Research Initiative, along with Professor Sir Tim Berners-Lee, inventor of the World Wide Web, Professor Nigel Shadbolt and Daniel Weitzner. They are pioneering the new discipline of Web Science, to develop a better understanding of the architectural principles that led to the Web’s growth and success, and ensure that these support the Web’s future development.

Throughout her career Wendy Hall has been a prominent and vocal advocate of women’s opportunities in science, engineering and technology. In her research and her public life she has sought to ensure that women are equal beneficiaries of technological advance, and her example of achievement and dedication has made her a distinguished and powerful role model for women. ‘I am thrilled to have been honoured in this way,’ said Professor Hall. ‘It is of course exciting for me personally and for my family, but it is also a tribute to all the people I have worked with in my career as a scientist and engineer both at Southampton and in the wider community.’

Professor Dame Wendy Hall took her undergraduate and postgraduate degrees at the University of Southampton, where she met her husband Peter Chandler. They have been married for nearly 30 years and live in the New Forest.

See coverage of the announcement on BBC Technology, The Guardian, and TechRadar.com

Posted by Joyce Lewis on 31 Dec 2008.

Wendy Hall is also President of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM), described as "the world’s largest educational and scientific computing society."

RELATED REFERENCES & RESOURCES

Association for Computing Machinery (ACM). Web site at http://www.acm.org/

Lipsett, Anthea (12/31/2008). Visionary computer scientist becomes a dame. guardian.co.uk, accessed Tues 1/6/2008 at http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2008/dec/31/new-years-honours-computing

Pioneer of cyberspace honoured. (12/31/2008). BBC online, accessed Tues 1/6/2009 at http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/7806093.stm

Web pioneer honoured by Queen: Professor Wendy Hall becomes a Dame in New Year's Honours. (12/31/2008). techradar.com, accessed Tues 1/6/2008 at http://www.techradar.com/news/internet/web-pioneer-honoured-by-queen-497490

Religion: A Force For Self-Control?

noreply@blogger.com (W. D. Craft) — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 03:00:00 +0000

TOPICs: religion, evolutionary psychology

Prompted by a recent news release on Science Daily, I had promised myself time to blog about and review McCullough & Willoughby's recent meta-analysis article on Religion and self-regulation, due out in Psychological Bulletin.

As I sat down this evening to organize some thoughts, I was surprised (although in retrospect surely shouldn't have been) to see I'm behind the curve already, with several blogs already responding to the news release and journal article — for example, see: Tim Rees' brief critical response (Improve your self control... with religion?) at the BHA Science Group blog. Since most of the blogs I've seen, however, seem to be responding directly to the news release (or related articles, like John Tierney's of the New York Times) instead of the actual research article, it's clear there's still plenty of opportunity (and need) to look carefully at the research article itself (downloadable in pre-print pdf form from Prof Michael McCullough's University of Miami website.

And that's where I will pick up tomorrow, beginning with McCullough & Willoughby's stimulating introduction and description of half-dozen or so propositions laying out the potential connections between religion and self-regulation.

In the meantime, here are some related video comments from McCullough himself (courtesy of the University of Miami website):

RELATED REFERENCES

McCullough, Michael (2008). Beyond Revenge: The Evolution of the Forgiveness Instinct. Jossey-Bass: San Francisco, CA.

See details at Amazon.com at http://www.amazon.com/Beyond-Revenge-Evolution-Forgiveness-Instinct/dp/078797756X/ref=si3_rdr_bb_product.

McCullough, Michael E. & Willoughby, Brian L. B. (2009). Religion, self-regulation, and self-control: associations, explanations, implications. Psychological Bulletin, in press.

A pre-print pdf of this article is available from the author's web site at http://www.psy.miami.edu/faculty/mmccullough/Religion_Research.htm

Rees, Tom (1/1/2009). Improve your self control... with religion? A BHA Science Group Blog entry accessed 1/4/2009 at http://bhascience.blogspot.com/2009/01/improve-your-self-control-with-religion.html?

Religion, Self-control, and Values (1/3/2009). TS-Si News Service, article accessed 1/4/2009 at http://www.ts-si.org/the-discussion/3708-religion-self-control-and-values.html

Religion May Have Evolved Because Of Its Ability To Help People Exercise Self-control (1/1/2009). Accessed 1/1/2009 at http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/12/081231005355.htm

Tierney, John (12/29/2008). For Good Self-Control, Try Getting Religious About It. The New York Times accessed 1/4/2009 at http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/30/science/30tier.html?

Disheartening Censorship

noreply@blogger.com (W. D. Craft) — Sat, 03 Jan 2009 18:43:00 +0000

TOPICs: censorship, political correctness

Enfuriating. Political correctness run amok — watch the video below about a university student-employee's brush with his school's political-correctness police, then link over to Ed Brayton's Dispatches From The Culture Wars for stimulating comments and discussion.

We have this snippet from the minutes of the 4/1/2008 Indianapolis Faculty Council (IFC) meeting:

Agenda Item IV: Updates/Remarks from the Chancellor

Chancellor Bantz gave the following report:

[…]

Affirmative Action: The Chancellor spoke to the recent action by the Affirmative Action Office regarding staff member, Keith Sampson. He stated there was no question there was a mistake in sending the first letter. The second letter sent withdrew the first letter and made clear there was no finding in the case and therefore, nothing placed in the staff member’s file. This is not a matter of litigation. He intended this spring to begin a review of the office procedures. At the end of this month, an external reviewer will look at the office and procedures. He agrees the office needs to be more successful in a number of places. The search continues for the new Director of Equal Opportunity. When the report is received for that office, it will be reviewed by the IFC which will show the number of cases the office reviews each year.

All of which seems reasonable. Later in the same minutes, however, the circumstances are referred to as "the Keith Sampson issue," which unfortunate phrasing suggests a continued institutional mis-apprehension and mis-interpretation of the ~~fiasco~~ entire event.

Moreover, apparently the Affirmative Action Office at IUPUI was reconstituted as the Office of Equal Opportunity (although publicly accessible records are not necessarily clear on this — did the OEO already exist previously?) with director Kim D. Kirkland and now … Assistant Director (!) Marguerite Watkins, who says on her staff directory web page that "My passion includes educating people."

Sadly, a Google-search of the IUPUI website produces only the single page hit for "Keith Sampson" (the IFC minutes quoted above).

RELATED REFERENCES & RESOURCES

Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE). Web site at http://www.thefire.org/

Indianapolis Faculty Council (IFC) Minutes dated April 1, 2008. Accessed Sat 01/03/2008 at http://www.iupui.edu/~fcouncil/minutes/Minutes_IFC_4-1-08.htm

IUPUI: Indiana University - Purdue University, Indiana. Web site at http://www.iupui.edu/

Proposed Resolution for the Review of the Affirmative Action Office, Agenda Item X of the Indianapolis Faculty Council (IFC) Minutes dated April 1, 2008. Accessed Sat 01/03/2008 at http://www.iupui.edu/~fcouncil/documents/ProposedResolutionAAO2008.htm.

Saha, Abhishek (5/2/2008). Keith Sampson round-up. Accessed Sat 01/03/2009 at http://musefree.wordpress.com/2008/05/02/keith-sampson-round-up/

Watkins, Marguerite. IUPUI Staff Directory Webpage at http://www.iupui.edu/~oeo/directory/watkins.html

Generating Ideas for Research —Post & Discussion on Thus Spake Zuska

noreply@blogger.com (W. D. Craft) — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 23:48:00 +0000

TOPIC: research ideas

Check out the stimulating post and discussion at Suzanne Franks' Thus Spake Zuska on the challenges of generating new ideas for research. Thought-provoking and motivating.

And keeping track of ideas … that's a serious challenge as well, requiring (1) some habitual "system," and (2) the regularly available energy to use one's system.

Gay Adoption Ban in Florida: UPDATE?

noreply@blogger.com (W. D. Craft) — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 22:30:00 +0000

TOPICs: GLBT, adoption

Some recent articles floating around online implied we might hear/see something in the near future from Florida's State Supreme Court on that state's ban on adoptions by gay couples. But the recent article by Janine Zeitlin and a Law Blog article by Dan Slater appear to just be recycling old news with nothing new to add.

I did find this bit of news, however, on the Martin Gill-related ACLU site:

On December 5, 2008, the ACLU and the children's lawyers filed a request seeking to expedite the appeal by bringing the case directly before the Florida Supreme Court. The request for an expedited appeal was subsequently denied.

An hour of my life lost on various searches has led to no other official information about the continuing court case of Martin Gill and his two adopted sons. (I ended my searches after looking through the Florida Third District Court Of Appeal site . . . if anyone can point me to better/more information, please do! )

Here's a brief youTube video from acluvideos:

RELATED RESOURCES

ACLU website: http://www.aclu.com/

RELATED REFERENCES

A challenge to Florida's ban on adoption by gay parents. ACLU website for miscellaneous information related to the Gill case, including a link to a PodCast featuring Martin Gill. Accessed Thurs 01/01/2009 at http://www.aclu.org/lgbt/parenting/37875res20081124.html

Slater, Dan (12/29/2008). Same-sex adoption debate rages on in Sunshine State. The Wall Street Journal's Law Blog on WJS.com. Accessed Thurs 01/01/2009 at http://blogs.wsj.com/law/2008/12/29/same-sex-adoption-debate-rages-on-in-sunshine-state/.

Zeitlin, Janine (12/27/2008). Florida high court to rule on same-sex adoption ban: Florida has only ban in U.S. news-press.com. Accessed Thurs 01/01/2009 at http://www.news-press.com/article/20081227/SS08/812280386/1002/NEWS01.

Festive Medical Myths

noreply@blogger.com (W. D. Craft) — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 02:41:00 +0000

TOPIC: medical myths

Do you think that sugar makes kids hyperactive and late-night eating makes people fat?

You're not alone. Those are just two of many medical-related beliefs commonly held by people around the world.

But they're also FALSE, and so are many other commonly-believed health-related assertions, as discussed in the article Festive Medical Myths recently published in the British Medical Journal (BMJ), by Rachel C. Vreeman (asst prof of paediatrics) and Aaron E. Carroll (assoc prof of paediatrics), both at the Indiana University School of Medicine.

Among the medical myths Vreeman & Carroll address:

Sugar Causes Hyperactivity in Children? FALSE!

According to Vreeman & Carroll,
At least 12 double blind randomised controlled trials have examined how children react to diets containing different levels of sugar. None of these studies, not even studies looking specifically at children with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, could detect any differences in behaviour between the children who had sugar and those who did not. [original text contained endnote citations of relevant articles]
Moreover:
Scientists have even studied how parents react to the sugar myth. When parents think their children have been given a drink containing sugar (even if it is really sugar-free), they rate their children’s behaviour as more hyperactive. The differences in the children’s behaviour were all in the parents’ minds. [see Hoover & Milch, 1994, referenced below]
Suicides Increase Over the Holidays? FALSE!

Vreeman & Carroll point out that "While the holidays might, indeed, be a difficult time for some, there is no good scientific evidence to suggest a holiday peak in suicides. [see the Annenburg Public Policy Center references below, as well as Bridges (2004)] … Indeed, people might actually experience increased emotional and social support during holidays. In the US, rates of psychiatric visits decrease before Christmas and increase again afterwards. [see Hillard, Holland, & Ramm, 1981] … Further debunking myths about suicide, people are not more likely to commit suicide during the dark winter months. Around the world, suicides peak in warmer months and are actually lowest in the winter.

Poinsettias are Toxic/Poisonous? FALSE! Vreeman & Carroll explain:
In an analysis of 849,575 plant exposures reported to the American Association of Poison Control Centers, none of the 22,793 cases involving poinsettia resulted in considerable poisoning. No one died from exposure to or ingestion of poinsettia, and most (96%) did not even require medical treatment. In 92 of the cases, children ingested substantial quantities of poinsettias, but none needed medical treatment, and toxicologists concluded that poinsettia exposures and ingestions can be treated without referral to a healthcare facility. Another study, looking at poinsettia ingestion by rats, could not find a toxic amount of poinsettia, even at amounts that would be the equivalent of 500-600 poinsettia leaves or nearly a kilogram of sap. [citations can be found in original text]

Some other beliefs Vreeman & Carroll look at and expose as groundless or outright false involve heat loss from one's head, nocturnal feasting, and curing hangovers.

Makes for entertaining and educational reading, especially when combined with their earlier paper on Medical Myths [see full citation below], in which they discuss commonly-held (but baseless) beliefs involving: drinking 8 glasses of water per day, the sleep-inducing properties of turkey, using only 10% (or some other small fraction) of one's brain, etc.

Perhaps JUST as entertaining, educational, and … sobering (?) are some of the reader responses to the original Vreeman & Carroll article (back in 2007), several of which manage (by example) to illustrate the challenges inherent in communicating scientific findings to the general public …

see e.g. —
"stupid and irresponsible" by david clarke [22 December 2007],
"unbelievable and shameful!" by Mikhail Vinin [23 December 2007],

but also the heartening responses exemplified by responses such as:
"Orders of magnitude?" by Andrew J Rees [24 December 2007]

RELATED REFERENCES

Annenberg Public Policy Center. Media continue to perpetuate myth of winter holiday-suicide link. www.annenbergpublicpolicycenter.org/Downloads/Adolescent_Risk/Suicide/myth_holiday_suicides20011204.PDF.

Annenberg Public Policy Center. Holiday-suicide link: newspapers turn the corner. www.annenbergpublicpolicycenter.org/Downloads/Releases/Release_HolidaySuicide_111907/suicidereleasenov152007final.pdf.

Annenberg Public Policy Center. The Holiday-Suicide Myth: newspapers (and TV shows) return to old ways. Report accessed Wed 12/30/2008 at http://www.annenbergpublicpolicycenter.org/Downloads/Releases/Release_HolidaySuicide/suiciderelease%202008%20with%20tables.pdf

Bridges, F. S. (2004). Rates of homicide and suicide on major national holidays. Psychol Rep, 94, 723-724.

Hillard, J. R., Holland, J. M., & Ramm, D. (1981). Christmas and psychopathology. Data from a psychiatric emergency room population. Arch Gen Psychiatry, 38, 1377-1381.

Hoover, D. W. & Milich, R. (1994). Effects of sugar ingestion expectancies on mother-child interactions. Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology, 22, 501-15.

Vreeman, R. C. & Carroll, A. E. (2007). Medical myths. BMJ, 335, 1288-1289. Full text accessed Wed 12/30/2008 at http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/335/7633/1288

Vreeman, Rachel C. & Carroll, Aaron E. (2008). Festive medical myths. BMJ (British Medical Journal), 337(7684), doi: 10.1136/bmj.a2769. Full text article accessed online Wed 12/30/2008 at http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/337/dec17_2/a2769.

UniSudoku: For The Perfect Sudoku Experience

noreply@blogger.com (W. D. Craft) — Mon, 01 Dec 2008 22:52:00 +0000

TOPIC: sudoku, logic puzzles

I've intended to post something on this for a long time: for the perfect sudoku puzzle experience on a Mac, try out UniSudoku (just $15 and downloadable at http://www.unisudoku.com/). David Ross is apparently a GUI-programming genius and has produced possibly the most perfect sudoku puzzle software/interface ever.

With a little practice you too can enter the beautiful heightened sudoku flash zone where the world seems to disappear and it's just you racing through an alternative sudoku universe. With a finely-tuned mouse the "flow" experience can be breath-taking and addictive.

Quick screen shot below. Let me know what you think!

KENKEN!If You Like Sudoku &hellip

noreply@blogger.com (W. D. Craft) — Thu, 27 Nov 2008 04:20:00 +0000

TOPIC: games

So, I finally clicked on that KENKEN link on NYT's crossword puzzle site and found a great new puzzle. Here's Will Shortz to tell us all about it:

And here's the page to get daily doses at whatever challenge level you crave: http://www.nytimes.com/ref/crosswords/kenken.html. Seems quite addictive … sudoku with a bit more depth. Try it out and tell me what you think. Seems like a great combination of arithmetic and logic for kids — I'm going to see if my 7-yr-old likes it too. UPDATE [a few minutes later]: OK, this is structurally only superficially like the sudoku, but it is indeed quite addictive!

Relying on SCIENCE & REASON,Judge Rules Against Florida's Ban on Adoptions by Gays

noreply@blogger.com (W. D. Craft) — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 22:14:00 +0000

TOPICs: gay rights, adoption

A bit of good news on the civil liberties front: Miami-Dade Circuit Judge Cindy Lederman [pictured at right] has ruled as UNCONSTITUTIONAL a strict Florida law blocking gay people from adopting children (see the original USA Today article here):

Miami judge rules against Fla. gay adoption ban

MIAMI (AP) — A judge on Tuesday ruled that a strict Florida law that blocks gay people from adopting children is unconstitutional, declaring there was no legal or scientific reason for sexual orientation alone to prohibit anyone from adopting.

Miami-Dade Circuit Judge Cindy Lederman said the 31-year-old law violates equal protection rights for the children and their prospective gay parents, rejecting the state's arguments that there is "a supposed dark cloud hovering over homes of homosexuals and their children."

She noted that gay people are allowed to be foster parents in Florida. "There is no rational basis to prohibit gay parents from adopting," she wrote in a 53-page ruling. …

Later in the article, ACLU attorneys are quoted as saying "the case was the first in the nation in which numerous experts in child psychology, social work and other fields testified that there is no science to justify a gay adoption ban." In fact, according to the USA Today article, "Organizations such as the American Academy of Pediatrics, American Medical Association and American Psychiatric Association all support permitting same-sex couples to adopt."

The great state of Florida begs to differ, however — and in the form of one Florida Assistant Attorney General Valerie Martin, apparently plans "a swift appeal." Even attorney and same-sex marriage ~~bigot~~ crusader John Stemberger got into the act, being quoted as calling the ruling "classic judicial activism."

Go to the ACLU website and download the PDF doc version of the trial court final decision — makes for great reading: Judge Lederman offers a thorough review of the scientific evidence presented and a firm no-holds-barred dismissal of much of the state's so-called expert testimony. In fact, reading the decision in greater detail has made me feel less dread as the state of Florida "swiftly" files the appeal … the state's case really seems based largely on outdated bigotry and explicitly religion-affiliated dogma. Even if the appeal is eventually heard, the state will have to come up with much, much better support for its stand. And frankly, such support simply doesn't exist. Let's hope Lederman's great example of relying on science and reason inspires courts in any future litigation.

RELATED RESOURCES

ACLU website: http://www.aclu.com/

American Medical Association (AMA) website: http://www.ama-assn.org/

American Psychiatric Association website: http://www.psych.org/

Family Equality Council website: http://www.familyequality.org/index_main.html

Florida Department of Children and Families website: http://www.dcf.state.fl.us/ess/ . The adoption program website is: http://www.dcf.state.fl.us/adoption/

Stemberger, John: professional website at http://www.orlandolawyer.tv/

RELATED ARTICLES & REFERENCES

A challenge to Florida's ban on adoption by gay parents. ACLU website for miscellaneous information related to the Gill case, including a link to a PodCast featuring Martin Gill. Accessed Wed 11/26/2008 at http://www.aclu.org/lgbt/parenting/37875res20081124.html

Florida Trial Court Opens Way For Lesbians And Gay Men To Adopt (11/25/2008). ACLU Press Release, accessed Wed 11/26/2008 at web address http://www.aclu.org/lgbt/parenting/37907prs20081125.html

Hudson, Waymon (10/23/2008). The insanity of John Stemberger: going down the rabbit hole in Florida. Blog commentary accessed Wed 11/26/2008 at http://www.bilerico.com/2008/10/the_insanity_of_john_stemberger_going_do.php

Miami judge rules against Fla. gay adoption ban. (11/25/2008). USA Today. Retrieved Wed 11/26/2008 at http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2008-11-25-gay-adoption_N.htm.

Trial Court Decision, available as PDF download at http://www.aclu.org/lgbt/parenting/37906lgl20081125.html

Congratulations to Heather Gillman!

noreply@blogger.com (W. D. Craft) — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 22:45:00 +0000

TOPIC: free speech

Surfing around looking for recent news/updates on the recent litigation involving Florida's Okeechobee High School and its efforts to suppress student efforts to form a Gay-Straight Alliance club (efforts that eventually failed spectacularly, by the way — see earlier commentary here), and I was reminded of the related events involving Ponce de Leon High School, then-principal David Davis, and Ponce de Leon High School senior Heather Gillman, which then led to this pleasant discovery [for the original, click here]:

Florida High School Student Wins Hugh M. Hefner First Amendment Award (10/20/2008)

Senior Heather Gillman Honored for Fearlessness In Speaking Out For the Rights of Gay and Lesbian Students

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: (212) 549-2666; media@aclu.org

MIAMI - The American Civil Liberties Union of Florida announces that Heather Gillman has been selected by the Playboy Foundation to receive the Hugh M. Hefner First Amendment Award for "her fearlessness in speaking out on behalf of the rights of gay students" at her Ponce de Leon high school, located in Florida's Panhandle.

Gillman sued her school after her high school principal discriminated against her gay and lesbian friends. At trial, the principal testified that he believed clothing or stickers featuring rainbows would make students automatically picture people having sex, and he forbade students from wearing any sort of clothing, stickers, buttons, or symbols to show her support of equal rights for gay people.

"Heather Gillman is a courageous young woman who is most deserving of this very prestigious First Amendment award," said Howard Simon, Executive Director, ACLU of Florida. That her actions have received accolades from the Playboy Foundation demonstrate that her actions go beyond the walls of her rural high school, she has in essence taken a stand for all students in America. She exercised leadership and honesty when she stood up to the school's principal and the school board on behalf of the rights of gay students and we congratulate her."

Tomorrow, Gillman and her Mother Ardena will travel to Washington D.C. to be honored at the October 21 awards ceremony where she will receive her $10,000 award to pursue education.

"I thank the Playboy Foundation for the Hugh M. Hefner First Amendment award. With the support of my parents and family I chose to protect the First Amendment rights of my classmates who support equal rights for gay people. Standing up to my school was really hard to do, but I'm so happy that I did, because the First Amendment is a big deal to everyone. I am grateful to the American Civil Liberties Union of Florida for defending me," said Gillman.

The day after being reprimanded for defending a gay student who had been harassed she returned to school wearing symbols of support including the rainbow flag and the initials G P for "gay pride." She was told by her school principal that she was not allowed to express any support for gay rights because it would be "disruptive," and that the symbols were signs of a "secret/illegal organization."

Past recipients of the First Amendment Award include filmmaker Michael Moore, comedian Bill Maher, and the late columnist Molly Ivins.

Wow. Way to go, Heather!

The 9/24/2008 press release from the Playboy Foundation notes that the First Amendment Awards were bestowed this year on just three recipients from a record number of 60 nominees,

… ranging from law professors to website creators to student journalists and representing both traditional and digital means of expression. The winners were chosen by a panel of distinguished judges: David M. Rubin, Professor and former Dean of the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University; Geoffrey Stone, Edward H. Levi Distinguished Service Professor at University of Chicago Law School, and Nadine Strossen, President of the American Civil Liberties Union and Professor of Law at New York Law School.

The Playboy Foundation praised Gillman for her "fearlessness in speaking out on behalf of the rights of gay students."

This puts 17-yr-old high school senior Heather Gillam in quite distinguished company. Former recipients include film-maker and activist Michael Moore and columnist Molly Ivins. This year's recipients also included New-York-based attorney Greg Lukianoff, president of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE), recognized for "his tireless efforts to defend First Amendment rights of students and faculty," and Mark Klein, a retired AT&T technician, recognized for his courage in speaking out against electronic surveillance of American citizens by our own government.

RELATED REFERENCES

Florida High School Student Wins Hugh M. Hefner First Amendment Award (10/20/2008): Senior Heather Gillman Honored for Fearlessness In Speaking Out For the Rights of Gay and Lesbian Students. Accessed 10/24/2008 at http://www.aclu.org/freespeech/youth/37255prs20081020.html

Hudson, Waymon (10/23/2008). FL Student Heather Gillman Honored for Speaking Out for LGBT Rights. Accessed 10/24/2008 at http://florida.bilerico.com/2008/10/fl_student_heather_gillman_honored_for_s.php

The Playboy Foundation. Web site accessed 10/24/2008 at http://www.playboyenterprises.com/home/content.cfm?content=t_template&packet=0007B308-45F5-1C7D-9B578304E50A011A&artTypeID=0007B451-BB99-1C76-8FEA8304E50A010D

Ponce de Leon Senior Wins $10,000 Hugh Hefner Award. (10/16/2008). Accessed 10/24/2008 at http://www.wtvynews4.com/home/headlines/31126474.html.

Jacobsen v. Katzer: Apppeals Court Rules That The Terms In Artistic License Are Indeed Enforceable Copyright Conditions

noreply@blogger.com (W. D. Craft) — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 21:12:00 +0000

TOPIC: open-source software, creative commons license

An apparent victory for Open-Source Software and Creative Commons licenses.

The United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has vacated a District Court decision in the case of Robert Jacobsen v. Matthew Katzer and Kamind Associates, Inc. (dba KAM Industries) and eventually sent the case back to the District Court (Northern District of California) for further proceedings.

The Appeals Court summarized the case quite simply:

We consider here the ability of a copyright holder to dedicate certain work to free public use and yet enforce an "open source" copyright license to control the future distribution and modification of that work.

Indeed. So what's the problem? Jacobsen originally sued for copyright infringement and moved for a preliminary injunction when Katzer/Kamind used his code without following the conditions Jacobsen provided in the public license. The District Court apparently ruled that the open-source Artistic License was overly broad and did not create any liability for copyright infringement, only perhaps a breach of the nonexclusive license.

I'm only vaguely aware of some of the issues surrounding the open-source software movement, but I've benefitted from the movement in several ways (e.g. my current personal printer driver is open-source software and works much better than the driver supplied by the printer's manufacturer) and I've encountered related issues (e.g. working on b logs such as this and developing wiki sites for various class-related work). The Appeals Court ruling is actually quite informative/educational in terms of some of the reasoning behind, necessity, benefits, and incredible propagation of Creative Commons public licenses.

Open Source software projects invite computer programmers from around the world to view software code and make changes and improvements to it. Through such collaboration, software programs can often be written and debugged faster and at lower cost than if the copyright holder were required to do all of the work independently. In exchange and in consideration for this collaborative work, the copyright holder permits users to copy, modify and distribute the software code subject to conditions that serve to protect downstream users and to keep the code accessible.2 By requiring that users copy and restate the license and attribution information, a copyright holder can ensure that recipients of the redistributed computer code know the identity of the owner as well as the scope of the license granted by the original owner. The Artistic License in this case also requires that changes to the computer code be tracked so that downstream users know what part of the computer code is the original code created by the copyright holder and what part has been newly added or altered by another collaborator.

Traditionally, copyright owners sold their copyrighted material in exchange for money. The lack of money changing hands in open source licensing should not be presumed to mean that there is no economic consideration, however. There are substantial benefits, including economic benefits, to the creation and distribution of copyrighted works under public licenses that range far beyond traditional license royalties. For example, program creators may generate market share for their programs by providing certain components free of charge. Similarly, a programmer or company may increase its national or international reputation by incubating open source projects. Improvement to a product can come rapidly and free of charge from an expert not even known to the copyright holder. The Eleventh Circuit has recognized the economic motives inherent in public licenses, even where profit is not immediate. See Planetary Motion, Inc. v. Techsplosion, Inc., 261 F.3d 1188, 1200 (11th Cir. 2001) (Program creator "derived value from the distribution [under a public license] because he was able to improve his Software based on suggestions sent by end-users. . . . It is logical that as the Software improved, more end-users used his Software, thereby increasing [the programmer=s] recognition in his profession and the likelihood that the Software would be improved even further.").

Jacobsen originally sued because Katzer/Kamind used his code but didn't include the required attributions/notices. Katzer has argued that Katzer/Kamind cannot be liable for copyright infringement because Katzer/Kamind had a license to use the material. The District Court originally agreed, basically concluding that one cannot be liable for copyright infringement for something one has been granted a license to use.

The Appeals Court ultimately disagreed, however, noting that "The heart of the argument on appeal concerns whether the terms of the Artistic License are conditions of, or merely covenants to, the copyright license," [pg 9] and going on to explain:

… The District Court did not expressly state whether the limitations in the Artistic License are independent covenants or, rather, conditions to the scope; its analysis, however, clearly treated the license limitations as contractual covenants rather than conditions of the copyright license.

Jacobsen argues that the terms of the Artistic License define the scope of the license and that any use outside of these restrictions is copyright infringement. Katzer/Kamind argues that these terms do not limit the scope of the license and are merely covenants providing contractual terms for the use of the materials, and that his violation of them is neither compensable in damages nor subject to injunctive relief. Katzer/Kamind's argument is premised upon the assumption that Jacobsen's copyright gave him no economic rights because he made his computer code available to the public at no charge. From this assumption, Katzer/Kamind argues that copyright law does not recognize a cause of action for non-economic rights, relying on Gilliam v. ABC, 538 F.2d 14, 20-21 (2d Cir. 1976) ("American copyright law, as presently written, does not recognize moral rights or provide a cause of action for their violation, since the law seeks to vindicate the economic, rather than the personal rights of authors.").

The Appeals Court points out, however, that "The conditions set forth in the Artistic License are vital to enable the copyright holder to retain the ability to benefit from the work of downstream users," [pg 11] going on to point out that:

By requiring that users who modify or distribute the copyrighted material retain the reference to the original source files, downstream users are directed to Jacobsen's website. Thus, downstream users know about the collaborative effort to improve and expand the SourceForge project once they learn of the "upstream" project from a "downstream" distribution, and they may join in that effort.

The District Court interpreted the Artistic License to permit a user to "modify the material in any way" and did not find that any of the "provided that" limitations in the Artistic License served to limit this grant. The District Court"s interpretation of the conditions of the Artistic License does not credit the explicit restrictions in the license that govern a downloader's right to modify and distribute the copyrighted work. The copyright holder here expressly stated the terms upon which the right to modify and distribute the material depended and invited direct contact if a downloader wished to negotiate other terms. These restrictions were both clear and necessary to accomplish the objectives of the open source licensing collaboration, including economic benefit. Moreover, the District Court did not address the other restrictions of the license, such as the requirement that all modification from the original be clearly shown with a new name and a separate page for any such modification that shows how it differs from the original.

The Appeals Court concludes that

The clear language of the Artistic License creates conditions to protect the economic rights at issue in the granting of a public license. These conditions govern the rights to modify and distribute the computer programs and files included in the downloadable software package. The attribution and modification transparency requirements directly serve to drive traffic to the open source incubation page and to inform downstream users of the project, which is a significant economic goal of the copyright holder that the law will enforce.

and in the end determine that "the terms of the Artistic License are enforceable copyright conditions."

John Markoff has a nice summary article in The New York Times, titled Ruling Is a Victory for Supporters of Free Software.

A more informative summary is available at GPL JMRI Beats Patent Troll Matt Katzer in Court.

ADDENDUM (OMG!): apparently this case has a very interesting history not even whispered about in much of the news coverage of the Appeals case, with Katzer apparently copying Jacobsen's code THEN obtaining a patent on some model railroad technology that included the Java Model Railroad Interface (JMRI) work already done by Jacobsen's group, THEN Katzer attempting to charge Jacobsen's group for the right to offer downloads … Katzer apparently went so far to even cybersquat — Jacobsen's group writes that "Katzer also improperly registered one of our trademarks, DecoderPro, as the domain name "decoderpro.com". The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) has ordered it returned to us, and wrote an entire section of the order on "Katzer's bad faith"." (see http://jmri.sourceforge.net/k/index.html). It appears that Katzer is much more than he appears. It will be ironic if such duplicity on his part eventually leads to solid case support for the affirmation of the open-source licenses.

RELATED REFERENCES

GPL JMRI Beats Patent Troll Matt Katzer in Court (8/15/2008). Slated, accessed 8/15/2008 at web address http://slated.org/jmri_beats_katzer_troll.

Jacobsen, Robert G. Website at the Department of Physics, University of California (Berkeley), accessed 8/15/2008 at web address http://physics.berkeley.edu/index.php?option=com_dept_management&act=people&Itemid=312&limitstart=0&task=view&id=363.

Jacobsen v. Katzer. (8/13/2008). Ruling from the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, accessed 8/15/2008 in pdf form at http://www.cafc.uscourts.gov/opinions/08-1001.pdf.

Java Model Railroad Interface (JMRI) website (accessed 8/15/2008) at http://jmri.sourceforge.net/.

KAMIND Associates, Inc. website, accessed 8/15/2008 at http://www.kamind.net/.

Markoff, John (8/13/2008). Ruling Is a Victory for Supporters of Free Software. New York Times (online). Accessed 8/14/2008 at web address http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/14/technology/14commons.html.

Open-source pact subject to copyrights law - US court. (8/15/2008). Reuters, accessed 8/15/2008 at web address http://www.stuff.co.nz/stuff/4657006a28.html.

Shiels, Maggie (8/14/2008). Legal milestone for open source. BBC News (online), accessed 8/15/2008 at web address http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/7561943.stm.

Welcome to KAM Industries. Website (accessed 8/15/2008) for "The Conductor" software and related information at web address http://www.trainpriority.com/.

Secular Camp featured on NPR (8/7/2008)

noreply@blogger.com (W. D. Craft) — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 22:28:00 +0000

TOPIC: religion, summer camp

Not long ago I posted on Summer Camp, Hold The Religion — prompted by an AP article by Valerie Bauman on the secular summer camp called Camp Quest. Barbara Bradley Hagerty of NPR has just run a segment this afternoon (8/7/2008) on a similar camp called Camp Inquiry, described on the Camp inquiry website as "one of many educational initiatives offered by the Center for Inquiry," and the following mission statement:

This is a place where kids can be themselves. We work toward helping youth confront the challenges of living a non-theistic/secular lifestyle in a world dominated by religious belief and pseudoscience. Grounded on the conviction that kids can begin establishing habits of the good and ethical life early on, Camp Inquiry 2008 adopts a three-part focus: The arts and sciences, the skeptical perspective, and ethical character development comprise an integrated approach to this “Age of Discovery.” Campers, counselors, and teachers will address key issues around individual identity, forging trusting relationships, establishing a sense of local and global community, and living with respect for the natural world.

Hagerty's NPR segment is available at http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=93174374 and will be available shortly in audio. The segment/article is a bit condescending, but she was dealing with relatively young kids and the attention itself was generally positive. It will be interesting to see the listener/reader reactions.

Angie McQuaid (one of the camp counselors, pictured above) spoke well in the segment:

"It's a brain spa," says Angie McQuaig, one of the counselors. McQuaig is an elementary school administrator in Georgia.

"As an educator, I like to teach critical thinking at a deep and erudite level, because it's not embedded in the curriculum as much as I'd like to see," McQuaig says. "And this provides a place for kids to talk about deep questions that many into adulthood don't even consider and contemplate."

Are they trying to create little atheists?

"Absolutely not!" McQuaig says. "We want to create little thinkers. Little thinkers that explore their own capacity and the external world, with all of the tools of science and humanity. That's why we're here."

Of course, the participants in any such summer camp will be uniquely self- or parent-selected. But the critical point for me is the opportunity for such kids.

Go visit the Camp Inquiry website. It's good reading.

RELATED REFERENCES

Bauman, Valerie (updated 5/28/2008). Atheist, agnostic families opt for own sleep-away camp. Accessed 8/7/2008 at web address: http://www.usatoday.com/news/religion/2008-05-27-atheist-camp_N.htm.

Camp Inquiry website, accessed 8/7/2008 at web address: http://www.campinquiry.org/.

Camp Quest website, accessed 8/7/2008 at web address: http://camp-quest.org/.

Center for Inquiry website, accessed 8/7/2008 at web address: http://www.centerforinquiry.net/.

Craft, W. D. (5/27/2008). Summer camp, hold the religion. Available at web address: http://psychescientia.blogspot.com/2008/05/summer-camp-hold-religion.html.

Hagerty, Barbara Bradley (8/7/2008). Camp Offers Training Ground For Little Skeptics. Segment broadcast on All Things Considered, National Public Radio, with text (and related figures) available (8/7/2008) at web address: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=93174374.

Federal Court Says Okeechobee High SchoolMust Allow Gay-Straight Alliance Club To Meet

noreply@blogger.com (W. D. Craft) — Sat, 02 Aug 2008 18:57:00 +0000

TOPIC: gay rights, high school, freedom of speech

In an article titled "Judge: Gay club can meet at Okeechobee high school," the MiamiHerald.com reported Wednesday 7/30/2008 the ruling of federal judge K. Michael Moore:

By KELLI KENNEDY
Associated Press Writer

MIAMI --
A school district in rural Florida must allow a Gay-Straight Alliance to meet on campus and must provide for the well-being of gay and straight students, a federal judge ruled, capping a nearly two-year legal battle over First Amendment rights.

Students do not "shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate," Judge K. Michael Moore said in a written ruling issued Tuesday night, quoting another case.

Kennedy also alludes to the case involving (former) high school principal David Davis of Ponce de Leon High School:

Earlier this year, a Florida judge said a Panhandle principal led a "relentless crusade" against gay and lesbian students at Ponce de Leon High School and violated their First Amendment rights by trying to prevent them from wearing gay pride clothing, stickers and buttons.

By the way: former principal David Davis, who ended up costing his Holmes County School District more than $300,000 in damages and attorney fees, has now elected to return to the classroom to teach … American government and other classes! American Government?! OMG. (see "Ponce de Leon High School Principal Back to the Classroom," 7/24/2008, referenced below.) ANYWAY, Kennedy notes that:

Her lawsuit [against Okeechobee] cites the 1984 federal Equal Access Act, which was initially pushed by evangelical Christians after some public schools banned after-school prayer meetings and other religious gatherings. It says that if a public school allows any extracurricular activities to meet on campus it must allow all groups to do the same.

There's some great irony for you!

The actual ruling can be downloaded in pdf form from the ACLU site at: http://www.aclu.org/lgbt/youth/36195lgl20080729.html.

I'm looking forward to a detailed reading of that document. In the mean time, I notice that the Gay Straight Alliance is not mentioned on the Okeechobee High School website nor is any link provided to the GSA under the website's listing of "clubs."

I DID notice, however, that the school website included the picture of the school mascot "Bubba" shown above. The picture itself is ironic after you read about some of the supposed shenanigans the school went through to deny the Gay Straight Alliance club the right to meet.

RELATED REFERENCES

Bubba the Brahman (picture of the Okeechobee High School mascot), accessed 8/2/2008 at web page http://www.okee.k12.fl.us/ohs/mascot/mascot.htm.

Gonzalez v. School Board of Okeechobee County - Case Profile (5/21/2008 ?). American Civil Liberties Union (online), article accessed Sat 8/2/2008 at web page http://www.aclu.org/lgbt/youth/35421res20080521.html.

Gonzalez v. School Board of Okeechobee County - Order Granting Plaintiffs' Motion for Summary Judgment; Denying Defendant's Motion for Summary Judgment (7/29/2008). PDF document available for downloading, accessed Sat 8/2/2008 at web address http://www.aclu.org/lgbt/youth/36195lgl20080729.html.

JUDGE REJECTS OKEECHOBEE SCHOOL BOARD'S ATTEMPT TO BLOCK GAY-STRAIGHT ALLIANCE'S ANTI-DISCRIMINATION LAWSUIT (3/13/2007). American Civil Liberties Union (online), article accessed Sat 8/2/2008 at web page http://www.aclu.org/lgbt/youth/29025prs20070313.html.

Kennedy, Kelli (7/30/2008). Judge: Gay club can meet at Okeechobee high school. MiamiHerald.com, accessed 8/2/2008 at web address http://www.miamiherald.com/news/florida/AP/story/623334.html.

Okeechobee High School website: accessed Sat 8/2/2008 at web address: http://www.okee.k12.fl.us/ohs/index.html.

Ponce de Leon High School Principal Back to the Classroom (7/24/2008). wtvynews4.com, accessed 8/2/2008 at web page http://www.wtvynews4.com/news/headlines/25875264.html

Ponce de Leon High School website: accessed Sat 8/2/2008 at web address http://pdlhs.hdsb.org/

Cool News From NASA:Phoenix Verifies Water On Mars

noreply@blogger.com (W. D. Craft) — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 04:35:00 +0000

TOPIC: water on Mars

Image: full-circle panorama in approximately true color, combining more than 400 images taken during the first several weeks after NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander arrived on the Martian artic plane. Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/University Arizona/Texas A&M University. See http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/phoenix/images/press/15158.html for more details.

NASA's Phoenix spacecraft & Mars probe has confirmed the presence of ice in the polar soil:

NASA Spacecraft Confirms Martian Water, Mission Extended
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/phoenix/news/phoenix-20080731.html

The Mission News site at NASA.gov reports:

TUCSON, Ariz. -- Laboratory tests aboard NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander have identified water in a soil sample. The lander's robotic arm delivered the sample Wednesday to an instrument that identifies vapors produced by the heating of samples.

"We have water," said William Boynton of the University of Arizona, lead scientist for the Thermal and Evolved-Gas Analyzer, or TEGA. "We've seen evidence for this water ice before in observations by the Mars Odyssey orbiter and in disappearing chunks observed by Phoenix last month, but this is the first time Martian water has been touched and tasted."

Boyton went on to say that "From my standpoint, it tastes very fine." (Mars probe finds water. USA Today, 7/31/2008).

RELATED REFERENCES

Mars probe finds water (7/31/2008). USA Today, accessed 7/31/2008 at http://www.usatoday.com/tech/science/space/2008-07-31-mars-water_N.htm

NASA Spacecraft Confirms Martian Water, Mission Extended (7/31/2008). NASA website, accessed 7/31/2008 at http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/phoenix/news/phoenix-20080731.html

Massachusetts Takes Another Step Toward Equal Rights

noreply@blogger.com (W. D. Craft) — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 23:35:00 +0000

TOPIC: gay rights, gay marriage

The Massachusetts legislature has now voted to repeal a 1913 law that had been used to block gay marriages involving out-of-state couples, and Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick indicates he will sign the bill.

So, now in addition to allowing residents of Massachusetts to participate in same-sex marriages (since 2004 under then governor Mitt Romney), out-of-state gay couples can go to Massachusetts to get married, even if their "home state" does not allow/recognize such unions.

Partly (ironically) driven by economic considerations, sure. But my less cynical side hopes that Massachusetts state Rep. Byron Rushing is sincere when he says that "This is question of fairness, and it is a question of equity" (Mass. House OKs out-of-state gay marriage, USA Today, 7/29/2008).

RELATED REFERENCES

Braun, Stephen (7/16/2008). Massachusetts Senate votes to end gay marriage restriction. Los Angeles Times, accessed Tues 7/29/2008 at web address http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-gaymarry16-2008jul16,0,5071765.story .

Goodridge v. Mass. Department of Public Health, 440 Mass. 309, 798 NE2d 941 (Nov. 18, 2003).

Mass. House OKs out-of-state gay marriage. (7/29/2008). USA Today, accessed 7/29/2008 at web page http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2008-07-29-mass-gaymarriage_N.htm?loc=interstitialskip .

Massachusetts Law About Same-Sex Marriage. Massachusetts Trial Court Law Libraries (online), web page accessed Tues 7/29/2008 at http://www.lawlib.state.ma.us/gaymarriage.html.

Viser, M. (7/10/2008). Gay-marriage advocates hope to repeal old law: Nonresidents now barred. The Boston Globe, accessed Tues 7/29/2008 online at web address http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2008/07/10/gay_marriage_advocates_hope_to_repeal_old_law/ .

Deroy Murdock Blasts "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" on National Review Online

noreply@blogger.com (W. D. Craft) — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 02:56:00 +0000

TOPIC: gays in the military

Deroy Murdock (a New York-based columnist with the Scripps Howard News Service and a media fellow with the Hoover Institution) has authored a nice article on National Review Online pointing up the continuing absurdities of the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" anti-gay military policy, and reporting particularly on the increased granting of "moral waivers" (through which the Army has evidently even inducted felony child molestors!):

… Pentagon officials evidently trust military inductees with felony rap sheets more than they do law-abiding gay GIs. Having relaxed academic, age, and weight restrictions to achieve recruitment goals, the Defense Department has granted “moral waivers” to criminal convicts. Simultaneously, it uses the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy to jettison gays in uniform, usually for merely disclosing their sexuality. This policy deserves a dishonorable discharge.

… Between 2003 and 2006, U.C. Santa Barbara’s Michael D. Palm Center calculates, “106,768 individuals with serious criminal histories were admitted” to the armed forces.

Last year, the Army gave moral waivers to 106 applicants convicted of burglary, 15 of felonious break-ins, 11 of grand-theft-auto, and eight of arson. It also admitted five rape/sexual-assault convicts, two felony child molesters, two manslaughter convicts, and two felons condemned for “terrorist threats including bomb threats.”

…

Conversely, expelled military personnel include Arabic linguists and intelligence specialists who help crush America’s foes in the War on Terror. “Don’t Ask” has ousted at least 58 soldiers who speak Arabic, 50 Korean, 42 Russian, 20 Chinese, nine Farsi, and eight Serbo-Croatian — all trained at the prestigious Defense Language Institute. Al-Qaeda intercepts need translation, and Uncle Sam may need people who can walk around Tehran with open ears. Yet these dedicated gay citizens now are ex-GIs.

Murdock's take-home message is rationality itself:

“Don’t Ask” should yield to equality: Sexual orientation should be irrelevant while inappropriate sexual conduct — gay, straight, or otherwise — should be punished.

RELATED REFERENCES

American Veterans for Equal Rights, http://aver.us/aver/

Freeman, Simon (7/02/2008). Pride & patriotism: The fight for the right to serve. Published online and accessed 7/03/2008 at web site http://atlanta.creativeloafing.com/gyrobase/pride_amp_patriotism/Content?oid=508559

Murdock, Deroy (7/23/2008). Don’t Make Sense: A policy that deserves a dishonorable discharge. National Review Online. Article accessed 7/28/2008 at web address http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=ODliYjkwN2RkNWExMWE5OGQxMzA2ODNlZTc5NTRhYjY=

Discovery Channel’sI Love The Whole World (Boom-de-Ah-Dah)

noreply@blogger.com (W. D. Craft) — Sat, 05 Jul 2008 19:51:00 +0000

TOPIC: Discovery Channel and the Whole World

OK, so I love to sing along with it (apparently like millions of others out there). And if you're one of the few who haven't had enough of it, here it is again:

I'm also a sentimental sap for feel-good songs with children singing:

And I really wish I had had someone like singingcera for one of my science teachers as a kid:

and then morbid me, I am thinking about the WHOLE world, with its violence and poverty and hunger and disease …

(Gay) Pride & Patriotism:A Cover Story by Scott FreemanAt Creative Loafing

noreply@blogger.com (W. D. Craft) — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 22:01:00 +0000

TOPIC: gay rights, don't-ask-don't-tell

Here's a terrific article on the US military’s painful "don't ask, don't tell" policy, by Scott Freeman at Creative Loafing (Atlanta), including some interview comments from Stephen Benjamin (recent former Arabic translator for the Navy, recent op-ed contributor to The New York Times: Don't Ask, Don't Translate, and recent guest on "The Colbert Report") and Danny Ingram (described as "one of the first gays kicked out of the Army under 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell.' ").

Along with some important personal stories and history of gays in the military, Freeman also has some sobering number for us:

In the 15 years since the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" law was put in place, an estimated 12,000 gay, lesbian and transgendered soldiers have been forcibly discharged.

"'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' has been an expensive proposition," says [Atlanta lawyer Jeff] Cleghorn, who sits on the board of directors of the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network. He points to a study by the University of California that determined the law has cost the military $363 million over the past 10 years. "Unfortunately, the military is not impressed by the numbers," he says.

Cleghorn's confident "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" will soon be repealed. According to the Pew Research Center, 52 percent of Americans supported removing the ban on gays in 1994 and 45 percent thought the ban should be continued. A recent Gallup poll showed 79 percent now support allowing gays to openly serve. And numerous other countries – including Great Britain, Australia, Canada and Israel – no longer have bans.

Freeman's article is a worthwhile read.

Related References

American Veterans for Equal Rights, http://aver.us/aver/

American Veterans for Equal Rights (Georgia Chapter), http://www.avergeorgia.org/

Graphical Analysis of Shakespearean Sonnet

noreply@blogger.com (W. D. Craft) — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 16:45:00 +0000

TOPIC: humor, math, & poetry, from graphjam