tag:typepad.com,2003:weblog-366029 2009-01-05T23:30:51-05:00 David Dobbs, contributor to NY Times Magazine, Scientific American, and other publications, on science, medicine, nature, and culture TypePad SmoothPebbleshttp://feedburner.google.com tag:typepad.com,2003:post-60923138 2009-01-05T23:30:51-05:00 2009-01-05T23:30:51-05:00

Seventeen months ago I said farewell to this Scienceblogs home, at least for a time, because I had not found blogging a comfortable fit. Since then, however, as I blogged off in the hinterland, I've come to better see how this slippery but flexible form can hold a valuable place in both my own writing and in the changing world of journalism.

DaveD http://dobbs.typepad.com/smoothpebbles/2009/01/why-ive-gone-back-to-seed---or-why-i-blog-more-happily-now.html tag:typepad.com,2003:post-60541946 2008-12-28T22:20:03-05:00 2008-12-28T22:20:03-05:00

Though it's likely become obvious already, I thought I should give notice I'll be blogging little if at all during this holiday week. Enjoy it, and I'll see you in the new year (if note before).

DaveD http://dobbs.typepad.com/smoothpebbles/2008/12/holiday-break.html tag:typepad.com,2003:post-60541894 2008-12-28T22:18:17-05:00 2008-12-28T22:18:17-05:00

Leon Krier, from "The City Within the City".: THE QUARTERS. A city can only be reconstructed in the form of urban quarters. A large or a small city can only be reorganized as a large or a small number of urban quarters; as a federation of autonomous quarters. Each quarter must have its own center, periphery and limit. Each quarter must be A CITY WITHIN A CITY. The quarter must integrate all daily functions of urban life (dwelling, working, leisure) within a territory dimensioned on the basis of the comfort of a walking person; not exceeding 35 hectares (80 acres) in surface and 15,000 inhabitants. Tiredness sets a natural limit to what a human being is prepared to walk daily and this limit has taught mankind all through history the size of rural or urban communities. One of the attractions of my own city, Montpelier, is that I can walk across it comfortably in well under half a day -- and can walk out of it, and into the countryside, in about 10 minutes, which is also how long it takes me to reach the city center. Despite that there is little mass transit, I rarely use a car. Krier's point about quarters -- that they must integrate all daily functions of urbain life -- seems spot on to me when I think of the cities (and parts of cities) that I've found most agreeable. For more along these lines, check out James Howard Kuntsler's website and Steven J. Dubner's...

DaveD http://dobbs.typepad.com/smoothpebbles/2008/12/the-walkable-city.html tag:typepad.com,2003:post-60235994 2008-12-19T18:48:59-05:00 2008-12-19T18:48:59-05:00

This seems to me a sharp-eyed take. Obama's effort to be post-partisan, as it were, is not merely an attempt to split differences or accommodate both sides of an argument. He seeks to change the terms of the argument, just as he did in both the primary and general elections.

DaveD http://dobbs.typepad.com/smoothpebbles/2008/12/ej-dionne-on-the-arne-duncan-choice.html tag:typepad.com,2003:post-60222008 2008-12-19T12:20:16-05:00 2008-12-19T12:20:16-05:00

Micheal Nielsen gets swiftly to a problem many scientists (and not a few writers) have with Gladwell's books -- and highlights their redeeming factors as well.

DaveD http://dobbs.typepad.com/smoothpebbles/2008/12/a-highly-interesting-review-of-gladwells-outliers.html tag:typepad.com,2003:post-60196954 2008-12-18T21:06:15-05:00 2008-12-18T21:06:15-05:00

As Obama solidifies his teams on science, education, and environment, attention -- and not a little worry from the drug industry -- is turning toward his hunt for a new FDA commissioner. The WSJ Health Blog reports that the FDA Commissioner Coalition, which is heavy with groups financed by the drug industry, appears increasingly concerned that Obama will appoint outspoken critics of drugmakers and the FDA, such as Cleveland Clinic cardiologist Steven Nissen or Baltimore health commissioner Joshua Sharfstein, who is heading Obama's FDA assessment team. While the coalition prominently talks about the need for an FDA chief who can withstand some kinds of outside pressure, there’s no mention of an ability to withstand pressure from industry. Yet undue industry influence is at the heart of concerns from both parties in both houses of Congress, from FDA officials, from doctors and many medical researchers. A copy of the Coalition's letter (to Secretary of Health Designate Tom Daschle) can be found at Pharmalot.

DaveD http://dobbs.typepad.com/smoothpebbles/2008/12/rumblings-and-worries-about-obamas-fda-options.html tag:typepad.com,2003:post-60195428 2008-12-18T19:55:00-05:00 2008-12-18T19:55:00-05:00

One more reason to like Will Smith. Hat tip to kottke, who links to some other amazing Rubikiean feats.

DaveD http://dobbs.typepad.com/smoothpebbles/2008/12/will-smith-schools-rubiks-cube.html tag:typepad.com,2003:post-60195382 2008-12-18T19:52:27-05:00 2008-12-18T19:52:27-05:00

Scientificblogging, drawing on apparently credible medical expertise, deflates six common med myths. My wife will love this. I've cited #4 to her a million times. 6 Medical Myths Debunked For Christmas: 1. Sugar makes kids hyperactive. 2. Suicides increase over the holidays. 3. Poinsettias are toxic. 4. You lose most of your body heat through your head. 5. Eating at night makes you fat. 6. You can cure a hangover with%u2026 Great fodder for Christmas parties.

DaveD http://dobbs.typepad.com/smoothpebbles/2008/12/6-medical-myths-debunked---just-in-time-for-the-holidays.html tag:typepad.com,2003:post-60186222 2008-12-18T16:01:54-05:00 2008-12-18T16:01:54-05:00

Atop other Obama appointments, this is one I suspect America's scientists will welcome. From the Washington Post: Report: Holdren to Lead White House Science Policy By Joel Achenbach President-elect Obama will announce this weekend that he has selected physicist John Holdren, who has devoted much of his career to energy and environmental research, as his White House science adviser, according to a published report today. The Obama transition office would not confirm Holdren's selection. Last night, asked by The Post to comment on the science adviser search, Holdren responded by e-mail that he would be unable to comment because of his work with the Obama transition team. The report today appeared online at ScienceInsider, a news blog published by the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Holdren served as president of AAAS in 2006. More at Politico.com, Science, and Discover, and Dot Earth.

DaveD http://dobbs.typepad.com/smoothpebbles/2008/12/encouraging-sign-that-government-may-be-going-all-empirical-on-us.html tag:typepad.com,2003:post-60156348 2008-12-17T22:14:58-05:00 2008-12-17T22:14:58-05:00

Other deadlines bar elaboration, but I wanted to draw attention to some worthwhile reading on the science front, mostly of the mind and brain variety

DaveD http://dobbs.typepad.com/smoothpebbles/2008/12/free-range-chimp-research-christmas-tree-clusters-gastrectomies-et-alia.html tag:typepad.com,2003:post-60104148 2008-12-16T18:35:01-05:00 2008-12-16T18:35:01-05:00

"A study just published in the journal CyberPsychology and Behavior has reviewed all of the available scientific studies on internet addiction and found them to be mostly crap. And not just slightly lacking, really pretty awful."

DaveD http://dobbs.typepad.com/smoothpebbles/2008/12/study-internet-addiction-a-bunch-of-bunk.html tag:typepad.com,2003:post-60103902 2008-12-16T18:28:18-05:00 2008-12-16T18:28:18-05:00

Via Kottke Regret the Error has released their annual roundup of media errors and corrections for 2008. The absurd corrections are always the best: We have been asked to point out that Stuart Kennedy, of Flat E, 38 Don Street, Aberdeen, who appeared at Peterhead Sheriff Court on Monday, had 316 pink, frilly garters confiscated not 316 pink, frilly knickers. And this: A film review on Sept. 5 about "Save Me" confused some characters and actors. It is Mark, not Chad, who is sent to the Genesis House retreat for converting gay men to heterosexuality. (Mark is played by Chad Allen; there is no character named Chad). The hunky fellow resident is Scott (played by Robert Gant), not Ted (Stephen Lang). And it is Mark and Scott -- not "Chad and Ted" -- who partake of cigarettes and "furtive man-on-man action."

DaveD http://dobbs.typepad.com/smoothpebbles/2008/12/oops----make-that-garters-media-errors-corrected.html tag:typepad.com,2003:post-60103810 2008-12-16T18:25:04-05:00 2008-12-16T18:25:04-05:00

Good stuff from Zimmer: You go for a swim, and you don't even notice the tiny worm that burrows into your skin. It slips into a vein and surges along through the blood for a while. Eventually it leaves your blood vessels and starts creeping up your spinal cord. Creep creep creep, it goes, until it reaches your head. It curls up on the surface of your brain, forming a hard cyst. But it is not alone%u2013every time you've gone for swim, worms have slithered into you, and now there are thousands of cysts peppering your brain. And they are all making drugs that are seeping into your neurons. These drugs are a bit like Prozac, except far more sophisticated. They target certain neurons in certain parts of the brain, altering your behavior surgically, without unwanted side effects. You don't know what's happening to you. But in situations in which you'd expect to feel scared or stressed, you just want to race around. You whirl in circles, doing whatever is necessary to get the attention of the very thing that terrifies you. Thanks to your uncontrollable flailing, that terror finds you, and you are destroyed. This is how I imagine you'd feel if you were a fish infected by a parasitic worm called Euhaplorchis californiensis.

DaveD http://dobbs.typepad.com/smoothpebbles/2008/12/zimmer-on-brain-changing-parasites.html tag:typepad.com,2003:post-60101924 2008-12-16T17:29:43-05:00 2008-12-16T17:29:43-05:00

Beethoven showed up 238 years ago today. No one else, no one else ... My violin teacher used to tell me, "You paid for the whole bow; use all of it." Those violinists aren't wasting any bow money. NB: earlier title said "Beethoven's 7th, on his 238th". I do know the difference! ... but had begun to post the 7th and changed my mind but not my title.

DaveD http://dobbs.typepad.com/smoothpebbles/2008/12/beethovens-7th-on-his-238th.html tag:typepad.com,2003:post-60081186 2008-12-16T09:48:48-05:00 2008-12-16T09:48:48-05:00

The Washington Post, in a story fairly typical of other coverage, says that Obama's pick for Secretary of Education will "reach out to unions, school reform gorups" and "bridge the divides among education advocates, teachers unions and civil rights groups over how to fix America's school." Or as another syndicated WaPo story put it, "Duncan is embraced by the teachers unions, which have been concerned about high-stakes testing and worry about merit pay being tied to test scores, as well as reformers, who favor charter schools and tougher standards." Apparently at least some from the teachers'-union end of this debate are offering an embrace not exactly friendly:

DaveD http://dobbs.typepad.com/smoothpebbles/2008/12/education-chief-arne-duncan-has-his-work-cut-out.html tag:typepad.com,2003:post-60079560 2008-12-16T09:04:58-05:00 2008-12-16T09:04:58-05:00

I don't play no stinkin' video games, but this is odd enough to be interesting Boing Boing reports, in two different posts, that a) Some employers are apparently discriminating against World of Warcraft players on the grounds that their heads are always within the WoW and not fully in this one (a stance that some WoW players agree with), but b) Obama is apparently NOT one of those employers, as he hired at least one WoW player -- Kevin Werbach (aka Supernovan Jenkins to WoWers -- to head his FCC transition team. I'm not brave enough to speculate on what this means. Technorati Tags: World of Warcraft, Kevin Werbach

DaveD http://dobbs.typepad.com/smoothpebbles/2008/12/world-of-warcraft----obama-hires-where-others-fear-to-tread.html tag:typepad.com,2003:post-60076050 2008-12-16T06:54:28-05:00 2008-12-16T06:54:28-05:00

Forgive if I'm obsessed with this death-of-journalism thingn -- Andrew Sullivan has a nice piece in the Times of London about dying newspapers. Like Surowiecki, he fears the loss of the deep reporting that newspapers are already doing less of, and for which so far we have no real replacement venue. Stunning stat from the story: The Baltimore Sun, a pretty big and renowned paper (and the basis for The Wire) gets about 17.5 million page views a month. Sullivan's blog at Atlantic gets 23 million

DaveD http://dobbs.typepad.com/smoothpebbles/2008/12/sullivan-on-death-of-newspapers.html tag:typepad.com,2003:post-60075806 2008-12-16T06:44:17-05:00 2008-12-16T06:44:17-05:00

A teacher in West Virginia rallied her students to fight to keep the right to recycle -- presumably for the civic (and eco) learning experience. John Tierney argues she's missing a better teaching opportunity:

DaveD http://dobbs.typepad.com/smoothpebbles/2008/12/tierney-asks-science-or-garbage.html tag:typepad.com,2003:post-60075642 2008-12-16T06:37:42-05:00 2008-12-16T06:37:42-05:00

I won't replicate the Word-of-the-Day email every day, but this was too good not to pass on. "The Dingle duo are seriously concerned that Jasmine's about to go doolally." doolally PRONUNCIATION: (DU-lah-lee) MEANING: adjective: Irrational, deranged, or insane. ETYMOLOGY: After Deolali, a small town in western India.

DaveD http://dobbs.typepad.com/smoothpebbles/2008/12/did-the-shoe-thrower-go-doolally-or-was-he-acting-rationally.html tag:typepad.com,2003:post-60062968 2008-12-15T21:20:06-05:00 2008-12-15T21:20:06-05:00

"r a while now, readers have had the best of both worlds: all the benefits of the old, high-profit regimeintensive reporting, experienced editors, and so onand the low costs of the new one. But that situation cant last. Soon enough, were going to start getting what we pay for, and we may find out just how little that is."

DaveD http://dobbs.typepad.com/smoothpebbles/2008/12/news-you-can-lose-financial-page-the-new-yorker.html