Green Gabbro

More on Mathphobia

Tue, 24 Jun 2008 09:07:26 -0500

I've been reading The Design of Everyday Things, which I recommend as a useful and interesting way of thinking about all sorts of minor frustrations in daily life. It's also applicable to teaching - I've definitely noticed many student problems that have more to do with misunderstanding the nature and purpose of the assignment, than with misunderstanding the concepts involved. I was blown away when I realized that not everyone automatically interprets an expression like "N_c(M)" to mean a quantity N_c that is a function of a variable M, but apparently a dedicated mathphobe in the California public school system can easily escape such basic mathematical acculturation. If we don't provide some other cue to them that we expect to see several different values of N_c, they will get confused and make mistakes.

Anyway, here's what Donald Norman has to say about math education:

With badly designed objects - constructed so as to lead to misunderstanding - faulty mental models, and poor feedback, no wonder people feel guilty when they have trouble using objects, especially when the perceive (even if incorrectly) that nobody else is having the same problems. Or consider the normal mathematics curriculum, which continues relentlessly on its way, each new lesson assuming full knowledge and understanding of all that has passed before. Even though each point may be simple, once you fall behind it is hard to catch up. The result: mathematics phobia. Not because the material is difficult, but because it is taught so that difficulty in one stage hinders further progress. The problem is that once failure starts, it soon generalizes by self-blame to all of mathematics. Similar processes are at work with technology. The vicious cycle starts: if you fail at something, you think it is your fault. Therefore you think you can't do that task. As a result, next time you have to do the task, you believe you can't so you don't even try. The result is that you can't, just as you thought. You're trapped in a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Mathphobes and math teachers in the audience, does this describe your experience? I find it hard to imagine a math curriculum that doesn't build on previous lessons, but I can certainly imagine a setup that allows more time and flexibility for teachers to address sticking points before they turn into nightmares.

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Someone Punk'd the CBS Science Desk!

Fri, 20 Jun 2008 00:27:35 -0500

This is the most irresponsible "science" "reporting" I have seen in yonks:

New research compiled by Australian scientist Dr. Tom Chalko shows that global seismic activity on Earth is now five times more energetic than it was just 20 years ago. The research proves that destructive ability of earthquakes on Earth increases alarmingly fast and that this trend is set to continue, unless the problem of "global warming" is comprehensively and urgently addressed.

Cursory examination reveals that Dr. Tom Chalko is a complete wackaloon! Even if you do not know the first thing about seismology, consider the warning signs that this "research" may actually be an attractive organic fertilizer:

Research article is published in a journal where 5/5 articles in the current issue are authored solely by... Dr. Tom Chalko!
Research article cites Wikipedia
Research article uses Observable Weird Capitalization for emphasis
Associated Press reporter was too lazy to call up any respectable seismologists for a second opinion, and probably did not alter Dr. Tom Chalko, M.sc., Ph.D.'s press release. Which would explain the Observable Weird Capitalization in the news article.

CBS (and any other news outlet that reprints this story) should be ashamed.

Update: CBS took the story down, and is now vigorously blaming the AP, who is, in turn, vigorously blaming CBS.

All I wanna know is, how can I get my crackpot press releases republished - even if only briefly - in major news outlets?

Hat tip: Emory Kimbrough.

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Carnival of Space #59

Thu, 19 Jun 2008 19:10:07 -0500

Greetings, and welcome to this week's Carnival of Space! Before getting to the astro-goodness, Will has a question: How many of you get your astronomy news directly from the press release?

Planets and Plutoids

Everyone likes Mars, which means everyone's attention is on Phoenix and its oven. At the Planetary Society blog, Emily Lakdawilla interviews Phoenix mission manager Barry Goldstein. Turns out, recent data-handling problems actually mean we'll get more data back from Phoenix:

[But] because we were in this anomalous state, we requested, and received, a bunch of contingency passes from MRO and Odyssey. So what ends up happening is: we told the science team 'you can do whatever you want, because the only thing we are worried about was flash, we just are not going to save it to flash when we turn off.' And we then told them we have all these [downlink] passes. So as it turns out, what the science team is planning is the most data-rich sol we've had to date, because we have all these extra passes. I was joking with Peter [Smith, the principal investigator] that he should pray for these things more often because he gets more data.

Meanwhile, Spirit and Opportunity soldier on, but someone needs to go blow the dust off Spirit's solar panels.

Everyone also likes Titan (quiet, you punks in the back! Titan is awesome!). Catholic Sensibility gives a brief history:

Titan was left unnamed for the first two centuries of its Earthling acquaintance. Luna Saturni was enough for the Dutch astronomer. When other moons were discovered, Titan was given a roman numeral, first II and then IV. For the early 1800's, it was known as Saturn VI. The numbering convention was I for the innermost moon, and everything else lining up in order. Not very imaginative. And a pain when astronomers kept discovering moons closer in and re-numbering the whole lot.

Sadly, not everyone likes Pluto. Stuart, a self-confessed "Pluto-hugger", discusses how Pluto's changing status affects his outreach work:

For people like me, who have to communicate science concepts and discoveries to the public, [the debate over Pluto's status is] a bit more personal because it is something I know in advance will need explaining and justifying at some point in the evening every single time I fire up my laptop and projector to do an Outreach talk. And when you're faced with a roomful of people who are genuinely baffled by the decision, and who now think astronomers are all squabbling, loony scientists, like the wild-haired "Doc Brown" in the Back to The Future films, or the buck-toothed bespectacled uber-geeks in the Larson cartoons, well, you see it differently.

A newly-discovered trio of extra-solar, several-Earth-mass bodies 42 light-years away definitely merit the label of "planet". Centauri Dreams comments that the discovery is a credit to improving instrumentation, and more are sure to follow.

Rocks... in Space!

The Bad Astronomer asks: Are we aliens?:

[S]cientists studying the Murchison meteorite have determined that the purines and pyrimidines -- specifically, uracil and xanthine -- have a non-terrestrial origin. In other words, the molecules in this meteorite, so crucial for life, were actually formed in outer space and fell to Earth.

... and then he throws cold water all over our panspermiac nerdgasms. Yeah, thanks.

Some of the rocks in space are the result of anthropogenic astro-bioturbation; the main characters in the sci-fi anime series Planetes are responsible for cleaning up this orbiting debris before it causes problems. Space Feeds shows us the first episode. I'd comment on it, but my connection is too flaky to actually watch more than the first 30 seconds.

If you need more planetary carnival action or a trip back to Earth, the latest edition of the Accretionary Wedge is out, covering the intersection of geology and art.

Below the fold: the stars!

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Advice for a Mathphobe?

Wed, 18 Jun 2008 08:40:55 -0500

A reader named Amanda recently wrote me, asking for some advice:

I graduated from NYU in 2007 and have been working in LA as an assistant, but I'm thinking about going back to college and getting a second degree. My first one is a BFA in screenwriting, so naturally I want to compliment that with a BS in geology in order to be a high school science teacher. Here's the thing: as obsessed as I am with geology, I'm terrified of actually studying it. I'm great with concepts, and applying things I've studied to real life.

Problem is, I'm terrrible at any level of math higher than algebra. Because I'm bad at it, I studied the -ologies in high school and have only a cursory background in chem and physics. I'm going to buy some old textbooks and try to teach myself, but I guess what I'm asking is: will my atrocious math skills render me totally and utterly screwed? Do you have any advice for someone who plans on studying geology as an undergrad?

At this point, let me note that my background is in geophysics, not geology. Moreover, I went to a school where history and literature majors were required to do differential equations. I honestly haven't the faintest understanding of what it would be like to live or work without math.

My instinct, when presented with a case of mathphobia, is usually divided between a desire to soothe and coddle the poor soul who was obviously traumatized at an impressionable young age, and, if the mathphobe in question is a student who doesn't think that an intro science class should contain such nasty things as logarithms, a desire to beat them over the head with a textbook. I have reprinted my response below the fold, but I'm sure some of you can improve on it.

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Another Lusi Update

Tue, 17 Jun 2008 19:40:56 -0500

From the perspective of this paper's publication, my cross-country move was badly timed. Since my email access has been so sporadic over the past couple weeks, I missed chances to help edit the press release and do a couple of interviews.

The press seems to have done just fine without me (except that no reporters have found my blog - or at least, no reporters have found it interesting). The Boston Globe has a nice photo set. What's weird, though, is watching the quotes from various officials at the company whose borehole we claim is responsible for the disaster.

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Devonian Fossil Gorge to Become... SIlurian Fossil Gorge?

Thu, 12 Jun 2008 23:34:45 -0500

I don't actually know what underlies the Middle Devonian brachiopods of my childhood, but I might get to find out soon. Iowa City is experiencing its second "500 year" flood in 15 years, and Coralville Lake has overtopped its dam... again. And the river hasn't crested yet. Fortunately, my family is on high ground, and playing host to some friends who've been evacuated from the flood zone.

Buildings in Iowa City must have floors that are at least 1 foot (or 1.4 of your Earth football diameters) above a designated "100 year" flood elevation. These elevations are determined by FEMA; climate records and projections are fed into hydrologic models to determine water elevations during freakishly wet years. Whether we're just having a statistical freakout, or whether the amount of rain that FEMA expects to occur in a 100-year flood needs adjusting... are there hydrologists or climatologists in the audience? This is beyond my expertise and I'm not in the mood to wade through the literature tonight.

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How to Find a Death Trap: A Guide for Apartment-Hunters

Thu, 12 Jun 2008 09:45:22 -0500

Earthquake engineer Kit Miyamoto has posted a journal of his trip to Sichuan. If you don't mind a little bit of construction jargon it's a good discussion of the details of what kinds of buildings collapse, and what kinds are safe, as well as the logistical difficulties of the immediate post-earthquake recovery. The lesson to be learned from the Sichuan earthquake is the same as the lesson of basically every major earthquake in the past several decades: If you build bad buildings, they will fall down and kill people.

After some earthquakes, we have been able to dramatically improve our understanding of what constitutes a "bad building". But in Sichuan - and Kashmir, and Bam, and Indonesia, and San Simeon, California - we already knew what was wrong. The real problems are social, political, and economic: We have lots of old buildings and can't just replace them all immediately; good buildings cost more (though investments in seismic safety definitely pay off when the Big One hits); building codes aren't always enforced the way they should be.

Instead of discussing these policy problems in detail, I'm going to spend the rest of this post explaining how relatively wealthy Americans can avoid buying or renting a piece of rubble in waiting. It is a delusion common to my social class that urging people in decent financial situations to make wise individual consumer choices is exactly the same as pushing for institutional change.

Really, though, it's just that I'm in the middle of an apartment search myself. Mr. Man and I keep having the same conversation: Oh hey, hardwood floors... garden space for tenants... what's the walk score?... AUGH NEVER MIND DEATH DEATH DEATH!

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How Crater Lake was formed, in four parts

Wed, 11 Jun 2008 15:09:03 -0500

How Crater Lake was formed, in four parts
Originally uploaded by erika_amir

Via LJ geology. Read the comments on this post...

Happy Birthday, Lusi (the Drilling Totally Did It)

Sun, 01 Jun 2008 01:24:57 -0500

It's been two years* since the ground opened near Sidoarjo, Indonesia, spewing mud over the homes, farms, and businesses of tens of thousands of people. The disaster quickly acquired the rather endearing name of "Lusi", which is short for "lumpur" (Indonesian for mud) and "Sidoarjo". The two-year anniversary media bonanza has focused on the continuing plight of the refugees and the publication of a new paper analyzing GPS data around the mud volcano to determine that there is, indeed, going to be a big hole in the ground where the mud used to be. Chris Rowan has already blogged about that study, so I'll not summarize it again here.

However, there's another paper due out, this time in Earth and Planetary Science Letters, (~~I'll link to it here as soon as it's properly in press - we're still waiting on the proofs~~ here it is, though it's behind an Elsevier paywall) discussing the cause of the eruption. The initial eruption was suspiciously near to a gas exploration borehole ... but it was also just three days after a magnitude 6.3 earthquake. Could the earthquake have caused the eruption?

Hah. No. It was totally the exploration well.

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Borrowing Geek Cred from the Mathematicians

Wed, 28 May 2008 08:58:51 -0500

Quick background: Paul Erdös was a prolific mathematician. If you co-authored a paper with him, you have an Erdös number of 1. If you co-author a paper with someone with an Erdös number of 1, you have an Erdös number of 2. It's like playing Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon if you're a gigantic dork.

Now that one of my papers has been officially accepted, I officially have an Erdös number of no greater than 6 - which fact I discovered using this handy-dandy search engine*. Though sadly, one of the papers that links me to Erdös is an obituary, not actual research.

As far as I can tell, this is not especially impressive, but I'm sort of pleased with it anyway.

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The Scouring of Fossil Gorge

Wed, 21 May 2008 21:59:00 -0500

Julian is hosting this month's Accretionary Wedge, and wants us all to discuss a geologic event that's significant to us personally. (Well, technically, he asked for the event that is most significant, but I love all my pet geologic events equally, so there, nyah.)

The nearly record-setting floods on the Mississippi River this spring have brought back memories of the summer when it just. kept. raining. During a rare break in the weather in July 1993, my mother took me, my sister, and friends up to the local Army Corps flood control structure, and the Coralville Lake behind it; of course, we got rained out. On the way back, though, we passed the dam's emergency spillway... and it was spilling!

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I have a Master's degree... in Science!

Tue, 20 May 2008 17:34:09 -0500

Hey, if it's good enough for Dr. Science, it's good enough for me.

Regular posting will resume shortly. First, I must complete some very important experiments on the rheology of dense particle suspensions in a water-alcohol-strawberry solution.

It's for Science.

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I'd Like to Thank the Academy

Mon, 19 May 2008 09:32:59 -0500

My committee has my thesis draft.

We're getting over a heat wave here in Berkeley. My office is neither air-conditioned nor particularly well shaded and ventilated, so I've been hanging out in my nice cool living room (not air-conditioned, but protected from the yellow face), putting my files in order, catching up on laundry, assembling alternate resumes and writing my acknowledgments.

I imagine committees sitting on drafts as adopting the posture of a brooding hen. That's funnier for some committee members than for others.

My ability to actually write the acknowledgments is limited by the heat - I lose about 5 IQ points for each degree above 72F - and by my fear of churning out a string of clichés (I was similarly stymied on the introduction and conclusion). So, while I could make a list of names and add words like "encouragement", "support", and "discussion" at random intervals, and it would even be a more or less true expression of sentiment, I can't quite bring myself to do it yet.

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A Brain Teaser

Tue, 29 Apr 2008 07:15:33 -0500

What do Emperor Hirohito, Princess Benedikte of Denmark, and Duke Ellington have in common?

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Green Gabbro

More on Mathphobia

Someone Punk'd the CBS Science Desk!

Carnival of Space #59

Planets and Plutoids

Rocks... in Space!

Advice for a Mathphobe?

Another Lusi Update

Devonian Fossil Gorge to Become... SIlurian Fossil Gorge?

How to Find a Death Trap: A Guide for Apartment-Hunters

How Crater Lake was formed, in four parts

Happy Birthday, Lusi (the Drilling Totally Did It)

Borrowing Geek Cred from the Mathematicians

The Scouring of Fossil Gorge

I have a Master's degree... in Science!

I'd Like to Thank the Academy

Tag Clouds for my Papers

A Brain Teaser