ScienceCom #1 - What is out there

A while ago I was reading an Italian newspaper, "Repubblica" - I was browsing various articles when a title in small prints caught my eye: the article mentioned the foundation of a new research centre to study the risk that humans destroy themselves by giving birth to a machine that eventually turns itself against its creator. Without further ado, here is the relevant link: http://www.cser.org/.

Pause.

This reminded me that a few months earlier I had bumped into an equally odd website: http://beyond.asu.edu/.

Another pause.

Continuing my journey through the resources of the internet, here is the most recent discovery (thank you, Rob!): http://storify.com/ingorohlfing/overly-honest-methods-in-science.

... Now what?

Let's start thinking about what such websites have in common - a certain vision of scientific research, perhaps.
My reaction when I read about the first project listed above may be described as a rapid sequence of thoughts along these lines:

- who are these people, and is there so much money out there that one can possibly spend on such nonsense? Clearly this is easily classified as a non-directional, superficial rant.

- no, but... Seriously? I can think of at least three alternative possible causes for the destruction of our race - and none of them includes a form of Artificial Intelligence (AI) turning into our terminator. Maybe I'm narrow-minded, though.

- why would someone come up with such an idea? Sometimes one hears people commenting on a silly proposal: "they had no more original thoughts to work on, hence their uninteresting latest idea". In this case it's the other way round, so to say. It seems like, oppressed by centuries and centuries of scientific debate and discoveries, and in a century - the current one - where the "Publish or Perish" principle has become deeply rooted into many researchers' brains... The focus on the identification of the most significant and meaningful priorities may be lost. Minds might start to wander freely, they may stumble on an idea or a hypothesis - and if they are not prompt enough in recognising it as a divertissement (an entertaining diversion), this may grow in size and eventually become a real entity like a centre or an institute.

The second link I copied above generated analogous considerations, except that here the centre is not "newly born"... It's up, running and, to be frank, I'm still debating within myself as to whether I find the whole structure trustworthy or not. Browsing the website there seems to be an equal amount of odd contents and stimulating talks and seminars.

The third website is probably the most interesting one; the first obvious reaction is laugh, of course - partly because many of the entries are just great, and partly because (especially if the reader is a scientist, or maybe-to-be-scientist too :) ) it is rather easy to spot a few comments that sound familiar and well-known. The second reaction comes as a question: why would anyone ridicule research? Perhaps the verb I chose is too strong, but I do feel like all the contributions to this web page subtract to science and scientific progress a share of its authority and reliability, not to mention its - supposed?! - rigour. Now, I know that such doubts arise every time one hears in the news that this or that paper (often published in a good journal) turned out to be an inventive creation of its authors, so to speak. The more I think about it, the more I feel like the point that strikes me here is the participation of young researchers and students. These "confessions of questionable scientific practice" belong to people who have just started to approach reseach or are still relatively new to the field - yet they all seem to have encountered a few examples of "bad science". And, more importantly, they are willing to share these experiences, wink and have a laugh about them.

I don't mean to sound intransigent or support censorship. This post is a mere collection of thoughts on the subject of what is out there, in terms of the scientific community and its views on itself and the world around it. Thank you for reading!

FolkRec - Now Is the Cool of the Day

... Yes, another recording - and another religious song, too! This one I learnt years ago - thanks to Mariano De Simone for teaching it to me. I think I memorised the lyrics gradually, and for a long time I didn't even own a printed copy of the words. The lyrics I refer to can be found here: http://www.mudcat.org/@displaysong.cfm?SongID=1331. There is a comment about another verse - true, the version I knew was indeed longer, but I personally decided to cut down one verse as I found it... less interesting (excuse my frankness). A recording of this tune that immediately comes to my mind is the one by Jean Ritchie (where she sings along with a choir whose size sounds... impressive!). I do believe that this song is religious - maybe this time it is also truly a Christian song.
On a general note, I am not a religious person - I am an agnostic, and a convinced one. Does it make sense then for me to venture into this kind of "belief-inspired repertoire", I wonder? I have asked myself this question many times, and I have never performed such songs in public (I do not perform in public very often anyway!). Now I posted two of them on this blog, so it may look like I finally found an answer to my question. Well, as much as it can sound trivial and superficial, I do believe that music is a universal language. There are songs that are deeply rooted in a specific culture or time in history, and these may therefore lose part of their potential "universality". On the other hand there are tunes, images and feelings that do cross boundaries, both cultural and temporal. And then one may end up humming a song that was originally sung by, say, workers in 19th-century North America or by English sailors at sea. Isn't this incredible?

On the field #4 - The Science Museum in London

In June I spent one afternoon at the Science Museum in London, where - shame! - I had never been before. If I had to be concise, I would probably choose one adjective: fabulous.

... Of course, brevity is no familiar word of mine. :) A first look at the museum plan suggested me that I would need to select a few topics and focus on these, leaving the others for future day trips to the capital. I thus visited quite extensively the Mathematics section, looking with amazement at the beautifully crafted three-dimensional reproductions of solution curves for differential equations and staring at the zoo of polygons and solids that were discovered (and sometimes named, just like one would do with a child of their own!) in centuries of mathematical studies. I strolled around a couple of temporary installations, one of which I very much disliked, the other of which I quite enjoyed. Ah, art combined with science - often probabilistic in its outcome! :) On a general note, I did find the idea of having a permanent collection as well as a few sections that host temporary exhibitions on various topics an extremely clever way of structuring a museum...

... Which leads me to the main reason why I started this post in the first place. When I entered the museum, the first object that drew my attention was a poster advertising one of these temporary sections, in this case one that focussed on the life and legacy of Alan Turing (http://www.sciencemuseum.org.uk/visitmuseum/galleries/turing.aspx). If the name does not ring any bell, I will leave you to the reading of the Wikipedia article (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Turing). If you do know a bit about Turing's contribution to mathematics, logic and computer science, then you probably won't be surprised to know that exploring the section one would be able to see a couple of Enigma machines and a reproduction of a computer designed by Turing himself when, well, a computer was everything but "personal" (in the early days, a "computer" was actually a human being - usually a woman - trained to compute specific calculations by typing on a machine very similar to the ones you would have written letters to your grandmother with), to mention a few items on display.

The real surprise came at the end of the exhibition: three very coloured, interactive machines had been brought there to get the so-called general public to familiarise with concepts such as looping. Such "key words" are well-known within the scientific community; they identify operations that are likely to appear as basic building blocks in many, many programming codes (irrespective of the specific language used). I must say that I voluntarily chose the looping example: I am an inexperienced programmer, and I still feel somehow uncomfortable every time I realise that I need to add a loop in a code. I thus decided to stop at the machine that stood there to give an insight into how looping instructions are written and executed: I was curious to see the way people would interact with it.

Let me try and describe the installation itself. Imagine a screen where specific areas (which are nothing but sets of pixels) have different colours: these coloured sections of the screen can be activated (and de-activated) depending on the instructions executed by the machine. This creates sequences of "coloured patches" that appear and disappear in cycles until one or more instructions change. This is because the lines of code that "tell the screen" "Now make the green pixels glow!" and so on are embedded in a loop, and are thus executed over and over (well... potentially - nothing lasts forever, I believe). Under the screen is a post where another screen is found: this one displays the actual code that is responsible for what happens on the glowing screen. It is also possible to see the circuit that physically implements the written programme. Finally, next to the screen showing the code there is a smaller screen that displays a few instructions that should allow visitors to understand how the machine works, and in turn make it possible to actively modify its glowing output.

I thus stand a few metres away from the installation: a first group of people arrives - good. They look like they are 25, maybe 30 years old; two men, two women. The latter somehow stay at a distance. Perhaps they are not interested, but maybe this is also because their male companions have quite naturally (and quickly) occupied the space in front of the screen: they are already interacting with the machine. What strikes me about the first bunch of groups that stop and spend some time in front of this looping machine is the following behaviour: they do look at the instructions that "translate" what the code does, but they rapidly start pressing the buttons that make it possible to modify the code - sometimes while they're still reading the instructions, and often in such a nervous way that makes me suspect that they're not really testing how this machine works. They play around. What is also interesting is that they seem to get bored quickly - many people extract a digital camera, take a picture of the coloured screen and then leave.

As for me, I had initially spent several minutes looking at the installation, and to be entirely honest, well, I am not sure I did understand how this is supposed to shine some light on how looping lines of code are implemented. Which is why I then decided to stay around, to see if I could feel less lost by watching other people dealing with the machine - someone could turn out to be a good demonstrator. Now, these first groups of visitors do not help at all: they're way too frantic, they touch every possible button and they don't seem to have any criteria driving their actions. Ah - now a man in his sixties comes around. He stares at the installation for a while. He looks at the glowing screen, then at the post with the two screens displaying the code and the instructions on how to operate the machine. Pause. He starts pressing a few buttons on the post - calmly but firmly, and constantly checking what the outcome of his actions is on the glowing screen: areas of different colours gently appear and disappear. Pause. He stares at the screen a little longer and he eventually leaves; I presume he is satisfied with the final result. Then I do realise - this man has just been my demonstrator! Now it all perfectly makes sense - easy. I am about to leave when something else happens: the post with the code and the instructions breaks - no instructions anymore. My reaction is immediate: too bad, now people won't stop as the machine cannot be operated in these conditions. Wrong. A couple (both in their mid-thirties, I would say) arrives and stares at the screens for a while: they do seem to get the general functioning, and after pressing a few buttons they leave. A few more people stop by: some of them look like they know what they're doing, some less - still they use the machine and produce coloured patterns on the glowing screen...

... Which is ultimately what happens when one switches on a laptop or a mobile phone: one does use them even without having a deep knowledge of the way they effectively work.

The code is there though.

>> _

Flowchart #2 - I decide to write about writing

As you may have guessed from my previous post, I am quite fond of everything that is related to typefaces and letterforms - with a special interest in handwriting - both in their standard and more creative expressions.

When it comes to calligraphy, it turns out that there are a few websites one may be curious to explore: for instance,

- http://www.calligraphyonline.org/index.html -- click and learn about the "Society of Scribes and Illuminators"... With such a name for their society the website deserves at least a visit, don't you think?

- http://www.clas.co.uk/index.html -- a recent discovery, hence I cannot say much about it; their summer course looks interesting...

- http://www.freehandwriting.net/ -- probably one of the first websites I found out about; I have never met Monica Dengo, but I had a chance to attend a short workshop run by one of her students and thought it was brilliant! Also, at least one of Monica Dengo's classes takes place in Venice... Not a bad location, huh?

Some days ago I thought of a connection I hadn't considered before. Penmanship as it is presented in the few above-listed websites stems from a rather specific - almost élite? - point of view on the matter: here writing by hand is not seen as a necessary skill allowing to communicate and express oneself, but rather as a more abstract activity - where sometimes one may even wonder whether the aesthetics became more relevant than the content. Thus it presupposes, by definition, that one learnt how to write in the first place, from the alphabet up to entire sentences and paragraphs, distinguishing between upper, lower case letters and so on. Have you ever asked yourself this question: how did I learn to write? How long was this process, and what was the evolution of my handwriting up to its present form?

I then decided I would look into this matter. With a scientific approach, of course.

And eventually, I drew the flowchart that is shown below.

When my eyes were stabbed by the flash of a neon light...

This is Berlin - again! This time the photos shown here come from an entirely different source: they were taken at the Buchstaben Museum (http://www.buchstabenmuseum.de/), which is a tiny yet meaningful (and playful) display of... Neon lights - precisely. Except that the point is not their being glowing. The aim of the museum is to preserve and document letterforms, as written on their homepage, as well as to plan "events designed to develop an appreciation for typography and for the items on display".
What I found very interesting is the opportunity to see various "fonts" applied to specific, real-life examples (a fishmonger's shop, a café and so on), with styles and "tricks" that change in time: the three photos below, for instance, the light with the glowing "W" comes from the thirties or the forties, if I am not mistaken. I love the "r" and "t" in the first photo, the way they are linked - it is a very peculiar graphic solution; and I found the "G" in the third picture very smooth and... Gentle.

The remaining two photos were taken with a more "scientific" approach in mind: here one learns how it is actually possible to fabricate such neon lights... Or at least, how this was done up to the invention and success of LEDs, I suppose. It is then almost natural, I think, to realise that this museum and its collection are not only about aesthetics; there is a true interplay of art and science/technology. The perspective might thus change, as a particularly smooth and curly typeface is not only nice to look at, but also likely to have been quite a challenge to produce as the neon light that is displayed right in front of you. :)

I imagine that it did make sense to gradually switch to LEDs - perhaps we (as a civilisation) should even rethink critically this sort of "glittery and 'must be eye-catching' culture of signs and messages".
I believe it is important that places like the Buchstaben Museum exist, because they do act as a "memorandum" of a few examples of virtuous human creativity and ingeniosity, all of which are aspects to respect and treasure.

A note -- While I was visiting the museum I happened to glance at a pile of small leaflets, each one with a big green "M" on it - I took one with me, and discovered this website: http://www.motaitalic.com/. It is not a very easy task to define what "Mota Italic" truly is - it is a gallery/shop in Berlin, but I think it is fair to say that it is mainly a proper type foundry. This means that if you visit their website and fancy one of their typefaces, you can purchase them and start using them when you write a document on your laptop, for example. I then had a relatively extensive look at the website itself: one page that caught my attention was http://www.motaitalic.com/typefoundry/fonts/gemma/rotalics - do not get me wrong, I love standard italics, but this "rotalics" does look interesting, too!

A second note, as important as the first -- If you don't know (or forgot) where the title of this post comes from, I suggest you check this link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BvsX03LOMhI. ;) [I am not entirely sure about all the words as they are shown in this video, but most of them seem right to me!]

On remembrance... And communication

In May I went to Berlin for a few days: I had a very pleasant time, and I thought I would now upload some photos that I took while exploring this lively city. Digital cameras are wonderful, but they do make it easy, far too easy to generate photos that rapidly add up to embarrassingly high numbers. For this reason, identifying a theme and selecting the few snapshots related to it seemed a quite reasonable strategy here. :)
The two pictures above show two memorials: the first one is found in the very central Bebelplatz and commemorates the - sadly famous - book burning ceremony that took place in 1933, while the second marks the spot where the body of Rosa Luxemburg was thrown into the Landwehr canal in 1919.
I have always thought that the choice of empty bookcases to remember a book burning episode is very meaningful. Absence is often regarded as a "lack of presence" and thus seen as a negative condition - yet an absence may be as significant as a presence, in a way which turns out to be much more intuitive than one may expect at first. A quote from Heinrich Heine is engraved next to the glass plate: "Where they burn books, they ultimately burn people".
Since I included a quote, why not add another one? This time it is by Rosa Luxemburg: "Freedom is always the freedom of the dissenter [the one who thinks differently]". The paragraph from which this sentence was taken can be found here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosa_Luxemburg.

This collection of concrete slabs of variable height is known as the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe. It was, and probably still is, a rather controversial project. I must say, I hesitated before I decided to visit it (also, I didn't go to the museum built - literally - under the memorial): even when I was there, surrounded by these grey blocks, my attention was mainly driven towards the construction itself - namely its spatial, geometrical features: light and shadow, uniformity, contrasts, loss of direction.

A memorial, whatever its form and nature may be, cannot provide a single, well-defined and universally (so to speak) accepted meaning: every individual will react differently to it and will be left with a handful of thoughts and impressions. As much as this may sound as an attempt to undermine the value of such monuments and sculptures, I believe it is not so.
Also, I think that an important aspect is their accessibility: anyone walking around Bebelplatz has a chance to see those white, empty shelves. I guess that a similar attempt to "bring a message to passers-by" has inspired science fairs and festivals organised in public squares, for instance: such initiatives are based on the line "If you don't come look for me, I will make myself almost impossible not to be noticed". The question is then: once you are indeed visible, will you be able to speak clearly, and will both parties understand each other? A sparkle that bursts communication is not overly complicated to generate. The point is: what follows the spark, and how?

I found a scanner... And other thoughts

First of all, good news: I have updated the image of the flowchart appearing in the previous post and it now looks much better! Victoire. :)

Today morning I found myself thinking about a topic that I've had in my mind for a while. I recognise two aspects to it: one is the "buy three and pay for two" kind of deal that is so popular here in the UK. The other involves "membership/priority/club/whatever-suggests-an-affiliation-with-benefits cards". I guess I could engage a lenghty discussion on both aspects, but I think I'll limit myself to a rather concise comment on the second one, at least for the time being.

When it comes to club cards, the choice is fairly binary: you either decide to get one or say "No, thank you" instead. Clearly both choices are pretty much reversible, but let's not think about this - let's say you've made up your mind. What I then find interesting is the following observation: both choices affect your actions as a customer, the difference being in the way they do so. If you've got a club card, you'll be likely to become a quite regular customer - that's what these cards are made for, aren't they? This is a rather clear influence on your daily/weekly life. Now let's suppose you haven't got a club card: then what happens is that you may feel you've got more freedom of choice - and you're right, in a way. So you'll go wherever is more convenient depending on your actual needs, thinking that there is no bias in your choice because you don't own any membership card. Yet it may also happen that, after a while, you realise that you do go to that same place over and over anyway, which means that you could have benefited from getting such a card. Hmm. What do you do then? You may finally change your mind and become part of the club, so to say. Or you may resist. But why would you do so? Just as a general protest against consumerism? Fair enough. Sometimes you'll maybe feel like you're losing the opportunity to get a deal and spare a little money, but at least you won't have given up on your position. Ultimately, I guess that my point goes back to the beginning of the paragraph: yes and no are indeed different answers, but both of them will change your perception of that environment. Thus the issue is in the initial question to the customer: I know this may sound a bit over the top, but it just appears as though the offer of a club card is, in a way,  an invasive action as it effectively influences individual behaviour. Where does this lead then? Perhaps to this: no matter what choice you make - keep thinking with your mind and, if necessary, well... Disobey. [Please note that the photo above is not mine - I found it on the Guardian website. If you don't know where the mask comes from, you may wish to check this link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V_for_Vendetta_(film)]

On a rather different note, I was coming back home tonight when I noticed a whole heap of Harley-Davidson motorbikes neatly parked on a significant portion of sidewalk. The scene in itself wasn't particularly eye-catching, but as I walked through this metallic assembly I felt a wave of heat coming from the vehicles and heard tickling and cracking sounds from the motors that were, I presume, still cooling down - the metal slowly readjusting its structure to the new temperature conditions. Cool. Immediately after this post-industrial observation I wondered whether I would have heard the bikers leaving whichever place they were at on that street. The answer came half an hour later - and it was yes, indeed you can. Rrrrroaaarrrrr. My reply, well, I guess it is contained in the photo shown below (which I took in Vienna). :)

On the field #1 - A performance in central Oxford

Today after lunch I went to Broad Street to have a look at a performance I had read about on the very nice website of Modern Art Oxford - "Musica Practica". For some more official information I would redirect you here: http://www.modernartoxford.org.uk/whats-on/musica-practica/about/

Here are a few photos I took at the beginning of the performance. I must admit, I was probably more interested in how passers-by would react to this unusual presence than in the performance itself. This said, it was fascinating to see how the conductor moved his arms and hands (and sometimes his entire body) - I have always thought that these are very graceful movements. I stayed around for half an hour and saw tourists taking photos as well as "locals" (what does this really mean in a town where there are so many students arriving from almost every part of the planet?) acting as if nothing was happening. Suddenly a man wearing a white shirt stepped in, clearly trying to establish a dialogue with the performer. I suspect that this person is the artist and writer who is mentioned on the website (see above); I am not entirely sure that his entrance was an advisable move. Then I took this photo with the two of them, conductor and spectator (or second performer?), and when I looked again at the picture (here the third one) I thought: this is pretty much how any form of communication or attempt for popularisation of a given topic works. Often the "expert" may be regarded as someone standing on a pedestal - therefore difficult to interact with.

 

Yet here comes a "translator", here represented by the man wearing the white shirt: I can imagine he stepped in to make the meaning of the performance clearer (he would pass in front of the conductor intentionally varying the pace of his walk) and show that communication is possible and successful. "If I open a channel with the conductor then these people who keep on staring at him - without even approaching sometimes - may also start trying to query and engage with the performer."

Of course there is no guarantee of success, just like when one learns a new language; when one attempts at testing their knowledge by interacting with native speakers the comunication may be difficult and at times not very satisfactory. Still it would be such a pity not to try!