Orange, Silver, and Black: The High Contrast Office. By brock2621, via Lifehacker.
- Phony Colors? Or Just Misunderstood? | Spitzer
A nice piece by Robert Hurt, one of astronomy’s premier visualizers, on the validity of “representative color” images. I particularly like the language translation analogy. Let’s rid our language of the misleading term “false color” and use “representative color” instead. - Telescopes don't make catalogues! | arxiv.org
“Here we advocate making catalogue-like data outputs that permit investigators to test hypotheses with almost the power of the original image pixels. The key is to provide users with approximations to likelihood tests against the raw image pixels.” - Have We Reached a Maximum Astronomical Research Output? | PASP
“We conclude that the astronomical research rates in [the US, UK, France, Germany, Italy, and the Netherlands] have not yet reached a maximum.” - From Stone Age to Space Age | IAU
The UNESCO World Heritage Committee has endorsed a thematic study on the Heritage Sites of Astronomy and Archaeoastronomy. “It presents an overall vision of astronomical heritage and attempts to identify some of the most outstanding examples that are of significance to everyone. The report details the main characteristics we should expect from an astronomical heritage site, and compares this to a representative sample of major heritage sites for astronomy around the world.” IAU working group website. (via astronomyblog)
Astro
- Swimming against the unseen tide | Physics World
“The results we found are consistent with the theory that people have implicit beliefs that associate different genders with different aptitudes and predilections. Even people who consciously believe in gender equality cannot suppress these automatic associations.” (Free, but registration required. Or usr: alphabeta, pswd: gammadelta)
Diversity and Equity
- 5 Lecturecasting Tools That I Can't Live Without (and Why) | ProfHacker
Is anybody “lecturecasting” their astronomy or physics courses?
Teaching
- 7 Simple Ways To Say “No” | Zen Habits
I also think it takes practice! Practicing saying no to easy things (speaking to the local amateurs, non-relevant referee request, for example) as a grad student and postdoc will make saying no to bigger commitments (review panels, committee work) much easier later on. Practice, practice, practice. - 20 Strategies to Defeat the Urge to Do Useless Tasks | Zen Habits
- The best goal is no goal | Zen Habits
Not something you hear very often…but probably helpful advice for some people. - Strategies for seeing clutter | Unclutterer
Productivity