I've been privileged enough to see astronaut Don Petit speak in person about life on the Internal Space Station. Check out this great short film by Christoph Malin that really gives a sense of what it feels like to have the Earth below your feet.
Source: Christoph Malin, via Slate
I had the Big Wheel ...
Couldn't get the Power Wheels ...
Forbidden Tech is my video series where I talk about pieces of technology that I was not allowed to have as a kid, scarring me forever. Check out the earlier Forbidden Tech videos here.
I wanted Power Wheels so bad! I could traverse the terrain of my neighborhood fairly easily with my Big Wheel, but I wasn't rocking in style. Funny thing is, I don't remember seeing many kids in my neighborhood with Power Wheels at all, but that commercial (Pow-pow-power wheels) was the best branding of that time. The song is still stuck in my head.
How do Power Wheels work? A simple rechargeable 12V battery provides power to turn the wheels when a kid presses on the accelerator. Yeah, I definitely wasn't getting one of those.
Check out my video on this - if you can't see it, click here.
Today is International Women's Day, and we should all celebrate the wonderful women that have made impacts in our lives. Google has an amazing doodle on its homepage to serve as a great launching point. But y'all know that I'm all about the math and science, and making sure that everyone gets into it.
Well, everyone except "math is tough" Barbie:
I ran into that video while reading about the stereotype of gender issues between men and women. I've often heard that men are better at math, and it becomes a bit of a self fufilling prophecy when I hear some of the women that I tutor repeat this myth. What boggles the mind is that some of these women repeat it even when they are damned good at math.
An interesting piece of data that comes out of the story is that we focus so much on tests, even though tests don't necessarily reflect classroom performance. We all know that women are beginning to dominate college, and I remember my advanced math and science classes in high school containing men and women. Despite that, repeatedly hearing "women can't do math or science" does have an effect, and at times can be a self fulfilling prophecy. I've tutored women that are stellar in math, yet still believe that they are not.
Also, there's this:
Math aptitude (even measured at the levels of outstanding instead of average performance) doesn’t explain sex disparities in science careers (most of which, incidentally, only require you to be pretty good at math, as opposed to wildly genius at it). In any case, scoring high in math is only loosely related to who opts for a scientific career, especially for girls. Many high scoring girls don’t go into science, and many poor scoring boys do.
This is key - you only need to be proficient at math and problem solving to be successful in a technical career. You don't need to be AMAZING at it unless you want to be a theorist or go for the PhD.
Let's celebrate International Women's Day by making sure that math and science reflect the diversity of the world!
A few of us got together in a Google+ hangout to talk about the intersection between science, race & media. We filmed the video below as a response to a Loop21 Twitter chat on race & media in which there was very little discussion about science.
The group features Dr. Caleph B. Wilson, Dr. Danielle N. Lee, journalist Jamila Bey, and myself. Unofficially known as the Dark Sci, we plan on pushing the conversation forward regarding the communication of science to a broader audience.
Chilling with the Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 (10.1"), a great tablet with mobile wifi to boot.
Starbucks. Amtrak. Barnes & Noble. All of these place offer the promise of free WiFi so that customers can freely browse questionable internet sites at their leisure. However, what always happens? The signal is crappy! Too many people are on it! It's too slooowwwww.
One way to get around this is to carry around your own WiFi signal. Most cell phone and tablet devices such as the Apple iPad or the Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 (10.1") pictured above contain an option that allows the device to broadcast its own WiFi signal. Confusingly, this can be called different things - Apple calls it Personal Hotspot, Verizon calls it Mobile Hotspot, and Windows Phone calls it Internet Sharing.
This may be an additional charge to enable mobile WiFi - AT&T charges me an extra $20/mo for my iPhone to share a WiFi signal. The price is worth it when I'm stuck somewhere with a crappy WiFi signal and I need to get work done. However, it WILL eat up your battery and drive up your data usage and potentially cost even more, especially if you're connecting using your laptop and visiting data heavy sites such as YouTube and Netflix. I've definitely been hit up with a bill that was significantly higher than I was used to because I didn't watch my data consumption.
BrothaTech also has a great piece on mobile hotspots last year - check that out by clicking here.
