Seriously! My headline isn’t hyperbole — that’s what linguists are arguing about. This isn’t like the age of the universe, with experts debating whether it’s 13.7 or 13.8 billion years old. Same thing, for most of us. This is a serious, tenfold difference of opinion. If you’re in the “continuity” camp, you believe that language […]
Barry Evans
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A Brief History of QR Codes
“I used to play Go on my lunch break. One day, while arranging the black and white pieces on the grid, it hit me that it represented a straightforward way of conveying information. It was a eureka moment.” — Masahiro Hara, quoted on Nippon.com, Feb. 10, 2020. If you’ve eaten out lately, you might have […]
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Make Friends, Live Longer
“… more than 20 percent of the adult population in America admits to struggling with loneliness. That’s more people than have diabetes in our country. That’s more than adults that smoke ….” Former U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy As everyone knows, the best way to stay healthy and live to a ripe old age is […]
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Of Photons and Cormorants
We were paddling on Stone Lagoon, cormorants in formation overhead, when out of the blue … “Hey, you know about science, right?” “A bit. I’m a science writer, not a scientist …” “Yeah, well. E = mc2, you know? Energy and mass?” “Um … OK.” “And photons don’t have any mass, right?” “Right.” “So if they’re […]
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The Two-Envelope Paradox
A lifetime ago — March 11, 2010 — I wrote in this space about a curious paradox I’d stumbled upon (“A Pair of Paradoxes”). It originated, near as I can tell, in a 1953 book by Belgian mathematician Maurice Kraitchik called Mathematical Recreations. Paraphrasing from my column: Over coffee, Alice and Bart decide on a […]
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NASA’s Origami Telescope (Part 2)
This is a continuation from last week, looking at arguably the most complex instrument ever created by humans: the James Webb Space Telescope. It’s scheduled for launch on Dec. 22, before being positioned in its operational orbit (L2) a million miles from Earth. During its month-long voyage to L2, it will unfold, origami-style, into its […]
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NASA’s Origami Telescope (Part 1)
The scheduled Dec. 22 launch of the James Webb Space Telescope from French Guiana will be the culmination of a quarter-century of designing, building and testing the most complicated thing ever built by humans. Webb, 25 years in the making, will succeed Hubble as NASA’s flagship project. Before reading more, I encourage you to check […]
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Voices from the Past
“Oh how much I want you at my birthday party. You’ll make the day so much more fun. I do hope you can make it.” — Letter from Claudia Severa to her sister Sulicia Lepidina, wife of Flavius Cerialis, prefect of a cohort stationed at Vindolanda fort, circa A.D. 100. This birthday invitation, written on […]
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Every (Oxygenized) Breath You Take
If you’ve seen those heart-wrenching photos from India of long lines of people waiting to get oxygen cylinders refilled, you’ll appreciate the benefit of personal, portable, oxygen concentrators. Especially during the COVID crisis, oxygen is at a premium. SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes Covid-19, reduces the ability of cells lining the lungs from functioning as […]
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Don’t Shoot the Physicist!
Today, hundreds, if not thousands, of theoretical physicists the world over are trying to find the holy grail of physics, a “theory of everything” (or TOE for short) that explains and links together all physical aspects of the universe. More concretely, a successful TOE would connect the two theories on which all physics depends: general […]
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One Second a Year
I imagine Socrates and Plato running into each other in the market. Socrates says, “Hey, wanna join me and the boys tomorrow after lunch in the forum? I feel a dialogue coming on.” Plato says, “Love to! When did you say?” Socrates gives him a look. “I just told you. After lunch.” Which was good […]
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The Quartz Crisis
The “quartz crisis” began in Tokyo on Christmas Day in 1969 when Seiko unveiled the world’s first quartz watch, the Astron 35SQ. Designed by Kazunari Sasaki of Suwa Seiko-sha, the Astron achieved 100 times the accuracy of a regular mechanical watch by using a vibrating quartz crystal instead of a balance wheel for time keeping. […]