| The Tale of The Engineer & The Professor |
[20091120|15:48] |
The Engineer & The Professor
I'd like to introduce you all to someone. He's the smiling chap on the left. His name is Trevor Beek and I work with him in the magnetometer lab at Imperial.
I recently read a section in CP Snow's The Two Cultures, a transcription of his 1959 Rede lecture at Cambridge, which reminds me of Trevor. Snow mainly intended to illustrate humanities' and sciences' understanding - or as he saw it, lack thereof - of one another. This paragraph draws attention to a different set of attitudes that I'm sorry to say still prevails in academic society.
"Pure scientists have by and large been dim-witted about engineers and applied science. They couldn't get interested. They wouldn't recognize that many of the problems were as intellectually exacting as pure problems and that many of the solutions were as satisfying and beautiful. Their instinct - perhaps sharpened in this country by the passion to find a new snobbism wherever possible, and to invent one if it doesn't exist - was to take it for granted that applied science was an occupation for second-rate minds. I say this more sharply because thirty years ago I took precisely that line myself. The climate of thought of young research workers in Cambridge then was not to our credit. We prided ourselves that the science we were doing could not, in any conceivable circumstances, have any practical use. The more firmly one could make that claim, the more superior one felt."
By these standards, Trevor is not a very important man. But one person who certainly doesn't hold such an arrogant and ill-conceived opinion about the nature of engineering is the man on the right, Professor Andre Balogh. Trevor has spent 44 of Prof. Balogh's 45 years working with him at Imperial. Trevor has had a hand in building every instrument that has gone into space and been used by the Space Physics group. When he solders a component to a breadboard, it does exactly what it's supposed to do. There are bits of his electronics handiwork orbiting an alarmingly high number of the bodies in our solar system. As an ex-colleague was fond of saying, if the aliens ever decide to clone humans from the cells they find aboard our spacecraft, the probability that they'll generate Trevor is rather high.
It continues to amaze me that there are postgraduate students and postdocs in our group who go through the three or four years of their PhDs or fellowships, using the data that would not exist without him, and don't know who Trevor is. One of the best things about him is that he sincerely doesn't care. I recently heard him say, "I'm the guy in the background. Nobody knows who I am and that's the way I like it." This is a man who has 787 scientific citations to his name. Seven hundred and eighty-seven. That is a number which a good many researchers would happily give up a kidney to have. Again, he doesn't care. It's not important. If there were a Coolness Factor (like an inverse Impact Factor) for academic achievement, the top of the scale would be measured by Trevor Beek. He loves his unassuming life, sitting with his colleagues at lunchtime, talking about old Bond films and giving advice on the best fish to put in your garden pond.
Although he could retire this year, he's just reducing his hours. Like most people who enjoy their work, he doesn't really want to retire yet. I expect to raise a glass of whisky with him many more times before he goes. And if you have a drink or three this weekend, I hope you'll give a little wave in London's direction in honour of this creative, productive engineer who's used his life's work to make it possible to conduct science research in space. |
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| My boys |
[20091117|17:14] |
What chance has a girl got against the onslaught of six naughty hazel eyes?
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| What's really important, though, is that I made apple crumble today. |
[20091115|22:52] |
I'm intrigued at the way my reading habits have evolved over the past few years. I used to be an avid re-reader. I own books whose re-read counts approach or surpass double digits, most of which are fiction (either novels or collections of short stories). I would also rarely fail to finish a book, even if I hated it.
Now, however, I read a good deal more non-fiction that isn't just science articles. I'm also very choosy about the fiction I read. If something fails to grip me, it goes to the charity shop without any sense of guilt or agonizing over my inability to appreciate it.
Below the cut are the books I've read since I started commuting from Cambridge to London at the end of July. Not a single one is a re-read.
( 25 )
I could probably have gotten through more if I didn't mix in the New Scientist, the Economist and the more than occasional guilty indulgence in sudoku & crosswords. However, I think my Christmas present to myself might be a re-reading of the David Eddings series The Belgariad, which I adored when I was twelve but hardly qualifies as Nobel-prize winning literature. |
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| BEER |
[20091110|17:44] |
I did physics on the train to work.
Then I got to work and did physics.
I had a meeting about physics.
I had lunch, during which physics was discussed.
I had another meeting about physics.
Then I taught physics in lab for 3.5 hours.
Poll #1483484 Physics or beer?
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 26What do you think I need now? |
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| Bonfire night & mulled wine |
[20091106|14:39] |
I knew it was coming, but it was still a slight shock last night when I had my first real pang of homesickness for life in London. Oh, I know I still work here, but commuting isn't the same thing.
The bloke and I decided to help a friend prepare for a lectureship interview today by running a mock interview last night and critiquing his presentation. I don't begrudge him this attention, as we'd all like to see him get this job. As I hurried home from the station, I saw some neighbourhood Bonfire Night fireworks above the roofs of the houses. I suddenly wished very much that I were in London, jammed into a pub with a dozen acquaintances, excitedly pouring mulled wine down my throat to insulate me against the cold before going to a park to watch the Guy burn.
I did get to have the mulled wine. I like the stuff I make best anyway. It goes like this. Start at least an hour before you want to drink it. Then, over the lowest possible heat - you don't want to boil the wine - mix the following:
- 1 bottle nice rich red wine (I favour chianti but merlot was fine last night. Thank you M&S.)
- 1 lemon, sliced into rough chunks
- 2 oranges, likewise
- 1 cinnamon stick
- 1 cup sugar (Can be adjusted for taste. I like mine pretty sweet.)
- some cloves
- ground cinnamon
- freshly grated nutmeg
- allspice
- splash of brandy, sherry or other sweet strong liqueur (I used the last of our previous year's homemade sloe gin)
Stir periodically. The longer you can bear to let it sit and heat slowly, the better it'll taste. When you can stand it no longer, make 2 cups of peppermint tea and add it to the mulled wine. Spoon into wine glasses as if it were punch. Nom. |
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| Boffoonery for Bletchley Park |
[20091104|11:51] |
I have now seen Simon Singh speak twice in the space of two weeks. I didn't know he was going to be at last night's charity comedic nerditry event "Boffoonery", in aid of Bletchley Park, at the Bloomsbury Theatre beforehand, though. So I think that means I am definitely not a Loony Fangirl. Nope.
For those of you who don't know, Simon Singh is a particle physicist turned popular science writer who has written such fascinating epistles (no, I'm not being sarcastic) as Fermat's Last Theorem and The Code Book. He is also a dynamic and incredibly articulate speaker. Last Monday, the deliciously cerebral mathmo ![[info - personal]](http://s.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png) happydork and I met upstairs at the Blue Posts pub in Piccadilly to hear him discuss his latest book Trick or Treatment, which is about alternative medicine, with the Science London book club. Much to our surprise, we found we were part of an audience of only 40-odd people, and thus nearly everyone who wanted to do so got to ask a question and engage him in dialogue.
Of course, we had to have the following discussion at the end.
![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) nanila: "Oh, you've taken notes!"
happydork: "Yes. I wasn't going to so I didn't bring my notebook, but..." She holds up a heavily annotated bus ticket.
nanila: "That settles it. You're blogging this."
And she wrote up the evening beautifully. I recommend that you read about it here.
Last night, Dr Singh opened "Boffoonery" with fabulous demonstrations of the perils of believing in pseudocode by finding signs and portents of Princess Diana's death in Moby Dick, and of the Enigma encoding machine that was cracked at Bletchley Park by Alan Turing & friends during the WWII. This was by far the most geekcore moment of the entire evening, which was good because the two pints on an empty stomach had kicked in completely by the time Hugh Dennis (yes, the one from "Mock the Week"), Robin Ince and Robert Llewellyn (better known as Red Dwarf's Kryten) appeared to make bad puns about computing and cryptography. Additionally, Maggie Philbin, Richard Herring, Robin Ince and Johnny Ball competed in the first and last ever Bletchley Park-themed quiz show, scored in binary. Johnny Ball explaining the Königsberg bridge problem with flourishes of green marker pen while strands of white hair waved energetically about his head is a sight I shall not soon forget.
Next week, I plan to attend a symposium in memory of Harry Elliott, FRS, a debate on human spaceflight run by the astrophysics group, and the Jay Reatard show. If Simon Singh appears at any of those, I shall be quite surprised. |
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| It's good catch, that Catch-22 |
[20091102|11:20] |
There have been developments in the ongoing saga of my quest to renew my visa. No wait, don't scroll to the next entry on your friends page! This is worth reading, if only for the element of schadenfreude.
Due to various bits of administrative faffing, I had to delay submission of my renewal forms. This means that it is getting rather uncomfortably close to the date of my visa's expiry. So I sought to make an in-person application. It's more expensive, but you get the visa that day and so it is guaranteed to happen before your current visa expires.
That is, assuming you can get an appointment.
I tried every office (Croydon/London, Sheffield, Birmingham, Glasgow, Liverpool, Cardiff) through the online booking system, repeatedly. None of them have appointments available. Please note also that some of these places are a good five-hour journey from both my place of residence and my work. I phoned UKBA, who informed me that every appointment at every office is booked through 31 December.
The really beautiful thing about this is that you are not allowed to renew your visa until within 5 weeks of its expiry date. Hence, by the time you're ready to submit your application, it is impossible to get an appointment.
The icing on the cake was finding out that since I filled out my form, it's changed. So I have to print out the whole 75 page application and fill it out again. |
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| Mr. Sandman, bring me a dream (part 1 of 2) |
[20091031|18:41] |
On Thursday night, imyril, dizzykj and I went to watch Ben Haggerty tell seasonally appropriate tales at the Barbican pit theatre. I enjoyed it so much I wrote them up on the train home, and I want to share them with you this Halloween night.
Ben began on a plane to Jonesborough, Tennessee, heading for a storytelling convention. A dashing devil in a cowboy hat tricked him into stretching out across Row 13, reserved for the absent Mississippi Moondoggies. The weather turned bad, forcing the plane to divert to a city in Georgia. Ben noticed a funfair during the bus trip to his hotel and walked to it after checking in, much to the consternation of the receptionist. He played a shooting gallery game, hitting an unprecedented nine out of 10 targets and winning a lucky silver-plated left hind rabbit paw (shot by a cross-eyed man on a moonlight night). He slipped the paw into his pocket and wandered on.
He felt drawn, guilt-ridden, to the sideshow, outlawed in his country. For a mere $5, he could purchase the privilege of viewing ten exhibits through ten doors. The first, he was told by the carnie barker, was something English for an Englishman. A lord found himself a lady at an American beauty pageant while playing away from home. He took her to the sideshow, where he was hypnotised by the expert sideshow performer Marcello. Since the lord had a laugh like a donkey, the lady told Marcello to turn him into one. The lord's braying amused her briefly, but she wanted something else. She told Marcello to turn him into a rabbit, as he'd been after her like one. He did. As the lord hopped about the stage, Marcello dropped dead of a heart attack. No one could snap the Englishman out of his trance.
Having viewed the unfortunate man, Ben remarked dubiously that it could be any old bloke pretending to be a rabbit. Ah, said the carnie man. ( Consider Door 2! ) |
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| Dr Bones, ? - 28 October 2009 |
[20091028|20:49] |
Many moons ago, Marco and I went to get a coffee after a rock-climbing trip. On the way out of Peet's, he was adopted on the pavement by a large grey cat of indeterminate age. Said cat spent a number of happy years with us in San Diego and Los Angeles. When it came time to move to London, he had to stay behind with my parents and my own cat, Molly.
Two years ago, he was diagnosed with 25% kidney function and given two months to live. Typically, the irascible grey cat was having none of that and continued to dominate my parents shamelessly.
Four days ago, he stopped eating and drinking. Today, my parents made the difficult decision to take him to the vet.
Good night, Dr Bones
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