Corante: technology, business, media, law, and culture news from the blogosphere
OUR PUBLICATIONS:
Corante is a trusted, unbiased source on technology, business, law, science, and culture that’s authored by leading commentators and thinkers in their respective fields. Corante also produces premium conferences and publications that help decision-makers better understand their industries and the world around them.
Corante Blogs
Corante Blogs examine, through the eyes of leading observers, analysts, thinkers, and doers, critical themes and memes in technology, business, law, science, and culture.
Vin Crosbie, on the challenges, financial and otherwise, that newspaper publishers are facing: "The real problem, Mr. Newspaperman, isn't that your content isn't online or isn't online with multimedia. It's your content. Specifically, it's what you report, which stories you publish, and how you publish them to people, who, by the way, have very different individual interests. The problem is the content you're giving them, stupid; not the platform its on."
by Vin Crosbie in Rebuilding Media
There's a problem in the drug industry that people have recognized for some years, but we're not that much closer to dealing with it than we were then. We keep coming up with these technologies and techniques which seem as if they might be able to help us with some of our nastiest problems - I'm talking about genomics in all its guises, and metabolic profiling, and naturally the various high-throughput screening platforms, and others. But whether these are helping or not (and opinions sure do vary), one thing that they all have in common is that they generate enormous heaps of data.
by Derek Lowe in In the Pipeline
Now that the Web labor market is saturated and Web design a static profession, it's not surprising that 'user experience' designers and researchers who've spent their careers online are looking for new worlds to conquer. Some are returning to the “old media” as directors and producers. More are now doing offline consulting (service experience design, social policy design, exhibition design, and so on) under the 'user experience' aegis. They argue that the lessons they've learned on the Web can be applied to phenomena in the physical and social worlds. But there are enormous differences...
by Bob Jacobson in Total Experience
Clay Shirky, in deconstructing Second Life hype: "Second Life is heading towards two million users. Except it isn’t, really... I suspect Second Life is largely a 'Try Me' virus, where reports of a strange and wonderful new thing draw the masses to log in and try it, but whose ability to retain anything but a fraction of those users is limited. The pattern of a Try Me virus is a rapid spread of first time users, most of whom drop out quickly, with most of the dropouts becoming immune to later use."
by Clay Shirky in Many-to-Many
Over the last few years we've seen old barriers to creativity coming down, one after the other. New technologies and services makes it trivial to publish text, whether by blog or by print-on-demand. Digital photography has democratised a previously expensive hobby. And we're seeing the barriers to movie-making crumble, with affordable high-quality cameras and video hosting provided by YouTube or Google Video and their ilk... Music making has long been easy for anyone to engage in, but technology has made high-quality recording possible without specialised equipment, and the internet has revolutionised distribution, drastically disintermediating the music industry... What's left? Software maybe? Or maybe not."
by Suw Charman in Strange Attractor
Derek Lowe on the news that the Nobel Prize for medicine has gone to Craig Mello and Andrew Fire for their breakthrough work: "RNA interference is probably going to have a long climb before it starts curing many diseases, because many of those problems are even tougher than usual in its case. That doesn't take away from the discovery, though, any more than the complications of off-target effects take away from it when you talk about RNAi's research uses in cell culture. The fact that RNA interference is trickier than it first looked, in vivo or in vitro, is only to be expected. What breakthrough isn't?"
by Derek Lowe in In the Pipeline
Andrew Phelps: "Recently my WoW guild has been having a bit of a debate on the merits of Player-vs.-Player (PvP) within Azeroth. My personal opinion on this is that PvP has its merits, and can be incredible fun, but the system within WoW is horridly, horribly broken. It takes into account the concept of the battle, but battle without consequence, without emotive context, and most importantly, without honor..."
From later in the piece: "When I talk about this with people (thus far anyway) I typically get one of two responses, either 'yeah, right on!' or 'hey, it’s war, and war isn’t honorable – grow the hell up'. There is a lot to be said for that argument – but the problem is that war in the real historical world has very different constraints that are utterly absent from fantasized worlds..."
by Andrew Phelps in Got Game
Derek Lowe: "So, you're developing a drug candidate. You've settled on what looks like a good compound - it has the activity you want in your mouse model of the disease, it's not too hard to make, and it's not toxic. Everything looks fine. Except. . .one slight problem. Although the compound has good blood levels in the mouse and in the dog, in rats it's terrible. For some reason, it just doesn't get up there. Probably some foul metabolic pathway peculiar to rats (whose innards are adapted, after all, for dealing with every kind of garbage that comes along). So, is this a problem?.."
by Derek Lowe in In the Pipeline
Bob Jacobson, on shopping at his local Albertsons supermarket where he had "one of the worst customer experiences" of his life: "Say what you will about the Safeway chain or the Birkenstock billionaires who charge through the roof for Whole Foods' organic fare, they know how to create shopping environments that create a more pleasurable experience, at its best (as at Whole Foods) quite enjoyable. Even the warehouses like Costco and its smaller counterpart, Smart & Final, do just fine: they have no pretentions, but neither do they dump virtual garbage on the consumer merely to create another trivial revenue stream, all for the sake of promotions in the marketing department..."
by Strange Attractor in Total Experience
Kevin Anderson: "First off, I want to say that I really admire the ambition of the Guardian Unlimited’s Comment is Free. It is one of the boldest statements made by any media company that participation needs to be central to a radical revamp of traditional content strategies... It is, therfore, not hugely surprising to find that Comment is Free is having a few teething troubles..."
by Kevin Anderson in strange
Corante Developments
Here you will find the latest news from Corante including updates on upcoming events, new initiatives, product and publication launches, and more.
It was with shock that I returned home from a night out last night to hear the news of Russell's passing. How terribly, terribly sad. Most of all for him, as he'd seemed buoyant, healthier, and content when I'd last seen him several months ago when he was in town - he was happy that work was busy and rewarding and was having fun with it but most of all was thrilled about how things were going with his girlfriend, Ellen.
I've known Russ for what seems like ages now (in a good way) though in fact it's only been about six or seven years since the early days of "commercial" blogging when he started working on various projects at and around Corante. He was a diligent, committed, and prolific journalist who had impressively and more ably than others been able to make the transition from the old-school way of doing things to the new. He had his quirks, as we all do, but I greatly valued that he was good-natured, collegial, reliable, quick to adopt, trustworthy, eager to learn, and earnest in his interest in helping others better understand what he wrote about.
He was also, it should be said, a kind and thoughtful soul and it was the rare conversation in which he didn't ask, with sincerity, about what he knew of my life, e.g. our new babe, and we didn't talk as seemingly old friends about our lives and respective paths. I can't say I knew him very well, of course, but in our half-dozen get-togethers over the years and dozens of conversations I got a good sense of the man: he cared about learning and sharing and his bearing was earnest and ego-less and we'll miss him for that and more.
We wanted to let you know about a discount to New Comm Forum, the annual event event put on by our friends at the Society for New Communications Research. The conference, which runs from April 22-25, will feature many of the field's leading observers and is an important event for those looking, in the words of SNCR, to "better understand new communications tools, technologies and emerging modes of communication, and their effect on traditional media, professional communications, business, culture and society."
Check out the event's website and, if you're interested in attending, be sure to use the code supplied below for a special discount.
EARLY BIRD PRICING - NOW UNTIL FEB. 15th
NewComm Forum Conference - $995.
Pre-conference or post-conference session - $195.
SNCR Jam only - $75.
REGULAR PRICING - AFTER FEB. 15th
NewComm Forum Conference - $1095.
Pre-conference or post-conference session - $249.
SNCR Jam only - $75.
CORANTE READER DISCOUNTS
NewComm Forum Conference - save an additional $100
Use discount code: NCF08100
Pre-conference or post-conference session - save an additional $45.
Use discount code: NCF0845
We've been remiss in letting you know about two new independent blogs we've helped launch in the past month or so.
The first - the ConversationHub - is a companion blog to Supernova 2007, the latest edition of Kevin Werbach's excellent conference on all things connected. As the conference site says: "Supernova examines the effects of an increasingly connected world on business, life, and public policy. As disparate physical and social networks link with one another, a new societal network is rapidly evolving... The New Network is greater than the sum of its parts. It challenges us to re-create everything from the software and hardware we use...to the business models we employ...to the information and entertainment we encounter...to the ways we work and play."
Visit the ConversationHub and you'll find several dozen leading thinkers and doers, led by a few notable ringleaders, weighing in on the themes and trends of the day in technology and business. We encourage you to tune in - feel free to comment and even suggest topics and ideas for posts.
The second blog - Mobile Messaging 2.0 - convenes about a dozen top observers of the mobile messaging space for an intense discussion of the industry and where it's headed. Among its contributors are leading commentators, journalists and players in the field - tune in and you'll find them touching on topics such as mobile device design, messaging platforms, market pressures, user-generated content, interface design, and much, much more.
Also, if you visit the site, which is sponsored by Airwide Solutions, this week, you'll find live coverage and commentary from Global Messaging 2007, to which several of our contributors have traveled to hear about the latest developments from a broad spectrum of the industry's players and providers.
Be sure to catch the Office 2.0 Conference and hear from and engage with leading thinkers and doers in this exciting new market. Find out more here and be sure to use the code "GLDRK" for a special discount for Corante readers.
In the Pipeline: Don't miss Derek Lowe's excellent commentary on drug discovery and the pharma industry in general at In the Pipeline
"I see no reason why students should not be exposed to all theories, recognizing that Darwin's theory's certainly one that is generally accepted in most of the scientific community. I think it's not inappropriate to say there are also people who believe this. Let the student decide." [Emphasis mine]
Okay students, we've spent our science class this year learning all theories about the universe. We've learned about astrology, about the creation tales of the Scythians, and we had a special visit from Mr. Peterson who has been trying to create his own universe in his garage with tin foil and a magnifying lens. I know some of you were not happy that we had to squeeze all of modern astronomy into a ten-minute survey, but it's hard to fit all theories into a year. But don't worry about your exam. See, here it is--just one question: "Which theory do you decide is right? Don't bother to explain why."
2. Jeb Bush's Secret:
The governor of Florida has proven hiimself a real pro at hemming and hawing about evolution. In the wake of the Dover decision, Bush was asked by the Miami Herald whether he believes in the theory of evolution.
`Yeah, but I don't think it should actually be part of the curriculum, to be honest with you. And people have different points of view and they can be discussed at school, but it does not need to be in the curriculum.''
Okay, students, today we're going to learn about evolution. Since we couldn't learn about it at school, we've come to the governor's mansion. Remember, this is all off the record.
Surely Jeb Bush makes perfect sense -- he doesn't think that poor people should know anything. He doesn't care what they think. If you're not smart enough to figure out what the rich people believe is true, to hell with you.
To a certain sort of right winger, the creationist dispute must look like a lottery they get to always win. It's a tax on stupidity, and the winnings go to republicans.
I wonder if McCain would like for students in government/civics classes to decide for themselves whether torturing P.O.W.s is morally acceptable, or for students in history classes to decide for themselves whether the Holocaust happened.
3. Jos ngel on December 30, 2005 01:44 AM writes...
Correction: Should the FACT of evolution be taught at schools?
`Yeah, but I don't think it should actually be part of the curriculum, to be honest with you..''
So many facts are disturbing... let's invent, and teach, something more pleasant and orthodox! After all, the purpose of education is to manufacture the kind of citizens we want to have, and those don't need to know about the FACTS.
4. Tambosi on December 30, 2005 06:21 PM writes...
Jornalismo e ciência
Quem gosta de temas ligados às ciências tem mais um blog à disposição. Trata-se de The Loom, de Carl Zimmer, jornalista norte-americano que publicou vários livros de divulgação científica e escreve regularmente no New York Times e nas revistas National Geographic, Science, Newsweek e Discover, da qual é um dos editores.Entre os muitos prêmios que já ganhou por seu trabalho destaca-se o Science Journalism Award de 2004, da American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS).
Alguns de seus livros já foram traduzidos no Brasil: À beira d’água (macroevolução e a transformação da vida), Rio de Janeiro, Zahar, 1998; A fantástica história do cérebro, Rio de Janeiro, Campus, 2004; O livro de ouro da evolução, Rio de Janeiro, Ediouro, 2005. Sua obra mais recente, ainda não traduzida por aqui, é Smithsonian Intimate Guide to Human Origins, Collins Publishers, 2005. Agradeço a indicação do blog (que passa a figurar na lista de links) ao jornalista Maurício Tuffani, que também virou blogueiro (ver Laudas Críticas).
7. Blaine Vincent, Jr. on February 14, 2006 05:03 AM writes...
I agree with "Tree" (commenting Feb. 12). "Postmodern" most appropriately refers to the emergence of a number of historiographers & philosophers of science, such as Karl Popper and Thomas Kuhn, followed a little later by a growing number of sociologists of science, all since the second half of the 20th century. It's become a wide spectrum of thinkers, but no matter how one regards some of the contributions emerging from, say, the more recent French philosophers in this movement -- it is not correct to include the antievolutionists ("teach the controversy") as part of the postmodern movement. The fundamentally religious agenda underlying those who reflexively challenge any teaching that seems inconsistent with their literal reading of the Bible is at least as old as the 16th century and comes mainly from the opposite end of the political spectrum as well. Confounding the creationist/ID reaction as part of the postmodern intellectual movement unfortunately tends to elevate and dignify the intellectual support of what to many of us evolutionists consider is the traditional religious/political chanllenge to the primacy of science in society. Yes, please, Carl Zimmer, don't label the antievolutionist reflex as postmodern.
8. Steviepinhead on February 14, 2006 01:14 PM writes...
The original driving motive beneath the relentless attacks on evolution may be "religious" (though I suspect at base it's something more like a deep insecurity), and the "critiques" of evolutionary science may all be endlessly-recycled canards, but that hasn't kept the creationists from "exapting" techniques that sure smell of the worst excesses of post-modernist thought.
These include the use of a post-modernist sociologist (?) as a defense expert in the Dover trial, and a more generalized anti-science criticism that chimes these tones: the observations, facts, and evidence upon which science bases its "theories" (deliberately emphasizing all the ambiguities inherent in that much-abused term) are no more entitled to "belief" than the subjective opinions of believers--perhaps even less entitled to credence, since they are merely reports from the "fallen" and error-prone physical senses, as opposed to the direct divine revelations that supposedly underlie the holy book and the "born again" experiences of believers. (The consensus, error-checking methods of science are of course either misunderstood or deliberately overlooked, and any available "fraud" or "hoax" by "scientists" is played for maximum shock and awe, no matter how much these isolated incidents underscore the veracity of science as a whole.)
In short, the creationists have now begun to embrace a broad "po-mo" how-do-we-know-what-we-claim-to-know, it's-all-biased-and-subjective, it's-not-real-but-an-artifact-of-an-institutional-mindset, blah-blah-blah, yadda-yadda approach, in addition to all their other shopworn tactics.
There is a place where the more extreme idiots of right and left meet ("where's this place called Lonely Street?").
I don't disagree that at least some of the thinkers who tend to be grouped loosely as post-modernists have something to offer the rest of us. But if they don't want the creationists to further tar their bedraggled plumage, then they too need to speak out against these anti-science, anti-reality morons.
At the end of my school years I was told by the teacher that Darwin's theory was not the only one (other theories were not even mentioned in the programm) and I think that I had the right to know that while at school.
10. Steviepinhead on February 16, 2006 08:41 PM writes...
So, Sonia, what ARE these "other" theories that you now believe you should have been told about earlier?
What different choices in your life--or just in your schooling--do you think you have made if your teacher had exposed you to these "other" theories? Are you saying that your intellectual development or your development as a person has been somehow stunted or delayed as a result of not hearing about these other theories earlier? Is there anything preventing you from now learning more about their pros (if any) and cons?
I notice that you haven't stated that any of these "other" theories are accepted as science. Do you understand the scientifid method and the manner in which scientists develop and test hypotheses about the observations they make? Did you do any research, after you were told about these so-called other theories, to see if they had any evidentiary support, were accepted by the vast majority of scientists, and so forth? If so, what did you learn?
Have you heard any news or learned anything from your further research about how these other theories have fared in court (for example, in the Dover case)? Or how they have fared when considered by state curriculum bodies (as in the recent decision by the Ohio curriculum board)? What is your understanding of why these decisions were reached?
With all due respect (and I am interested in your responses), you haven't given us very much to go on here--you haven't even told us what these other theories are!
I'm really sory for the previous post where I didn't explain clearly what I ment. Here is an example of what I was talking about:
"The newly-discovered Sahelanthropus tchadensis fossil, another ape species that lived 2 million years before Australopithecus, is actually more "human-like" according to evolutionary criteria. In other words, it demolishes the "evolutionary scheme."
The essence of the matter is this: there are a large number of very different ape species that once lived in the past and are now extinct. The skull or skeletal structures of some of these show similarities to those of man. Yet those similarities do not mean that these creatures have any relationship to man. Evolutionists line up the skulls from these extinct species in a manner required by their theory and try to come up with "a ladder from ape to man." Yet the deeper research into the subject goes, the more it is realized that there is no such ladder, rather different species of ape lived at different times in the past.
Moreover, it emerges that man came about all of a sudden, with no evolutionary process behind him. In other words, that he was created."
In my post I just wanted to say that very often at school they give us an information pretending that it's the universal truth not expecting any discussion or searching for other points of view.
Corante: technology, business, media, law, and culture news from the blogosphere
OUR PUBLICATIONS:
Corante is a trusted, unbiased source on technology, business, law, science, and culture that’s authored by leading commentators and thinkers in their respective fields. Corante also produces premium conferences and publications that help decision-makers better understand their industries and the world around them.
Corante Blogs
Corante Blogs examine, through the eyes of leading observers, analysts, thinkers, and doers, critical themes and memes in technology, business, law, science, and culture.
Vin Crosbie, on the challenges, financial and otherwise, that newspaper publishers are facing: "The real problem, Mr. Newspaperman, isn't that your content isn't online or isn't online with multimedia. It's your content. Specifically, it's what you report, which stories you publish, and how you publish them to people, who, by the way, have very different individual interests. The problem is the content you're giving them, stupid; not the platform its on."
by Vin Crosbie in Rebuilding Media
There's a problem in the drug industry that people have recognized for some years, but we're not that much closer to dealing with it than we were then. We keep coming up with these technologies and techniques which seem as if they might be able to help us with some of our nastiest problems - I'm talking about genomics in all its guises, and metabolic profiling, and naturally the various high-throughput screening platforms, and others. But whether these are helping or not (and opinions sure do vary), one thing that they all have in common is that they generate enormous heaps of data.
by Derek Lowe in In the Pipeline
Now that the Web labor market is saturated and Web design a static profession, it's not surprising that 'user experience' designers and researchers who've spent their careers online are looking for new worlds to conquer. Some are returning to the “old media” as directors and producers. More are now doing offline consulting (service experience design, social policy design, exhibition design, and so on) under the 'user experience' aegis. They argue that the lessons they've learned on the Web can be applied to phenomena in the physical and social worlds. But there are enormous differences...
by Bob Jacobson in Total Experience
Clay Shirky, in deconstructing Second Life hype: "Second Life is heading towards two million users. Except it isn’t, really... I suspect Second Life is largely a 'Try Me' virus, where reports of a strange and wonderful new thing draw the masses to log in and try it, but whose ability to retain anything but a fraction of those users is limited. The pattern of a Try Me virus is a rapid spread of first time users, most of whom drop out quickly, with most of the dropouts becoming immune to later use."
by Clay Shirky in Many-to-Many
Over the last few years we've seen old barriers to creativity coming down, one after the other. New technologies and services makes it trivial to publish text, whether by blog or by print-on-demand. Digital photography has democratised a previously expensive hobby. And we're seeing the barriers to movie-making crumble, with affordable high-quality cameras and video hosting provided by YouTube or Google Video and their ilk... Music making has long been easy for anyone to engage in, but technology has made high-quality recording possible without specialised equipment, and the internet has revolutionised distribution, drastically disintermediating the music industry... What's left? Software maybe? Or maybe not."
by Suw Charman in Strange Attractor
Derek Lowe on the news that the Nobel Prize for medicine has gone to Craig Mello and Andrew Fire for their breakthrough work: "RNA interference is probably going to have a long climb before it starts curing many diseases, because many of those problems are even tougher than usual in its case. That doesn't take away from the discovery, though, any more than the complications of off-target effects take away from it when you talk about RNAi's research uses in cell culture. The fact that RNA interference is trickier than it first looked, in vivo or in vitro, is only to be expected. What breakthrough isn't?"
by Derek Lowe in In the Pipeline
Andrew Phelps: "Recently my WoW guild has been having a bit of a debate on the merits of Player-vs.-Player (PvP) within Azeroth. My personal opinion on this is that PvP has its merits, and can be incredible fun, but the system within WoW is horridly, horribly broken. It takes into account the concept of the battle, but battle without consequence, without emotive context, and most importantly, without honor..."
From later in the piece: "When I talk about this with people (thus far anyway) I typically get one of two responses, either 'yeah, right on!' or 'hey, it’s war, and war isn’t honorable – grow the hell up'. There is a lot to be said for that argument – but the problem is that war in the real historical world has very different constraints that are utterly absent from fantasized worlds..."
by Andrew Phelps in Got Game
Derek Lowe: "So, you're developing a drug candidate. You've settled on what looks like a good compound - it has the activity you want in your mouse model of the disease, it's not too hard to make, and it's not toxic. Everything looks fine. Except. . .one slight problem. Although the compound has good blood levels in the mouse and in the dog, in rats it's terrible. For some reason, it just doesn't get up there. Probably some foul metabolic pathway peculiar to rats (whose innards are adapted, after all, for dealing with every kind of garbage that comes along). So, is this a problem?.."
by Derek Lowe in In the Pipeline
Bob Jacobson, on shopping at his local Albertsons supermarket where he had "one of the worst customer experiences" of his life: "Say what you will about the Safeway chain or the Birkenstock billionaires who charge through the roof for Whole Foods' organic fare, they know how to create shopping environments that create a more pleasurable experience, at its best (as at Whole Foods) quite enjoyable. Even the warehouses like Costco and its smaller counterpart, Smart & Final, do just fine: they have no pretentions, but neither do they dump virtual garbage on the consumer merely to create another trivial revenue stream, all for the sake of promotions in the marketing department..."
by Strange Attractor in Total Experience
Kevin Anderson: "First off, I want to say that I really admire the ambition of the Guardian Unlimited’s Comment is Free. It is one of the boldest statements made by any media company that participation needs to be central to a radical revamp of traditional content strategies... It is, therfore, not hugely surprising to find that Comment is Free is having a few teething troubles..."
by Kevin Anderson in strange
Corante Developments
Here you will find the latest news from Corante including updates on upcoming events, new initiatives, product and publication launches, and more.
It was with shock that I returned home from a night out last night to hear the news of Russell's passing. How terribly, terribly sad. Most of all for him, as he'd seemed buoyant, healthier, and content when I'd last seen him several months ago when he was in town - he was happy that work was busy and rewarding and was having fun with it but most of all was thrilled about how things were going with his girlfriend, Ellen.
I've known Russ for what seems like ages now (in a good way) though in fact it's only been about six or seven years since the early days of "commercial" blogging when he started working on various projects at and around Corante. He was a diligent, committed, and prolific journalist who had impressively and more ably than others been able to make the transition from the old-school way of doing things to the new. He had his quirks, as we all do, but I greatly valued that he was good-natured, collegial, reliable, quick to adopt, trustworthy, eager to learn, and earnest in his interest in helping others better understand what he wrote about.
He was also, it should be said, a kind and thoughtful soul and it was the rare conversation in which he didn't ask, with sincerity, about what he knew of my life, e.g. our new babe, and we didn't talk as seemingly old friends about our lives and respective paths. I can't say I knew him very well, of course, but in our half-dozen get-togethers over the years and dozens of conversations I got a good sense of the man: he cared about learning and sharing and his bearing was earnest and ego-less and we'll miss him for that and more.
We wanted to let you know about a discount to New Comm Forum, the annual event event put on by our friends at the Society for New Communications Research. The conference, which runs from April 22-25, will feature many of the field's leading observers and is an important event for those looking, in the words of SNCR, to "better understand new communications tools, technologies and emerging modes of communication, and their effect on traditional media, professional communications, business, culture and society."
Check out the event's website and, if you're interested in attending, be sure to use the code supplied below for a special discount.
EARLY BIRD PRICING - NOW UNTIL FEB. 15th
NewComm Forum Conference - $995.
Pre-conference or post-conference session - $195.
SNCR Jam only - $75.
REGULAR PRICING - AFTER FEB. 15th
NewComm Forum Conference - $1095.
Pre-conference or post-conference session - $249.
SNCR Jam only - $75.
CORANTE READER DISCOUNTS
NewComm Forum Conference - save an additional $100
Use discount code: NCF08100
Pre-conference or post-conference session - save an additional $45.
Use discount code: NCF0845
We've been remiss in letting you know about two new independent blogs we've helped launch in the past month or so.
The first - the ConversationHub - is a companion blog to Supernova 2007, the latest edition of Kevin Werbach's excellent conference on all things connected. As the conference site says: "Supernova examines the effects of an increasingly connected world on business, life, and public policy. As disparate physical and social networks link with one another, a new societal network is rapidly evolving... The New Network is greater than the sum of its parts. It challenges us to re-create everything from the software and hardware we use...to the business models we employ...to the information and entertainment we encounter...to the ways we work and play."
Visit the ConversationHub and you'll find several dozen leading thinkers and doers, led by a few notable ringleaders, weighing in on the themes and trends of the day in technology and business. We encourage you to tune in - feel free to comment and even suggest topics and ideas for posts.
The second blog - Mobile Messaging 2.0 - convenes about a dozen top observers of the mobile messaging space for an intense discussion of the industry and where it's headed. Among its contributors are leading commentators, journalists and players in the field - tune in and you'll find them touching on topics such as mobile device design, messaging platforms, market pressures, user-generated content, interface design, and much, much more.
Also, if you visit the site, which is sponsored by Airwide Solutions, this week, you'll find live coverage and commentary from Global Messaging 2007, to which several of our contributors have traveled to hear about the latest developments from a broad spectrum of the industry's players and providers.
Be sure to catch the Office 2.0 Conference and hear from and engage with leading thinkers and doers in this exciting new market. Find out more here and be sure to use the code "GLDRK" for a special discount for Corante readers.
1. Andrew Brown on December 28, 2005 03:12 PM writes...
Surely Jeb Bush makes perfect sense -- he doesn't think that poor people should know anything. He doesn't care what they think. If you're not smart enough to figure out what the rich people believe is true, to hell with you.
To a certain sort of right winger, the creationist dispute must look like a lottery they get to always win. It's a tax on stupidity, and the winnings go to republicans.
Permalink to Comment2. Christopher Heard on December 29, 2005 02:05 AM writes...
I wonder if McCain would like for students in government/civics classes to decide for themselves whether torturing P.O.W.s is morally acceptable, or for students in history classes to decide for themselves whether the Holocaust happened.
Permalink to Comment3. Jos ngel on December 30, 2005 01:44 AM writes...
Correction: Should the FACT of evolution be taught at schools?
Permalink to Comment`Yeah, but I don't think it should actually be part of the curriculum, to be honest with you..''
So many facts are disturbing... let's invent, and teach, something more pleasant and orthodox! After all, the purpose of education is to manufacture the kind of citizens we want to have, and those don't need to know about the FACTS.
4. Tambosi on December 30, 2005 06:21 PM writes...
Jornalismo e ciência
Quem gosta de temas ligados às ciências tem mais um blog à disposição. Trata-se de The Loom, de Carl Zimmer, jornalista norte-americano que publicou vários livros de divulgação científica e escreve regularmente no New York Times e nas revistas National Geographic, Science, Newsweek e Discover, da qual é um dos editores.Entre os muitos prêmios que já ganhou por seu trabalho destaca-se o Science Journalism Award de 2004, da American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS).
Permalink to CommentAlguns de seus livros já foram traduzidos no Brasil: À beira d’água (macroevolução e a transformação da vida), Rio de Janeiro, Zahar, 1998; A fantástica história do cérebro, Rio de Janeiro, Campus, 2004; O livro de ouro da evolução, Rio de Janeiro, Ediouro, 2005. Sua obra mais recente, ainda não traduzida por aqui, é Smithsonian Intimate Guide to Human Origins, Collins Publishers, 2005. Agradeço a indicação do blog (que passa a figurar na lista de links) ao jornalista Maurício Tuffani, que também virou blogueiro (ver Laudas Críticas).
5. Leon Brooks on January 2, 2006 12:18 AM writes...
“Blogueiro?” I see Brasilian Portugese is suffering as badly as English from the onslaught of new technology. (-:
Permalink to Comment6. Tree on February 12, 2006 08:52 AM writes...
You make several good points, but, please, please, please, stop using "post-modern" as a term of opprobrium.
Permalink to Comment7. Blaine Vincent, Jr. on February 14, 2006 05:03 AM writes...
I agree with "Tree" (commenting Feb. 12). "Postmodern" most appropriately refers to the emergence of a number of historiographers & philosophers of science, such as Karl Popper and Thomas Kuhn, followed a little later by a growing number of sociologists of science, all since the second half of the 20th century. It's become a wide spectrum of thinkers, but no matter how one regards some of the contributions emerging from, say, the more recent French philosophers in this movement -- it is not correct to include the antievolutionists ("teach the controversy") as part of the postmodern movement. The fundamentally religious agenda underlying those who reflexively challenge any teaching that seems inconsistent with their literal reading of the Bible is at least as old as the 16th century and comes mainly from the opposite end of the political spectrum as well. Confounding the creationist/ID reaction as part of the postmodern intellectual movement unfortunately tends to elevate and dignify the intellectual support of what to many of us evolutionists consider is the traditional religious/political chanllenge to the primacy of science in society. Yes, please, Carl Zimmer, don't label the antievolutionist reflex as postmodern.
Permalink to Comment8. Steviepinhead on February 14, 2006 01:14 PM writes...
The original driving motive beneath the relentless attacks on evolution may be "religious" (though I suspect at base it's something more like a deep insecurity), and the "critiques" of evolutionary science may all be endlessly-recycled canards, but that hasn't kept the creationists from "exapting" techniques that sure smell of the worst excesses of post-modernist thought.
These include the use of a post-modernist sociologist (?) as a defense expert in the Dover trial, and a more generalized anti-science criticism that chimes these tones: the observations, facts, and evidence upon which science bases its "theories" (deliberately emphasizing all the ambiguities inherent in that much-abused term) are no more entitled to "belief" than the subjective opinions of believers--perhaps even less entitled to credence, since they are merely reports from the "fallen" and error-prone physical senses, as opposed to the direct divine revelations that supposedly underlie the holy book and the "born again" experiences of believers. (The consensus, error-checking methods of science are of course either misunderstood or deliberately overlooked, and any available "fraud" or "hoax" by "scientists" is played for maximum shock and awe, no matter how much these isolated incidents underscore the veracity of science as a whole.)
In short, the creationists have now begun to embrace a broad "po-mo" how-do-we-know-what-we-claim-to-know, it's-all-biased-and-subjective, it's-not-real-but-an-artifact-of-an-institutional-mindset, blah-blah-blah, yadda-yadda approach, in addition to all their other shopworn tactics.
There is a place where the more extreme idiots of right and left meet ("where's this place called Lonely Street?").
I don't disagree that at least some of the thinkers who tend to be grouped loosely as post-modernists have something to offer the rest of us. But if they don't want the creationists to further tar their bedraggled plumage, then they too need to speak out against these anti-science, anti-reality morons.
Permalink to Comment9. Sonia on February 16, 2006 04:36 PM writes...
At the end of my school years I was told by the teacher that Darwin's theory was not the only one (other theories were not even mentioned in the programm) and I think that I had the right to know that while at school.
Permalink to Comment10. Steviepinhead on February 16, 2006 08:41 PM writes...
So, Sonia, what ARE these "other" theories that you now believe you should have been told about earlier?
What different choices in your life--or just in your schooling--do you think you have made if your teacher had exposed you to these "other" theories? Are you saying that your intellectual development or your development as a person has been somehow stunted or delayed as a result of not hearing about these other theories earlier? Is there anything preventing you from now learning more about their pros (if any) and cons?
I notice that you haven't stated that any of these "other" theories are accepted as science. Do you understand the scientifid method and the manner in which scientists develop and test hypotheses about the observations they make? Did you do any research, after you were told about these so-called other theories, to see if they had any evidentiary support, were accepted by the vast majority of scientists, and so forth? If so, what did you learn?
Have you heard any news or learned anything from your further research about how these other theories have fared in court (for example, in the Dover case)? Or how they have fared when considered by state curriculum bodies (as in the recent decision by the Ohio curriculum board)? What is your understanding of why these decisions were reached?
With all due respect (and I am interested in your responses), you haven't given us very much to go on here--you haven't even told us what these other theories are!
Permalink to Comment11. Gwen on February 19, 2006 10:54 AM writes...
I'm really sory for the previous post where I didn't explain clearly what I ment. Here is an example of what I was talking about:
"The newly-discovered Sahelanthropus tchadensis fossil, another ape species that lived 2 million years before Australopithecus, is actually more "human-like" according to evolutionary criteria. In other words, it demolishes the "evolutionary scheme."
The essence of the matter is this: there are a large number of very different ape species that once lived in the past and are now extinct. The skull or skeletal structures of some of these show similarities to those of man. Yet those similarities do not mean that these creatures have any relationship to man. Evolutionists line up the skulls from these extinct species in a manner required by their theory and try to come up with "a ladder from ape to man." Yet the deeper research into the subject goes, the more it is realized that there is no such ladder, rather different species of ape lived at different times in the past.
Moreover, it emerges that man came about all of a sudden, with no evolutionary process behind him. In other words, that he was created."
In my post I just wanted to say that very often at school they give us an information pretending that it's the universal truth not expecting any discussion or searching for other points of view.
Permalink to Comment12. Sonia on February 19, 2006 10:56 AM writes...
I'm sorry. That was me. I use public computer that's why the name was wrong.
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