Monthly Archives: March 2006

Bubble bubble, toil and trouble

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A new story in Nature reiterates that an Indian-American nuclear scientist’s claims of tabletop fusion are suspect (thanks, Saheli):

Dr. Rusi Taleyarkhan

Several Purdue researchers said Rusi Taleyarkhan, a Purdue professor of nuclear engineering, has stymied their attempts to verify or refute aspects of his controversial “bubble fusion” experiments since late 2003, when he joined Purdue’s faculty. In an article published online Wednesday in the journal Nature, they said their confidence in his work at Purdue and previously at Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee has been seriously shaken…

Seth Putterman, a professor of physics at the University of California, Los Angeles, who received a $350,000 grant from the Defense Department to try to reproduce Taleyarkhan’s findings, said he has been unable to do so. [Link]

In February 2005, the BBC commissioned a collaboration between Seth Putterman and Ken Suslick (two leading sonoluminescence researchers) to reproduce Taleyarkhan’s work. Using similar acoustic parameters, deuterated acetone, similar bubble nucleation, and a much more sophisticated neutron detection device, the researchers could find no evidence of a fusion reaction. This work was reviewed by a team of four scientists, including an expert in sonoluminescence and an expert in neutron detection, who also concluded that no evidence of fusion could be observed. [Link]

Taleyarkhan’s paper had skeptics from the beginning — this excerpt is from 2002:

However, many scientists remain sceptical of the results reported by Rusi Taleyarkhan and his colleagues at Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee, including other researchers at ORNL who tried and failed to repeat the experiments.

The second ORNL team say they used a more sophisticated detection system. But team member Mike Saltmarsh says: “Our experiment saw no evidence for nuclear fusion. This does not prove that no nuclear fusion is going on – it’s virtually impossible to prove a negative – but it does show that if it exists, it is at a very low level…” [Link]

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Liberté, Égalité, montrez les cheveux

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The French turban ban – it’s not just for school children any more. [Thanks to Greg and Al Mujahid]

Chirac: You can’t drive in my country. But you should take our toxic waste, and buy our goods. And keep that Mittal guy away from us! We’re civilized and you’re the natives, remember?

Manmohan Singh: [Must not slap guest across the face. Must not administer thapad with my left hand …]

France’s highest administrative body ruled Monday that Sikhs must remove their turbans for driver’s license photos, calling it a question of public security and not a restriction on freedom of religion. [Link]

This, of course, is unequivocally full of steaming hooey. Firstly, it clearly is an abrogation of religious freedom for Sikhs. Secondly, it doesn’t even make sense! Unless they’re planning on banning driving while turbanned, this is going to make it harder for the police to compare drivers license photos with the individuals driving.

This ruling is a reversal of an earlier ruling that sided with the Sikh plaintiff on a technicality, and means that any future appeals will have to be conducted at a pan-European level:

The Council of State’s ruling reversed its own decision in December in favor of Shingara Mann Singh, a French citizen who refused to take off his turban for a license photo in 2004… Singh’s lawyer, Patrice Spinosi, has said they could take the case to other tribunals, such as the European Court of Human Rights. [Link]

None of you can drive in my country either! Off with all of your turbans!

The ruling comes just after Chirac’s visit to India, where he was greeted by protesting school children. Personally, I can’t believe the gall of this faint Gallic shadow of De Gaulle, shaking hands with the Prime Minister while pushing policies that would make it virtually impossible for Manmohan Singh to get a license there.

Then again, this entire trip was about jointly selling French goods and French merde, so I shouldn’t be surprised. France is hoping to supply India with nuclear technology, warplanes and civilian aircraft:

France is … hoping to strike key defence deals with India which is in the market for 126 new warplanes, a purchase worth billions of dollars. A deal for the supply of 43 Airbus commercial aircraft to state-run Indian airlines was also signed during the visit in a deal estimated at $2.5bn. [Link]

At the same time, Chirac defended efforts to prevent Mittal from taking over Belgian based steel maker Arcelor, saying that there was no racism involved:

Mr Chirac said on Monday that in principle France had absolutely “nothing against a non-European taking over a European company”. “The concerns that have been expressed are entirely legitimate. I do not understand what the fuss is about,” he said. [Link]

It’s the old dual standard – free trade for you, but not for us, right? Keep this up, Jacques my boy, and you’ll be eating Freedom Fries with your humble pie the next time you visit India …

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They love themselves some Kali

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Here are excerpts from The Daily Show on Dubya’s South Asia trip:

Sub-Continental Divide: The deal: our scientists will help India build nuclear reactors if their children stop crushing us in spelling bees. We’re trying so hard. I mean, for god’s sake, your names already have, like, 20 letters in them. That’s a huge advantage…

Holy shit, what is that? That’s a potato? India is so kicking our ass!

Obligatory geography lesson for American viewers

Insight on India and Pakistan: Resident Expert John Hodgman takes a look at India and Pakistan… which are two different countries.

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Nessie? Desi

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My fofatminions, I’ve been hearing back-chatter about the mystery of me. Rrrreeeally? I’m so flattered, though gentlemen don’t kiss and tell, they kiss and post.

But as I am a gentle and one-track uncle, let’s talk about how Everything Comes From Desiland. A study just published in a British science journal pushes the idea that the “Loch Ness monster” was actually an Indian elephant on its way to performing in a circus:

Neil Clark, curator of paleontology at the Hunterian Museum in Glasgow, sees striking similarities between descriptions of Nessie and what an Indian elephant looks like while swimming. And perhaps not coincidentally, a traveling circus featuring elephants passed by the misty lake in the 1930s at the height of the monster sightings.

“It is quite possible that people not used to seeing a swimming elephant — the vast bulk of the animal is submerged, with only a thick trunk and a couple of humps visible,” thought they saw a monster, Clark said in an interview Tuesday…

But he said the vast majority of sightings occurred not long after 1933, the first year of the A82, a road that runs alongside the lake. Around that time, Mills’s traveling circus was visiting nearby Inverness and “would have stopped on the banks of Loch Ness to allow their animals to rest.”

You can judge for yourself whether Nessie is desi. Take a long, sensitive look…

Convincing, na? One shadowy mystery solved, one to go.

Only fools in pools see lumps and trunks as things that go plunk in the night. That dark summer night, in your jacuzzi, that was me. My humps, your aquifer, please excuse. I was on my way to performing in a circus.

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“…an important part of growing up there”

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Many of you may remember my previous post about the two Lodi, CA men (father and son) being tried for terrorism:

U.S. v. Hamid Hayat and Umer Hayat

Federal criminal charges alleging that a 47-year-old California father and his 22-year-old son lied to the FBI about training at and/or visiting al Qaeda terrorist and jihadi training camps in Pakistan. (June 7, 2005)

The Los Angeles Times provides details from their ongoing trial:

In a 2004 visit to a clandestine camp in Pakistan, Umer Hayat said he witnessed nearly 1,000 terrorist trainees — masked like “ninja turtles” — slashing curved swords at dummies with images of President Bush, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and former Secretary of State Colin Powell.

In a videotaped interrogation by FBI agents shown in federal court Tuesday, Hayat said trainees at the camp allegedly attended by his son also practiced pole vaulting “like 50 feet” so they could leap rivers.

Hayat, 47, an ice cream truck driver, and his son Hamid, 23, both of Lodi, are on trial in Sacramento. Hamid Hayat is accused of attending a terrorist training camp, and both are accused of lying to federal agents.

The son is the one who the FBI thinks visited the terrorist training camp and he faces up to 39 years in prison. The dad, who faces up to 16 years in prison, is basically accused of trying to protect his son by covering up the facts. Here is the part that got my attention though. I have seen this a thousand times on episodes of NYPD Blue or The Shield, but it caught me off guard to see it in real life, even though I know how it’s done. Check it out:

As in the videotaped interrogation of Hamid Hayat shown earlier in the trial, the FBI agents did most of the talking and sometimes appeared to reassure the Hayats, who speak halting English, about their actions.

FBI agent Timothy Harrison described attending training camps in Pakistan as “an important part of growing up there.” FBI agent Gary Schaaf characterized terrorist camps as a rite of passage for Pakistani males. Another agent described Umer Hayat’s visit to the camp as the equivalent of a father inspecting a child’s college campus.

Defense attorney Johnny L. Griffin said Umer Hayat was “psychologically bullied and emotionally pressured into doing whatever the FBI agents wanted him to say or do.”

Why the hell didn’t they have a lawyer present? Were they tricked into speaking on the record without one because they didn’t understand English too well, or because they just didn’t want one? Continue reading →

‘Applegeeks’

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Applegeeks is an anime-style Web comic drawn by two desi students at University of Maryland, College Park, Mohammad ‘Hawk’ Haque and Ananth Panagariya. They got a shout-out in last week’s Newsweek for a potential book deal:

Haque

Panagariya

As a sign that they’re settling in, some of the parents of these twentysomethings are beginning to see that prestige can be measured in more than M.D.s. “In the end, if you do excel, you’re going to succeed in your field,” [Arvind Panagariya, an economics professor at Columbia University] concedes, referring to his 22-year-old son, whose Web comic Applegeeks is in negotiations to be published as a book. [Link]

It’s lushly drawn with mostly geek humor, but Haque occasionally throws in references to Islam and discrimination:

Mr. Squirrely – The squirrel with mysterious powers and the ability to communicate with Hawk. Possibly a delusion brought on by Hawk’s Ramadan fasting…

Jayce torturing Hawk during Ramadan. Ramadan is a Muslim holiday which calls for fasting. Hawk follows this tradition and during it, Jayce often teases him by eating immense portions of food. Mr. Squirrely’s first appearance is during one of Hawk’s fasts. [Link]

UMD is also the alma mater of Liberty Meadows creator Frank Cho. That’s at least three Asian-American cartoonists from one campus — must be something in the water. But both strips’ obsessions with cartoon vixens is classic geek.

Related post: Smashing icons

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Anyone using Google Desktop?

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If you use Google Desktop or a browser which snapshots pages, could you please paste the last few days of our News tab into an email for me?

I’ve thoroughly b0rked some of the summaries on our News tab while carelessly editing the database by hand. Right now I’ve got only the last couple of pages saved.

The perpetrator will be thoroughly self-abused. Thanks in advance!

Update: Now fully restored using Google Desktop cache (thanks, Ashvin and others).

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The Science Gap – Revisited

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A bit of an oldie (forgive me, work’s been a beeyatch). Economist Robert Samuelson writing for MSNBC, hits an issue recently discussed on Sepia Mutiny – the much feared Science & Engineering gap with India & China.

Samuelson’s retort is multi-pronged. First, the gap with India/China isn’t as crazy as the numbers might suggest it to be –

Judged realistically, China and India aren’t yet out-producing the United States in engineers. Widely publicized figures have them graduating 600,000 and 350,000 engineers a year respectively, from six to 10 times the U.S. level. But researchers at Duke University found the Chinese and Indian figures misleading. They include graduates with two- or three-year degrees–similar to “associate degrees” from U.S. community colleges. And the American figures excluded computer science graduates. Adjusted for these differences, the U.S. degrees jump to 222,335. Per million people, the United States graduates slightly more engineers with four-year degrees than China and three times as many as India.

…Only about 4 percent of the U.S. workforce consists of scientists and engineers.

Secondly, even if the gap is real, econ 101 would dictate that the “shortage” should reveal itself in engineering salaries (on average). And yet….

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At Least the Military is Winning Somewhere…

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The Solomon Amendment is a Federal law which directs that certain Federal funds be withheld from recipient colleges and universities that do not grant military recruiters access to their campuses on a level equal to that provided to any other employer.

The Forum for Academic and Institutional Rights (FAIR), an association of law schools and professors that oppose discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation, alleged that the Solomon Amendment infringed on its First Amendment freedoms of speech and association due to the militaryÂ’s discriminatory recruitment practices (i.e., “donÂ’t ask, donÂ’t tell”). (See Abhi’s previous post on the case here.)

The U.S. Supreme Court unanimously ruled against FAIR yesterday, issuing an opinion [.pdf] that upholds the constitutionality of the statute and that in effect gives FAIR three-snaps in a Z-formation (i.e., the “Zorro snap“). (While some legal commentators predicted a unanimous outcome, I honestly did not think a case this contested in the public sphere would yield an 8-0 result.)

Joan Biskupic of USA TODAY described the Court’s reasoning:

“Accommodating the military’s message does not affect the law schools’ speech, because the schools are not speaking when they host interviews and recruiting receptions.” [T]he basic communications required of colleges were bulletin board notices and e-mails [which] hardly could be compared to the kind of “compelled” government speech that has been invalidated through the years, such as a West Virginia law that required schoolchildren to recite the Pledge of Allegiance and to salute the American flag, or a New Hampshire law that ordered the state motto — “Live Free or Die” — to be on license plates. [Link]

As this astute (and hopefully single) desi notes on her blog, Mia Culpa:

The decision boosts the Bush administration as it struggles to maintain recruiting levels to wage wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. It’s a defeat for Harvard, Yale, Columbia and other universities that accused the government of intruding on academic freedom. [Link]

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A dog’s life

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The good ol’ U.S. of A.: alleviating poverty, one five-star doggie hotel room at a time…

An argument broke out between US security personnel and the management of the [five-star] Le Meridien Hotel in New Delhi on Wednesday over the accommodation of 60 sniffer dogs that are part of President George W Bush’s security entourage. The US Embassy booked 70 rooms in the hotel in the Indian capital, where Bush will travel on Thursday. However, the hotel management was surprised to find that the rooms had been reserved for dogs.

These weren’t just any old pooches, they were decorated officers of the U.S. Secret Service:The hotel management was surprised to find that the rooms had been reserved for dogs

US security personnel accompanying the sniffer dogs were offended when the management told them that dogs were not allowed on the hotel premises, saying that they were “security officers”. The External Affairs Ministry had to intervene and arrange for the rooms to be allotted to the American “officer” dogs. Each “security officer” dog has been provided an air-conditioned room with an American attendant. [Link]

… the newly revamped Le Meridien in New Delhi has some “special guests”… The hotel is playing host to an “important delegation” from the United States — the K9 dog squad. But the word “dog” is never mentioned in front of these elite canines: they are referred to as “officers”… Kennels have been flown in specially for them… The “officers”, who have been decorated for their service, have their own private area in Le Meridien. [Link]

Upon hearing of the K9 unit’s digs, half the population of Bihar attempted to enlist Continue reading →