In the 1970s, the Nobel committee made statements about the Soviet menace by giving Nobel prizes to Russian dissidents like Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
What's their implication when the Nobel peace prize goes to Jimmy Carter or to Al Gore? Are we the new menace? Do they feel they have to prop up our dissidents?
While the Soviet dissidents were truly outside the system -- Solzhenitsyn was a physicist who was arrested for bad-mouthing Stalin in private letters -- our dissidents are failed presidents and presidential candidates. Consider also the very likely possibility that two families will be in the White House for a consecutive 32-year period, and it is hard to escape the conclusion that political power and the ability to be heard is very closely held in America.
And yes, I know the Nobel peace prize is awarded by the Norwegians; the other Nobels are by the Swedes. So, the organization honoring Al Gore is different from the one that honored Solzhenitsyn (he won in Literature). But it is all part of the same zeitgeist.
Mt Williams Dr
The wife wanted me to return something she'd picked up at the new Kohl's in Norman. This is the first time I have been to that area after the development started and it was amusing to see a road marked Mt. Williams Dr.
I know it's a cliche that developers name streets and subdivisions for the natural features they raze down. Hence all the streets named "Glen" and "Meadow" in Northern Virginia.
But "Mt. Williams Dr." must be a unique occurence -- naming a street after an artificial feature. Because you see, Mt. Williams was just a huge mound of dirt that the Navy (don't ask me why land-locked Oklahoma had a navy base, but they did) used as an artillery target in the 1940s. The developers razed down the dirt mound when the university sold the land for development, but apparently they felt compelled to name a street after it.
Don't get me wrong ... I have fond memories of Mt. Williams. It was right at the exit off I-35 that my apartment was, so I associate the sight of that dirt mound after a long road trip with the feeling of finally being home. Besides, Mt. Williams was one of the features by which one could quickly locate Norman on satellite pictures. And that made it the answer to a trivia question -- what's the largest man-made structure in Norman?
Still, naming a street after an artificial feature is quite lame. Don't give the patriotic argument, that the reason the name sticks around is that it was used for target practice during World War II. Imagine that it was a church that had been razed to make way for a street. Would the street be named for that church? Don't answer that.
I know it's a cliche that developers name streets and subdivisions for the natural features they raze down. Hence all the streets named "Glen" and "Meadow" in Northern Virginia.
But "Mt. Williams Dr." must be a unique occurence -- naming a street after an artificial feature. Because you see, Mt. Williams was just a huge mound of dirt that the Navy (don't ask me why land-locked Oklahoma had a navy base, but they did) used as an artillery target in the 1940s. The developers razed down the dirt mound when the university sold the land for development, but apparently they felt compelled to name a street after it.
Don't get me wrong ... I have fond memories of Mt. Williams. It was right at the exit off I-35 that my apartment was, so I associate the sight of that dirt mound after a long road trip with the feeling of finally being home. Besides, Mt. Williams was one of the features by which one could quickly locate Norman on satellite pictures. And that made it the answer to a trivia question -- what's the largest man-made structure in Norman?
Still, naming a street after an artificial feature is quite lame. Don't give the patriotic argument, that the reason the name sticks around is that it was used for target practice during World War II. Imagine that it was a church that had been razed to make way for a street. Would the street be named for that church? Don't answer that.
A.B.D.s and postdocs: lack of good incentives
Today, before lunch, a colleague (S.) and I were glancing at the profile of one of our aerobics instructors. She had listed her degrees and on that list was
Ph.D Social Studies (A.B.D)
"What is A.B.D?," he asked me. "All but dissertation," I told him. Since S. and I had both finished our Ph.Ds the same year, we got to talking about self-motivation, the ability to find an original topic and being able to write when there were no hard deadlines.
As luck would have it, this article on why PhDs take so long showed up on my RSS feed while I was eating lunch. The article quotes a NSF study to claim that:
That may all be true, but I would have liked to see a breakdown of these statistics by discipline. I think that including the "soft" sciences exacerbates the problem -- an English PhD who will find it very hard to get a job has little incentive to graduate. It's quite likely that his student teaching job at the university is more attractive than working at a coffee shop. In science and engineering, where PhDs who graduate can expect to find work doing what they trained to do, the problem is a lot less severe. And even in science and engineering, a field like theoretical physics (where jobs are scarce) sports extra-long PhDs and an almost-mandatory postdoc.
Now, the prevalence of postdocs in fields where jobs are scarce -- that would be a topic fit for a NSF study. Postdocs are just cheap labor. I think that funding for new PhD students should be reduced in fields where graduating PhD have to accept postdoctoral appointments.
This is not rocket science -- the lack of jobs for PhDs in some fields is the reason people take so long to finish. Add in the incentive of good jobs after graduation, and people will finish their PhDs faster.
As luck would have it, this article on why PhDs take so long showed up on my RSS feed while I was eating lunch. The article quotes a NSF study to claim that:
For those who attempt it, the doctoral dissertation can loom on the horizon like Everest, gleaming invitingly as a challenge but often turning into a masochistic exercise once the ascent is begun. The average student takes 8.2 years to get a Ph.D.; in education, that figure surpasses 13 years. Fifty percent of students drop out along the way, with dissertations the major stumbling block. At commencement, the typical doctoral holder is 33, an age when peers are well along in their professions, and 12 percent of graduates are saddled with more than $50,000 in debt.
That may all be true, but I would have liked to see a breakdown of these statistics by discipline. I think that including the "soft" sciences exacerbates the problem -- an English PhD who will find it very hard to get a job has little incentive to graduate. It's quite likely that his student teaching job at the university is more attractive than working at a coffee shop. In science and engineering, where PhDs who graduate can expect to find work doing what they trained to do, the problem is a lot less severe. And even in science and engineering, a field like theoretical physics (where jobs are scarce) sports extra-long PhDs and an almost-mandatory postdoc.
Now, the prevalence of postdocs in fields where jobs are scarce -- that would be a topic fit for a NSF study. Postdocs are just cheap labor. I think that funding for new PhD students should be reduced in fields where graduating PhD have to accept postdoctoral appointments.
This is not rocket science -- the lack of jobs for PhDs in some fields is the reason people take so long to finish. Add in the incentive of good jobs after graduation, and people will finish their PhDs faster.
My excuse for why this blog is not widely read
Long ago (two months ago to be precise), I suggested to all you stuck-in-the-mud readers out there that you should really be reading this blog through a RSS feed. I use Google Reader, but there are lots of others out there. It is really a much faster way to get updated content than to browse sites one by one. Browsing the web is so 1990s.
When I set up Blogspot to serve out the blog via RSS, I had a choice. I could serve out the entire article, or I could serve out just the first few sentences and make you, dear reader, click on the link to read the whole thing. I chose to serve out the whole article. Why? Well, the whole "do unto your neighbor" thing. But at least on the internet, being altruistic can be its own reward. From an economics blogger, comes another reason. The folks who use RSS readers tend to be journalists, geeks and connectors -- folks who are influential enough to drive more traffic to the site. Thus, keeping them happy by serving out full articles is a good idea even though the page view statistics suffer.
This brings us to my excuse for why I had only 400 page views in September -- your use of RSS news feeds undercounts my readership but you folks are not doing your part in driving traffic to my site :) That's my story and I'm sticking to it.
When I set up Blogspot to serve out the blog via RSS, I had a choice. I could serve out the entire article, or I could serve out just the first few sentences and make you, dear reader, click on the link to read the whole thing. I chose to serve out the whole article. Why? Well, the whole "do unto your neighbor" thing. But at least on the internet, being altruistic can be its own reward. From an economics blogger, comes another reason. The folks who use RSS readers tend to be journalists, geeks and connectors -- folks who are influential enough to drive more traffic to the site. Thus, keeping them happy by serving out full articles is a good idea even though the page view statistics suffer.
This brings us to my excuse for why I had only 400 page views in September -- your use of RSS news feeds undercounts my readership but you folks are not doing your part in driving traffic to my site :) That's my story and I'm sticking to it.
Me have an accent?
K., a colleague from work, is also in DC this week. So we met at a Spanish restaurant near Chinatown, in downtown DC last night. After dinner, I went looking for green tea ice cream (I love green tea ice cream) but Washington DC's Chinatown is too gentrified. No green tea ice cream. They did have moon cakes though, although it was sized for American appetites and I didn't feel like pigging out.
Anyway, this morning, I told my class that I'd gone to a Tapas restaurant yesterday and that the place was surprisingly lively for a Thursday evening. "A very happening place," I informed them.
A student in the back looked at me with a horrified look. "Where did you go again?," she asked.
"A Tapas restaurant," I repeated, "you know a Spanish restaurant."
"Oh," she sighed in relief, "I thought you said 'topless' restaurant".
My accent's not that bad.
Anyway, this morning, I told my class that I'd gone to a Tapas restaurant yesterday and that the place was surprisingly lively for a Thursday evening. "A very happening place," I informed them.
A student in the back looked at me with a horrified look. "Where did you go again?," she asked.
"A Tapas restaurant," I repeated, "you know a Spanish restaurant."
"Oh," she sighed in relief, "I thought you said 'topless' restaurant".
My accent's not that bad.
London to Sydney, by bus
When I first heard about a bus service between two islands (England and Australia), I thought it was an obvious way to reel the suckers in. But, no, a mostly overland bus route exists and takes 12 weeks to make the entire journey. I've been to several places on that journey -- London, Vienna, Delhi, Kuala Lumpur and Sydney, but oh the places in between: Prague, Gallipolli, Corbett, Kathmandu, Bali, Ayers Rock. That, I think, would be an awesome way to spend 3 months.
No sputtering
"Fr. Briggs" (there's a story behind that name, but don't want to bust his privacy here) asks me what I replied to the 5-year's question about what we were praying to. Nothing inspired, I am afraid.
This is of course not the first time that I've sputtered. Usually, though, I can come with a better answer days after the moment has passed. In this case, though, sputtering is still the only thing I can come up with.
Incidentally, on the national anthem before ball games thing, I don't know if you've seen this video:
The adult doing the class act in that video is Philadelphia coach and former hall-of-fame player Maurice Cheeks. Mo Cheeks was inspired -- he knew exactly what to do at the moment when it mattered.
This is of course not the first time that I've sputtered. Usually, though, I can come with a better answer days after the moment has passed. In this case, though, sputtering is still the only thing I can come up with.
Incidentally, on the national anthem before ball games thing, I don't know if you've seen this video:
The adult doing the class act in that video is Philadelphia coach and former hall-of-fame player Maurice Cheeks. Mo Cheeks was inspired -- he knew exactly what to do at the moment when it mattered.
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