December 2008
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Science 2008
Out of the blue last weekend, I was invited to participate in a review of the year’s science stories on PressTV, which I subsequently learned was an Iranian-oriented news channel; according to my Teheran-raised grad student, “the Iranian government doesn’t have much control over them, so they are sort of free of sides”. Media whore…
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Serra’s steel
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Despite 100 years of abstract, conceptual, modernist art, it is surprising that Richard Serra’s sculpture works as miraculously well as it does. I went to see the (now-closed, alas) exhibition of his latest sculpture at London’s outpost of the Gagosian Gallery. For the last few decades, Serra has been taking great sheets of Cor-ten steel…
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Holiday Spirit
I’ve been asked by Katherine Blundell, a colleague in the Oxford Astronomy department, to spread this information about a chance to get a piece of astronomical history, and help a child in need. Please be generous! There is a one-off opportunity to buy vintage prints of the original photographic plates of the Palomar All-Sky Survey.…
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Health Care at Home and Abroad
By far the best article I’ve read about the British healthcare system, appeared this morning… in the New York Times. It discussed the NHS‘s National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE), the organization that rations pharmaceuticals in the UK (although you’ll rarely hear the word “ration” used). When NICE’s decisions are discussed in the…
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