Takoyaki Journals

So on my way to Japan and back I listened to the audiobook version of Joe Hallinan's book 'Why We Make Mistakes.' It's really interesting, all about the psychology and neruo-science of making mistakes, and obviously applies to my line of work. When I got back I picked up a paperback copy of the book and gave it to my boss to read. I think he's enjoying it, he quoted it at a few of my coworkers today, so that's a good sign.

I wrote the author an e-mail to tell him how much I enjoyed it, and to ask him if he had any advice on mitigating the kind of errors we see at work. (There's a chapter on the kind of mistakes that Airport Security makes, which is pretty much the same position an inspector is in) And he wrote back that he would call me some time this week! How exciting is that!?

Anyway, here's an interesting quiz I found on his site:


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So I not only watch a lot of odd nonfiction TV, I also read a lot of odd nonfiction books. I was reading Stephen Ray Gould's "Full House," which is an interesting book about evolution and baseball. I skipped the baseball chapters altogether but the evolution bits were interesting. And he talks a lot about the Drunkard's Walk. Which is like a mathematical way of saying 'you don't have to go home, but you can't stay here.' And that if you start at a fixed point, and move randomly...you'll end up somewhere.

This resulted in the best diagram in the history of nonfiction ever.
( I give you... )

Today I give you MANY VIDEOS. So I put them behind ( the cut. )

10 Science Fair Projects That Will Make You Feel Dumb

Boom-De-Yada!

I bought a copy of BBC's 'Knowledge' magazine the last time I made it to a big bookstore, and I've been carrying it around in my purse and reading it at lunch breaks and the doctor's office and that sort of thing. This magazine is seriously awesome. Like a less tongue in cheek Mental Floss.

The April issue highlights Darwin and Evolution and has a seriously excellent article called "Evolution in Action" about Richard Lenski's experiments with E. Coli bacteria, which he's been working on since 1988. He teaches at Michigan State! How did I not know about him then so I could fangirl him!?

There's a lot of information at the wikipedia article. But in short, Lenski started with 12 identical lines of E.Coli bacteria in their own petri dishes. He set about starving the bacteria by giving them very minimal amounts of glucose. To quote the article, "Lenski wanted to see if the bacteria would be altered by natural selection. In each generation, some of the bacteria would mutate. A few of those mutations might make them grow and reproduce faster in their flask and they'd out-compete the other bacteria. Over time, natural selection might transform the bacteria in measurable ways...If evolution was at all repeatable, he hoped to get similar results in many of them."

Every day he takes some of the bacteria and freezes it, creating a fossil record. Any changes can be checked by thawing a previous generation of bacteria out and examining them.

After 5000 generations of bacteria all 12 lines grew faster and were about twice the size of their 'ancestors.' And more and more changes occurred. The same genes mutated in most lines, but not the same way. So while more than one line evolved to use the glucose more efficiently, when they had to feed on maltose instead some lines adapted well, and others starved. By 2001 one of the lines had developed the ability to eat citrate, and the population in the dish exploded.

The whole experiment is just incredibly exciting...and so well planned, researched and maintained.