I was delighted to discover that if you put 'wind up a scientist' into Google, the very first item that comes up is my post last year on this topic. Surely definitive proof that if you want to wind up a scientist, this is the place to do it (see the old post if you want to know why this date is the second annual wind-up-a-scientist day. Actually it will tell you why it's wind-up-a-scientist day - the reason it's the second one is because last year's was the first).
The point is that scientists can take themselves a bit too seriously, something that is probably worth both celebrating and deflating.
Last year I suggested many options, but this year I'd like to focus on a theme. What's your favourite item spoofing a real scientist (not fictional ones, that's cheating)? To lead off, I'd like to provide this rather excellent Brian Cox spoof:
I'm not sure this is a spoof -- it's pretty great, actually, really...tastefully done? -- but if you haven't seen/heard it, I definitely wanted to share.
If I'm honest, the title of this post is an exaggeration to make a point. I don't really hate opera. There are a couple of operas - notably Monteverdi's Incoranazione di Poppea and Purcell's Dido & Aeneas - that I quite like. But what I do find truly sickening is the reverence with which opera is treated, as if it were some particularly great art form. Nowhere was this more obvious than in ITV's 2010 gut-wrenchingly awful series Pop Star to Opera Star , where the likes of Alan Tichmarsh treated the real opera singers as if they were fragile pieces on Antiques Roadshow, and the music as if it were a gift of the gods. In my opinion - and I know not everyone agrees - opera is: Mediocre music Melodramatic plots Amateurishly hammy acting A forced and unpleasant singing style Ridiculously over-supported by public funds I won't even bother to go into any detail on the plots and the acting - this is just self-evident. But the other aspects need some exp...
Nothing seems to suit Christmas reading better than either ghost stories or Christmas-set novels. For some this means a fluffy romance in the snow, but for those of us with darker preferences, it's hard to beat a good Christmas murder. An annual event for me over the last few years has been getting the excellent series of classic murderous Christmas short stories pulled together by Cecily Gayford, starting with the 2016 Murder under the Christmas Tree . This featured seasonal output from the likes of Margery Allingham, Arthur Conan Doyle, Ellis Peters and Dorothy L. Sayers, laced with a few more modern authors such as Ian Rankin and Val McDermid, in some shiny Christmassy twisty tales. I actually thought while purchasing this year's addition 'Surely she is going to run out of classic stories soon' - and sadly, to a degree, Gayford has. The first half of Murder by Candlelight is up to the usual standard with some good seasonal tales from the likes of Catherine Aird, Car...
The Internet has gone mildly bonkers over a child in America who was marked down in a test because when asked to work out 5x3 by repeated addition he/she used 5+5+5 instead of 3+3+3+3+3. Those who support the teacher say that 5x3 means 'five lots of 3' where the complainants say that 'times' is commutative (reversible) so the distinction is meaningless as 5x3 and 3x5 are indistinguishable. It's certainly true that not all mathematical operations are commutative. I think we are all comfortable that 5-3 is not the same as 3-5. However. This not true of multiplication (of numbers). And so if there is to be any distinction, it has to be in the use of English to interpret the 'x' sign. Unfortunately, even here there is no logical way of coming up with a definitive answer. I suspect most primary school teachers would expands 'times' as 'lots of' as mentioned above. So we get 5 x 3 as '5 lots of 3'. Unfortunately that only wor...
I'm not sure this is a spoof -- it's pretty great, actually, really...tastefully done? -- but if you haven't seen/heard it, I definitely wanted to share.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zSgiXGELjbc
Hope you enjoy!
That's very nice - as you say, not so much a spoof, more an appreciation, but very fitting for this august event.
ReplyDelete