The Velvet Underground of… 8 Oct 2010 Recently there have been a couple of “Velvet Underground” posts, of the kind that the VU were a very unknown but amazingly influential group. As Chad Orzel says, “only of order a thousand people bought the first Velvet Underground record, but every one of them went on to start a band.” He identifies the VU of physics as Sadi Carnot. Larry Moran identifies Max Delbrück as the VU of molecular genetics (and a great choice it is too). But this is a meme! We can uselessly pass this on! Who are the VUs of other disciplines and topics? I’m going to identify Otto Neurath as the VU of the philosophy of science. Do you have a VU? Biology General Science History Humor Philosophy Science HistoryPhilosophy
Evolution Annie’s death was not the cause of Darwin’s agnosticism 6 Jul 2009 That rough punk of evolution, Mark Pallen, has a table up documenting the formulation and spread of the story that it was the horrible death of Darwin’s favoured daughter, Annie, which, he reckons, is not true. He’s working up a paper on the matter, he says. But Darwin’s stated reasons… Read More
Administrative Hi. I’m John, and I Tweet 22 Sep 2009 Yeah, I know, I’m a follower, not a leader these days*. You note that I have given into the Twitterpated Tsunami, in the side bar. My username is john_s_wilkins, because I’m really, really unimaginative. I still don’t know what it’s all about, but I will learn. * I knew that… Read More
Evolution Conference on religion as an evolutionary byproduct 18 Apr 2011 If you are in the UK, and if you are a postgraduate, there will be a conference on religion as an evolutionary byproduct (the “spandrel” account of religion) at the University of Birmingham on 17 May. They will cover the travel costs of graduate speakers. Contact Naomi Thompson (nxt915@bham.ac.uk) by… Read More
What’s the difference between being aVU of x and being an xer’s xer? I want to see some serious conceptual analysis here.
I just wanted to say that Max Delbrück seems like a character from either a Mel Brooks or Steve Martin movie.