Science & Technology Thread

[Dick_Pole]

Judging by the News Thread it looks like there's demand for discussion on scientific and technological topics so I figured in making a new thread to preserve it. Hopefully this can turn into a place where people can discuss and share ideas while leaving the egos at the door, and I'll start with mine. I consider science to be a hobby of mine and I picked up a lot over the years but haven't had any formal training since high school and I'm no authority on any subject.

My topics of interest are astronomy, cosmology and particle physics and that's what I'll be focusing on though any scientific topic including behavioural sciences should be discussed. I'll be posting lectures because that's how I feel I absorb the most information compared to reading materials. I'm not a huge fan of documentaries since I find the information somewhat lacking in a lot of them.

I figured this lecture from Dr Michelle Thaller in 2011 about Dark Matter and Dark Energy would be a good one to start with. It's a few years old but covers the basics. About half way through it she shares a theory of dark matter being like an intrinsic gravitational "landscape" that formed the super clusters of galaxies. I never heard of this idea until then and it blew my mind to think of gravity almost like you would riverbeds directing rivers across a continent.

[jaysblue]

This is a thread that Grant would have created...

[Frag]

This is a thread that Grant would have created...

Too bad he's busy building his praying mantis army.

[GD]

rip In The News

[Frag]

As for how I absorb information best, since the OP mentions lectures, I'm a visual learner. Some lecturers are very good at presenting their information in a way I can grasp, while others aren't. However, that doesn't mean they are bad overall at what they're doing. Their way of explaining complex concepts could be grasped by other means besides the visual medium. Also, I actually enjoy documentaries for the reasons I stated. That is, if the documentary isn't missing any key information.

[GD]

I find most people are visual learners.

[Frag]

I find most people are visual learners.

I think most people are a combination of different learning styles. Some have a preference towards being visual learners, others lean towards auditory or kinesthetic learning (eg. athletes for the latter).

[Boxcar]

The education system is not very kind towards kinesthetic learners.

[KingKat]

Judging by the News Thread it looks like there's demand for discussion on scientific and technological topics so I figured in making a new thread to preserve it. Hopefully this can turn into a place where people can discuss and share ideas while leaving the egos at the door, and I'll start with mine. I consider science to be a hobby of mine and I picked up a lot over the years but haven't had any formal training since high school and I'm no authority on any subject.

My topics of interest are astronomy, cosmology and particle physics and that's what I'll be focusing on though any scientific topic including behavioural sciences should be discussed. I'll be posting lectures because that's how I feel I absorb the most information compared to reading materials. I'm not a huge fan of documentaries since I find the information somewhat lacking in a lot of them.

I figured this lecture from Dr Michelle Thaller in 2011 about Dark Matter and Dark Energy would be a good one to start with. It's a few years old but covers the basics. About half way through it she shares a theory of dark matter being like an intrinsic gravitational "landscape" that formed the super clusters of galaxies. I never heard of this idea until then and it blew my mind to think of gravity almost like you would riverbeds directing rivers across a continent.

By astrophycisit standards she's quite charismatic but she has a sing-songy lift at the beginning of many of her sentences that gets annoying over time.

[bendera3]

As for how I absorb information best, since the OP mentions lectures, I'm a visual learner. Some lecturers are very good at presenting their information in a way I can grasp, while others aren't. However, that doesn't mean they are bad overall at what they're doing. Their way of explaining complex concepts could be grasped by other means besides the visual medium. Also, I actually enjoy documentaries for the reasons I stated. That is, if the documentary isn't missing any key information.

I'm with you. One of the hardest things about college for me were the lecturers at Temple that just talked. After I transferred to LaSalle it was so much easier for me because it was a very visual school. I stopped reading the books and just going to the classes solely because of the Powerpoints (which I have to admit, were quite good).

[KingKat]

Insane mode on the $120,000 Tesla Model S P85D.

[Laika]

I find most people are visual learners.

All people are visual and kinesthetic learners (unless you're blind, or handless because you're a Saudi that stole a Twix when you were 6 years old).

Eyes and hands are two of the three (or four) most significant human evolutions.

The demarkation occurs between the auditory/linguistic/logical/social/solitary learning styles.

[Frag]

Ah well.

[Abomination]

My topics of interest are astronomy, cosmology and particle physics and that's what I'll be focusing on though any scientific topic including behavioural sciences should be discussed. I'll be posting lectures because that's how I feel I absorb the most information compared to reading materials. I'm not a huge fan of documentaries since I find the information somewhat lacking in a lot of them.

I figured this lecture from Dr Michelle Thaller in 2011 about Dark Matter and Dark Energy would be a good one to start with. It's a few years old but covers the basics. About half way through it she shares a theory of dark matter being like an intrinsic gravitational "landscape" that formed the super clusters of galaxies. I never heard of this idea until then and it blew my mind to think of gravity almost like you would riverbeds directing rivers across a continent.

Last night I installed NASA's "Integrated Software for Imagers and Spectrometers" (which has a really unfortunate acronym) on my linux drive, so I could play around with the various spacecraft images myself.

I think I need to get out more.

[KingKat]

How Effective is the Eye Black that Athletes Wear?


http://mentalfloss.com/article/52181...-athletes-wear

[KingKat]

Snow Blower Powered by a Chevy V8 Car Engine:

http://www.chonday.com/Videos/snowblowvch1