Homeopathy advertised in The New Scientist

2 April 2005

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The New Scientist talks about “The 13 things that don’t make sense“. Some of the 13 items are at least questionable. For example, it seems to me pretty one-sided to claim that the experimental case for cold fusion is ‘bulletproof’. Bob Park has a much less positive view of the issue, for example here. Also, after reading Brian Greene’s The Fabric of the Cosmos, I thought that inflationary cosmology gave a good explanation for the ‘horizon problem’. According to the New Scientist, “In scientific terms, the uniform temperature of the background radiation remains an anomaly.” The third item that I am quite skeptical about is number 4 – the Belfast homeopathy results:

“MADELEINE Ennis, a pharmacologist at Queen’s University, Belfast, was the scourge of homeopathy. She railed against its claims that a chemical remedy could be diluted to the point where a sample was unlikely to contain a single molecule of anything but water, and yet still have a healing effect. Until, that is, she set out to prove once and for all that homeopathy was bunkum.

In her most recent paper, Ennis describes how her team looked at the effects of ultra-dilute solutions of histamine on human white blood cells involved in inflammation. These “basophils” release histamine when the cells are under attack. Once released, the histamine stops them releasing any more. The study, replicated in four different labs, found that homeopathic solutions – so dilute that they probably didn’t contain a single histamine molecule – worked just like histamine. Ennis might not be happy with the homeopaths’ claims, but she admits that an effect cannot be ruled out.”

I am looking forward to more results that show that homeopathy works. However, scientists and editors and journalists alike should keep in mind that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. I have a feeling that New Scientist’s free advertisment for homeopaths was a bit too early and unnecessary.

Tokaji Aszú

26 March 2005

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As somebody who is somewhat proud of his Hungarian background, when it comes to discussing wine, I always pretend to know how Tokaji Aszu, the most famous Hungarian wine is made. I realized however that I didn’t really know much about it — until I stumbled into the subject in Harold McGee’s excellent book “On Food and Cooking – The Science and Lore of the Kitchen“. So here it is.

The key point is that the grapes are allowed to become infected with ‘noble rot’, the mold Botryitis cinerea, that is a destructive disease of grapes and other fruits. “It becomes noble only in the right climatic conditions, when the initial infection in humid weather is followed by a dry period that limits the infection.” The mold “dehydrates the grapes, concentrates their sugars, and transforms their flavor and consistency”. The trick was invented in the Tokaj region of Hungary around 1650 (not ‘Tokaji region’ as McGee writes — the ‘-i’ at the end of the word in Hungarian means ‘from’, that is, Tokaji = from Tokaj). By 1750, it was adopted by the Germans; the French started using the method around 1800 in the Sauternes region of Bordeaux. [Hmmm… The French learning winemaking tricks from the Hungarians…]

The sweetness of the Tokaji largely depends on how many hods of ‘aszu’ grapes (that is, grapes affected by noble rot) was added to each 136 liter barrel of must made from ‘normal’ grapes; the traditional hods that carry ~20 kg of grapes are called “puttony” in Hungarian, and you can find Tokaji Aszu that is 3, 4, 5, or 6 ‘puttonyos’.

The terroir of the Tokaj region of course is just right for the aszu wine; this means south facing slopes with soils developed on volcanic rocks (andesites if I remember well) . In fact, the Tokaj Mountains are one of the oldest gold and silver-based mining districts of Tertiary-Quaternary volcanic arc of the Carpathians.

Here is more if you are interested. This might be too much detail, but looks great. And here is everything you wanted to know about the geology of the Tokaj Mountains.

The Fabric of the Cosmos

26 February 2005

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During my recent trip to Boston / MIT, I picked up a copy of “The Fabric of the Cosmos” by Brian Greene, and I read about half of it by now. It is a great reading; I think I am starting to get a vague idea about both how relativity and quantum physics work, subjects that I was utterly ignorant of not long ago. Sometimes the references to the Simpsons and Springfield and agent Mulder and Scully and baseball can be annoying, but overall I am really enjoying this book.

And I am realizing how ‘narrow-minded’ we humans are. Evolution shaped our minds so that we easily understand what is important for our survival, but there was no selective pressure to evolve an understanding of how things work on much larger or much smaller spatial and temporal scales: having some intuitive ideas about what trajectory a thrown piece of rock describes probably had some survival value, but our ancestors did not need to know about the probabilistic nature of the subatomic world in order to get through the hard times.

On digital SLRs and compact cameras

30 January 2005

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When last summer I bought a Nikon D70, I only knew that I wanted a very good digital camera. Since all the reviews about the Nikon D70 were extremely positive, this was my final choice. But even after I bought it, I had some afterthoughts that maybe it would have been better to get an expensive (but similarly priced to a ‘cheap’ DSLR) point-and-shoot camera that has a fixed lens, like the Nikon 8700 or the Sony DSC-F828. With these, you get a lens with a wider range of zoom, without having to buy another expensive lens and then having ot change them all the time.

But since then I have been using the Nikon D70 quite often (not as often as I’d like to, but that’s another story), and I am perfectly happy with it. Ken Rockwell explains very well here why it is a no-brainer whether to buy an expensive point-and-shoot camera or a ‘cheap’ DSLR for the same price. Even the latest and greatest point-and-shoot cameras do not have the speed necessary to capture moving subjects. Here is how Ken Rockwell sums it up:

“For a small snapshot camera get a $300 point-and-shoot. I have one, love it, and take it everywhere.If you want to spend a grand for serious digital photography forget the expensive p/s cameras and go straight to any DSLR. Since you can get a far superior DSLR for what you used to have to pay for just a p/s as of 2004 I see no need for the expensive p/s digital cameras. The reason we still have expensive p/s cameras today is because camera companies still have two sets of development and marketing teams, one for each class of camera, so there are still people at these companies pushing the expensive p/s cameras even though the DSLRs made by the same company are better for the same price. Other companies, like Sony, don’t make any real DSLRs and of course they will promote their p/s cameras. Don’t waste $1,000 on a point and shoot unless you really want to trade off ease of use, speed and image quality for a little size and weight.”

Ian Anderson on Christmas

26 December 2004

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The best thing about Christmas is that you get a few free days — and I manage to spend them without worrying too much about not working. If I want to be more sympathetic, I think I can pretty much agree with Ian Anderson’s (from the good old Jethro Tull) views on the subject:

“My views on Christmas? Well, I’m not exactly a practising paid-up Christian but I have grown up and lived with a so-called Christian society for 55 years and still feel great warmth for the nostalgia, festive occasion and family togetherness, so much a part of that time of year. Maybe without Christmas we would have that much less to celebrate and enjoy in this troubled old world. But it’s really all the Winter Solstice and the re-birth of nature overlaid with the common sense and righteous teachings of Mr. C.

A Christmas in this modern world should, in my view, accommodate the leisure needs and affections of Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, atheists and agnostics, as well as Fido the family dog and Felix the cat. Throw in a few lost cousins and that dreadful man from next door and you have it! Sip the sloe gin, pull a cracker (so long as she’s not the daughter of that dreadful man from next door), kiss and cuddle under the mistletoe, toss Vegan disciplines aside, gobble the turkey (steady on, now) and have a therapeutic respite from the rigours of daily life.”

Introverts and extroverts

23 December 2004

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An article on introverts by Jonathan Rauch — it also has been published in “The Best American Science and Nature Writing” 2004 volume (edited by Steven Pinker):

“With their endless appetite for talk and attention, extroverts also dominate social life, so they tend to set expectations. In our extrovertist society, being outgoing is considered normal and therefore desirable, a mark of happiness, confidence, leadership. Extroverts are seen as bighearted, vibrant, warm, empathic. “People person” is a compliment. Introverts are described with words like “guarded,” “loner,” “reserved,” “taciturn,” “self-contained,” “private”–narrow, ungenerous words, words that suggest emotional parsimony and smallness of personality. Female introverts, I suspect, must suffer especially. In certain circles, particularly in the Midwest, a man can still sometimes get away with being what they used to call a strong and silent type; introverted women, lacking that alternative, are even more likely than men to be perceived as timid, withdrawn, haughty.

Are introverts arrogant? Hardly. I suppose this common misconception has to do with our being more intelligent, more reflective, more independent, more level-headed, more refined, and more sensitive than extroverts. Also, it is probably due to our lack of small talk, a lack that extroverts often mistake for disdain. We tend to think before talking, whereas extroverts tend to think by talking, which is why their meetings never last less than six hours.”

Az egyetem irracionalitása (?)

11 December 2004

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Még egy idézet a Korunk új egyetem-számából (Bókay Antal pécsi egyetemi tanár cikke):

“Az egyetem posztmodernizálódásának fontos jele az egyetem mint intézmény erősödő irracionalitása. Az „észváros” esztelenné válhat. Az irracionalizálódásnak pedig teljesen egyszerű okai vannak. A központi támogatási források beszűkülésével kiszámíthatatlanná válik az egyetemi környezet, és kétségessé válik az egyik legjelentősebb egyetemi vívmány az autonómia.”

Én nem értem ezeket a posztmodern harcosokat. Ha úgy vélik, hogy a tudományos kutatás és az egyetemek túlságosan függővé váltak a nagy cégektől és a nagy pénzektől, akkor beszéljenek arról, és ne burkolják a témát ilyen nonszenszbe, mint “az egyetem mint intézmény erősödő irracionalitása”.

Mikor jönnek rá ezek a humán szakos “tudósok”, hogy Derridán, Lyotardon, Foucaulton, és Heideggeren kívül egyebet is lehet olvasni?

S ha már újra a posztmodernnél tartunk, érdemes megnézni hogy hogyan tud a számítógép néhány másodperc alatt a fentihez hasonló elmélkedéseket produkálni itt, és megtanulni hogy hogyan írjunk posztmodernül.

U.S. science supremacy threatened by competition

5 December 2004

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Number 67 in the ‘top science stories of the year’ in Discover Magazine is entitled ‘U.S. Science Supremacy Threatened by Competition’. Some interesting facts: according to the National Science Board, an independent policy group that advises the president and the congress,

the drop in foreign applications – down 28 percent at the graduate level – is (…) certain to affect the future of science. Many who come here to study do not return to their native countries. A survey by the National Science Foundation in 2000 reported that 38 percent of U.S. scientists with doctorates were born abroad.

Also:

the number of research articles by Americans has been stagnant compared with an increasing number written by Western Europeans in the last decade.