this entry comes from a draft from last year october:
as we sit in a busy cafe which is renowned by its cakes with the fellow heidelbergers and sip our coffee, our friend claudia, with a voice uncontrolled, tells us what she realized about publicity of science. everybody become suddenly silent and look at us. she cracks up in awkwardness.
another person who is not afraid to spit out bullshit (more precisely lies) in public and profit from it is serkan anılır. i have mentioned him in a former post and at that time in sourtimes. but things turned out to be worse than i thought.
let's back up a bit: anılır is an architect in tokyo university, which currently works in a project called infra-free, meaning infrastructure free buildings. but more importantly he regularly appears in the contemporary media, both in japan and turkey as the:
space elevator guru,
jaxa (japanese space agency) department leader,
astronaut candidate,
cosmologist,
scientist with awards,
writer, educator, entertainer, enterpreneur etc.
but he and his career came under questioning by a group of online people. of course i need to mention myself and my post in turkish sourtimes, but more importantly a group of japanese interested people realized the importance of the situation and started a blog only dedicated to our researcher anılır. i was contacted through my post here and my sourtimes entry, and i witnessed as the thing unveiled.
it seemed his lies about his past exceeded paid bullshit awards, fake papers nowhere to be found and talk materials full of plagiarized material but also included a photoshopped picture of himself in an astronauts suit in the children's book he wrote.
he retaliated in his blog that this picture was a joke that got out of hand and he was going to reply to the allegations.
that never happened.
funny thing is right now that post is currently deleted which can be found in sourtimes.
even worse the japanese bloggers sent a big package to tokyo university with their findings. the investigations started on december and they ended this month (march). and for the first time in the university history a phd was annuled (see google translated japanese press release, and an english news)
this is a great day for the university and science, it more so because it underlines the importance of the common people's (translated people outside university) participation in it. not the academia, not the media, not the public, not the government (which funded him) and not even the tokyo university itself discovered it, but rather a group of japanese bloggers, getting partly help from turkish volunteers made this happen.
we are at a time of transformation, a transformation of not only communication but a paradigma shifting, revolution pending, change of means of production. don't think that i am extrapolating too much. as the information was commodified starting from 60s and used as a means of profit; now it is time to free it for the people.
the classical institutions which control the information and the people who take advantage of them through the titles and the credibility that are given are bound to be replaced by a more equal and efficient way of information production: that is the effort of a web community that can access the information freely, and share and proliferate it collaboratively.
p.s.: by the way turkish news channels were pretty quick to pick up on the story. here is a nice recap from december.
Showing posts with label science. Show all posts
Showing posts with label science. Show all posts
2/20/10
corrupting germany through history of islamic astronomy
turkey is a great experiment of and case study for modernism in early twentieth century. i think "the little prince" is a book that is translated to most languages, and it perfectly captures the zeitgeist, with a footnote on turkish modernism. the asteroid of the little prince is discovered by a turkish astronomer but western audiences do not believe him due to his clothing, till a turkish dictator makes a law for clothing and with the switch of clothing the turkish astronomers ideas suddenly become acceptable (check it out yourself).
This asteroid has only once been seen through the telescope. That was by a Turkish astronomer, in 1909. On making his discovery, the astronomer had presented it to the International Astronomical Congress, in a great demonstration. But he was in Turkish costume, and so nobody would believe what he said.
Grown-ups are like that...
Fortunately, however, for the reputation of Asteroid B-612, a Turkish dictator made a law that his subjects, under pain of death, should change to European costume. So in 1920 the astronomer gave his demonstration all over again, dressed with impressive style and elegance. And this time everybody accepted his report.
for me this is a perfect example about how the perception of science as empirical, rational and progressive is misplaced. the current problems of science of course is not effected by things like dress code but rather community connections due center periphery relations, which puts the scientists of peripherial countries into a disadvantageous positions.
a bold proposition coming from a well respected western scientist is more likely to be accepted in the scientific community, rather than it coming from an outsider.
this shows there is a certain aspect of habitus culture in the community of science, to form collaborations and apply for grants, we abide by unwritten rules of communication. although it creates hindrances for the outsiders, it is not by itself such a bad thing but rather a fact.
as a scientist who wants to change the sexist and racist practices of science, and destroy the market oriented transformation aspect of it, my solution is to show the cultural aspect of science and learning science.
ok, my rationalizations are sometimes an overkill i admit. here is what i am doing as a practice, i will be giving a talk in mannheim (which supposedly has the most fraction of inhabitants with turkish background) and a giving a talk in the planetarium about history of islamic science.
it is called islamic science, since back at those days there were no nations and the culture was dominated by islam, the language of science was arabic. science was conducted intercontinentally, and most importantly the switch from greek idealism to empiricism happened during middle age, in an islamic geography.
i believe, like the change of our clothes, the switch in language was made in hopes of a paradigmatic shift in the minds of the masses, in effect only caused us to be severed from our history. the history of science we learn is written by west, completely disregarding the middle age transition from ancient greek concepts to enlightenment. in our history islam is disdained as backward and dogmatic.
it might be, but only the institution of the religion; not the culture of it, which included all colors of heterodoxy, and richness of literature, science and logic; even literary analysis of kur'an.
in summary i will talk about vahdeti mevcut as a basis form empirical research, i will talk about geometry, spherical trigonometry, first analog computers and more importantly the attempts to topple ptolemaic universe.
8/20/09
a critique of economy of intellectual property, an introduction
it is time, as we the scientist need to acknowledge the fact that there is an economy behind our rather solipsist defined "search for reality" practice of science. Not only a whole industry of "tool building," is out there what is worse, our intellectual property gets owned by scientific journals so that they can sell subscriptions.
this discourse is motivated by a recent phdcomic.
they argue that they are providing the important service of deciding what is "cutting edge research." imagine the journals that affect you getting a job, continuing research are basically setting the "contemporary trends" in contrary to what most of the scientists think of as the science they need to pursue. i don't know what my molecular biology and biophysics friends think but my astronomer and physicist colleagues are fed up and disillusioned by the choices these highly regarded magazines make.
and get this, they are getting paid for this. be they are non-profit organizations or not.
here comes another challenger, called Public Library of Sciences. they support ideologically all articles should be publicly accessible and they publish online journals. they emerged from a very effective public relations stunt, which was triggered by a boycott of journals to make their archives public.
now they are considered to be a new business model in which they rely on scientist charges and do almost the same kind of editorial "filtering" that the high brow journals do.
i became interested in the progress of scientific publishing which not only affects but defines most of our lives. and this is a first post in this series. and i want to finish with a post from phdcomics phorum.
this discourse is motivated by a recent phdcomic.
they argue that they are providing the important service of deciding what is "cutting edge research." imagine the journals that affect you getting a job, continuing research are basically setting the "contemporary trends" in contrary to what most of the scientists think of as the science they need to pursue. i don't know what my molecular biology and biophysics friends think but my astronomer and physicist colleagues are fed up and disillusioned by the choices these highly regarded magazines make.
and get this, they are getting paid for this. be they are non-profit organizations or not.
here comes another challenger, called Public Library of Sciences. they support ideologically all articles should be publicly accessible and they publish online journals. they emerged from a very effective public relations stunt, which was triggered by a boycott of journals to make their archives public.
now they are considered to be a new business model in which they rely on scientist charges and do almost the same kind of editorial "filtering" that the high brow journals do.
i became interested in the progress of scientific publishing which not only affects but defines most of our lives. and this is a first post in this series. and i want to finish with a post from phdcomics phorum.
If I had any editorial input at The Onion, I would do an article about Nature announcing a new spin-off journal: Nature Horseshit. There'd be quotes from Nobel laureates about all the horseshit research they had that would be perfect for the journal, etc, etc.
8/5/09
secrecy or flat out evil?
i have been accused of secrecy before. both in sourtimes and by tolga yarman. people who think my ideas are atrocious, think that i am only doing these because i am a tricky, sneaky bastard.
well in reality these people should wonder and consider how i am in real life. let's take away the fact that people are so getting used my radicalism that they are in the border of not listening to me ever, but at the same time i seem to reflect upon a strange aura, even in a scientific background.
this is from the conference proceeding i received two weeks ago by mail:
guess which one i am? ok i learned afterwards that they showed this picture in the conference dinner, alongside with other "funny" pictures but i mean, wtf? this is the actual proceeding publication.
as you can guess i wasn't very social this conference.
well in reality these people should wonder and consider how i am in real life. let's take away the fact that people are so getting used my radicalism that they are in the border of not listening to me ever, but at the same time i seem to reflect upon a strange aura, even in a scientific background.
this is from the conference proceeding i received two weeks ago by mail:
guess which one i am? ok i learned afterwards that they showed this picture in the conference dinner, alongside with other "funny" pictures but i mean, wtf? this is the actual proceeding publication.
as you can guess i wasn't very social this conference.
8/1/09
guest log: (...) a giant leap for exploitation
One small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind.
Destiny has its funny ways: 40 years from that first legendary moonwalk in the year of the much more terrestrial departure of the "moonwalker"...
Two different but strong symbols of one same culture: the american dream, the possibility of reaching the impossible, of physically touching the sky starting from nothing.
The culture also where things are not what they seem. A black man that looks white, an old man that wants to be an eternal teenager. A science mission that nobody will ever remember as scientific but that only served to the purpose of showing the strength not only of a country but of a whole political, economical and ethical system. A mission so similar to a hollywood movie to be surrounded by the myth of a setup.
One giant leap for mankind, but in what direction? It is undeniable that that day the whole western world held its breath and dreamed of whole new frontiers of knowledge and freedom. The movement of the students, then in its most intense and creative years, surely dreamed of a different freedom that seemed only a step away that night in front of the television as well as the next day in the streets with thousands of people.
But there is probably no better symbol than the mission to the moon to relate the exploitation of scientists and of the concept itself of science to a more general defense of a political and economical model. That was not a step for mankind, but a step ahead of the Western block with respect to the Eastern one, not a sign of unity but of division, not of brotherhood but of predominance. And all this defended (at least waiting to see whether it worked or not) under the shield of "science" and "progress".
The whole rush to space, as the cold war in general, gave to the great science that was produced in those years on both sides, its character of competition and suspect and secrecy, and highlighted the necessity for scientist to accept the concept of "production" to survive.
The cosmonauts...a childhood dream or one more shiny commercial?
- ailu
Destiny has its funny ways: 40 years from that first legendary moonwalk in the year of the much more terrestrial departure of the "moonwalker"...
Two different but strong symbols of one same culture: the american dream, the possibility of reaching the impossible, of physically touching the sky starting from nothing.
The culture also where things are not what they seem. A black man that looks white, an old man that wants to be an eternal teenager. A science mission that nobody will ever remember as scientific but that only served to the purpose of showing the strength not only of a country but of a whole political, economical and ethical system. A mission so similar to a hollywood movie to be surrounded by the myth of a setup.
One giant leap for mankind, but in what direction? It is undeniable that that day the whole western world held its breath and dreamed of whole new frontiers of knowledge and freedom. The movement of the students, then in its most intense and creative years, surely dreamed of a different freedom that seemed only a step away that night in front of the television as well as the next day in the streets with thousands of people.
But there is probably no better symbol than the mission to the moon to relate the exploitation of scientists and of the concept itself of science to a more general defense of a political and economical model. That was not a step for mankind, but a step ahead of the Western block with respect to the Eastern one, not a sign of unity but of division, not of brotherhood but of predominance. And all this defended (at least waiting to see whether it worked or not) under the shield of "science" and "progress".
The whole rush to space, as the cold war in general, gave to the great science that was produced in those years on both sides, its character of competition and suspect and secrecy, and highlighted the necessity for scientist to accept the concept of "production" to survive.
The cosmonauts...a childhood dream or one more shiny commercial?
- ailu
6/2/09
cryptic update
today is the day i solved one of the major problems of my phd thesis.
after all this time of not writing, i decided to tune on to write this. and the worst part is i cannot talk about it. not only i am keeping myself anonymous, as if i am an important person, i am keeping my work secret, as if it matters. as if anybody cares about my blog or my work, or anybody will find this out in a search engine. for fucks sake only approx. 5 other person work on my topic in the world overall, and still i (we? i an my supervisor) need to be careful for our work not to be stolen.
so this blog is called marxists in space and yet i admit my copyrights, or worse intellectual property. in my mind, in a communist society information should be open (as in open source) and free (as in freedom). but nevertheless, the world of science is based on merit and i cannot ignore the existence of these concept just like communists consuming goods from capitalist production, investing their money and financing their future.
there is a well known cliche about the communist kid who has converse shoes and levi's jeans which comes from the "common" people as a criticism to show the idiosyncrasy of the marxists, inescapability from the market and the impossibility of communism. the basis of the criticisms are not only ill founded also what kind of communist the people expect us to be is uncertain.
probably an alien, who has nothing to do with the social comtemporary life. another reason why marxists should go to space.
hence why as a scientist who is critical of the ethics behind the meritocratic system of intellectual rights, which puts competition before collaboration, i practice the same values in order to not parish.
but other than that i want to show you!
this is a circular polarization spectrum, it is quantified by the ratio of stokes parameters. stokes parameters are basically the amplitude of a photon as an electroamgnetic wave. hopefully i will explain these things more in detail later. but nevertheless i am working on modeling of astrophysical objects and their spectra is the main diagnosis tool for us. this object very peculiar just by itself, have been modeled before, but reason for its high circular polarization has been unable to be untangled before. i have a quite good idea what is causing it, and i made some test. this all happened today around 19:00 pm, but i will present my hypothesis to my supervisor.
even if it is correct, the following precise modeling will be painstaking and tedious and life shattering. (ok i am a bit dramatic)
after all this time of not writing, i decided to tune on to write this. and the worst part is i cannot talk about it. not only i am keeping myself anonymous, as if i am an important person, i am keeping my work secret, as if it matters. as if anybody cares about my blog or my work, or anybody will find this out in a search engine. for fucks sake only approx. 5 other person work on my topic in the world overall, and still i (we? i an my supervisor) need to be careful for our work not to be stolen.
so this blog is called marxists in space and yet i admit my copyrights, or worse intellectual property. in my mind, in a communist society information should be open (as in open source) and free (as in freedom). but nevertheless, the world of science is based on merit and i cannot ignore the existence of these concept just like communists consuming goods from capitalist production, investing their money and financing their future.
there is a well known cliche about the communist kid who has converse shoes and levi's jeans which comes from the "common" people as a criticism to show the idiosyncrasy of the marxists, inescapability from the market and the impossibility of communism. the basis of the criticisms are not only ill founded also what kind of communist the people expect us to be is uncertain.
probably an alien, who has nothing to do with the social comtemporary life. another reason why marxists should go to space.
hence why as a scientist who is critical of the ethics behind the meritocratic system of intellectual rights, which puts competition before collaboration, i practice the same values in order to not parish.
but other than that i want to show you!
this is a circular polarization spectrum, it is quantified by the ratio of stokes parameters. stokes parameters are basically the amplitude of a photon as an electroamgnetic wave. hopefully i will explain these things more in detail later. but nevertheless i am working on modeling of astrophysical objects and their spectra is the main diagnosis tool for us. this object very peculiar just by itself, have been modeled before, but reason for its high circular polarization has been unable to be untangled before. i have a quite good idea what is causing it, and i made some test. this all happened today around 19:00 pm, but i will present my hypothesis to my supervisor.
even if it is correct, the following precise modeling will be painstaking and tedious and life shattering. (ok i am a bit dramatic)
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