Science Impact

The Guardian has a blog post up by three neuroscientists decrying the state of hype in the media related to their field, which is fueled in part by their colleagues seeking "impact."  They write:Anyone who has followed recent media reports that electrical brain stimulation "sparks bright ideas" or "unshackles the genius within" could be forgiven for believing that we...

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Coming up on the Radio Cardiff Sports Show - 1st March 2011

A Happy St David's Day to all our listeners....On this week’s show we feature Simon’s regular round up of the Cardiff Devils and all things ice hockey.Plus we look at England’s dramatic tie versus India at the Cricket World Cup and the views on the tournament so far with Zaheer Haque.Matthew Eves returns to the show to bring us up-to-date with the latest boxing news and Yousef...

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Bicycle Shopping: What Do We Expect?

Last week, I wrote about my sister's search for a basic, comfortable roadbike and in the post I explained that she is looking for a "normal" bike - That is, for a bike that is neither vintage, nor classic, nor lugged, nor artisanal - just a regular bike in the sense that one could walk into a bicycle shop off the street and buy it for a reasonable price. Once again I thank...

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DePaul's Friday Symposium on Compliance in Chicago

This Friday, the DePaul Journal of Sports Law and Contemporary Problems hosts "A Rule is a Rule: Compliance in the World of Sports." The presenters include Timothy Epstein, Marc Edelman, and myself. 2.75 hours of CLE is available for attorneys and a reduced rate admission is offered for law students from other area schools. Here's the event description: The DePaul Journal of Sports Law & Contemporary Problems will host its annual sports law symposium, A Rule is a Rule: Compliance in the World of Sports, on March 4th, 2011. During this event,...

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Oil Prices and Economic Growth

Last week I solicited perspectives on the relationship of oil prices and economic growth.  Thanks to all who emailed and commented.  This post shares some further thoughts.First, there does appear to be a sense of conventional wisdom on this subject.  For instance, from last Friday's New York Times:A sustained $10 increase in oil prices would shave about two-tenths...

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Rest week and the upcoming Uddevalla Open LC comp

This week is rest for me. I will do some mobility and a few reps later in the week. With "few reps" I mean few - like 3-5 - hence, it is not an understatement. I am curious to see how it goes - the training suffered some from the bad cold last week. On the other hand, I felt ok lifting Saturday.I prefer an entire week of rest (though I don't taper down before that). I tried...

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More Sports Law Links

As a follow-up to Mike's recent post with a number of sports law links, I wanted to provide a few more, as there have been a number of interesting developments in our field. 1. 60 Minutes ran a story on legendary Vegas-based sports gambler Billy Walters last month. The video clips provide a fascinating look into the world of high stakes "white collar" sports gambling. 2....

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[SOC]

It is the last day of February 2011. It feels weird that a month should be over so soon. Spring is in the air here in South Carolina which means pollen and allergies. I have spent the previous evening researching the paleo diet, the Atkins diet, Dean Ornish, etc. Basically, the conclusions that I reached in my article "Why You Are Fat" hold firm. Both the vegetarians and the...

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Australia Carbon Tax Poll

<a href="http://www.blogpoll.com">Free Blog Poll</a&...

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The Flip Side of Extreme Event Attribution

I first noticed an interesting argument related to climate change in President Bill Clinton's 2000 State of the Union Address:If we fail to reduce the emission of greenhouse gases, deadly heat waves and droughts will become more frequent, coastal areas will flood, and economies will be disrupted. That is going to happen, unless we act.Taken literally, the sentences are...

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Climate Science Turf Wars and Carbon Dioxide Myopia

Over at Dot Earth Andy Revkin has posted up two illuminating comments from climate scientists -- one from NASA's Drew Shindell and a response to it from Stanford's Ken Caldeira.Shindell's comment focuses on the impacts of action to mitigate the effects of black carbon, tropospheric ozone and other non-carbon dioxide human climate forcings, and comes from his perspective as...

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Moultons, Modern and Vintage

Local bike shop Harris Cyclery has begun carrying Moulton bicycles, and I had not seen one up close until now. They had a dove gray one in the window that called out to me, so I took it outside for a closer examination and test ride.  Jon Harris then brought out another Moulton - one of his personal bikes made in the 1960s, that had once belonged to Sheldon...

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Sunday Sports Law Links

* Mark Cuban wonders why more superstar U.S. teenage basketball players don't go play professionally in Europe, where players can be as young as 14 and earn lucrative contracts. The NBA, as we know, requires that U.S. players be 19-years-old and one-year removed from high school before they are eligible to play.The European route was clearly successful for Brandon Jennings,...

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The Weakness of Karen De Coster

Karen De Coster is a bad ass. She is a libertarian, an accountant, a writer, an activist, and a devotee of the paleo diet and exercise regimen. Plus, she looks hot holding a firearm. She is also very opinionated and does not hesitate to say exactly what she thinks. You can get a taste of that here.There is much to like and admire about Karen. She is awesome in so many ways....

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No Car, Must Travel

It has been two and a half months now without the car - pretty much the entire winter. For the most part we did not miss it. But now that the blizzards have subsided, it is time to get things done. We'll start going on photoshoots and other trips again soon, and there are other ways in which we will need it as well. This weekend was our first experiment with alternative options.I...

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Lccj-session at UKC

Lccj 2x20kg: 10Lccj 2x24kg: 5, 40/8min, 10Lccj 2x20kg: 5Lccj 2x24kg: 5 Lccj 2x28kg: 3Jerk 2x20kg: 30, 10rpm Oa swing 24kg: 20/20/15/15/10/10/5/5 BU cleans 20kg: ca 50sec/50secDid the last session before the comp on Saturday up in Uddevalla. Now will be a week of rest with some few reps in Wedensday, or Thursd...

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Bringing it Home

Writing at MIT's Knight Science Journalism Tracker, Charles Petit breathlessly announces to journalists that the scientific community has now given a green light to blaming contemporary disasters on the emissions of greenhouse gases:An official shift may just have occurred not only in news coverage of climate change, but the way that careful scientists  talk about it....

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Random Thoughts on Various Subjects

1. ROUGH WEEK AT THE C-BLOGI've had a heck of a week at work, and I have been tired lately. I have not had the energy to post my usual slew of shit here at the C-blog. The ideas are there, but I find it difficult to sit at the keyboard and express them. This comes from a decision on my part to catch another gear on the job. I had a friend many years ago who I lifted with who taught me that your job can be turned into your cardio workout. We both were in college and worked at the same pizza place. Basically, we ran harder and worked harder. We would...

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Eagles Players Help Boy Nearly Bullied to Death / SportsLeader Testimony

An excellent piece by Rick Reilly of ESPN ... We need more NFL players to step up like this to help save our youth. Do your athletes help get rid of bullying at your school?Maybe your athletes could go to a school and give a jersey to a bullied boy ...Let's be part of the solution. SportsLeader helps coaches develop great young men like Mike Cook:* - Please remember in your prayers Todd Brechbill and his wife Jennifer and family. They unfortunately lost their baby to a miscarriage. The baby was 10 weeks old....By Rick Reilly ESPN.comhttp://sports.espn.go.com/espn/news/story?id=6120346Among...

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Waters lifts Principality award

Darren Waters with Pontypridd Principality branch manager Andrew ClarkPontypridd flanker Darren Waters has won the Principality Player of the Month award for January.Darren has been instrumental in Ponty’s recent good form on three fronts with the club sitting at the top of the Principality Premiership, and in the quarter-finals of both the British & Irish Cup and SWALEC...

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On Handmade Bicycle Shows

[image via prollyisnotprobably]Continuing with the theme of framebuilding, today is the first day of NAHBS 2011 - the North American Handmade Bicycle Show, held this year in Austin, Texas. I received a couple of invitations this time around and for a brief moment considered going... then remembered the state of my finances and swiftly came down to Earth! Besides: To tell the...

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