August 11, 2006

Mr. BS Pilot

As I was reading The Science Book, I quickly realized that I've lost all memory of what we've learned the previous school year...again. Familiar names and terms kept flashing by...but I could never exactly remember what it was about. I guess it's good to be reminded of them so that the start of university will have less of a negative punch to it, with the new experience of lectures and whatnot. Orientation might help lessen the tension too.

"The Aristotelian name of the tomato, for instance, had expanded into Solanum caule inerme herbaceo, foliis pinnatis incisis, racemis simplicibus (Solanum with smooth herbaceous stem, incised pinnate leaves and simple inflorescence). This name is less convenient than the Linnaean name Solanum lycopersicum." - Naming life

"What's more, electrons, previously regarded as particles, sometimes behave like waves. We seem to need both models. As Sir William Bragg quipped in the 1920s, 'On Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays light behaves like waves, on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays like particles, and like nothing at all on Sundays.'" - Wave nature of light

"There were three obvious clues. First of all, Uranus had until 1822 been accelerating, but had then become retarded." - Discovery of Neptune

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