ChemBark

I don’t know why I find myself writing so many posts about happenings at Columbia, but I do. And the trend continues, thanks to this ad I found on page 84 of the March 18th edition of Chemical & Engineering News:

 

The ad begins:

THE DEPARTMENT OF CHEMISTRY seeks to appoint an Associate in Discipline beginning July 1, 2013, for our busy undergraduate laboratory programs. This is a full-time special instructional faculty position with multiyear renewals contingent on successful review…

An Associate in Discipline, you say? Great. I can think of a few chemists at Columbia who need to be disciplined (1 2)…

I was amused by a news story out of Florida, where a pair of disc jockeys were suspended after going on the radio Monday (April Fools’ Day) and reporting that the local water supply had dihydrogen monoxide in it. Unaware that dihydrogen monoxide is H₂O, and H₂O is water, many residents went crazy:

 

As if we needed any more evidence that science education in this country is absolute crap.

What’s more, the DJs might face felony charges. From a legal standpoint, I’m interested in seeing how this one turns out. I haven’t heard any direct quotes from the broadcast, but can you charge someone with a crime for stating a scientific fact? I’m assuming they were careful and said something along the lines of “there’s dihydrogen monoxide in the water” as opposed to “the water is poisoned with dihydrogen monoxide.” Anyway, I suppose the DJs went in with a fair amount of mens rea; what else did they expect to happen?

 

Photo sources/credits: User “Vdp” on Wikipedia, Catholic Church (of England and Wales), Prince George’s County Fire Department (via C&EN)

Bobak “The JPL Mohawk Guy” Ferdowsi dyed his hairdo several weeks back to celebrate the discovery of chloromethane on Mars:

Very nice, though I’m not a big fan of the atomic radii. That turquoise chlorine atom should be huge—4 times the diameter of the red hydrogens.

You just can’t trust engineers these days…

Happy Thanksgiving from the staff of ChemBark!

As a service to PIs everywhere, the editor is compelled to remind those of you who are grad students and postdocs that “Thanksgiving is a dinner, Christmas is a day.”

That is all.