adios, CopyrightX

To my great surprise, my review of 3.091x course became the most popular post of all time on this blog. That is to say, more than 365 pageviews. I know, it’s peanuts, but then I never expected this blog to be much visited in the first place. Let’s see if my 100th post (!) will be a hit.

HLS1x Copyright, aka CopyrightX, was the second edX course I took. Apart from the fact that these are both edX courses, there is very little in common between CopyrightX and 3.091x. I intend to continue with edX next academic year and look forward to surprises. Yet I dare to suggest that there is very little in common between CopyrightX and any other edX course.

To start with, one cannot simply, single-clickingly (is there such a word?) register for CopyrightX, like for any old edX course. No sir, you have to apply. This year class was limited to 500 participants. Mmm, I thought, intriguing. I just had to apply and see what happens next.

the book has no future

In his recent article in Chemistry International [1], Peter Atkins wrote:

The book has no future. Most of us who have been brought up surrounded by the tactile pleasure of paper books (p-books) have a sentimental attachment to them, relishing their feel, enjoying being curled up with them in their friendly presence, responding perhaps subconsciously to their smell, enjoying their instant access, finding it easy to browse, serendipitously opening a page and lighting on an enjoyable enlightenment. For those like us in this respect, there will always be paper books, just as there are vintage cars for enthusiasts. The rest of the world, however, will have moved on.

With all respect to the author of the classic Physical Chemistry textbook — the Russian translation of which I was using in my university days — I disagree. The printed book existed for hundreds of years and it will take more than advent of cheap e-book readers to make p-book extinct. It was predicted that compact discs will kill vinyl, then that DVD-Audio and Super Audio CD will kill CDs, and that mp3 downloads will render all of the above obsolete. Today very few people remember what DVD-Audio or SACD was all about, while vinyl sales are on the rise. (The only SACD I have is 30^th Anniversary Edition of Dark Side of the Moon which I bought ten years ago and never had a chance to listen in all its 5.1 surround glory.)

If anything has no future, it is the traditional publishing model. The big publishing houses missed their many chances to make any meaningful contribution to e-books. Now, the main focus of Atkins’s article is on textbooks. He seems to be either unaware of the Open Access movement, or simply ignores it. He mentions some “wikitexts” but, amazingly, never names either Wikipedia, Wikibooks or Wikisource. Too bad. With all the wealth of free educational information on the Web, one must be mad to buy e-textbooks. In the meantime, the authors increasingly move to self-publishing. Who needs the middlemen?

Interestingly, in his earlier article on the same topic [2], Professor Atkins explained exactly why p-books will stay with us:

A p-book is a beautiful thing. It smells good when new, it generally looks good, and it has the virtue of serendipity, for casual browsing can bring the browser to an unexpected viewpoint. The approximate location of knowledge in books can be remembered, or at least half-remembered, for years. Books are life’s companions, and even the sight of a volume on a shelf can remind one of a special moment. But, most important of all, a p-book is “always on.” A book can be opened at a whim and immediately offers its contents to its reader. Books can be read in the brightest sunlight, on the balmiest beach, at almost any angle, in even the most bizarre bodily posture, for hours on end, even while one’s airplane is landing and taking off.

Printed matter is self-sufficient. You don’t need any device to read it. If hacker attacks destroy all Amazon Cloud services, or a hurricane plunges the cities into darkness, the books will still be there. If there are problems with sat nav reception or you forgot to charge the mobile phone, the map still can help. And so on.

But what the new generation think? My children love their PCs, Wii and MP3 players. I asked them today what they prefer, e-book or p-book. And the answer is: the real thing.

1. Atkins, P. (2013) The future of the book. Chemistry International 35, 3—6.
2. Atkins, P. (2009) Beyond the book. Chemistry International 31, 9—11.

hand wash

Last night I put this, presumably, hand-wash only jumper into a washing machine. On a hand wash cycle, cold water. The machine stopped in the middle of the cycle because the filter was blocked. I left it overnight. This morning, I took the filter out (a minor flood followed). It looked as if someone was trying to stuff a felt hat into it and partially succeeded. The rest of the hat is all over the drum. Mopped the floor. Decided to repeat the rinse. The machine stopped in the middle of the cycle. Took the filter out. Mopped the floor. Took the dripping jumper out to the garden. Washed my hands from fluff. Cleaned more serious fluff from the washer’s drum. Run the rinse. Took the filter out. Mopped the floor. Cleaned some further fluff from the drum. Run the rinse. Checked the jumper. My, this hand wash involves a lot of hand washing. Took the filter out. Mopped the floor.

This reminded me of my early or, indeed, my later days (and nights) in “biocomputing”, now known as “bioinformatics”. True, the machine does something, eventually, but cleaning the mess is left up to you.

it’s nonsense to look for a solution if it already exists

Мы сидели, подперев головы, и предавались самоуничижению, когда в зал заглянул Федор Симеонович. Насколько я понял, ему не терпелось узнать мое мнение о составленной им программе.
— Программа! — желчно усмехнувшись, произнес Хунта. — Я не видел твоей программы, Теодор, но я уверен, что она гениальна по сравнению с этим... — Он с отвращением подал двумя пальцами Федору Симеоновичу листок со своей задачей. — Полюбуйся, вот образец убожества и ничтожества.
— Г-голубчики, — сказал Федор Симеонович озадаченно, разобравшись в почерках. — Это же п-проблема Бен Б-бецалеля. К-калиостро же доказал, что она н-не имеет р-решения.
— Мы сами знаем, что она не имеет решения, — сказал Хунта, немедленно ощетиниваясь. — Мы хотим знать, как ее решать.
— К-как-то ты странно рассуждаешь, К-кристо... К-как же искать решение, к-когда его нет? Б-бессмыслица какая-то...
— Извини, Теодор, но это ты очень странно рассуждаешь. Бессмыслица — искать решение, если оно и так есть. Речь идет о том, как поступать с задачей, которая решения не имеет. Это глубоко принципиальный вопрос, который, как я вижу, тебе, прикладнику, к сожалению, не доступен. По-видимому, я напрасно начал с тобой беседовать на эту тему.

Аркадий и Борис Стругацкие, Понедельник начинается в субботу

So we sat, propping up our heads and abandoning ourselves to mutual devaluation, when Feodor Simeonovich looked in. As near as I could make out, he was impatient to hear my opinion of his program.
“Program!” exclaimed Junta, smiling biliously. “I haven’t seen your program, Feodor, but I am sure that it is a work of genius in comparison to this— ” He handed Feodor Simeonovich the sheet with the problem, holding it in ginger disgust between two fingers. “Regard this exemplar of mental poverty and vapidity.”
“B-but, my dear f-fellows,” said Feodor Simeonovich, having diligently deciphered the handwriting. “This is B-Ben B-Beczalel’s problem! Didn’t C-Cagliostro prove th-that it had no s-solution?”
“We know that it has no solution, too,” said Junta, bristling immediately. “But we wish to learn how to solve it.”
“H-how strangely you r-reason, C-Cristo... H-how can you look for a solution, where it d-does not exist? It’s s-some sort of n-nonsense.”
“Excuse me, Feodor, but it’s you who are reasoning strangely. It’s nonsense to look for a solution if it already exists. We are talking about how to deal with a problem that has no solution. This is a question of profound principle, which, I can see, is not within your scope, since you are an applications type. Apparently I started this conversation with you for nothing.”

Arkady and Boris Strugatsky, Monday Begins on Saturday (translated by Leonid Renen)

both and neither academic or artistic

I wish somebody offered me a job just like that, after a short email exchange.

I wish to offer you a job.

It is a peculiar response to your request for more information, I realize, but I ask you to consider my proposal with an open mind.

I know a degree about you from my formal inquiries (I hope you don’t mind, but I couldn’t risk error). And your response encouraged me to conclude that you’re exactly the person I’m looking for.

My needs are uncomplicated. I wish to employ a bright, able-bodied person with the right kind of eye to help me locate some very specific art works.

You fit those requirements admirably, and I’m inclined to believe that you are at a stage in your career where you need an extra challenge.

The job I’m offering you will require resourcefulness, imagination, willingness to travel, plus a deep love of artifact. The salary would be substantially higher than the one you receive at present.

I don’t think I’ve misjudged your potential for change.

Professional researchers are all well and good, but this is a task that requires a subtle sensibility that is both and neither academic or artistic.

Nick Bantock, The Venetian’s Wife ; highlighter mine

jealousies and rivalries

From Friends, Lovers, Chocolate by Alexander McCall Smith:

Isabel did not like her desk to get too cluttered, but that did not mean that it was uncluttered. In fact, most of the time there were too many papers on it, usually manuscripts that had to be sent off for peer assessment. She was not sure about the term peer assessment, even if it was the widely accepted term for a crucial stage in the publishing of journal articles. Sometimes the expression amounted to exactly that: equals looked dispassionately at papers by equals and gave their view. But Isabel had discovered that this did not always happen, and papers were consigned into the hands of their authors’ friends or enemies. This was unwitting; it was impossible for anybody to keep track of the jealousies and rivalries that riddled academia, and Isabel had to hope that she could spot the concealed agendas that lay behind outright antagonism or, more often, and more subtly, veiled antagonism: ‘an interesting piece, perhaps interesting enough to attract a ripple of attention.’ Philosophers could be nasty, she reflected, and moral philosophers the nastiest of all.

so long, 3.091x

Hooray, I just downloaded a pdf file certifying that I

“successfully completed 3.091x: Introduction to Solid State Chemistry, a course of study offered by MITx, an online learning initiative of The Massachusetts Institute of Technology through edX”.

Frankly I don’t understand why it took 17 days to generate the certificate but hey, it was a free course and I wasn’t in a hurry.

I took this course hoping to refresh or possibly fill some gaps in my university chemistry, and also because it was one of the inaugural courses offered by edX. I expected it to be both challenging and fun. It was challenging all right. But it could do with a little bit more fun.

For the benefit of future students, here are my personal impressions of the course.

forever foreign

In the preface to his novel NO, Carl Djerassi wrote:

A striking phenomenon of the contemporary science scene is the remarkable Asianization of the American research laboratory: Asians now represent in certain disciplines, such as chemistry or engineering, the majority of graduate students in many American universities. In many of these institutions, more than half the postdoctoral fellows (the most exploited but also most productive sector of the research establishment) have received the bulk of their college or university education in Asia.

NO was published in 1998. You’d think that since then the said postdocs moved up to professorial positions across American academia and have taken, well, most of them. Wrong! As Lilian Gomory Wu and Wei Jing write in their recent Nature article:

Across all sectors, Asians in US STEM [science, technology, engineering and maths] careers are not reaching leadership positions at the same rate as white people, or even as members of other underrepresented groups. In academia, just 42% of Asian men are tenured, compared with 58% of white men, 49% of black men and 50% of Hispanic men. Just 21% of Asian women in academia are tenured, the lowest proportion for any ethnicity or gender. They are also least likely to be promoted to full professor.

But why? The authors argue that

east Asians’ humble demeanour could cause them to describe the implications of their research in modest terms, which might bring them lower ratings from reviewers.

On the other hand,

a work group of the US government’s Equal Employment Opportunity Commission reports that Asians are often perceived as ‘forever foreign’, which can affect how others assess their ability to communicate, their competence and, more importantly, their trustworthiness.

It’s all good to be hardworking, patient, family oriented and so on, but if you don’t sex up your research, you don’t get promoted. And don’t get trusted either.

season greetings to excellent people

This is the time of year — again! — when they start cleaning their desks and send holiday greetings to unsuccessful applicants. I don’t even have to open these emails anymore to know what’s there. I just got one today.

Dear Dr. Doctor,

Thank you for your recent application.

The appointing committees have now had a chance to consider your application and have on this occasion decided not to take it any further.

You were up against some outstanding candidates and the choice of the shortlist was very difficult.

On behalf of whoever it is who couldn’t bother to write himself, I should like to thank you for your interest in applying.

With best wishes,

Human Resources

The other one came last week. I don’t remember what the application was about because the letter referred to it by some number and right now I am too tired to look it up. Most probably it was regarding the position advertised last Summer. I liked the wording so much that I made a note of it:

To continue its policy of investment in excellent people, the School of Something Else at the University of Poshborough is seeking to appoint up to (some number) high calibre individuals at either high or even higher level.

But I am the excellent people! How come they don’t see that?

I know. This is all my fault, really. Instead of just sending the application off and forgetting about it, I am worrying that they will expect more of me than I can deliver. So I put all sorts of ridiculous stuff in my covering letter. For example:

As you can see from my CV, I do not have a strong record of teaching at the university.

How’s that? I bet nobody else is doing this. My goal is to convince them that I am the best candidate to fill the position, not some sort of impostor. If they can see something from my CV, then they will see. Or maybe not. The point is not to worry about that.

Another mistake I keep on repeating is to do an informal enquiry, whenever such an option exists.

Dear Professor Professor,

I would like to apply for a position of Somebody in Something as advertised somewhere. However before sending the full application, I am asking for your kind advice.

<insert a stupid bit about not having a strong record of doing Something>

I do not wish to waste the expert committee’s time. <Why?> Therefore I would greatly appreciate your frank opinion whether I should proceed with full application.

Yours sincerely,

Dr. Doctor

Dear Dr. Doctor,

Thanks for the email and CV. Your career track is a bit unusual and the fact that you have not been active in science in the last three years will probably catch the attention of the assessment committee.

I can not tell you whether to apply or not, it has to be your own decision.

Kind regards,

Professor

See? Totally absurd query and deservedly useless response.

Sir Patrick Moore (1923—2012)

Moore was perhaps the last in the great British tradition of significant contributions to science by distinguished amateurs, and was fiercely proud of his amateur status.

Derek McNally

I wonder what academic bureaucrats of today would make of Sir Patrick Moore’ CV if he ever applied for professorship. Moore never went to the university (he famously refused a government grant to study at Cambridge), let alone wrote a Ph.D. thesis. So what. Dennis Barker wrote in The Guardian:

With one exception after his teaching days — his directorship of Armagh Planetarium in Northern Ireland (1965—68) — Moore was never an employee.

Even better.

I first learned about Moore from Англия, a British magazine published (in Russian) in Soviet times. I remember the black and white photo of him by the grand piano, the caption saying that Moore is an accomplished musician possessing perfect pitch. Back then, I thought he was some sort of English eccentric. Many years later, I saw him on the BBC. Yes he was an archetypal English eccentric all right, and amazingly brilliant at that. He joined the RAF during World War II; he met Yuri Gagarin and appeared in Doctor Who. He was the world’s longest-serving TV presenter — and, briefly, the finance minister for the Monster Raving Loony Party. According to Wikipedia, “as a pianist, he once accompanied Albert Einstein playing The Swan by Camille Saint-Saëns on the violin”. He wrote hundreds of books, including the one called Bureaucrats: How to Annoy Them. So I think his application would not be successful.