science of all kinds 🔬

This designation is based on the direction the compound rotates polarized light that's shined upon it. If it rotates the light clockwise, it's dextrorotatory, and it's referred to as right-handed. Counterclockwise = levorotatory = left handed. It's important in biochem, not only because biological systems tend to differentiate between the two, but... See more

It’s important to note that the concept of a field cannot be broken down into something which has a material or mechanical analogy. Sometimes, physicists think of a field as the aggregate effect of exchange or virtual particles which are governed by a quantum field theory, or the effect of the curvature of space time, but it’s important to note... See more

“ To see the beauty of the Maxwell theory it is necessary to move away from mechanical models and into the abstract world of fields. To see the beauty of quantum mechanics it is necessary to move away from verbal descriptions and into the abstract world of geometry. Mathematics is the language that nature speaks. The language of mathematics makes

... See more

This probability of obtaining another data set as extreme as the one collected is known as the P value. The P value is often criticized for being misunderstood and misused in the field of medicine.2,3 For example, in contrast to popular belief, the P value is not a measure of how correct a hypothesis is, nor is it a measure of the size or... See more

In a free society, at one or another point in your life, you’ll actually have to form your own opinion about something. You’ll do better at that if you have some practice forming opinions. When experts have strong opinions on something, this is a good opportunity to practice your opinion-forming skills, see whether you get the same result as the... See more

instrumentalism is “the view that theories are merely instruments for predicting observable phenomena or systematizing observation reports.”

But I was learning that succeeding at a research institution like Penn required skills that had little to do with science. You needed the ability to sell yourself and your work. You needed to attract funding. You needed the kind of interpersonal savvy that got you invited to speak at conferences and made people eager to mentor and support you. You... See more

In a nutshell, the way I have understood it, given a specific set of data, the frequentist believes that there is a true, underlying distribution from which said data was generated. The inability to get the exact parameters is a function of finite sample size. The Bayesian, on the other hand, think that we start with some assumption about the... See more