By any measure, it's a very good day today. It's Sunday, but not necessary a holiday for a freelancer. I work on any day when there is work to be done, and I play on any day when there is no demand. It took me about three hours to edit replies to reviewers' comments, which had 20+ pages. The writing was good, and the logic was clear. I cannot ask for better work than this. (And, the paper will be accepted after this round of revision!) Then, it's yoga time. Today's instructor is new. In fact, it's her first time teaching. There were only about five students, but that may be a good thing because every student can get extra assist from the instructor. She made some mistakes, but her music was good and her instruction carried her own thoughts (not just a total copy of the routine). She has a nice voice, and she carries calmness and gentleness through her voice. I was very happy to be in her class! Rushing through lunch in five minutes, so that I could join friends to watch the women's World Cup! What a game! (Yesterday, the score was 0:0 after 90 minutes between England and Germany. Then, the recording ended, and I missed the rest of the game!) I don't recell ever watching a game like this: the team I am sided with won one goal after another (plus an own goal for the other team). It was nothing you would expect from a World Cup Final, but I am glad my team won! Back to work after dinner, because Sunday does not mean a day of rest, for a freelancer.
Opening my Yahoo Knowledge School webpage, I found out this answer to someone's question "How to make a good impression?" I just wrote several simple sentences to this question (which was written several years ago). The following is my answer. 1. Dress properly and comfortably. 2. Have confidence in yourself. 3. Speak neither too fast nor too slow but with composure. 4. Look at the eyes of the people you are talking to but don't stare at them for a long time. 5. Choose topics which can interest both of you. 6. Arm yourself with more meaningful thought. You can surely leave better impression to others if you do as I tell you.
http://youngsfishmarket.com/index.cfm/menu/ http://www.yelp.com/biz/ono-hawaiian-foods-honolulu http://www.yelp.com/biz/helenas-hawaiian-food-honolulu http://hailishawaiianfood.com/ ps. I have never been to any of these places. Will try them one by one, and report back.
Note: I knew a little about the Haber-Bosch process , when I co-taught at U. Hawaii. How little did I know about Haber himself. Here is what I heard over the NPR, and googled. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fritz_Haber Haber was born in Breslau , Germany (now Wrocław, Poland), into a Hasidic Jewish family. Nobel Prize During his time at University of Karlsruhe from 1894 to 1911, Fritz Haber and Carl Bosch developed the Haber process , which is the catalytic formation of ammonia from hydrogen and atmospheric nitrogen under conditions of high temperature and pressure. In 1918 he received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for this work. The Haber-Bosch process was a milestone in industrial chemistry, … The food base of half of the current world population is based on the Haber-Bosch process. World War I Haber played a major role in the development of chemical warfare in World War I . Part of this work included the development of gas masks with adsorbent filters. In addition to leading the teams developing chlorine gas and other deadly gases for use in trench warfare , Haber was on hand personally to aid in its release despite its proscription by the Hague Convention of 1907 (to which Germany was a signatory). Future Nobel laureates James Franck , Gustav Hertz , and Otto Hahn served as gas troops in Haber's unit. Gas warfare in World War One was, in a sense, the war of the chemists, with Haber pitted against French Nobel laureate chemist Victor Grignard . Regarding war and peace, Haber once said, "During peace time a scientist belongs to the World, but during war time he belongs to his country." This was an example of the ethical dilemmas facing chemists at that time. His first wife Clara , a fellow chemist and the first woman to earn a Ph.D at the University of Breslau, committed suicide with his service revolver in their garden , possibly in response to his having personally overseen the first successful use of chlorine at the Second Battle of Ypres on 22 April 1915. She shot herself in the heart on 15 May, and died in the morning. That same morning, Haber left for the Eastern Front to oversee gas release against the Russians. Haber left behind his grieving 13-year-old son, who had been the one to discover his dying mother. Haber defended gas warfare against accusations that it was inhumane, saying that death was death, by whatever means it was inflicted. During the 1920s, scientists working at his institute developed the cyanide gas formulation Zyklon A , which was used as an insecticide , especially as a fumigant in grain stores. During the Holocaust, Zyklon A was altered by the Nazis to be used in the gas chambers of concentration camps as Zyklon B. Haber's creation of Zyklon A was used to kill millions after his death. Criticism Haber received much criticism for his involvement in the development of chemical weapons in pre-World War II Germany, both from contemporaries and from modern-day scientists. The research results show the ambivalence of his scientific activity: on the one hand, development of ammonia synthesis for the manufacture of explosives and of a technical process for the industrial manufacture and use of poison gas in warfare, but on the other hand, development of an industrial process without which the diet of today's humanity would not be possible.
About 24 hours before the New Year arrives in Hawaii, I received a call from a good friend. I was surprised, because hardly anyone calls this late unless it's from China, from someone who cannot figure out the time difference correctly. Oh, she is stuck at the NRT due to flight cancellation. Luckily, she has Skype. So, she called me, without knowing exactly what time it is here (almost midnight). Immediately, I gave her my good friend's phone number, the one who lives in Chiba. A good friend's good friend's friend, at least. Right? I should be in bed by now, but I don't want to go to sleep. Why? I just finished the book, "The Hunger Games." The ending is so heavy. I don't know if I want to read Book 2. Do I?
近日我写了一篇标题为 好论文的标准：“两性”兼备 的博文，赚了不少点击，也有不少网友参与评论，其中有一位半开玩笑的说我的这篇博文也是“两性”兼备，这便引出了本文的话题：好博文，尤其是科学网的好博文也要“两性”兼备！ 在上述博文中，我提到：好论文的标准中的 “两性”兼备是指 新颖性、有趣性 / 可读性。当然，不可否认，正如有的网友指出，这所谓的“两性”，应该是指“三性”，这个涉嫌玩标题党的标题当初也是为了吸引眼球。说 “两性”兼备，可能有许多人感兴趣，但是如果换成“三性” 兼备，我估计许多人就兴（性）趣寡淡了。我个人认为：上述博文似乎可以作为一个很好的例子可佐证本文我的主要观点：科学网的好博文也要“两性”兼备。下面会进一步分析，但是首先需要强调的是：我所认为的好博文的“两性”兼备和好论文的“两性”兼备不尽相同。 好博文的“两性”，我认为最重要的是要 ： 科学性 + 有趣性 ，和好论文对 新颖性（创新性）的要求不同，写博文毕竟不是发表论文，对于新颖性要求不高。下面就具体谈谈为何科学性和有趣性是科学网好博文的 缺一不可的必要条件，并且这两点几乎又是好博文的充分条件。 “科学性” ：毫无疑问，只要是真正的好论文，“科学性”那是必须的，对于“科学”网上的好博文而言，我觉得也需要有“科学性”，因为对于科学网上的网友，我相信大多数都有看具有科学性的文章的心理预期，热衷于八卦、情色、掐架、明星新闻的网友估计不会想着要来科学网搜搜、看看。为了迎合这种心理预期（这种“迎合”，似乎比一般的曲意迎合还是上了点档次），科学网的博文也有必要多少有点“科学性”。当然这个科学性的涵义，我个人认为需要适当外延，因为有些看起来和“科学”不大沾边的博文，比如有些摄影类的博文，似乎和科学有点距离，但是有些摄影高手，比如以科学网博主李学宽和孟津等老师为代表的一批高手，尽管他们不是职业摄影家，但是照片拍的却很有专业水准，所配图片的介绍和解释也往往妙趣横生，可以说和图片相得益彰，真正是图文并茂，在我看来，这类的博文的科学性同样很强，可以说是“很猛、很强大”。反之，有些看起来很有科学性的博文，但是文章本身笔误很多，或者文章有学术性的硬伤，再加上写的又无趣，自然算不上好博文。但是，如果一篇博文，只是为了有趣而有趣，插科打诨，而没有任何科学性可言，则同样算不上好博文，至少应该算不上科学网的好博文，毕竟科学网不是小品、相声的集中营。 有趣性 ：在博文有科学性的前提下，好博文要写的有趣，有趣并不意味着简单地搞笑，但是幽默风趣无疑会为博文增色，当然，我所理解的有趣性，还在于博主能够以引人入胜的方式表达自己的观点或者讲述自己的故事，所以博文要能吸引读者读下去，除了和文章本身内容有关，也更与作者如何写自己的博文有关。科学性再高的博文，如果读者压根就没有兴趣读下去，也是枉然。我觉得一个好的博文，首先要有一个好的吸引人眼球的标题，不谦虚的说，我自认为我的大多数博文的标题还算比较吸引人，我在写每一篇博文时，我的博文题目都会仔细考虑一下，以尽可能在反映文章内容的前提下，尽量更有趣。在现在这个几乎人人是博客写手的今天，要想有更多的读者点击阅读自己的博文，扩大影响，首先要有一个好的标题。 在科学网，科学性与有趣性兼备的博文有很多，这方面难捏的很好的博主也有不少，我个人认为这其中的出色代表之一为李福洋老师，他的一系列有关科普的博文大都堪称科学性与有趣性的完美结合，可以说是科学网博文中的精品中的精品。另外，我不知道科学网编辑的精选、置顶博文的标准具体是什么，但从过去近两个月的经验来看，科学网编辑们认为的好博文似乎也基本符合上述的“两性”标准。 另外，顺便谈点题外话，有些网友在我的博客留言或评论说我的博文篇篇被精选，这实在是抬举我了，我在科学网开博近两个月来，已写（包括以前在别的博客写的）博文 40 余篇，尽管大多数蒙科学网编辑抬爱被精选（其中一些甚至被置顶推荐），但是还有一些未被精选，在此澄清一下。还需要说明的是，尽管我的大多数博文被精选，但是我一没有给科学网编辑 MM 送过花，二没有给科学网编辑 GG 喝过酒。另外，我更想强调的是：我写博文并非是为了被精选（尽管被精选是令人高兴的事），如果只是为了被精选，写博文估计就没有多少乐趣了，我写博文最大原因或者因素是兴趣，写自己感兴趣的话题，写作过程本身就是一件愉快的事情，看到自己写的博文，尤其是关于英文论文写作方面的博文，对于年轻研究生们有点帮助，自然觉得很欣慰，从而也觉得自己是有福气之人，因为正如圣经所言：“给比受更有福”。 写博文最令我感到高兴，或者说最有收获的地方是：当自己写的博文贴出后， 有网友有精彩评论（这样的评论往往比我写的博文本身好的多）或者指出我的博文中学术上／科学上的硬伤／错误，从而自己得以学习和提高。这样的例子，对于我而言可以说是不胜枚举，其中一个例子：比如我在一篇涉及诺贝尔奖的博文中（点击参见： 全球史上被引用次数最多的论文—兼议诺贝儿奖 ） ，曾提到 田中耕一 ，在我的博文原文中曾有一句话“ 田中耕一 只有本科学历，这是诺贝儿奖百年历史上首次也是迄今唯一一次颁发给一个是只有本科文凭的科学家”，有位网友就质疑这句话，提出“ Please check Guglielmo Marconi, 1909 laureate for physics ”， Marconi 即为发明电报的马可尼， 1909 年获诺贝尔物理奖，我在网上一查（包括诺贝尔基金会官方网站），果然马可尼基本就没有接受过多少正规的学校教育，主要靠家庭（尤其是其母亲）教育。当然，我原文中那句对 田中耕一 的表述并非是自己的猜测，也是有根据的，在英文维基百科上关于 田中耕一 的介绍中有这么一句：“ As of 2008, he is the only person without a post-bachelor's degree to have won a Nobel Prize in a scientific field ”。而我的那篇博文对 诺贝尔奖的讨论只限科学类奖项，并且 2009, 2010 年 诺贝尔科学类三大奖的得主，都读过研究生，所以我才得出上述对 田中耕一 的错误论述，这件事，也看出维基百科的不靠谱之处，不过，瑕不掩瑜，维基百科的好处和优点还是要远远大于其不足之处。 当然，在这位网友质疑后，我根据自己的进一步网上查询结果，确定自己是错误之后，就立刻更正自己的博文，并致歉，我和那位网友也互相加为好友。但是在科学网上，我也看到有些博主，在别人对自己的博文提出质疑之后，或者死不认帐，或者对指出错误的网友冷嘲热讽，我觉得这样，一是表现出对自己、对自己博文没有足够的自信，也使自己丧失了非常好的学习、进步的机会。这一段，我这样说，并非想表明自己是多么的 NB 或者境界高 , 而是认为科学网的博客也可以（也应该）成为大家相互切磋、学习提高的平台。事实上，我最近就斗胆对一位博主的英文博文指出一些明显的错误，该博主不但不没有表现出反感，还对我的评论意见表示感谢，并对博文做了相应修改，还主动加我为好友，这种经历我是第一次，因为我即使看到别人的博文有错误，也不愿指出，怕别人不高兴，但我相信：像上述这位虚心的博主应该是科学网的主流和大多数。 当然，我写博文，并非都是上述愉快的经历，不爽的事情也发生过，科学网有位大侠级的博主曾提到，赞扬型的博文可称为“献花”，批评性博文可称为“放炮”，我就曾经写过一篇多少有点“放炮”性质的有关大学排名的博文，这篇博文，我尽管只是用数据说话，这通“放炮”还是炸着了自己，如同捅了马蜂窝，引来了不少谩骂和人身攻击，我当然没有对这些人以牙还牙，我觉得骂人不但伤害了别人还伤害了自己，甚至还会累及自己的母校或者工作单位（即使是匿名评论，留下的 IP 地址也大致暴露了自己的身份） 。最后，由于这些人坚持不懈地谩骂和攻击，该博文不得不被迫关闭了评论功能，这也是迄今为止，我的博文中唯一关闭了评论功能的。然而，这个不爽的经历也让我至少有两点收获：１）更加容易知足：现在写博文，只要不挨骂，我就很知足了；２）人人都喜欢别人“献花”，不喜欢被别人“放炮”，所以，我决定：以后多“献花”，少、乃至不“放炮”，“放炮”多了，是否炸了别人倒不一定，受伤的首先是自己。毕竟，正如一位博主所言，写博文，博的就是“心情”！有人将谩骂和人身攻击型的评论比喻为自己后花园的一坨 shi ，如果天天出门看到这玩意，还有心情写博文？！ 对上述 “两性”兼备话题之外的跑题，深表歉意！ （ 王守业写于 2011 年 6 月 3 日，图片来自网络，感谢作者。未经允许，请勿转载）
Think You Know 'How To Write A Sentence' (click here to listen)? Most people know a good sentence when they read one, but New York Times columnist Stanley Fish says most of us don't really know how to write them ourselves. His new book, How To Write A Sentence: And How To Read One, is part ode, part how-to guide to the art of the well-constructed sentence.
More than a year ago ( under the old SciNet system) , I wrote a Blog: Your “good friend” is only a click away … At that time, I didn’t like to become someone’s “good friend” without knowing. Now, I am afraid that I am partly responsible for the “two click” to mingle provided by the new SciNet system. I wonder if it is possible to add a “choice” for the Blogger to decide whether he prefers “one click” or “two click.” As suggested by Neil: Neil决定接受科学网任何用 户的好友申请 Happy Chinese New Year!
A Good Woman Director Mike Barker's adaptation of an Oscar Wilde play is set in 1930 on Italy's sparkling Amalfi Coast. What does a good woman have if not a good reputation? Well, you will be surprised An Ideal Husband I watched the 1999 film version last night. For the story itself, go to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/An_Ideal_Husband
As the year 2009 nears its end, I have been thinking of what to share with my friends. Some of them already sent me their greeting cards via snail mail, which I have not done for years in the name of being green. Some of them will for sure send me a detailed year-end-report-card, which I tried to write myself but never was able to finish in the past. Thanks to Blog, I am going to do it this time. Things happened, both good and bad. For the sake of celebrating holidays, I will only share the good news with you, as indicated by the title, and send the bad ones down the trash chute. 1) Our research on the ASOMZ (Arabian Sea oxygen minimum zone) is on target to be finished in summer 2010. This is a 3-yr NSF project, with one PI and three co-PIs. I have always wanted to work on an ecosystem model, but funding was hard to obtain even for someone with a good track record. Thanks to Jay, who is the PI, our proposal was accepted after the initial submission! (Note, the success rate for the U.S. NSF proposals is about 20%.) We worked hard to extend the 4.5-layer model to 6.5-layer model and to add another component to the NPZD ecosystem model. However, even when Raleigh came to visit this summer, we were nowhere near our goal, to shift the OMZ to the central and eastern basin of the Arabian Sea as observed. I was getting nervous, because the clock was ticking and the fund was running out During Raleighs visit, we decided to have a three-way conference call every week from then on. Even with Skype, such an arrangement is not always easy because Raleigh is on the east coast and I am in Hawaii, 5-6 hours of time difference. Plus, Raleigh teaches and Jay travels. However, we managed, sometimes spending two hours to go over the Web page I maintain, which contains standard plots for the latest experiments. (For the usefulness of Web page for research, see my Blog Research needs a good environment and devotion .) I would walk them through important new results, and they would ask questions and make recommendations for new experiments. Even after running more than nearly 300 experiments since Raleighs visit in July 2009, we were so close but still not quite there yet. Recent discussions with John Bullister in Seattle reminded us the importance of CFCs as tracers to estimate water age and possibly pathways. Discussions with Akio in Japan on a related project made me realize there was a coding error related to the Persian Gulf water as a boundary condition. When Akio visited in mid December, we went over the 300-minus experiments to help him understand what we had been struggling with. Thanks to that lengthy overview, a new idea occurred to Jay. Bingo! We have finally obtained the solution we are happy with! I am sure many of you have similar experience, so I dont need to say how joyful we were when the three of us chatted via Skype last week, the final conference call of the year. Indeed, this is the best Christmas present for the whole team, which also includes Akio and Vinay. I would call this true team work! 2) I edited more than 60 manuscripts this year, which means I am half way to become a full-time freelancer! Sure, I will miss research, but the freedom of being a freelancer is worth it! 3) I finally remodeled BOTH bathrooms, and they are so beautiful! Was it hard work? Of course, but if the contractors are good, the stress is so much less. Happy holidays and see you all in 2010 if not before!
At the end of my presentation, Tim teacher said tai hao le when I sent my handout to him. Instantaneously, I felt my work paid off. Of importance is that I spent 7 days (not net time) preparing the 3-minutes presentation. As far as I am concerned, 3-minutes presentation means more than an oral English text, and it brings me an absolutely good opportunity to practice. Just as Tim said, we treat it as a practice rather than a test, and we are here for fun. Actually, we have learned a lot from the practice. The following is the procedure of my preparation. At the beginning, about a week ago, I chose the topic how to elaborate a perfect resume, based on my relevant materials. Later, I made ppt slides, and It cost less time. After that I wrote the handout associated with ppt slides for a whole morning. However, I found a quite number of problems existed when I related my handout to ppt slides. Consequently, I had to modify them. Among modifications were deletions, additions, transformations and so on. Beyond imagination, the process of modification cost me more time. In the following days, I had been practicing the presentation. Firstly, I needed to turn to the handout since forgetting words were usual. Gradually, I could tell the topic fluently, abandoning the handout. Lately, I discovered interactions with audience were lacked, so I designed some special interactions plot into the presentation, and then tried the effect. Then I practiced for no less than 30 times, in class, before sleeping, even when walking. Another key point is that I had to suppose the scene and tried eye contact, body language, meanwhile controlling time. At last, I typed my handout and copied them for audience. Just one hour before presentation, a bug occurred. When I read my handout again, I found a spelling error. What should I do? I spent a quarter correcting the error one by one. Why did I spare no efforts to prepare the presentation? One key reason is that I am inspired by lecture preparation experience of Bill gates. Early spring this year, Bill gates was invited to make a lecture by his alma mater-- Harvard University. For the lecture, he prepared for half a year. You cant imagine such a famous figure spent such a long time preparing a lecture. At the start, he discussed how to choose an appropriate subject with his team workers. Then he collected sufficient relevant materials for his lecture. Even he asked help from famous figures such as Warren Buffett etc. when the handout was completed, he tried practicing it in his office, at home, even on holiday. As a result, he addresses a perfect lecture in Harvard University, and he also received an honorary PhD degree granted by Harvard University. I thank Bill gates, Tim teacher, my partner Y. J. ZHANG, and my career teacher N. HUANG with Intel and H. LI with Deloitte, and they all contributed to my presentation.
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