It always has seemed kind of silly to discuss markup so often, and not allow people to use inline links in their comments, for crying out loud. So I’ve opened up a small subset of HTML elements. The new system allows links and a number of inline elements such as <em> and <code>. I would have liked to open up elements such as <pre> and <blockquote>, but… eh. It’s a long story. Anyway, the upshot is that instead of saying,

Evan, your “commentary” on <marquee> and <blink> (https://www.goer.org/HTML/examples/htmlhorror1.html) was in *wretched* taste.

you can now say,

Evan, your “commentary” on <marquee> and <blink> was in wretched taste.

How exciting! I almost opened up the style attribute, so that you all could chew me out in large, red Comic Sans MS. But bold will have to do.

Aaaanyway. Since this entry is so short, here are a few amusing physics links I’ve collected over the last few days.

• Chad Orzel: Scattered Thoughts on Physics Pedagogy. Chad, Chad, you’re teaching engineers. Why are you tangling yourself in knots? Just teach V=IR by rote, hand out A’s like candy, keep a low profile, collect tenure, everybody’s happy. Sheesh, I really should have stuck with academia. It ain’t exactly brain surgery. [Via J. Bradford DeLong.]

• From TechCentralStation, the same magazine that brings us Instapundit’s ruminations on how Luddites are holding back “molecular manufacturing”, we find this article on global warming. It’s replete with gems such as:

  “Take, for instance, the “average global temperature,” which is the primary statistic offered as evidence of global warming. The problem with this statistic is that it has no physical meaning. Temperature is not a thermodynamic variable that lends itself to statistical analysis, nor does it measure a physical quantity.”

  Oh, dear. Bear in mind that I have met hardcore Ayn Rand libertarians who do understand thermodynamics, some of whom have even gone on to earn doctorates in physics. So I think it’s just TechCentralStation. [Via J. Bradford DeLong. For an economics professor, he’s quite the clearinghouse for physics links. Maybe he should read up on Quantum Finance.]

• Understanding Research Papers. For the record, “correct within an order of magnitude” is a perfectly acceptable answer in astrophysics.