Happy New Year!

Recently read: Steven Strogatz, Sync: How Order Emerges from Chaos in the Universe, Nature, and Daily Life

Word of the day: bobeche (n.) A disk or flange-shaped extension at the top of a candlestick nozzle used to catch and retain the candle wax drippings. [Source: http://www.englishpewter.co.uk/glossary.html]

List: Notable electrical-engineers-turned-physicists

• Paul Adrien Maurice Dirac: Bachelor's degree in electrical engineering from University of Bristol. Shared the 1933 Nobel Prize in physics for his reformulation of quantum mechanics.
  
• Edward Mills Purcell: Bachelor's degree in electrical engineering from Purdue University. Shared the 1952 Nobel Prize in physics for discovering nuclear magnetic resonance in condensed matter.
  
• John Bardeen: Bachelor's and master's degrees in electrical engineering from University of Wisconsin. Shared the 1956 Nobel Prize in physics for the invention of the transistor. Shared the 1972 Nobel Prize in physics for developing a fundamental theory of conventional superconductivity (Bardeen-Cooper-Schrieffer (BCS) theory).
  

Recently read: Lillian Hoddeson and Vicki Daitch, True Genius: The Life And Science Of John Bardeen, The Only Winner of Two Nobel Prizes in Physics

Recently read: Joel Shurkin, Broken Genius: The Rise and Fall of William Shockley

Ben Franklin's biggest mistake

Why do people voluntary submit to the temporal shell game known as Daylight Saving Time? The number one reason that the Powers That Be cite is energy savings, but the evidence for this is inconclusive. In particular, the marginal benefit of extending the Daylight Saving period, as was done in the Energy Policy Act of 2005, seems negligible at best. It also seems rather half-hearted--if you're going to impose such madness, you might as well make all time Daylight Saving Time and maximize the "benefits."