Search Results for: innovation

[a great societal] “challenge, a development problem, is the widening gap between advancing scientific knowledge and technology and society’s ability to capture and use them.” – The International Council for Science[1]. A year ago a friend, Ryan Baker, earned his doctorate … Continue reading →

The previous LOTRW post compared innovation to a tractor pull; throughout history, each increment of innovation is made a bit more challenging by the growing accumulation of prior progress that must be accommodated and pulled along. Fortunately, not all innovation … Continue reading →

A vignette: in the 1990’s, I did a fair bit of government-related travel. Too many sleepless nights in distant hotel rooms, too tired to read, biological clock messed up, but there would be TV. Would tune around looking for sports … Continue reading →

Two weeks ago, Andy Miller of our group here in the AMS Policy Program DC office suggested we should all give a listen to Freakonomics radio episode #348, dated 9/6/18. What great advice! So, paying it forward. We all should want to … Continue reading →

Last week saw two major events in the United States. The first, the historic encounter between President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping, was duly accompanied by pomp and by breathless, nonstop media attention. Meanwhile, under the media radar, … Continue reading →

As hinted in an earlier LOTRW post, NASA’s Applied Sciences Program (ASP) and the 2007 NRC Report Earth Science and Applications from Space: National Imperatives for the Next Decade and Beyond (the Decadal Survey) have accomplished a beneficial synergism. The … Continue reading →

This is the last in our three-part mini-series on how our growing numbers can buy time for ourselves and for our planet, its atmosphere and oceans, its landscape and its ecosystems. You know we’re going to talk about innovation. The … Continue reading →

On July 11 my InBox contained this contribution from a New York Times (subscription) service, a thoughtful piece by David Gelles entitled A.I.’s insatiable appetite for energy. He cited an interview that he and other reporters had held some weeks … Continue reading →

On June 26, Marcia McNutt, President of the National Academy of Sciences and Chair of the National Research Council, presented what NASEM billed as an inaugural State of the Science Address. A February press release had publicized the event this way: “Just … Continue reading →

“A man only learns in two ways, one by reading, and the other by association with smarter people.” – Will Rogers[1] I absolutely love this book: High Tension, FDR’s Battle to Power America, by John (“Jack”) Riggs came out in … Continue reading →