Delays, and more delays

We've been waiting for a while now for our paperwork to come in. These are needed to obtain our entry visas into Mozambique. Now before you jump to conclusions, it is not a beaurocratic issue ... in fact it is not clear what happened. The papers were sent, but they were not received. But it doesn't matter, there are other things that require our attention such that we won't be leaving prior to the end of April.

One thing though, it allows us to celebrate some very important events in the lives of some dear friends!

So always look at the positive side of things. We now have had the wonderful opportunity to celebrate some important events in the lives of some dear friends. One had succesfully defended her Ph.D., and the others have just become new Canadian Citizens! I'm so glad we were here to celebrate these events. It also gives me the opportunity to spend more time with friends, cycle around town, and enjoy our awesome library. In between I've started on my Portuguese lessons - similar, but not so similar, to Spanish. It's weird: with languages I need to hear to learn, with other topics, I need to read. Probably has something to do with the way brains, or my brain, is wired.

But check out the following language learning links:

• http://www.easyportuguese.com/ 
• http://www.livemocha.com/ - You can also learn other languages here.
• http://www.sonia-portugueseforkids.com/
• http://www.bookbox.com/ - Basically lots of videos in various languages. Each as subtitles that change colour, very similar to karaoke.

If you know of others, please add to the list in the comments below.

Quantum physics

By now you most likely have come across the video about Joseph Kony produced by KONY2012. The narration is quite moving, the movie well produced, the story ... yes, very sad and troublesome. And yes, I am totally ignorant about this story.

One of the topics we tackled at our SKWID training was that of "the single story" - keeping to one perspective of our world, rather than searching and understanding other alternatives of the story. Chimamanda Adichie has an excellent TED talk describing what this is and its impact.

Chemistry, like the real world, has a lot of unknowns. A professor once told me that we probably know at best, about 10% of what's to know about chemistry. Of that there's like 1% of the reactions that are so well known that you can effectively predict the outcome of the reaction, and more importantly, repeat the experiment reliably. Discovering new reactions, creating new compounds and materials requires lots of resources and time to properly investigate. Why? Because we cannot rely on one source of information. We have to constantly test our hypothesis, always asking "are these results real? or are they a phantom of our imagination?"

Look at the hot discussion in physics today: 1) The mounting evidence supporting the observation of the Higgs-Boson particle, and 2) The hint that the speed of light is not the absolute - it could be broken.

These are quite important experiments as they have great ramifications on our understanding of this universe as well as our technologies. How so? The discovery and verification of the former - also referred to in the media as the "God particle" (physicist really dislike this term) - would complete an important physics model called the Standard Model. By doing so, we begin to understand how particles get their mass. Implications? We have particles for light called photons. We are taught that atoms are composed of electrons, neutrons and photons. However, there is one observation of our physical world that we have yet to verify the particle responsible for it: gravity. According to theory, there should be a particle - a graviton. Its validation would in turn help in our understanding of String Theory - perhaps you've seen What the bleep do we know

While the latter, if found true would have meant the dismantling our understanding of physics - particularly quantum physics. As it turns out, by looking at multiple aspects, and "checking in" with other scientists you'll be happy to know that the speed of light remains absolute!

So, back to Kony. There's got to be more to this story than just the Jedi vs. the Sith, or good vs. bad. Where did he come from? Why is he doing this? What are his motivations? Why hasn't the Ugandan army been able to do something about it? Why hasn't the UN done something about it long time ago? Wait, the war ended like six years ago? Well what about the reports of the behaviour of the Ugandan army?

While all are valid questions, I do not understand the issue enough to discuss it here. All I can do is look deeper into this topic with an open mind ... avoid a single story. I encourage you to do the same.

To get started here is the TED talk I mentioned earlier:

And here are some links that I just came across:

1. Grant Oyston's post on his Visible Children blog
2. The Telegraph - outrage over KONY2012 movie