AlunSalt

Welcome to my home page. This is where I aggregrate the various things I leave around the web.

The extraordinary research of the BCA

The British Chiropratic Association have quietly announced the historical discovery of the decade. It's major news and we know it's true because the alternative would be that they're making a demonstrably bogus claim about chiropractic treatment on their website.

The Antikythera Mechanism: Art or Science?

Some posts take quite a while to write. This is a response to Candy Minx and Martin Rundkvist who were discussing the Antikythera Mechanism in 2006. Candy Minx thought the Antikythera Mechanism was an expression of what was already known and embedded in a society through things like myth and ritual. Martin thought that the mechanism was far more complex. Originally I planned to write a fence-sitting compromise. Here it is. This is science turned up to 11.

Bateman’s Scars

Bateman's tragedy is that he had the technology, but he worked before there was a better understanding of how to use it. His excavations could be called vandalism, but he didn't have the benefit of hindsight. Archaeology often investigates a site by destroying it. Today we have a permanent reminder in the Bronze Age barrow at Arbor Low, which still bears Bateman's scars.

Crowdsourcing Fieldwork: A Neuroarchaeology Project?

Most museums I go to seem to have much darker galleries for prehistoric material that classical material. That has to have a psychological effect, but does it also have a physiological effect? Is the difference in light enough that there's a difference feeling to observing prehistoric material to classical material because of the room and not the content? Do I have a method for finding that out?

Local Archaeology at the river Trent

Archaeology isn't just about far away and exotic places. Swarkestone Bridge is a local site with plenty of history. And, if you live outside the UK, it's far away and exotic.

Recent Posts

• Teaching, Web2.0 and Teaching Web2.0
  

  Yesterday I was at an event organised with the HEA centre for Biosciences, Enhancing learning through Web2.0. I thought it was a very good day. I didn’t get exactly what I wanted out of the day. What I was hoping for something to help me build a workshop for teaching Web2.0 tools to students. The [...]

• Astrology in the Infinite Monkey Cage
  

  The Infinite Monkey Cage tackled astrology this week, amongst other things. Ben Miller visited to Jonathan Cainer, astrologer extraordinaire, to see how astrology works. This seems to have come as a shock to Prof. Brian Cox who doesn’t think that it works. Ben Miller, who was ABD in Physics, argued it did work. For Ben [...]

• There seems to be some confusion about what science journalism is
  

  This will be the last climate change post of the year. The reason it’s going up is because while I was writing tomorrow’s entry. my RSS box pinged with this blog post from Ed Darrell, which is well worth reading. It’s a simple illustration of the use of double standards.
  Recently I commented on the reporting [...]

• A Titanic victory for the skeptics
  

  I don’t know about you but I’ve been absolutely riveted by the recent release of records from a break-in at the White Star line. No really, it’s not just a stream of bilge from people who may not be experts but reckon something. Frankly I can’t get enough of hearing about the same claim that [...]

• REF & ʇɔɐdɯı lɐɹnʇlnɔ
  

  At the start I should make clear that I am not an expert and I can’t say for certain exactly what Impact is. The reason I’m writing this is that sadly no one else can say what Impact is either, though HEFCE has a go. That’s a problem, because it’s going to play a big [...]

Versus the Electric Cyclops

Marked on del.icio.us

• Confidence Intervals 2009/11/28
  
• The Academic Journal Racket « In the Dark 2009/11/18
  Telescoper explains how academic publishing works. The only thing that would improbe the post would be the theme from 'The Naked Gun' in the background.
  
• A Case in Antiquities for ‘Finders Keepers’ - NYTimes.com 2009/11/17
  You can make arguments in favour of repatriation of antiquities. You can make arguements against. Being on either side doesn't make you inherently foolish. But when you write that the British Army took the Rosetta Stone from the French and "returned it to the British Museum" then something has gone wrong. It's probably a case of momentary brainfade rather than idiocy, but it matters because the whole question of ownership of the Rosetta Stone is about where it rightfully belongs. Using the word 'returned' builds in the assumption that all antiquities are inherently British.
  
• Notes & Queries; Sledges - Theoretical Structural Archaeology 2009/11/17
  Geoff Carter concluded he didn't have evidence for a staggeringly early cart shed in Poland. Could it have been a used to house a sledge? I've just realised I know absolutely nothing at all about the history of sleds and sledges. Not only that, but I can't recall much attention being called to them in early prehistoric archaeology other than when people want to talk about moving megaliths to Stonehenge. Yet Martha Murphy (guest blogging) shows there's plenty of questions to ask about neolithic transport.
  
• British bank turns to treasure hunting via @johnabartram 2009/11/17
  Avast me hearties! Robert Fraser & Partners be scourin' the high seas in search of booty. They be fundin' Odyssey Marine Exploration, Inc. ter search the Caribbean fer Spanish gold. Arrr!
  

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