I just spent the afternoon playing doing valuable research with Lego.  The pics above show my amazing creation but they don't do justice to the complexity of it.  I really didn't think I'd need the instructions but I was so wrong.

This was actually part of a research study that will be done with 4-5 year old children.  Essentially, the kids will be asked to follow instructions to build objects and the researchers are interested in the self-regulatory processes during constructive play ...  woosh ...  Me play with Lego. Me happy.

Apparently, the bus above is considered too complex, which doesn't surprise me since it took me a few hours to put it together.  Most of that time was spent rummaging around in the box for the right parts (that's part of the study design).  I didn't help myself by deciding part way through that I wanted it to be a right-hand drive bus instead of the left-hand drive that the instructions described (you might be able to spot the difference between pics 2 and 3).  That was fun.

Lego itself is pretty interesting and there are some really strict tolerances required in its manufacture.  If you've ever played with Lego, consider the following: the pieces are held together only by friction, yet you can create and dismantle fairly large and robust objects; if you build a wall of Lego, the plane of that wall is pretty smooth (no protruding bricks).  If you're manufacturing millions of these little things, you can only achieve that with some damn precise engineering.  Apparently the moulds are made within a tolerance of 2 micrometers.  For comparison, the width of a human hair ranges from 17-180 micrometers.  It's even more impressive when you consider that bricks from 1958 are still compatible with bricks made today.

Check out the Lego Wikipedia article for more info.

 

 

 

I just moved desks from one side of the room to the other.  While messing with the cabling I also cleared out a bunch of nerf bullets from under the desk.  

 

As if that's not ominous enough, behind me is what appears to be the weapons stockpile (see pic above).

 

I'd like to think that the New Year will bring peace, love and harmony to this part of the building but that would be crazy talk.  

 

I'm going to be Switzerland (or maybe the Red Cross).

 

 

This is on @nick_wood's desk. Yes, that's real hair. Yes, it's Nick's hair. So far you can see that it works on iPads and cakes.

Not sure how much my therapy* will cost but it's going on expenses :-P

* that's therapy and a dustbuster

 

Update: Turns out that it doesn't work as well on cakes as I previously thought.  I'd take another photo, but the cake is gone...

I was at a good friend's PhD viva a couple of weeks ago and I was impressed with the 'pomp and circumstance' surrounding it.  Basically, the Dutch do PhD vivas/ceremonies way better than the Brits, especially given how much blood, sweat and tears are involved in getting to that stage.

There were lots of photos that day but I've managed to capture most of the story in the selection of pictures above. There are lots of differences between what I saw and the UK system.  

For example, it's obvious that the event is a public affair although seating is strictly limited so it's usually just friends and relatives of the graduand (he's the tall guy in the middle of the first pic).  There is a committee of examiners who can question the candidate, which includes his supervisor and the period of questioning lasts no more than 45 minutes.  That's it.  At the end of the 45th minute, the master of ceremonies (can't remember his official title) will stop whoever's speaking and usher the committee out to deliberate.  By contrast, in the UK, the event would be a private meeting with only two examiners (supervisor not present), lasting anywhere between 1.5 to 3 hours.

Having said all that, the comparison isn't really fair.  In the Dutch system, the viva is much more of a ceremony than an examination.  The Thesis will already have been read and approved long before the public defence takes place.   That's including any corrections that have been requested.  Therefore, barring allegations of plagiarism, the outcome of the viva is already known to everyone which lends a much more ceremonial air to the proceedings.  That doesn't make the questions any less tricky though.  Once the committee returns from it's recess, there are some proclamations and the degree itself is awarded (it's in the blue tube).  After that, there's a drinks reception and few family/friends head off for dinner.  Overall, a very civilised affair with the attention squarely on the graduate throughout.

Frankly, I thought the Dutch method of graduating was way better than the UK equivalent (the expense notwithstanding).  After spending several years working on research followed by the effort of writing it up, I've always felt the UK ceremony was a bit of a let down.  Over here, families sit in a large room full of strangers, and watch a procession of other strangers spend 30-45 seconds in front of a robed figure before picking up a sheet of paper on their way out of the back door.  There's a brief flurry of excitement as you see your <insert_relation_here> have their few seconds of attention followed by the realisation that you still have to sit through the remainder of the class before you can leave.  Not much of a celebration of the achievement in my opinion (not that I should disparage it too much since I have yet to finish myself!)

Given the fundamental differences in how PhDs are examined between the UK and the Netherlands, I'm not sure what we could do to introduce more of an 'individual ceremony', though it would certainly be nice to try.  If I ever get there, I'm making sure I mark the occasion properly ... which reminds me, back to work. :)

Had a slightly bizarre experience at lunch today. Pretty much everyone I sat with was talking about games they’d played in Starcraft II (see below). Words like fast expand, Cruisers and Zerg were being bandied about and for several minutes it felt like a different language (the terminology gets even more odd with things like cheese tactics).

I mean, I speak English so I knew all the words but the order they were strung together in was alien to me. Direct peer pressure rarely works on me (and they’ve already tried) but apparently being part of a conversation where I’m failing to understand anything is like crack. I have to go off, google stuff and try and get a basic understanding. In this case, if I want to continue having lunch with these guys I’ll probably have to start playing. Given my tendency for getting addicted to (good) computer games, this could end badly for everyone.

Luckily, (this time) the conversation did move on to other topics, including male nurses and how PAs could take over the world. Epic stuff.

Amir

(folks were: @plc, @leemallabone, @rahulvohra, @matclayton, @robbiethng)

BCPA Monthly Draw – June

I’m the guy in the white helmet.

The above was my first attempt at a proper 3-way skydive. If you look closely it becomes obvious that I’m being dragged around. I’ve clearly got some work to do before I can keep up with these guys by myself. We did get 7 or 8 points though!

About the video

The BCPA is the national student body that promotes skydiving. Every month there’s a draw of three formations. The idea is to complete the sequence of formations (and repeat) as many times as possible within the time allowed (35sec).

June was the last draw of this academic year and the formations in the video are Sputnik, Opal and Cluster. The divepool these formations came from can be found here.