NerdNite[34]: The birds and the bees
Why go through all the trouble of finding a mate when you can just split yourself in two? And why does it seem like everyone and their mother has an allergy nowadays?
This month, Nerd Nite is bringing you two fabulously nerdy talks on sex and things that cause rashes. Unrelated, of course.
Bee there and be square!
Nerd Nite Seattle LUCID
7:30 (Doors open at 6:30)
Admission: $5
Why Sex Wins: The Evolutionary Advantages of Sexual Reproduction
Mimi Cheng, Ph.D.
Ever wonder why sex evolved when living organisms were perfectly content with reproducing asexually for millions of years? Why go through all the trouble of finding a mate when you can just split yourself in two? In this talk, we’ll discuss the pros and cons of asexual vs. sexual reproduction, The Red Queen Hypothesis, the different agendas of males and females, how meiosis and sex generate genetic variation, and why variation is an evolutionary advantage for a species.
Mimi has a Ph.D. in biology from Johns Hopkins University, where she was responsible for the lives and deaths of millions of fruit flies. During her post-doc at the University of Washington, she realized that teaching was 77% more fun and 90% less frustrating than doing research. She now spends her days teaching biology at a local university, watching too much television, not knitting nearly enough, and never going rock climbing.
Debunking Common Allergy Myths
Kevin Dooms, M.D.
Kevin Dooms is a UW Med alum and pediatric allergy specialist in Bellevue, where he spends at least half his day telling patients they’re not allergic. In his spare time he eats copious dairy and gluten, which he finds extremely delicious.
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NerdNite[33]: Top Gun and Turks
Did you know Top Gun sucked?! We were as shocked as you.
Join us for this month’s Nerd Nite where we will learn what the classic ’80s (and totally not gay propaganda) film got wrong about fighter pilots. We’ll also be hearing about the fall of Constantinople, one of the most heavily fortified cities in the world. Until it fell, that is.
Be there and be square!
Nerd Nite Seattle LUCID
7:30 (Doors open at 6:30)
Admission: $5
If you were a child of the ’80s, the movie Top Gun taught you all you ever needed to know about fast women and faster jets. But what’s the real story of how technology, politics, and a bombastic fighter jock named John Boyd created the generation of fighter planes that’s still with us today? Let’s dive into the “complex” part of the defense-industrial complex.
Andy Wagner is an engineer with–um, a large aerospace company in the Pacific Northwest. With degrees from Vanderbilt & Tufts Universities, and a decade of experience in the aviation business, he reads a lot of military history and enjoys correcting factual errors in airplane movies.
Should Have Closed That Gate: The Fall of Constantinople
So just how did those Ottomans get their empire started in the first place? Why was Columbus looking for a new spice route? And why do we call it Istanbul now? The answer to these questions and more lies 1453 Siege (And Conquest) of Constantinople, an extraordinary event that saw the end of one Empire and the rise of another. Come join us on a retrospective review of the causes, personalities and innovations behind an event many historians mark as the end of the Medieval Era.
Michael spends more time reading about dead people than ought to be legal in most states, and occasionally likes to talk about it (Because they sure aren’t). With one nerd nite behind him he’s back for more, examining the birth of the Ottoman Empire on the heels of its Christian predecessor in a presentation that hopefully makes up for its lack of harem girls with action, drama and a sprinkling of apocalypic fervor.
NerdNite[33]: A snowball’s chance in July
This month, Nerd Nite is serving up a frosty reprieve from the summer heat. Our two speakers will be bringing us chilling tales from Snowball Earth, the poles and the stars!
Be there and be square.
Nerd Nite Seattle LUCID
7:30 (Doors open at 6:30)
Admission: $5
Snowballing out of control – the beginning and end of the ancient frozen Earth
Adam Campbell
What planet from the Star Wars Universe do you think Earth most resembles? Maybe Endor with its lush forests? Perhaps Coruscant with its sprawling cities or even Naboo with its wide plains and deep oceans? You probably didn’t guess the ice planet of Hoth. But Hoth, with its constant snow and frozen surface is exactly what scientists think the Earth looked like over 500 million years ago, during what are called the Snowball Earth events.
What was the Snowball Earth? What could happen to Earth to turn it into a frozen waste? How could Earth ever hope to escape from this frozen state? And how did life ever survive on this extremely hostile planet? As a graduate student in University of Washington’s Earth and Space Sciences Department, I’ve been studying these exact questions. We’ll explore the evidence for the Snowball Earth, the role that Snowball Earth events played in shaping the planet we live on today, and what we can learn about life on other planets from studying the Snowball.
Ice Physics Is the Coolest
Regina Carns
It starts with a small, familiar molecule–two hydrogens and an oxygen–but the structures arising out of this simple material can boggle the mind with intricate beauty and planet-spanning scope. A tangent-filled and enthusiastic journey through the world of ice from the micro to the macro, with a few anecdotes from the ice-dominated lands near the poles.
Regina has spent several years studying glaciology and astrobiology at the University of Washington and getting frequently distracted from her dissertation by other interesting science facts. In her off hours she enjoys roasting coffee and singing sea shanties. Her sporadically-updated science and poetry blog can be found at squidonice.wordpress.com.
NerdNite[31]:Seattle Retro(virus)
Come on down to Nerd Nite and throw back a couple of LUCID’s finest cocktails while enjoying the nerdisms of our fabulous speakers and your new nerdy friends. Be there and be square!
Nerd Nite Seattle LUCID
7:30 (Doors open at 6:30)
Admission: $5
The Seattle of Yesterday, Today!
Casey McNerthney
NerdNite[30]: Science truth is stranger than science fiction
Come on down to Nerd Nite and throw back a couple of LUCID’s finest cocktails while enjoying the nerdisms of our fabulous speakers and your new nerdy friends. Be there and be square!
Nerd Nite Seattle
LUCID
7:30 (Doors open at 6:30)
Admission: $5
“Backyard Xenolinguistics” | Rachael Tatman
Science fiction is full of alien languages, from Klingon to Na’Vi to Huttese. But even the “weirdest” scifi languages tend to sound (and look) pretty human. What would a truly alien language be like? Our search for answers might start in an unexpected place: the signed languages of Earth.
Rachael Tatman is a second-year graduate student and NSF Graduate Research Fellow in Linguistics at the University of Washington. She studies phonetics, phonology and sign linguistics. In her spare time, she blogs sporadically about language and linguistics at Making Noise and Hearing Things and tanks for her MMO guild.
“Your mother did what to your genes?” | Chrysalis Sabatinos and Virginia Morris
Epigenetics: the study of things that change gene expression independently of the genetic code.
We were taught that DNA was pretty much encoded they way it was written, boy were we told wrong. Looks like the way the our genetic story is read has more to do with who’s doing the reading and how they are reading the code then we originally thought. So, who is doing the reading? What affects the way DNA is read? Come, listen, and find out how important it is when the word is the same but it is pronounced differently. (And yes, we are hearing the UK and US pronounciations of aluminum in our heads right now.)
Dr. Chrysalis Sabatinos and Dr. Virginia Morris are Naturopathic doctors in Seattle. Both graduated from Bastyr University in Kenmore. Presently they are working on making medicine more fun, aka running a clinic in South Lake Union.
NerdNite[29]: The Dark Side of the internet
What lurks beneath the sunny cyber exterior of the internet? What you don’t know may shock you!
After years of loyal Nerd Nite attendance, two regulars are finally gracing the LUCID stage with their formidably nerdy talks. Be there and be square.
Nerd Nite Seattle
LUCID
7:30 (Doors open at 6:30)
Admission: $5Don’t Click On That
Brent DormanThere’s a lot of crap on the internet. Half your matches on Tinder are porn robots. A friend on Facebook just posted another (obviously fake) Jennifer Lawrence sex tape. Your Twitter and Instagram feeds are filled with shoes… an unending stream of knock off shoes. Someone’s behind all this spam – but who are they? And how do these scams actually work?Brent works on security at Facebook. For the past several years he has regularly dived into the dark underbelly of the internet to protect your innocent eyes from what lurks beneath.A Bit about Bitcoin
Mark WronkiewiczWhat is this bitcoin fad we keep hearing about? Hasn’t the news media, which always factually verifies its stories, reported its death like five times anyways? At this nerd nite, you’ll get a thoroughly geeky walk through of this resilient internet currency’s internal mechanisms, as well as the outlandish tales that have stemmed from its existence. Truth is truly stranger than fiction (especially when you’re talking about pseudo-anonymous internet money invented by some shadowy unknown internet figure that allows transfer of money between any two people in the world and is essentially impossible to regulate).Mark is a graduate student studying Neuroscience at UW. His work focuses primarily on Brain-Computer Interfaces, i.e., controlling computers and robots by thinking for both rehabilitative and augmentative goals. Outside of the academic realm, he enjoys hiking, predicting stock price and sports outcomes, and playing the guitar (poorly).
Nerd Nite[28]: Third Time’s the Charm
Two veteran Nerd Nite speakers will enter. Only one will leave as the first three-time presenter…and the other one will leave as the second. What will determine the outcome? A jousting match? A pi-off? A green-beer-fueled bar-fight-battle-royale? No. The flip of a coin.
Come enjoy some of LUCID’s finest cocktails while witnessing Nerd Nite history in the making. Be there and be square!
LUCID Seattle
7:30 (Doors open at 6:30)
Admission: $5
The Art of Arms
Sasha Myerson
Focusing on blazon, the rules which govern and the language which defines medieval European heraldic arms, this talk is likely to contain:
• An argument as to why heraldry is not completely irrelevant to modern American life
• Several groan worthy puns
• Long descriptive sentences made up of strange, foreign words (much like a Starbucks coffee order)
• Some brief forays into history
• At least a few references to Monty Python, A Knight’s Tale, and likely something starring Cary Elwes
• And (drum roll, please) a coat of arms for Nerd Nite Seattle
Sasha studied Medieval Art History in college and narrowly dodged the bullet of flipping burgers for a living (can you just imagine “yay and verily, good sir, wouldst thou like fries with that?”). She very much enjoys those rare opportunities, which Nerd Nite affords her, to geek out over history and get free booze for it. Heck, she’d do it without the booze (no take backs).
How the %&$ They Work: Magnetism from Sorcery to Science in the 19th Century
Rick Clinite
They store our recordings and inspire our morning poetry. They sort our utensils and offer us vague medical promises in airline catalogs. But this talk is about what magnets were to Western society two hundred years ago: an obsession of doctors, mathematicians, mechanics and adventuring explorers. Subverting quackery, enduring class discrimination and escaping from war prisons, the scientists of the 19th century were able to compile their findings and produce a theory that brought magnetism from a navigational aid to understanding the basic structure of the Universe.
NerdNite[27]: Love is in the air…
If you’ve been looking for the perfect romantic activity to do this Valentine’s Day weekend, then Nerd Nite has just the event for you! Our speakers are bringing us two topics sure to light a spark in the coldest of hearts: Harems and STDs.
Nerd Nite Seattle
Monday, February 17th| 7:30 (Doors open at 6:30)
Admission: $5
LUCID
Love is a burning thing | Amanda Green
Sexually transmitted infections (STIs) have affected the sexual health and behaviors of humans for as long as they’ve been practicing (and boy have they been!). As with other communicable diseases, the carriage and infection patterns of STIs are constantly changing in response to our prophylactic, treatment and behavioral efforts. More than just a sex-ed primer: come learn about the current state of STI prevalence and inequity, the sexy and gritty details of STI transmission, and the new and interesting ways in which they affect our lives.
Amanda Green is a former parasitology and virology researcher, and current medical student at the University of Washington who is interested in adolescent medicine and infectious disease. She helped to organize and run the (now defunct) Seattle Rainbow Women’s Health Fair, contributed to the UW School of Medicine’s Sexpertise adjunct curriculum, and has spent time volunteering with HIV NGOs in Ghana and Kenya.
The Lifted Veil: Love, Ambition and Conspiracy in the Ottoman Harem | Michael Benavidez
NerdNite[26]: Take me to your liter!
Come on down to Nerd Nite and throw back a couple of LUCID’s finest cocktails while enjoying the nerdisms of our fabulous speakers and your new nerdy friends. Be there and be square!
Nerd Nite Seattle
Monday, January 20th| 7:30 (Doors open at 6:30)
Admission: $5
LUCID
Magic inside the bottle: spirits and distillation
Erik Chapman
Fermi’s Paradox and Why It Matters
Tola Marts
When we first developed radio telescopes, we pointed them at the stars and thought we’d soon tune in alien civilizations. Instead, the silence has been deafening. In 1950, Enrico Fermi asked friends “where are they?” The more we learn about the fundamentally life-friendly structure of the galaxy, the more urgent Fermi’s question becomes. We will review the latest thinking on Drake’s equation, the solution schema to Fermi’s Paradox, and the implications for our own civilization.
Tola Marts is a mechanical engineer at Bellevue-based Intellectual Ventures, where he is currently designing vaccine distribution systems for rural Africa. He received his BSME from the University of Minnesota. He lives on the Eastside with his family, where in his spare time he indulges his twin passions for motorcycling and municipal politics.
NerdNite[25]: Electric slide!
Come on down to Nerd Nite and throw back a couple of LUCID’s finest cocktails while enjoying the nerdisms of our fabulous speakers and your new nerdy friends. Be there and be square!
Nerd Nite Seattle
Monday, December 9th| 7:30 (Doors open at 6:30)
Admission: $5
LUCID
Salsa dancing from the engineering consulting perspective
Liang Sim
What does the sensuality and passion of salsa dancing have in common with the rigor and logic of engineering or management consulting? A lot, in fact. Salsa can be described very accurately using Newton’s Three Laws, engineering block diagrams, nonverbal multi-sensory communication mechanisms, and the infamous 2×2 matrices that consultants love. Consequently, many nerds turn out to be avid salsa dancers, and vice versa.
Liang Sim is a business development analyst at Boeing and a graduate of MIT’s Aeronautics and Astronautics program, where he conducted research on the feasibility of skintight spacesuits (think of the shrink-on suits from The Incredibles). He’ll be assisted by his wife, Eliza Hutchinson, who is a medical student at the University of Washington. Liang and Eliza met at a Boston salsa club in 2008, and have been dancing together ever since.
The Secrets of Power (Electrical Power, That Is…)
Gia Mugford
Where does all that electricity come from? Where does it go? How would the Northwest actually get to renewable power? (Hint: trees, trees and more trees…) What the hell is renewable, anyway? These and many other questions may or may not be answered, with a bevy of cool charts and graphs, and plenty of bad jokes, nerd night style.
Gia Mugford did research science for ten years and then got a degree in architecture. So naturally she now works in building energy efficiency, figuring out how to keep your baseboards from crashing the electrical grid, and generally calculating cool stuff for the Bonneville Power Authority, that shadowy secret pseudo-governmental organization that sells your utility it power…. more on that later!
