A long summer

Indeed it has been a long summer, though the good weather appears to be drawing to a close. Over the last few months, I have attended three cosmology conferences or workshops and also been on a two-week holiday in the Dolomites, where I occupied my time by doing things like this:

La Guglia Edmondo de Amicis, near the Misurina lake.

and enjoying views like this:

Cima Piccola di Lavaredo, from the Dibona route on Cima Grande.

This explains the lack of activity here in recent times.

Returning home a couple of weeks ago, I was full of ideas for several exciting blog posts, including a summary of all the hottest topics in cosmology that were discussed at the conferences I attended, and perhaps an account of my argument stimulating discussion with Uros Seljak. However, it has come to my attention that there are other physicists in other parts of the world who happen to be working on the exact same topic that my collaborators and I have been investigating for the last few months. The rule in the research world is of course "publish or perish" (though some wit has suggested that "publish and perish" is more accurate) – so most of my time now will be spent on avoiding being scooped, and the current hiatus on this blog will continue for a short period. Looking on the bright side, once normal service resumes, I hope to have some interesting science results to describe!

In the meantime, I can only direct you to other blogs for your entertainment and enlightenment. Those of you who like physics discussions and have not already read Sean Carroll's blog (a vanishingly small number perhaps?) might enjoy this post about Boltzmann brains. I personally also enjoyed this argument against philosopher Tom Nagel.

For people interested in climbing news, I can report that my friends on the Oxford Greenland Expedition that I mentioned once here have returned safely after a successful series of very impressive climbs. I found their regular reports of their activities in the expedition diary well-written and rather thrilling – not just the climbing, but also the account of the journey to Greenland by sea in the face of seemingly never-ending gales! Well worth a read, as is this.