{"id":775,"date":"2011-02-17T17:41:08","date_gmt":"2011-02-17T21:41:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/core\/?p=775"},"modified":"2011-02-17T17:46:34","modified_gmt":"2011-02-17T21:46:34","slug":"q-is-dark-energy-more-interesting-than-dark-matter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/core\/2011\/02\/17\/q-is-dark-energy-more-interesting-than-dark-matter\/","title":{"rendered":"Q: Is dark energy more interesting than dark matter?"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment776\" style=\"width: 548px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"http:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/core\/files\/2011\/02\/Codrington-Library-All-Souls-College-Oxford-England.jpg\"><img aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment776\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-full wp-image-776\" src=\"http:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/core\/files\/2011\/02\/Codrington-Library-All-Souls-College-Oxford-England.jpg\" alt=\"Codrington Library, All Souls College, Oxford, England\" width=\"538\" height=\"475\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/core\/files\/2011\/02\/Codrington-Library-All-Souls-College-Oxford-England.jpg 768w, https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/core\/files\/2011\/02\/Codrington-Library-All-Souls-College-Oxford-England-300x264.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 538px) 100vw, 538px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment776\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Codrington Library, All Souls College, Oxford, England.<\/p><\/div>\n<p><em><a href=\"http:\/\/bu.edu\/core\/faculty\/hudon.htm\">Prof. Daniel Hudon<\/a>, of <a href=\"http:\/\/bu.edu\/core\/cc105\">CC105<\/a> and <a href=\"http:\/\/bu.edu\/core\/cc106\">CC106<\/a>, writes&#8230;<\/em><\/p>\n<p><a name=\"top\"><\/a> This month, in their <a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Harper%27s_Magazine#History\">Readings<\/a> department, <em><a href=\"http:\/\/www.harpers.org\/\">Harper\u2019s<\/a><\/em> magazine published a list of questions<a href=\"#footnote\"><sup>*<\/sup><\/a> from the entrance examination to <a href=\"http:\/\/www.all-souls.ox.ac.uk\/\">All Soul\u2019s College<\/a> at <a href=\"http:\/\/www.ox.ac.uk\/\">Oxford University<\/a>. Applicants take four examinations of three hours each, and in the general subject tests must answer three questions from a list. The question in the title to the post was one of the few science questions; other science-related questions include:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>If there are millions of other planets capable of supporting advanced life-forms, why haven\u2019t we seen or heard from them?<\/li>\n<li>Is there anything to be said for astrology?<\/li>\n<li>What can we learn from a century of sound recording?<\/li>\n<li>How many people should there be?<\/li>\n<li>Has there ever been a period that was not an information age?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Elsewhere in the list you find abundant questions that Core students can relate to:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>From where does a sense of community come?<\/li>\n<li>What has happened to epic poetry?<\/li>\n<li>Why does truthfulness matter?<\/li>\n<li>Would it have been better had some surviving works of ancient authors been lost?<\/li>\n<li>Have any philosophical problems been finally solved?<\/li>\n<li>Is Amazon.com good for literature?<\/li>\n<li>Has morality made progress?<\/li>\n<li>Is nothing sacred?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Provocative questions! Last year, to the chagrin of the traditionalists, the college dropped <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2010\/05\/28\/world\/europe\/28oxford.html\">its famous one-word essay subject<\/a>, in which applicants were asked to write coherently for three hours about a single word, such as \u201cinnocence,\u201d \u201cmiracles\u201d or \u201cwater.\u201d Detractors argued that the entrance test, sometimes known as the \u201cworld\u2019s hardest exam,\u201d <a href=\"http:\/\/www.guardian.co.uk\/education\/2010\/may\/17\/all-souls-college-entrance-exam\">has now been made too easy<\/a>. I wonder how an entrance-earning essay on the word \u201cscience\u201d would read&#8230;<\/p>\n<p>Read a longer sample of questions <a href=\"http:\/\/www.guardian.co.uk\/education\/2010\/may\/17\/all-souls-college-entrance-exam\">published in the <em>Guardian<\/em><\/a>, or about how a few of the paper\u2019s hand-picked entrants <a href=\"http:\/\/www.guardian.co.uk\/books\/2010\/sep\/25\/all-souls-fellows-general-paper\">fared under exam conditions<\/a>. The college\u2019s own collection of general subject exams from the last five years <a href=\"http:\/\/www.asc.ox.ac.uk\/userfiles\/file\/EF\/PastPapers\/General.pdf\">is also available online<\/a>. Click <a href=\"http:\/\/www.asc.ox.ac.uk\/content\/Past_Papers\">here to browse<\/a> other subject exams.<br \/>\n_ _<br \/>\n<a name=\"footnote\">*<\/a> = In the ironic fashion typical of <em>Harper\u2019s<\/em>, this list was juxtaposed with a list of questions posted to online message boards by <a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Jared_Lee_Loughner\">Jared Loughner<\/a>, who is charged for a shooting that killed six people in Tucson. [<a href=\"#top\">back to top of post<\/a>]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Prof. Daniel Hudon, of CC105 and CC106, writes&#8230; This month, in their Readings department, Harper\u2019s magazine published a list of questions* from the entrance examination to All Soul\u2019s College at Oxford University. Applicants take four examinations of three hours each, and in the general subject tests must answer three questions from a list. The question [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1284,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[4261,3715],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/core\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/775"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/core\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/core\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/core\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1284"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/core\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=775"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/core\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/775\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":780,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/core\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/775\/revisions\/780"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/core\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=775"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/core\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=775"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/core\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=775"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}