Do It For Science
PyCon 2017
Portland, OR
May 20, 2017
Kathryn (Katy) Huff
“Heavier-than-air flying machines are impossible” - Lord Kelvin, 1895
“ Organized Skepticism. Scientists are critical: All ideas must be tested and are subject to rigorous structured community scrutiny.” - R.K. Merton, 1942
“ The scientific method’s central motivation is the ubiquity of error—the awareness that mistakes and self-delusion can creep in absolutely anywhere and that the scientist’s effort is primarily expended in recognizing and rooting out error. ” - Donoho, 2009.
“the first principle is that you must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool.” - R. Feynman, 1974
“I am thinking about something much more important than bombs. I am thinking about computers.” - John von Neumann, 1946.
Science
- builds and organizes knowledge
- tests explanations about the universe
- systematically,
- objectively,
- transparently,
- and reproducibly.
Otherwise it's not science.
Science relies on
- peer review,
- skepticism,
- transparency,
- attribution,
- accountability,
- collaboration,
- and impact.
Since 6th century BCE, science has been perfecting these tenents.
Open source software is now superior at all of them.
Computers
should...
- improve efficiency,
- reduce human error,
- automate the mundane,
- simplify the complex,
- and accelerate research.
But scientists aren't trained to use them effectively.
We need you.
“Tell me and I'll forget, show me and I'll remember, involve me and I will understand.” -- Xun Kuang, 3rd Century BC
Water
US EPA WNTR: Water Network Tool for Resilience
Climate
Energy
A Nuclear Fuel Cycle Simulation Framework
The Nuclear Fuel Cycle
Hundreds of discrete facilities mine, mill, convert, fabricate, transmute, recycle, and store nuclear material.
Agent Based Systems Analysis
An agent-based simulation is made up of actors and communications between those actors.
Agent Based Systems Analysis
A facility might create material.
Agent Based Systems Analysis
It might request material.
Agent Based Systems Analysis
It might do both.
Agent Based Systems Analysis
Even simple fuel cycles have many independent agents.
Transition Analysis
Power generated by reactor type.
Material Tracking
Fuel movement by type.
PyNE
Health
Pint
In [1]: import pint
ureg = pint.UnitRegistry()
3*ureg.meter + 4 * ureg.cm
Out [1]: <Quantity(3.04, 'meter')>
github.com/hgrecco/pint has 97 open issues
Four Simple Steps
- Be curious
- Pick a project
- Contribute to science
- Save the world
THE END
katyhuff.github.io/2017-05-20-pycon
Do It For Science: PyCon 2017 by Kathryn Huff is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Based on a work at http://katyhuff.github.io/2017-05-20-pycon.