Michael J. Vandeman, Ph.D.

 

"And gladly wolde he lerne and gladly teche" Geoffrey Chaucer, The Canterbury Tales, line 308.

 

Qualifications:

 

I have a B.A. Magna cum Laude from the University of California at Berkeley in Mathematics, With Special Distinction in Mathematics. I also got straight A's in Honors Physics. As a Junior at U.C. Berkeley, I ranked 37 1/2th out of 1300 college math students in the nation in the annual mathematics contest sponsored by the Mathematical Association of America. I have an M.A. in Mathematics (including study in Statistics) from Harvard University. And my Ph.D. from the University of California at Los Angeles is in Psychology, concentrating in Psychometrics. Psychometrics is the science of the measurement of human behavior and traits, and forms the scientific basis upon which transportation modeling and all other forms of human measurement rest. I taught measurement theory -- specifically, Reliability and Validity -- at California State University, San Francisco. I have been a computer programmer since 1962. I taught computer science for U.C. Berkeley Extension. In other words, I am an expert in mathematics, statistics, scientific method, measurement science (including modeling), and computer science. On my own, I have studied conservation biology, and have written and presented papers at numerous environmental and scientific conferences. I’m the world’s foremost expert on mountain biking impacts, partly because most researchers are mountain bikers or are otherwise biased in favor of mountain biking, and don’t tell the truth.

 

Passions:

 

Art (especially Winslow Homer, Jose Orozco, Diego Rivera, Albert P. Ryder, Utamaro, A. Paul Weber), bicycling, biology (especially frogs and snakes), bookstores (especially Black Oak and Kinokuniya), English Literature (especially Emerson, John Steinbeck, and Walt Whitman), habitat restoration (removing invasive non-native plants), ham radio, hiking and camping, judo, languages (especially German, Japanese, and Spanish), libraries, mathematics (especially calculus, point-set topology, and trigonometry), music (especially Johann Sebastian Bach, Agnes Chan, Crystal Gayle, Cyndi Lauper, Iris DeMent, John Seed, "Keep on the Sunny Side of Life", "Across the Great Divide" (Kate Wolf), Joan Baez, Martha Schlamme, Ravi Shankar, Red Gum, Sharon Burch, Stephanie Davis, Tammy Wynette, Wagner (especially "Tristan and Isolde" and "The Flying Dutchman"), and Yothu Yindi), nurses, organic food, plants (especially trees), picking up trash (get a picker-upper like the "Park Patrol" from Pikes Peak Industries, PO Box 9422, Colorado Springs, CO 80909), programming (especially assembler and PL/I), reference librarians, Synanon, teachers, the U.S. Southwest, water (especially streams), wilderness

 

Peeves:

 

Air pollution, callousness towards wildlife, drugs, guns, invasion or destruction of wildlife habitat (especially by vehicles, such as ATVs, horses and burros, jetskis, mountain bikes, rafts, snowmobiles, and other ORVs), motor vehicles, road and highway construction, violence, waste (especially time)

 

Favorite Foods:

 

Fruit juice (especially pomegranate), Indian, Japanese (especially sushi), Mexican, Native American (especially pumpkin soup), olalieberry pie, organic tomatoes, Persian (especially chicken pomegranate), tropical fruit (especially durian, mango, and papaya), Washington State apples, Bartlett pears, blackberry pie, persimmons, and rhubarb pie

 

Favorite Recipes

 

Favorite People:

 

I prefer people (like some of those I found in Synanon) who want to make the world better. It amazes me how many people think that life consists of simply building their own nest, & then sitting in it. Where do they think the tree came from?

 

Favorite Poets:

 

Geoffrey Chaucer, John Milton, William Shakespeare, Robert Burns, Walt Whitman

 

Favorite Restaurants

 

Current Interests