Halloween Science: Your Ancestors May Have...
Something Happened In Silicon Valley
Learning Through Student Feedback
By Mark Pierce
The Probability Density Function: A Known Unknown
In 2003, the Human Genome Project was completed and both Tesla and LinkedIn... Read >
A new call to action by ecologists uses a numerical model to note that wildfires... Read >
A recent study found the first evidence that sperm microRNAs act as carriers... Read >
In the 1980s, as tanning beds became a craze, melanoma rates began to climb... Read >
Information freedom is a good thing but there is no question it has been weaponized... Read >
Impostor participants are people who fake data in order to take part in health... Read >
AT 2024tvd: A Black Hole Is Eating A Star Outside A Galaxy Center, And Spitting Parts Back Out
When you picture a black hole, you probably picture in the center of a galaxy with matter swirling toward it. You're not wrong but that is why the exception proves the rule.A recent study detected a surprising tidal disruption event where a black hole outside the center of a galaxy is tearing apart ...
Interna
With this post I would like to present a short update of my personal life to the few readers who are interested in that topic. You know, when I started writing online (over 20 years ago!), blogs used to contain a much more personal, sometimes introspective, description of the owner's private life ...
How Elementary Particles Die
A preambleSubnuclear physics obeys the laws of quantum mechanics,
which are quite a far cry from those of classical mechanics we are accustomed
to. For that reason, one might be inclined to believe that analogies based on
everyday life cannot come close to explaining the behavior of elementary ...
Searching For Impossibly Rare Decays
I recently ran into a description of the Mu3e experiment, and got curious about it and the physics it studies. So after giving it a look, I am able to explain that shortly here - I think it is a great example of how deep our studies of particle physics are getting; or, on the negative side, how ...
UCLA: Asthma Sufferers Are Contributing To Climate Change
A new cross-sectional analysis estimates that asthma inhalers contribute the same carbon emissions as 530,000 cars each year. That's over over 2 million metric tons of greenhouse gases annually from the three types of inhalers approved for asthma or COPD during the years 2014 to 2024. ...
How The Ancient Volcanoes Of Ultima Thule Impacted Climate Then And Now
Some sixty million years ago a fountain of hot rock that rises from Earth’s core-mantle boundary unleashed volcanic activity across a vast area of the North Atlantic, from Scotland to Greenland. We can detect the effects in spectacular basalt columns of the Giant’s Causeway in Ireland.But why ...
Why The French Get Grumpy When It's Warmer
The French look at not owning air conditioning as a point of pride, and it may have made them so grumpy it explains why they passed laws saying no one can install it unless they get permission from their neighbors, and perhaps even the city or prefecture government.They can talk about mitigating ...
How European Forests May Look By The Year 2100
A new computer simulation says that climate change may may ruin the tall beech trees common in Europe. Unfortunately, many other simulations already said it was too late to curb runaway emissions by India and China as of 2016.For the last 2,000 years, the area from southern Sweden to central France ...
What's Happening In The Brains Of Protesters?
From Los Angeles to Portland to New York City, political protests have become common. That provides data for what may be happening in brains and how engaged people can avoid becoming a Tyler Robinson or Luigi Mangione or Antifa in Oregon.The US is not special when it comes to protests, the Carnegie ...
Do You Have A Sixth Sense? NIH Funds An Interoception Study To Find Out
The process by which the nervous system continuously receives and interprets the body’s physiological signals to keep vital functions running smoothly, a "sixth sense" called
interoception
that tells your brain when you need to breathe, when your blood pressure declines or when you have an ...
Genetic Mutations In Brain Tumors Can Now Be Detected During Surgery
Conventional genetic analysis methods for genotyping of brain tumors usually require one or two days to obtain results but a new method can determine optimal resection margins during surgery in just a few minutes.The ability to accurately detect genetic mutations in a brain tumor was demonstrated ...
‘Universal’ Antibody Cocktail Targets Flu Virus Weak Spot
FDA-approved flu treatments target viral enzymes of influenza but the virus mutates, which is why there is a new vaccine each year. Recent work showed that a cocktail of antibodies offered protection mice from nearly every strain of influenza. Even avian and swine flu. Their cocktail did not allow ...
Coca Leaf: Native Heritage Or Dangerous Drug?
Due to President Clinton's 1994 DSHEA law (Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act of 1994), and diverting science funding to the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine, a large number of people believe acupuncture works and that supplements can be alternatives to medicine ...
Medicaid Emergency Room Costs For Illegal Immigrants Under $4 Billion In 2022
A cross-sectional analysis of emergency Medicaid expenditures from data in the 2022 Medicaid Budget and Expenditure System found that of the 38 states plus Washington, DC, was nominal compared to overall spending.There are confounders. Not all states allow it and 11 did not report emergency Medicaid ...
Cancer And Diabetes Deaths Down 80%, Why Do Progressives Insist The Modern World Kills Us?
Death rates from non-communicable diseases like cancer, diabetes, and heart disease continue to decline but you wouldn't know that by corporate media which prints every claim that some useful product is "linked" to shorter lifespans.Weedkillers, processed food, artificial sugar, you ...
None Of Us See The Same Colors But Our Brains See Some Things In Common
Colors trigger unique brain responses, the subjective nature of our brains and eyes, not to mention different media, is why a famous blue dress experiment took countries by storm.To try and help determine how different people have the same brain responses to colors, researchers measured color ...
The Evolution Of Halloween
Samhain,
All Hallows Evening. Hallowe'en, Halloween. The name has changed but the
world’s fascination with a day of spooks and scares has never wavered. Except it
has also always been about harvests and farming and food.
It may
seem odd to lump together food and ghosts but that is Halloween ...
Why Dogs Get Addicted To Their Lamb Chop Toy
In 1956, prize-winning puppeteer Shari Lewis appeared on the Captain Kangaroo children's show and debuted a new...well, it was basically a sock with eyes.(1) She called it Lamb Chop, though, and her ventriloquism was a big hit with kids.Imagine what she would think if she knew Lamb Chop toys were ...
The Birth Paradox
Surely you’ve noticed that many countries are subsidizing births – and others are banning abortions – even as tech lords lament the number of “useless people” in the world. You’ve noted the contradiction, and you’ve asked yourself, “What’s going on here?” Cool Hand Luke might ...
Deontological Decisions: Your Mother Tongue Never Leaves You
Ιf you asked a multilingual friend which language they find more emotional, the answer would usually be their mother tongue – the one they used while growing up and probably still use at home. This does not mean they are incapable of expressing emotion in another language, but there is a clear ...
AI Helps Doctors Look At Lots Of Data Fast For Diagnostic Clues
Actors, artists, and musicians are rightly worried about the impact of AI on their incomes but doctors and scientists welcome the help. They know typewriters didn't make literature worse than writing in longhand and "AI" - LLMs - likewise removes the 'how' of information access so thinkers can ...
Altmetric Will Now Include Your Podcast
In the early days of Science 2.0, blogging did not get a lot of institutional respect. Public outreach was a waste of time, academics were often told, leave that to science journalists and the PIOs at schools who write press releases.It seemed archaic. Anyone who knows how much of science is government ...
How Will Humans And Machines Live Together?
Everybody wonders what will happen with artificial intelligence (AI). Truly, it could go in any of several ways. This column lays out possible scenarios.Scenario-building is usually a group activity, however. So I invite your views on the driving forces and possible additional scenarios.(This is ...
Zombies In Love And Other Scary Things Taxpayers Fund
We definitely need to DOGE nonsense like acupuncture out of the NIH and use that money for science but I don't want to live in a culture where children's theater doesn't want to have a play about "the ups-and-downs of a lovesick zombie who can’t find a date inthe land of the living."It may not ...
Air India Flight 171 Accident Summary - Key FindingsThe purpose of an air accident report is to... more »
As a member of the public, how can you determine whether Tylenol, also known as acetaminophen,... more »
In the past few years my activities on this site - but I would say more in general, as the same... more »
This came up on 2nd November 2024 (give or take a day), a broadcaster objecting to a carbon capture... more »
Sheer beauty — a beautiful Euhoplites ammonite from Folkstone, UK. These lovelies have a pleasing... more »