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Europe Ponders Another Year Trying To Combat Fall Armyworm Without Modern Pesticides

Europe Ponders Another Year Trying To Combat Fall Armyworm Without Modern Pesticides

Jul 23 2025 | comment(s)

The polyphagous Spodoptera frugiperda (fall armyworm), a Lepidopteran pest, has European farmers in a panic and, when the environmental NGOs government funds are not around, it has politicians concerned also. 

Though classified as a priority pest since 2023, fall armyworm remains easy to establish and fast to spread. Corn crops, a vital part of EU agriculture, remain at risk. Despite that, policymakers have been promoted using pesticides which work poorly but are approved by environmental groups while talking about climate change. The problem is clear but environmental activists have insisted human health and the environment will be impacted unless legacy products that are ineffective remain the sole solution.
Eric Weinstein's Geometric Unity Has A Fundamental Flaw. No Lagrangian, No Theory

Eric Weinstein's Geometric Unity Has A Fundamental Flaw. No Lagrangian, No Theory

Jul 23 2025 | comment(s)

Eric Weinstein's theory of Geometric Unity is wrong. So is every other so-called theory of everything that anyone has proposed so far.  His has a deeper problem, however.  A theory in physics derives its prediction by way of a energy like quantity called a Lagrangian.  (In some cases similar quantities such as a Hamiltonian, or Action, or a generation function aka partition function will be used).  His theory does not have that. He's also not being suppressed or silenced.

Here is the core problem. We have four fundamental forces: gravity, electromagnetism, the strong nuclear force, and the weak nuclear force. These are described by two different frameworks. General relativity describes gravity.

AI Reveals 10X More Yellowstone Volcano Earthquakes Than Known Before

AI Reveals 10X More Yellowstone Volcano Earthquakes Than Known Before

Jul 20 2025 | comment(s)

Yellowstone was the first national park designated in the United States and is a popular tourist destination, but there is a lot going on underneath that people never feel.

A new analysis of 15 years of historical earthquake data from the Yellowstone caldera used machine learning and found an order of magnitude more seismic events than previously acknowledged. 
Counterfeited In China: US Tariffs May Hurt Criminals The Most

Counterfeited In China: US Tariffs May Hurt Criminals The Most

Jul 20 2025 | comment(s)

In early 2025, the Trump administration began to place tariffs on countries that already had them on the U.S., like China, Brazil, and many in Europe. China has already begun to experience deflation but a new book reveals that the business sector likely to be impacted most is the $500,000,000,000 counterfeiting business there.
RSV Vaccine For Pregnant Women Leads To 72% Fewer Babies Hospitalized With The Virus

RSV Vaccine For Pregnant Women Leads To 72% Fewer Babies Hospitalized With The Virus

Jul 20 2025 | comment(s)

Real world data show that the respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) vaccine rolled out for pregnant women in the UK last year has already resulted in a 72 percent drop in babies being admitted to the hospital among women who took it. 

Experts predict that as more women take it, England is the home of both the modern anti-vaccine and anti-GMO movements so change takes time, it will further reduce the number of needlessly sick babies each year and therefore the burden on the overtaxed National Health Service system.
The End To Universities Using Graduate Students As Piggy Banks Is Near

The End To Universities Using Graduate Students As Piggy Banks Is Near

Jul 16 2025 | comment(s)

In the 1980s, the majority party in Congress saw demography claims that people with college educations made more money than those without.  Universities began to lobby for student loan changes. Many smaller private schools were facing funding crunches and people going to college would fix that.

The drumbeat for equitable treatment for the poor got louder and as part of other governance, Congress included changes that made so student loans, which originated thanks to President Johnson in 1965, were now unlimited. Because governance is governance, a Republican president signed it over the objections of those who said it was turning a Bachelor's degree into the new high school diploma. Nearly everyone would have one, except with debt.(1)
Gen X Is Getting Its Own Captain America

Gen X Is Getting Its Own Captain America

Jul 15 2025 | comment(s)

Gen X is getting its own Captain America. This is a big deal. Culturally, the Boomer majority gave way to the next large demographic, Millennials, while Gen X got slighted. Even though we had the best music since the 1940s.

On the plus side, being a minority means we don't get hate. Gen Z dislikes millennials for being cringe, millennials dislike Gen Z for being so Puritan, and everyone dislikes Boomers because they won't stop talking about Woodstock and Kennedy. Some argue that instead of being too small to matter we are the coolest but that's subjective.
FDA Goes After Illegal Kratom 7-OH Supplement Sellers

FDA Goes After Illegal Kratom 7-OH Supplement Sellers

Jul 15 2025 | comment(s)

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has sent seven recent letters sent to companies selling products containing 7-hydroxymitragynine, also known as 7-OH.1, an illegal opioid.

It became popular because it is found in the dangerous supplement kratom, illegal even in the country that exports it to the United States, and supplement grifters also began selling the compound in gummies, drink mixes, and shots.


Agricultural Science Wins In The One Big Beautiful Bill

Agricultural Science Wins In The One Big Beautiful Bill

Jul 15 2025 | comment(s)

It's always easy to be critical of government, but while the new administration cut grants for sociologists who want to "study" why people still play Everquest 2, it also boosted funding for the National Animal Health Laboratory Network, and programs like the National Animal Disease Preparedness and Response Program and the National Animal Vaccine and Veterinary Countermeasures Bank.
Contrary To The Poltical Narrative, A Lot Of Government Science Funding Doesn't Go To Science

Contrary To The Poltical Narrative, A Lot Of Government Science Funding Doesn't Go To Science

Jul 14 2025 | comment(s)

Every day we read a new headline warning us that American leadership is about to erode because of budget cuts to 'science.'

We have been told tuberculosis was about to be eliminated by a vaccine but a grant got cut and, gosh darn it, now Republicans ruined it. We have been told we'll be set back for generations. 
Activin-A: Muscle Weakness In Cancer Survivors May Be Treatable

Activin-A: Muscle Weakness In Cancer Survivors May Be Treatable

Jul 13 2025 | comment(s)

Tumors can destroy the blood vessels of muscles even when the muscles are nowhere close to the tumor. That is the key finding of a new study that my colleagues and I recently published in the journal Nature Cancer.

Muscle loss in cancer patients is a major health problem, but the exact causes of how precisely tumors affect muscles remain an active area of research.

More AI In Health Care Could Save Lives

More AI In Health Care Could Save Lives

Jul 12 2025 | comment(s)

Imagine walking into your doctor’s office feeling sick – and rather than flipping through pages of your medical history or running tests that take days, your doctor instantly pulls together data from your health records, genetic profile and wearable devices to help decipher what’s wrong.

This kind of rapid diagnosis is one of the big promises of artificial intelligence for use in health care. Proponents of the technology say that over the coming decades, AI has the potential to save hundreds of thousands, even millions of lives.

What’s more, a 2023 study found that if the health care industry significantly increased its use of AI, up to US$360 billion annually could be saved.

Forget Political Posturing, It's Hard To Warn People About Dangers Like Floods

Forget Political Posturing, It's Hard To Warn People About Dangers Like Floods

Jul 11 2025 | comment(s)

Flash floods like the one that swept down the Guadalupe River in Texas on July 4, 2025, can be highly unpredictable. While there are sophisticated flood prediction models and different types of warning systems in some places, effective flood protection requires extensive preparedness and awareness.

Ohio State Endorses Probiotic Yogurt - Using Mouse Studies

Ohio State Endorses Probiotic Yogurt - Using Mouse Studies

Jul 10 2025 | comment(s)

A new paper from Ohio State University can be considered a giant endorsement for yogurt that makes you poop - but unfortunately for giddy food corporations hoping to gain some scientific credibility it is only in mice, and therefore EXPLORATORY.

Because mice are not little people.

You just wouldn't know that from the school's press release, which alleges pesticides are ruining your microbiome and probiotics may save us, a leap so far beyond the scope of the study we have to wonder if the academics involved are about to launch a new line of supplements.
UC Davis Epidemiologists Out To Scare New Mothers Again

UC Davis Epidemiologists Out To Scare New Mothers Again

Jul 09 2025 | comment(s)

In the modern era we can detect anything in anything. Being able to detect in parts per billion, trillion and even quadrillion means that if an epidemiologist can "correlate" a chemical to harm in a spreadsheet, someone raising money opposing science can weaponize the result.

A new paper finding that they can detect chemicals linked to harm in rats with the urine of 201 preschool kids is a new battle in the War on Moms that activists continually wage, but there is no reason for parental concern. Unless you believe in homeopathy.

Highlights From MODE And EUCAIF

Highlights From MODE And EUCAIF

Jul 06 2025 | comment(s)

After a month of intense travel, which among other things included attendance to the MODE Workshop in Crete and the EUCAIF conference in Sardinia, I am back to northern Sweden. Besides significantly improving my well-being, given the horrible heat wave that hit Southern and Central Europe in the past few weeks, the move north allows me to finally give a relaxed look back at the most relevant information I gathered at those events, and other relevant things.
The Right Of Return Is Complicated

The Right Of Return Is Complicated

Jul 04 2025 | comment(s)

My June 28 column on the Middle East drew a comment concerning Palestinians ejected from their homes by the post-WWII influx of European Jewish refugees to what’s now Israel. Eighty years after the fact, descendants of those displaced still feel much anger.

You Don't Need Government Food Bans For Health, Provide Structure And Choice For Kids

You Don't Need Government Food Bans For Health, Provide Structure And Choice For Kids

Jul 01 2025 | comment(s)

If you need any new evidence that science is just another arm of politics, look to the switch in the Republican party once President Donald Trump embraced former Natural Resources Defense Council lawyer, friend of Obama, and anti-science zealot Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.(1)
The College Major Is A Recent Invention, It May Be Time To Get Rid Of It

The College Major Is A Recent Invention, It May Be Time To Get Rid Of It

Jul 01 2025 | comment(s)

Colleges and universities are struggling to stay afloat.

The reasons are numerous: declining numbers of college-age students in much of the country, rising tuition at public institutions as state funding shrinks, and a growing skepticism about the value of a college degree.

Ray-Ban Meta Wayfarers - Bulky, Beautiful, Limited

Ray-Ban Meta Wayfarers - Bulky, Beautiful, Limited

Jun 30 2025 | comment(s)

Once a decade, I buy a pair of good sunglasses. I didn't know I was doing that, it wasn't intentional, I only realized it when I bought a pair of Persol sunglasses in 2005 that my wife mentioned it seemed to be a pattern. It really wasn't. I still had a pair of Aviators from the 1980s and she bought me a pair of sunglasses in the 1990s so it wasn't really a trend, it was coincidence. In 2015 or 2016, while living in New York City due to running a nonprofit there, I was tired of my old glasses and walked into a Sunglass Hut on Fifth Avenue and bought a new pair.