Featured Articles

'What Hath God Wrought' - Today, Luddites Are Concerned About Weedkillers Like They Once Were The Telegraph

'What Hath God Wrought' - Today, Luddites Are Concerned About Weedkillers Like They Once Were The Telegraph

Sep 20 2022 | comment(s)

Do you believe the telegraph was giving telegraph operators cancer? If not, it's only because there was no Robert F. Kennedy Jr. or US Right To Know group promoting fear and doubt about it the way they do vaccines, food, and cell phones.

On May 24th, 1844 a telegram was sent from the Capitol because Samuel Morse, the inventor, wanted a government contract. Because he was diplomatic, he let the daughter of Henry Ellsworth, first Commissioner of the U.S. Patent Office, draft the message. And because young people need to Live In Important Times, the message proposed by young Annie was "What Hath God Wrought.” (1)
In The Quantum World, You Can Get Something From Nothing

In The Quantum World, You Can Get Something From Nothing

Sep 20 2022 | comment(s)

Creativity occurs whenever novel connections are made, and often, this occurs by accident.
Finding And Testing A New Solution To The Mystery Of Dark Matter Via Gravitational Waves

Finding And Testing A New Solution To The Mystery Of Dark Matter Via Gravitational Waves

Sep 19 2022 | comment(s)

The solution to the issue of dark matter and dark energy may be found by way of modifying Einstein's equations of General Relativity.  Working with Shane Larson of Northwestern University we may have found an analytical and exact solution to one such set of equations.  With this we may be able to test such proposals once and for all using the future Laser Interferometer Space Antenna, LISA. Exact solutions to the differential equations that describe fundamental physics are rare. So rare they are sometimes called by name.  As one of many collaborators in the Laser Interferometer Space Antenna, Fundamental Physics working group, solving such problems is just what I do.

Don't Be A Charles About Science: The New Prince Of Wales Should Divest From Mystical Organic Beliefs

Don't Be A Charles About Science: The New Prince Of Wales Should Divest From Mystical Organic Beliefs

Sep 19 2022 | comment(s)

England is in crisis. They lost a beloved figurehead this month but for decades prior were losing scientific ground. If you look for the home of the modern organic food and anti-vaccine movements, you find their nexus in 1990s England.

The primary royal behind those beliefs is now King Charles III. 
Even Before The Pandemic, 20% Of Kids Reported Depression Symptoms

Even Before The Pandemic, 20% Of Kids Reported Depression Symptoms

Sep 19 2022 | comment(s)

Responses to the COVID-19 pandemic, from school closures to lockdowns, were important for health officials and implemented even after factoring in concerns about long-term psychological effects.

If results from 2015-2020 surveys are an indication, depression cases may go up sharply in future data. In 2020, past 12‒month depression was prevalent among nearly 20 percent of adolescents and young adults, and almost 10 percent of Americans.  
Being A Great Drummer May Be Genetic

Being A Great Drummer May Be Genetic

Sep 19 2022 | comment(s)

'Keeping time' is easy for humans, but not all can keep time equally. Some great drummers, and even more guitarists, use a device like a metronome to keep them on a precise beat, while others seem to do it effortlessly.

A new study finds human capacity to move in synchrony with a musical beat may be partially coded in the human genome.
Disease Spillover Risk Was Oversimplified During The COVID-19 Pandemic - And It's A Chronic Problem In Science Journalism

Disease Spillover Risk Was Oversimplified During The COVID-19 Pandemic - And It's A Chronic Problem In Science Journalism

Sep 16 2022 | comment(s)

SAR, R0, these are all terms that became part of the pop culture lexicon during the COVID-19 pandemic. Unfortunately, because they were used in simplistic fashion they were more helpful for those engaged in wedge politics than the public.

Part of the problem can be laid at the feet of social media. COVID-19 was the third coronavirus pandemic of the last 17 years but it was the first to truly spread worldwide and have so much concern that the country where it originated created a campaign of disinformation, and even got the World Health Organisation to be complicit. And it all happened in real time on social media.
Detecting Seafood Fraud Using Chemical Maps

Detecting Seafood Fraud Using Chemical Maps

Sep 13 2022 | comment(s)

Food fraud is common. Probably 25 percent of imported food with an "organic" label is just conventional food and even in America some organic farmers are just selling regular food. In Europe, everyone knew that Russia was not magically producing all of the organic food they were selling to France and Germany so those companies could pretend it works to feed the world.
20 Post-Doctoral Research Positions Open At INFN

20 Post-Doctoral Research Positions Open At INFN

Sep 13 2022 | comment(s)

Are you a recently (<8 years) appointed Ph.D. graduate in fundamental physics, who wants to work in Italy? This post is for you. The INFN is opening 20 positions for foreigners who would like to join a group of research in one of the INFN sections (there are 25 across Italy). The positions are for one year, renewable, and the salary is competitive, given that it is roughly at the level of a starting associate professor in Italy. Note, also Ph.D. students who plan to graduate before November 1st 2023 can apply! 


Also, the 8-years limit can be waived if you spent time in maternity, military service, or illness. The winning candidates are expected to start their contract before November 2023.
Rare Diamonds Came From Outer Space

Rare Diamonds Came From Outer Space

Sep 13 2022 | comment(s)

Scientists have confirmed the existence of lonsdaleite, a rare hexagonal form of diamond named after British crystallographer Kathleen Lonsdale, in ureilite meteorites from the mantle of a planet in our solar system.

According to the new findings, a large asteroid probably collided with the planet collided about 4.5 billion years ago, and the hexagonal structure of lonsdaleite’s atoms, making it harder than the cubic structure of terrestrial diamonds.
Infertility Was A Problem In The 19th Century, And Still Is Today In Scandinavia

Infertility Was A Problem In The 19th Century, And Still Is Today In Scandinavia

Sep 12 2022 | comment(s)

It is something we have all heard; educated, wealthy people who don't want to have kids, for various reasons. They are letting culture of the future be created by someone else. It is common to be voluntary now but in the past it was not a choice.

Demographers recently looked at the Skellefteå region in northern Sweden (since the work of digitizing population data from the 19th century on had already been done) and had access to 5,850 people and their children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren, which numbered in the tens of thousands.
Marek Karliner On Exotic Doubly-Heavy Hadrons

Marek Karliner On Exotic Doubly-Heavy Hadrons

Sep 10 2022 | comment(s)

In the final day of the ICNFP 2022 conference in Kolympari (Greece), we could listen to an enlightening presentation by Prof. Marek Karliner (Tel Aviv University), who is an absolute authority on the matter of the theory of hadron spectroscopy. 
Bitter orange, Ephedra and Heart Issues: Supplements Among The Left Coasts Show How Endemic Anti-Science Beliefs Remain

Bitter orange, Ephedra and Heart Issues: Supplements Among The Left Coasts Show How Endemic Anti-Science Beliefs Remain

Sep 07 2022 | comment(s)

Since 2021, journalists and their political allies have been acting like Republicans are anti-vaccine and Democrats have always been the party of science.

Just the opposite was true. Prior to politicization of COVID-19, right-wing religious states like Alabama and Mississippi had nearly 100 percent vaccine uptake while cities like San Francisco, Berkeley, and Los Angeles had so much denial that California had more unvaccinated kids than the rest of America combined. After years of pressure because of the issue, Governor Jerry Brown was forced to sign a law removing those arbitrary exemptions.
Evolution And The Importance Of Hybridization

Evolution And The Importance Of Hybridization

Sep 07 2022 | comment(s)

Although neanderthals died out over 40,000 years ago, we are living in an age in which there are more people with their DNA than at any other time in history, with research finding that

Mother’s Touch Formula: Probiotic, Prebiotic, Non-GMO, And Lying About FDA 'Approval'

Mother’s Touch Formula: Probiotic, Prebiotic, Non-GMO, And Lying About FDA 'Approval'

Sep 06 2022 | comment(s)

Mother’s Touch Formula claims to be all of the stuff that the anti-science community loves; prebiotic, probiotic, Non-GMO, whatever.

The problem is it also claims to be FDA approved, and that is a lie.

Ignore the weird schism in culture that people who buy holistic goopy nonsense think FDA and most science is a Vast Corporate Conspiracy while seeking out scientific legitimacy, this stuff is fraudulent.


MeowTalk App Is A Psychic For Cat Owners

MeowTalk App Is A Psychic For Cat Owners

Sep 06 2022 | comment(s)

From the BBC to Daily Mail, corporate journalism is covering an app that claims to understand what your cat is saying and translate it for you.

If you have used Alexa or Siri, you know those can't even understand English all that well, so you are right to be skeptical they understand cat. But MeowTalk has help. You tell it what you want to believe your cat is saying.

It's like going to a psychic and latching onto any random thing they say - "I feel someone whose name starts with a J in the room" "WOW. I had an uncle named John!" - as affirmation that it is working. 

In chemical and food epidemiology and other fields that rely too heavily on surveys it is this:

64% Of Women Report Premenstrual Syndrome - That Makes It A Public Health Issue

64% Of Women Report Premenstrual Syndrome - That Makes It A Public Health Issue

Sep 06 2022 | comment(s)

In 460 BC, Hippocrates described the earliest documented premenstrual syndrome, but it wasn't until 1931 that Dr. Robert Frank gave it a modern look with his paper on "premenstrual tension." In 1953 it was re-branded "premenstrual syndrome" because it covered so many symptoms. About 150.

By the early 1990s, women, and then men, were ridiculing the idea because no two women described the same thing. When a syndrome covers everything, it covers nothing, the clinical guidance notes.
Are Particle Masses Fixed Or Not?

Are Particle Masses Fixed Or Not?

Sep 06 2022 | comment(s)

A reader of this blog left an interesting question in the comments thread of the article I wrote on recent ATLAS results two days ago. As I tried to answer the question exhaustively, I think the material might be of interest of other readers here, so I decided to make an independent post of it, adding some more detail.

John asks whether it is possible that what we see, when we plot the mass of a particle, is the true distribution of values of the particle - i.e. that the particle does not have only one mass, but a distribution of values. The question is not an idle one! So let us discuss it below. I will make a few points to clarify matters.

1. We estimate by proxy
Is The Art Community Sexist?

Is The Art Community Sexist?

Sep 05 2022 | comment(s)

In the art world, there is a gaping gender imbalance when it comes to male and female artists.

In the National Gallery of Australia, only 25% of the Australian art collection is work by women.

Just Correlation: Sleep Apnea And Cancer Risk

Just Correlation: Sleep Apnea And Cancer Risk

Sep 05 2022 | comment(s)

Sleep apnea is a condition where people experience partial or complete obstruction of their airways during sleep and stop breathing several times a night. It can can manifest as loud snoring, gasping, choking and daytime sleepiness and is believed to affect at least 7 percent of the population.

There is correlation between that and obesity, diabetes, cigarettes, and alcohol. There is no plausible biological mechanism for why those would cause sleep apnea, it is just correlation - epidemiologists look at rows of inputs and columns of effects - and that is the problem with a new paper claiming a link to cancer.