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Hank CampbellRSS Feed of this column.

I founded Science 2.0® in 2006 and since then it has become the world's largest independent science communications site, with over 300,000,000 direct readers and reach approaching one billion. Read More »

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What is a paltry $195 billion in real cost versus $1 trillion in potential savings? Fans of 'jobs created or saved' fuzzy economics will love a report by the Joint Center For Political and Economic Studies, which says that six new Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) air quality regulations, which will cost about $195 billion over the next 20 years, will save well over $1 trillion. 

I italicize $1 trillion because it works best if you use a Dr. Evil voice to read it so I wanted to give you a visual hook. Like him, it may take some trial and error to figure out what number will have enough impact to mobilize people into action so, like these numbers, just make them up until you get the desired effect.
A number of midwives believe modern births rely too heavily on medication and technological intervention and they instead have created 'birthing rituals' to send the message that women's bodies know best and that birth is about female empowerment.

It's no surprise the Pacific Northwest, home of progressive anti-vaccine efforts, is also on the vanguard of this latest fad in anthropology. In Medical Anthropology Quarterly, Melissa Cheyney,  assistant professor of medical anthropology at Oregon State University, documented rituals used by midwives and conducted interviews with midwives and new mothers.
Think Christmas has gotten way too secular?  Turkey may be the place you want to move because they make sure kids stick with religion, though the 2.2% who are not Muslim will be tough to find so your Christmas dinner might be poorly attended.  Knowing how other countries treat science is important to help us appreciate how we do. Sure, people can whine in America if some kooky school district has right wing people wanting to give religion equal time in science classes but it's not exactly life threatening to tell kids dinosaurs ate coconuts - the anti-science left won't even give their kids vaccines and that's a much more dangerous problem.
It's two weeks until Christmas and if you are a Science 2.0 reader, that means it is at least time to think about shopping for a Christmas gift.  Demographically, not a lot of you were lining up to gratefully overpay for Apple's latest offering or whatever else obedient Oprah viewers are expected to buy on Black Friday.

Here are three nifty ideas that are science related for your consideration, in three age ranges.  If you just like gadgets you can check out the Top Gadgets of 2011 instead.

For The Young 
If a crime occurs, asking the criminal what happened is unlikely to give you the most accurate picture of events.  This is why police interview the victim first.    So an evolutionary psychologist outlining how great evolutionary psychology is has to be taken with a grain of salt; no one becomes a professor in a field and then decides it is a lot of woo.
You know you are culturally hip when magazines want to do their photo shoots with you in them - the poor Tea Party folks clearly have to get some representation in midtown Manhattan if they want to get haute couture coverage.

Until then, Occupy Wall Street is the cool place to be solely for well-heeled fashionistas.  Kanye West looked silly showing up in a $300 shirt and gold chains to show he was not part of the 1%, even though his net worth is $400 million dollars.   His problem was he was too humble - if you want to go full on into progressive acceptance you have to shamelessly plop your highly paid models in their $3,000 suits in front of the protesting masses and pretend they belong.  Confidence sells.