j7uy5
Posts by this author
September 3, 2009
The odd thing about the Pfizer story is that it is old news.
Fierce Pharma
href="http://www.fiercepharma.com/story/pfizer-takes-2-3b-bextra-charge/2009-01-26">wrote
about it on 26 January 2009, and Neuron Culture
href="http://scienceblogs.com/neuronculture/2009/01/…
August 28, 2009
...and the steel hits the flesh.
Mark Rosenberg, MD, representing the
href="http://www.researchamerica.org/pgr_society">Paul G. Rogers
Society for Global Health Research, had an opinion piece published
in the Boston Globe. He makes a good point about health. It
is not just doctors and…
August 27, 2009
The health care reform process is getting extremely ugly.
href="http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/healthcare/la-na-healthcare-insurers24-2009aug24,0,6925890.story">
href="http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/healthcare/la-na-healthcare-insurers24-2009aug24,0,6925890.…
August 24, 2009
href="http://www.researchblogging.org">
alt="ResearchBlogging.org"
src="http://www.researchblogging.org/public/citation_icons/rb2_large_gray.png"
style="border: 0pt none ;">
A fair amount has been written about the topic of motivated
reasoning. Jonah Lehrer
href="http://scienceblogs.…
August 23, 2009
Some irreverent souls have taken to Sunday blogging on a freethinking
themes. I choose to Ozymandize* that which we worship the most:
our economic system.
That plant in the middle is
href="http://scienceblogs.com/corpuscallosum/2009/07/color_of_the_year_mimosa.php">my
mimosa (
href="http://…
August 22, 2009
IEEE
href="http://spectrum.ieee.org/green-tech/fuel-cells/hydrogen-helper">reports
that chicken feathers are superior to carbon nanotubes:
src="http://photos-g.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc1/hs148.snc1/5494_920199924833_2254023_51033310_7917444_s.jpg"
align="left" height="86" width="130">…
August 19, 2009
It is refreshing to see something like this. Both drugs are
available as generics, so the financial motivation for a study like
this is not great. But the clinical benefit could e substantial,
albeit for a small subset of patients.
Clozapine is considered to be the most efficacious antipsychotic…
August 13, 2009
At the Lawrence Hall of Science, at the University of California -
Berkeley, there is a children's playground. On the playground,
theere is a whimsical sculture based on DNA. Lots of people like
it. Indeed, Dr. Stemwedel wrote
href="http://scienceblogs.com/ethicsandscience/2007/08/…
August 13, 2009
I haven't been a good blog-citizen lately. And no, it is not
because of fatigue. Anyway, I've going to try to get back to
looking at other people's blogs more, and not just here at
ScienceBlogs.
Dr. Serani kindly
href="http://drdeborahserani.blogspot.com/2009/08/5-reasons-you-may-be-tired.html…
August 9, 2009
The way that the debate over health care is being conducted is brazen and disturbing. If it turns out to be a flashpoint for violence -- as it may -- it will be profoundly ironic: our efforts to improve health care delivery, end up being a catalyst for generalized thuggery.
August 5, 2009
This is good. Indeed, it may qualify as the type specimen (
href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holotype">holotype) of
snark. From The New Yorker:
href="http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/hendrikhertzberg/2009/08/clinton-north-korea.html">It's
So Obvious
From Avi Zenilman, online news…
August 3, 2009
There is a short
open-access article about whole-body neuronal MRI, in the most recent
NEJM. The authors describe a technique of visualizing peripheral
nerves. Normally, these are not seen very well on MRI. This
limits the usefulness of MR imaging for nerves outside of the central
nervous system…
August 2, 2009
Botanical names drive me nuts, sometimes. Every plant that is
worth anything has many names. The supposed gold standard, the
(Latin) Linnaean taxonomical name, gets changed every so often.
So there is no constancy. You'd think it would be easier to
research something if it has an unusual name…
July 29, 2009
The Knowsley Safari Park
wants their visitors to know that the babbons are smart. They
have figured out how to open car-top cargo carriers.
This is not actually a candid photo. It was staged, in order to
educate the visitors about his potential problem with their Papio
anubis population.
Source:…
July 27, 2009
Natalie Angier has another
href="http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/21/science/21angier.html?sq=behavior%20what%20animals%20do&st=cse&scp=1&pagewanted=print">interesting
article in the NYT. In the article, she discusses the meaning
of the word behavior. Apparently, this all came from…
July 26, 2009
Alabama has decide to not allow a particular wine to be sold. The
reason is that the label contains "some nudity."
MONTGOMERY, Ala. -- A wine label showing a nude nymph is too
much for Alabama's liquor control agency, which has told restaurants
and stores not to sell the product.
The label on…
July 25, 2009
We grow catnip in the garden outside the home-office window. Our
cat likes to lay in front of the window, and stare wistfully at the
catnip.
style="display: inline;">But today, he saw something unexpected. The neighbor's cat was
laying in the catnip.
July 24, 2009
style="display: inline;">The
href="http://www.pantone.com/pages/pantone/pantone.aspx?pg=20634&ca=10">Pantone
color of the year for 2009 happens to be: PANTONE 14-0848
Mimosa. Something about this captured my attention.
I was casually sipping from the Internet firehose when I…
July 23, 2009
This is one of those sickening things that is
href="http://www.pamshouseblend.com/tag/Tasers">all too common:
href="http://www.cnjonline.com/news/tucumcari-34303-year-chief.html?wap=0">
href="http://www.cnjonline.com/news/tucumcari-34303-year-chief.html?wap=0">Tucumcari
police chief…
July 22, 2009
I got a kick out of this illustration. It's from the coloring
book at Neuroscience for Kids, showing what neuroscientists look like:
style="display: inline;">Neuroscience
for Kids (link to pdf coloring book)Neuroscience
for Kids (link to website)
July 21, 2009
href="http://annarbor.com/2009/07/didnt-get-enough-of-the-art-fairs-last-week-check-out-this-time-lapse-video.html">AnnArbor.com
(HT:
href="http://vielmetti.typepad.com/vacuum/2009/07/soft-launch-day-16.html">Edward
Vielmetti) has a youtube time-lapse video at the
href="http://en.wikipedia…
July 20, 2009
I was off-line for several days, because the modem toasted
itself.
I didn't do it, honest! It had been acting up for a couple of
weeks, causing random "web site not found" errors. If it happened
very much, I'd reboot the thing and it would be better for a while.
Finally, it failed. The green…
July 16, 2009
A friend sent me a link to an article about the upcoming fifth edition
of the American Psychiatric Association's Diagnostic and Statistical
Manual. The article speaks of flaws in the process, and warning
of dire "unintended consequences."
href="http://www.psychiatrictimes.com/print/article/10168/…
July 12, 2009
Went for a Sunday drive. Saw this:
White Sands National Monument
Drove a little farther, saw this:
Odocoileus hemionus
You might have guessed, I did not take the first picture. It is aview
from Earth orbit. The second picture, I did take; it is a
view through my windshiled. The two…
July 10, 2009
A chart on Clusterstock (great name) by Kamelia Angelova (another great
name) shows what I've suspected for a while: all the jobs created in
the USA, during the Bush II years, were unsustainable. All have
been lost. Meanwhile, the population has increased by about 23
million.
style="display:…
July 6, 2009
Comparative Effectiveness Research (CER) has been controversial, as
href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/03/16/AR2009031602913.html">noted
in the Washington Post.
Admittedly, most of the controversy has been contrived.
Fortunately, the process is moving forward;…
June 29, 2009
Psychology is turning out to be a rather important field these
days. Nate Hagens has a post on The Oil Drum,
href="http://www.theoildrum.com/node/5519">The Psychological and
Evolutionary Roots of Resource Overconsumption Revisited. He
reviews the evolutionary psychology of poor economic…
June 27, 2009
OK, folks, explain this to me.
It is a bicycle. Bicycles are cool. But from the
looks of this thing, it seems as though it would be like riding an
anvil around town. Sure, it'd be great if you got hit by a
Hummer. The bike would be fine.
style="display: inline;">There are
href="http://www…
June 25, 2009
PhysioProf commented about this back in 2006 after Alex Palazzo 's
post,
href="http://scienceblogs.com/transcript/2006/12/silent_mutations_inactivates_p.php">A
silent mutation affects pain perception? That post discussed
mutations that affect pain perception. Now, there is a bit
more…
June 22, 2009
It was the second-most-blogged article on the NYT when I got up this
morning; now, it is the first-most-blogged. It is the article
that reports on a survey that shows 72% support for a government-run
health insurance program. The program would be similar to
Medicare, but would be available to…