Social Sciences
oracknows | October 26, 2009I had meant to address this topic last week, but the whole Suzanne Somers thing bubbled up and overwhelmed my blogging attention. Regular readers of this blog probably realize that I tend to live and die as a blogger by the maxim that if some is good more must be better. So I clobbered the topic with three posts in rapid succession. Now that that's out of the way, I can address topics that readers have been bugging me about sending to me.
At or near the top of the list has to be a biased and poorly framed article that appeared in The Atlantic this month. I tell ya, I've been a subscriber to…
terrasig | October 25, 2009
One of the most engaging and clearly-written pieces of science journalism over the last year or so was published in Wired magazine last week. Amy Wallace's, "An Epidemic of Fear: How Panicked Parents Skipping Shots Endangers Us All," is part interview with rotavirus vaccine developer, pediatric infectious disease physician, Dr Paul Offit, and description of the anti-vaccination movement in the United States.
Wallace's work is the centerpiece of a collection of smaller articles providing science-based information about vaccination that also refutes common anti-vaccination myths including "…
grrlscientist | October 25, 2009
Image: wemidji (Jacques Marcoux).
Nam et ipsa scientia potestas est (And thus knowledge itself is power)
-- Sir Francis Bacon.
When you go hiking or sailing or stargazing, why not consider writing about your experience of nature and sharing it with the world? Or maybe you are watching an ant's nest in the crack of a sidewalk, walking down the beach, flipping rocks to see what's underneath, or sitting in your kitchen, watching birds eating seeds at your birdfeeders? Your experiences could be interesting to others if these activities provide you with questions that you decide to investigate…
dgmacarthur | October 25, 2009It's been an intensive week of genomics here at the American Society of Human Genetics meeting, and I haven't been able to grab time to blog as much as I'd have liked. In fact there's a whole load of genomics news I'll be trying to cover in some detail over the next couple of weeks; for the moment, though, I couldn't let today's presentation from personal genomics company 23andMe go by without at least some comment. (For other coverage of the conference, do check out Luke Jostins' blog coverage and the stream of live analysis on Twitter.)
The 23andMe presenter (Nick Eriksson) delivered an…
grrlscientist | October 24, 2009
Image: wemidji (Jacques Marcoux).
Nam et ipsa scientia potestas est (And thus knowledge itself is power)
-- Sir Francis Bacon.
Scientia Pro Publica (Science for the People) was just published recently. This edition is entitled Scientia Pro Publica -- 14th edition. The author of Genetic Interference is speaking (right now!) at the American Society of Human Genetics Annual Meeting and is planning to "live blog" that conference as well, despite the fact it's in Hawai'i, so be sure to poke around on his blog to find those essays.
Scientia Pro Publica (Science for the People) is a…
grrlscientist | October 23, 2009
Image: wemidji (Jacques Marcoux).
Nam et ipsa scientia potestas est (And thus knowledge itself is power)
-- Sir Francis Bacon.
Scientia Pro Publica (Science for the People) was just published recently. This edition is entitled Scientia Pro Publica -- 14th edition. The author of Genetic Interference is speaking (right now!) at the American Society of Human Genetics Annual Meeting and is planning to "live blog" that conference as well, despite the fact it's in Hawai'i, so be sure to poke around on his blog to find those essays.
Scientia Pro Publica (Science for the People) is a…
grrlscientist | October 20, 2009
Image: wemidji (Jacques Marcoux).
Nam et ipsa scientia potestas est (And thus knowledge itself is power)
-- Sir Francis Bacon.
Scientia Pro Publica (Science for the People) was just published recently. This edition is entitled Scientia Pro Publica -- 14th edition. The author of Genetic Interference is speaking (right now!) at the American Society of Human Genetics Annual Meeting and is planning to "live blog" that conference as well, despite the fact it's in Hawai'i, so be sure to poke around on his blog to find those essays.
Scientia Pro Publica (Science for the People) is a…
oracknows | October 19, 2009Many have been the times over the last five years that I've called out bad journalism about medicine in general and vaccines in particular, especially the coverage of the discredited notion that vaccines or mercury in vaccines somehow was responsible for the "autism epidemic." That's why I feel a special responsibility to highlight good reporting on the issue. Indeed, reporting on this issue is so uniformly awful that when I see something this good, I want to do everything in my power to hawk the hell out of it. So, I want you to read this article in the November issue of WIRED Magazine…
grrlscientist | October 19, 2009
Image: wemidji (Jacques Marcoux).
Nam et ipsa scientia potestas est (And thus knowledge itself is power)
-- Sir Francis Bacon.
Scientia Pro Publica (Science for the People) was just published at Genetic Interference. This edition is entitled Scientia Pro Publica -- 14th edition. The author of Genetic Interference is speaking at the American Society of Human Genetics Annual Meeting and is planning to "live blog" that conference as well, despite the fact it's in Hawai'i, so be sure to poke around on his blog to find those essays.
Scientia Pro Publica (Science for the People) is a…
emjohnson | October 18, 2009Classical literature has judged Helen of Troy harshly. Because she chose Paris after having children with Menelaus, her chroniclers condemn her for the destruction of a great society. In Homer's Odyssey the bard writes:
Helen would never have yielded herself to a man from a foreign country, if she had known that the sons of Achaeans would come after her and bring her back. Heaven put it in her heart to do wrong, and she gave no thought to that sin, which has been the source of all our sorrows.
This has been the tradition in Western society. An open female sexuality has been viewed as…
razib | October 17, 2009From the comments:
Jizya is only a financial tribute / aid to the Muslim State which is in-charge of safeguarding the security of the state and non-muslim's lives and properties on their behalf.
Non-muslims pay Jizya BUT they are EXEMPTED from any other taxes which muslims pay in a Muslim State i.e. Zakat, Khums etc.
As compared to taxes which the Muslims are subjected in a Muslim state, the amount of Jizya is very low.
As such, Jizya should not be interpreted as "Additional Tax" imposed on non-muslims. It is rather a "lesser" obligation as compared to that of a Muslim.
I've heard this…
jstemwedel | October 16, 2009This, in turn, means that members of the public who strongly disagree with your stand may decide to track you down and let you know they disagree with you.
Apparently, this may become an issue for those who signed the Pro-Test petition in support of ethical and human scientific research with animals. From an email sent to signatories:
[A] few websites hosted by animal rights activists have encouraged their readerships to visit the list of Pro-Test signatories in order to find names and to contact those persons to express their opposition to animal research. While your email addresses on the…
drorzel | October 16, 2009
slacktivist: Oh, and Tony Perkins? He lies. A lot. For money.
"Please don't clutch your pearls and get the vapors that such an impolite thing is stated so honestly. That Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council lies a lot in order to scare people into sending him money is not surprising, or new, or unusual or controversial. Tony Perkins lies for money. Giraffes have long necks. Water is wet. "
(tags: politics religion law crime society evil stupid gender race blogs slacktivist)
The Digital Cuttlefish: Someone Is Wrong On The Internet
"Someone Is Wrong/
...On The Internet,/
And I won't…
cortex | October 15, 2009I've got a new article in Nature this week on the growing number of learning and memory enhanced strains of mice, and what these smart rodents can teach us about the human mind. I also discuss Luria's The Mind of A Mnemonist and the stunning research demonstrating that the cognitive deficits of many neurodevelopmental disorders, including Neuroï¬bromatosis, Down's Syndrome and Fragile X, have actually proven to be reversible, at least in mouse models. The article is behind a paywall, but here's the lede:
Ten years ago, Princeton researcher Joe Tsien eased a brown mouse, tail first, into a…
emjohnson | October 15, 2009There may need to be a significant revision in the recent description of one of humanity's oldest ancestors. Ardipithecus ramidus (or "Ardi" for short), the 4.4 million year old hominid fossil discovery, has been a godsend to paleoanthropologists (pun intended). But one of the key researchers has made what could be a serious error in his interpretation.
Christopher Ryan, who writes for Psychology Today at his blog Sex at Dawn (also the title of his forthcoming book) has discovered evidence that could undermine Owen Lovejoy's argument about human sexual evolution ever since Ardi:
In a…
dgmacarthur | October 14, 2009I'll be away for the American Society of Human Genetics meeting in Hawaii for most of the next couple of weeks - I'll be covering the conference primarily via Twitter, and you can follow all of the tweets from the conference using the #ASHG2009 hashtag.
Genetics bloggers/tweeters should also pencil in the "tweetup" on Thursday 22nd from 4:30 to 5:15 in the ASHG Press Office (Room 318 in the Convention Center), organised by Chris Gunter; anyone interested should RSVP via email. This should be a good chance to put faces to many of the names in your Twitter and RSS feeds.
There's a lot of…
bioephemera | October 14, 2009Just saw this posting:
The Stetten Fellowship seeks to encourage postdoctoral historical research and publication about biomedical sciences and technology and medicine that has been funded by NIH since 1945. Fellowships carry a stipend in the range of $45,000 per year and include health insurance and a work space, computer, and phone in the Office of NIH History. (Fellowships may be renewable to a maximum of 24 months, subject to satisfactory progress.) Stetten Fellows have access to the resources of the Office of NIH History, the collections of the Stetten Museum, the National Library of…
edyong | October 14, 2009In the 1990s, Colombia reintegrated five left-wing guerrilla groups back into mainstream society after decades of conflict. Education was a big priority - many of the guerrillas had spent their entire lives fighting and were more familiar with the grasp of a gun than a pencil. Reintegration offered them the chance to learn to read and write for the first time in their lives, but it also offered Manuel Carreiras a chance to study what happens in the human brain as we become literate.
Of course, millions of people - children - learn to read every year but this new skill arrives in the context…
emjohnson | October 13, 2009In my earlier post I discussed the "Grandmother Hypothesis" as an explanation for human reproductive senescence, or menopause. A problem arises in understanding why women forgo one-third (and sometimes as much as one-half) of their reproductive lives, a condition unique in the natural world. Could this just be a neutral mutation, an artifact of longer human lives, or might it be a product of natural selection? If the latter, what selection pressure(s) could result in this unique human adaptation? The grandmother hypothesis posits that women who stopped ovulating in their golden years were…
pharyngula | October 13, 2009I am astounded. Usually AiG simply refers to me as "the Professor" or "the atheist", but in their latest screed they actually mention me by name…and they even spell it correctly! Of course, they get everything else wrong.
A well-known University of Minnesota-Morris professor who has a history of hate speech against creationists—especially Answers in Genesis and the Creation Museum1—inadvertently admitted recently that we were not wrong. This was kind of a blessing in disguise and also reveals much about his character. Professor Paul (P.Z.) Myers said:
First, there is no moral law: the…