mikethemadbiologist

One of the things that has been revealed by the VA Tech shooting is that the government keeps a database of prescription drug users. This has bothered some. Glenn Greenwald writes (italics mine): Let me ask you this question: let's say I come into your office (I'm a mentally competent adult --…

At this point, it still seems unclear what happened at VA Tech, and like all tragedies, there probably would have been, in hindsight, many places where someone could have intervened and stopped the madness. One area that needs to be examined is the role of campus disciplinary systems. Full…

The hilarious picture below accompanied a very interesting NY Times article about chimpanzee intelligence: (from here) The taller ape is Jane Goodall. Funny picture.

...you probably won't like this video. But if you like sharks, you'll love this video. By way of cookie jill: I had no idea sharks could move like that.

Instapundit is arguing that, had the Virginia Tech students been armed, fewer students would have died. Even if this were correct, it ignores all of the other times students would have guns. Do you really think drunk college students should be carrying? If college hasn't changed too much since I…

Former Republican governor and presidential hopeful Tommy Thompson just entered the running for the Stupid Asshole of the Week. From his comments to the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism in Washington D.C.: "I'm in the private sector and for the first time in my life I'm earning money. You…

I found two good posts about taxes: one describes why we need them, and the other describes how much of your taxes go to pay for something you probably don't even think about. First, the 'mystery' budget item: servicing the interest payments on the federal debt. From hilzoy (italics mine): Total…

Happy day before Patriots' Day. Tomorrow, I'll be watching the Boston Marathon (I don't really have a choice; it goes right past my building). Anyway, here's some science and other links for you: There's a humongous fungus among us. And it could create real problems for food production. One…

You might do a little better if your campaign advisors don't insult your own party's base. From the New York Observer (italics mine): I got to talk a little bit about it with Samantha Power, a Pulitzer Prize-winning author on the subject of genocide and an informal advisor to Mr. Obama's campaign…

After reading Mike Dunford's letter to his representatives about the occupation of Iraq, I decided to write my own. Hopefully, it will have more influence than the other letters I've written... I recently read the following written by the husband of an Army officer currently deployed in Iraq,…

While I'm not as bothered by the Pope's statement about evolution as PZ is, what's troubling is the scientific misunderstanding shown by his statements. I agree with one sentiment, which is that biology doesn't tell us much about meaning, since I think meaning is something we ascribe to physical…

According to CNN, a bomb blast has killed at least two people in the Iraqi Parliament. This building is located in the Green Zone. I hope Bush, McCain, and the other members of the Coalition of the Sane have the decency to wait until the bodies cool a few hours before they claim that this proves…

I've never really considered myself an anonymous blogger, even though I blog under the pseudonym "Mike the Mad Biologist." I think about fifteen minutes of serious investigation would reveal my identity (nefarious as it is). It's more of a minor affectation than anything else. But two incidents…

No, not those hideous boots! The Ug99 black stem rust fungus, a strain of Puccinia graminis. It doesn't kill people directly, but it could wipe out much of the world's wheat crop. As always, the developing world will probably be hit the hardest. And it's a potential failure of surveillance.…

While walking to work a couple of weeks ago, I saw this Smart car tooling around Boston. And it's no ordinary Smart car either... It's apparently part of a promotion for a chocolate company. Yes, it has bunny ears. an aside: Am I the only one who thinks Smart cars should be called iCars?

I've mentioned the National Antimicrobial Resistance Monitoring System (NARMS) before. Today, I'll be attending the NARMS public hearing which is going to discuss four questions: 1) Why, on this night 1) Are there inherent biases in the sampling strategies employed in NARMS? If so, how can they be…

From the archives, here's something about how we might be underestimating the strength of natural selection when we look at molecular data: PZ Myers has a superb summary of a very interesting PLoS paper. In the paper, the authors identify those genes that have experienced strong selection, and thus…

I've just finished reading Chris Mooney's and Matt Nisbet's Science article about communicating science to the general public. It's right on target. When it comes to defending evolutionary biology, the success one will have is far less dependent on marshalling the appropriate facts than many…

The AFL-CIO has a very interesting website site that calculates how much CEOs are paid relative to the average U.S. worker. While useful, for many economic conservatives, it won't matter at all, since, well, that's why they're conservatives. But I've devised my own comparison that will matter to…

A huge number of antibiotic prescriptions are filled due to the misdiagnosis of sore throats. Here's something from the archives about this problem while I'm away. A long-standing complaint by many microbiologists has been the mistreatment of sore throats in children. Antibiotics are often…

From the archives comes this bit about the ludicrous (and willful) misunderstanding that creationists have regarding 'beneficial' mutations: Whether they are young earthers or intelligent design advocates, one tactic creationists use is to claim evolutionary biologists-always described as "…

From the archives comes this post about the effect antibiotic resistance could have during an influenza outbreak. I recently corresponded with someone in a position to make public health policy who wanted to know what effect antibiotic resistance would have on avian influenza (this makes me think…

You can't go wrong with the title "Residence time and food contact time effects on transfer of Salmonella Typhimurium from tile, wood and carpet: testing the five-second rule." And it only gets better. Here's the abstract: Aims Three experiments were conducted to determine the survival and…

If you celebrate Passover, have a good seder. If not, I hope the Great Matzo Ball brings you lots of gifts anyway. And here's a helpful video about matzah:

Garry Wills, in an essay from the NY Review of Books, "Bush's Fringe Government", writes the following about the reign of Little Lord Pontchartrain: How do you govern an apostate nation? When the entire culture is corrupted, the country can only be morally governed in spite of itself. A…

...I plan on visiting the Smithsonian. Sadly, it hasn't been run very well the last seven years. Maybe the resignation of Lawrence Small will turn things around. Who is Small? Here's what the Nitpicker has to say about l'affair Small: But, in the past 20 years, Republicans--and some DLC…

...or something like that. By way of skippy, comes this, erm, fascinating creationist exposition on the inertness of peanut butter: People can't really be this stupid, can they?

Atrios makes an interesting observation about the decline in newspaper sales and political trend at major metropolitan dailies: One of the never-discussed dirty little secrets of the newspaper industry is that many editorial pages in newspapers in major cities lean heavily right, especially…

How can the DLC-wing of Democratic Party, including Rahm Emanuel, continue to claim to know what's best for the Democratic Party after they've been so badly schooled? By other Democrats (italics mine): It isn't just Ford who wanted to take us down a different path--it is the entire neoliberal,…

One of the interesting things about blogging is that it has undermined the importance of the punditocracy. In the pre-interenet, and certainly pre-blog era, you had a very different relationship to politics, even if you were aware and relatively active: you were a consumer. By consumer, I mean…