Over at Open Parachute, Ken has posted an item on ‘why is science important?’ It includes a series of brief videos showing a range of scientists giving their answers to this question. Well worth viewing.
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the need for science communication
By now the fact that senior NIWA scientist Jim Salinger lost his job last week has made global headlines (in the blogosphere at least). Apparently, he spoke to the media without approval from his superiors. OK, NIWA is a commercial entity & there are a lot of checks & balances to ensure that commercially sensitive information […]
Continue readinga good summary on swine flu
The front page of the Herald this morning was pretty much given over to swine flu – how many cases there might be in NZ, various public health concerns, that sort of thing. I thought it was a bit excitable, but still, understandable I guess & hopefully will raise public awareness of some of the issues […]
Continue readingfish oil follow-up (& some more stats)
I’ve written previously on suposed ‘trials’ of the benefits of fish oil on kids’ school performance. One was the ‘Durham trial’, where a large cohort of schoolchildren was given fish oil supplements without any real scientific basis for doing so; another was in New Zealand. As I said then, one of the many problems with this […]
Continue readingthe past is the key to the present
I really enjoy reading Brian Switek’s posts on his blog, Laelaps – especially those relating to mammalian evolution & to the history of science. He’s just written a lovely piece about the evolution of seals, including the comment that this lovely fossil helps to explain why it is that seals (unlike whales & dolphins) swim […]
Continue readingwhen people are most likely to accept outrageous statements…
I thought this fitted rather well with some recent posts 🙂 courtesy of GraphJam
Continue readingmore on epigenetics & imprinting
Grant is a regular commenter here & occasionally I’ve twisted his arm & persuaded him to write a guest post for me. The following item is one of these – it was too good (& too long!) for the comment thread. Grant begins: Alison recently put up an article about epigenetics. Since I was in […]
Continue readingan entertaining look at our family tree
Horrakapotchkin! It seems that hsi is no longer available – something t do with a ‘terms of use violation’. I do hope the problem – whatever it is – is cleared up as this really was rather cool. ______________________________________________________________________________ and a useful introduction to some of the terminology used in phylogenetics. (Courtesy, as usual, of […]
Continue readingben goldacre’s missing chapter
I’m a big fan of Ben Goldacre’s – I read his coliumn regularly & thoroughly enjoyed his recent book, Bad Science. Except for the missing chapter – when the book was published, Ben was engaged in a court battle over the content of that particular part of the book. Anyway, that’s over, Ben (& the newspaper […]
Continue readingopposable thumbs
On my recent epigenetics post, Heraclides pointed me in the direction of an article about polydactyly in cats. It contains the comment that these cats are also known as mitten or thumb cats because they can learn to pick up things, open latches or move objects with near-human dexterity. Well, OK, we had a cat who was […]
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