Commentary invited by editors of Scientific American
When I, mild-mannered guy, journeyed to wild remote Africa, I made sure my mind was revved up with knowledge of evolution, and my body was revved up with vaccinations of typhoid, yellow fever, hepatitis A, tetanus, polio, meningococcus, and measles.With the best of romantic intentions, in a small gift box, I had surprised my wife on our 25th wedding anniversary with two blank airplane tickets and pencil...
My friend lit up her electronic cigarette during intermission when we were in line for a bathroom at a Broadway theater. People in the line looked at her disapprovingly.
IRBs and the Future of Citizen ScienceuBiome is a citizen science startup that sequences the microbiome, financed entirely by crowdfunding.
Scary myths and scary data abound about life as a tenure-track faculty at an "R1" university. Scary enough to make you wonder: why would any smart person want to live this life?As a young faculty member at Harvard, I got asked such questions a lot...
Metaphors are our shortest stories. They are economical explanations that shape our understanding (itself a “mobile army of metaphors”). But badly mixed metaphors from physics and biology animate economics, creating “confusion’s masterpiece.” Another Shakespearean phrase, “invisible hand,” is partially to blame.Science’s theories—its verifiable stories—also use metaphors...
Through the series Mr Tompkins by George Gamow, and decades later, a single work, Alice in Quantumland by Robert Gilmore, the reader is able to take a tour with the characters, Mr Tompkins and the reconstituted Alice, to a world that appears physically implausible to our quotidian yet very real...
The rain had not let up all morning. Rain is typical during a wet season in the Dzanga-Sangha Protected Areas, Central African Republic. It was getting a bit late to be leaving for a trip to the famous Dzanga Bai to observe the elephants but the weather had delayed our departure...
From above, it looks like the fur of a big cat. Vegetation and barren land array to form tiger stripes and leopard spots in the dry landscape surrounding Niamey, Niger.
It happened before. Well, not quite this rapidly, but about 55 million years ago (to geologists, the recent past), Earth experienced an explosive rise in temperature.
In corporate culture there’s an enjoyable and simple way of killing time in tedious meetings. It’s called Buzzword Bingo and this is how it works.Instead of the numbers that appear on traditional bingo cards, you substitute the jargon that inevitably peppers conversations in large organisations...
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