"It takes more work to communicate with someone whose native language isn't the same as yours. And autism goes deeper than language and culture; autistic people are "foreigners" in any society. You'…

We all say hurtful things to the ones we love. Some things we mean, and others we're just using the other person as a punching bag. Sometimes the damage we do with those words can't be undone and can…

Sometimes natural is not good.   Actually, a lot of the time natural is bad but we live in in era where anti-science types have a 'natural' fetish, believing anything natural is good. But not…

The International Conference on New Frontiers in Physics (ICFP) 2012 started today with a rich program of experimental and theory talks. I should be swimming in the Cretan sea in front of the nice…

The island of Crete, in the middle of the Mediterranean sea, is home to ICFP 2012, a conference in high-energy physics. I arrived yesterday night and this morning I woke up with a gorgeous view of…

Bill Bryson edited a very good book in 2010 titled, “SEEING FURTHER – The Story of Science and the Royal Society”. Each chapter was written by a different author chosen for expertise in particular…

New chemical compounds that can make key modifications to common sugar molecules - glycans - which are found on the surface of all cells in our body are new tools for investigating treatments for…

People never fail to amaze me: when they think they are anonymousthey will say the nastiest things to each other.  I have been reading a number of the commentson articles about evolution vs…

Last Transit of Venus was more fruitful than could be expected. Thousands of amazing images were taken and this is just enough to appreciate the high point of the event. Things more physical or…

Having come across this article, "Sleepy medical staff run increased risks of accidents driving home after a night shift", I couldn't help but be struck by two obvious questions. (1).  Since…

Cosmological Constant - it's the blog's title, but something more, As you may know, Einstein himself called it his greatest blunder. Why did he say these words? Let us see...When Albert Einstein…

The CERN average of searches for rare B decays to muon pairs has been shown yesterday in a talk given by Mitesh Patel at the "Physics at the LHC" conference, which is being held in Vancouver (BC)…

The fourth FQXi essay contest “Which of Our Basic Physical Assumptions Are Wrong?” is underway.   Wittgenstein knew precisely which one; I am all about that one as you may know, but we are…

Induced pluripotent stem cell (iPSC) research in the last 2 years has faced many twists and turns. With scientists uncovering a number of disturbing genomic abnormalities in these cells, the future…

A major function of microRNAs is to inhibit messenger RNA (mRNA) translation by binding to a specific 3’ untranslated region (UTR) through sequence complementation. In a recent study published in the…

In the last few weeks there has been a sugar tsunami in the media. CBS reported about sugar toxicity. Mayor Bloomberg banned the serving of sugary drinks greater than 16 fluid ounces in New York City…

I think I've got it. The reason why we, as evolutionists have such difficulty in speaking to creationists is because the idea of it is so far removed, so abstract - indeed, so patently wrong - that…

Browsing, as I do from time to time, recent German news in thelocal.de, I came across Schoolboy cracks age-old maths problem Shouryya Ray, who moved to Germany from India with his family at the age…

AUCKLAND, NZ – Twelve hours after liftoff from San Francisco airport, fifteen hours after my roommate dropped me off at the international terminal, I was hauling my luggage toward my connecting gate…

It appears that Hank may have become infected with a virus that originated from his computer.  If so, this would represent the first instance of a computer virus capable of acting on a…