Can somatic cells be reprogrammed to become pluripotent stem cells? Well, the answer is yes or no, depending on your perspective, and perhaps your definition of what pluripotent stem cells should be.…

It is interesting how often and freely we use these three elements of thought processing and presume that what we are expressing is being legitimately represented.  Beliefs are readily…

Just a quickie here. So I'm reading a comic book, Marvel's "Ultimate Galactus". In it, a godlike being named (in Kree... not Cree, but Kree) Gah Lak Tus is attacking the Earth, sending superpowered…

I thought the 'PepsiGate' issue, as former Scienceblogs folks termed it, was overblown.  As I discussed in Symbol Stacks And Science Communication, it wasn't the first time they did it and…

Survivalism, British Style John Christopher’s 1956 No Blade of Grass is an extremely compelling page turner that portrays our moral traditions and social glue as being so fragile that they can be…

Kathleen and I have been spending a fair shake of our time looking through the interwebz at the whole Judge Rotenberg Center issue. There are hundreds of pages of materials to go through, and heck…

“Do you believe in global warming?” he shouted after me as I was leaving the plane. On the plane  going back from ESA's Living Planet Symposium  in Bergen I sat beside a very lively and…

Arctic Ice July 2010 - Update #1 Before I write another line about ice, I want to thank all of my readers.  Whether or not you leave comments, whether or not you link in other blogs, just…

UPDATE: if you came here to learn more details about the rumored Higgs signal, which media around the world are discussing and which Fermilab Today just dismiss-tweeted, please visit this other more…

There are many predictions suggesting that climate change could create new permissive habitats for disease transmitting arthropod vectors. As a result of climate change, and associated global warming…

'Show her your love is as bag as the whole solar system' sounds like a schlocky sales pitch, right?  Well, it is but the Laura Cesari, a.k.a. Chain of Being, Solar System Necklace is just too…

Watch out, Jayson Blair - there's a new sheriff in town, and it's going to cross-reference your work to make sure you haven't plagiarized your material. Plagiarism, using others' work but putting it…

A reality check on“healthy aging.”  The real troubles - and opportunities - of a gero-nation go unheeded. The numbers are increasingly disturbing: By 2050, some 88 million Americans will be over…

Women are waiting until their 30s and 40s to have children, but when they decide to do so, they are a lot more willing to engage in a variety of sexual activities to capitalize on their remaining…

I happened to be reading Howard Bloom's book The Genius of the Beast when I saw something odd happening in social media - there was a minor blow up on a science blogging site called Scienceblogs.com…

Mercola, webster of woo, he of the get your vitamin D through our tanning bed fame, has a new post up at Huffington Post. I tell you, I find it endlessly comforting to know that these medically…

"My plan for today: 1. Pick up dry cleaning.2. Go to dentist.3. Think up brilliant idea.” Good luck with that third bullet. Big ideas can’t be planned like growing tomatoes in one’s garden. We…

According to a survey conducted by the Pew Research Center's Internet and American Life Project and the Imagining the Internet Center at Elon University, the Internet will do more social good than…

Which country does not belong in the following list: Burma, Liberia, Somalia, United States? OK, that was not too difficult. As astute Scientific Blogging reader you got that right. Somalia has made…

What do you get when you mix politics and space exploration?a) an impenetrable messb) an interesting clash between technology and peoplec) something scarier than sausage making For those who think…