Neonicotinoid pesticides were invented because there was concern that they could have an effect on bees.Colony collapses have happened all throughout recorded history, of course, but in an immediate news cycle when every blip leads to gigantic fundraising opportunities, it is customary to hyperventilate and mobilize the donor base against science. Yet despite the beliefs of environmentalists, a 1980 PC is not better than a PC made today and legacy pesticides are not superior to neonicotinoids.

It's no secret by now how prescient Science Left Behind was in noting the anti-science beliefs of the left, at a time when science media insisted being anti-science was solely an inherent trait of being a Republican, were going to become a huge problem for public acceptance of science.

On Twitter, you follow and are followed, so if you are going to create a list of most impactful science people, there is only one valid metric - the number of "followers" who are going to see what they write.

Proposition 65, which mandates warning labels on just about every product in every store in the state, insures that Californians have no clue what actually can be harmful or not. What doesn't 'cause cancer' if an epidemiologist can torture data long enough that it confesses?

Did you know that “nearly three-quarters of adult lesbians overweight or obese,” and that gay males are not? I confess I didn't, though it may be because, outside a relative, I am not sure I know any lesbian women, due to my "I don't give a crap" policy which causes me to forget to assume two women together are lesbians and wonder what it has to do with their waistlines. 

Dr. Anne Glover, chief scientific adviser to the president of the European Commission,  was a welcome event for the science community when she got that job. Perhaps Europe would finally revisit the Science Enlightenment, and stop finding experts to endorse whatever polls say science policy should be.It hasn't been easy. She has been targeted by both Greens and her boss for supporting the overwhelming consensus on biology. Her boss even publicly said when it comes to science, she is speaking her opinion - it's weird when a scientist only has an opinion...unless it matches political beliefs.

You'd think Hawaii would be really supportive of science.Without genetic modification and the GMO Rainbow papaya crop, papaya on Hawaii would be extinct due to the ringspot virus, but everyone in Hawaii hates science. Naked girls sell calendars of cheesecake under the pretense that it will save Hawaii from science, a politician drafted a bill to ban all GMOs except the GMO Rainbow papaya.

Pacific Research Institute Fellows Dr. Wayne Winegarden and Dr. Marc Miles have created the 50 State Index of Energy Regulation, which covers the various regulatory climates for energy consumption, production and distribution. It's no secret that energy is the great equalizer. We have written numerous articles showing that with clean energy - not by penalizing everything but the pet projects of politicians and the lobbyists paid to support some schemes - everything is possible. Cheap energy is the road from poverty and makes everything else possible.

The Ebola outbreak in West Africa continues to rage and has now claimed the lives of more than 1,100 people. Is that a lot? It depends. In context, that is 10 percent of the lives France lost during a heatwave in 2004 while they protested American foreign policy in the streets, so clearly it is a matter of priorities. Unlike France, Africa regards preventable deaths as a priority but there are lessons for developed nations in there also.First, and most importantly, is that American health care is quite good. Yes, it's expensive, but this outbreak really can't happen here, no matter how much the instant news cycle wants to hype it up.

The University of Tokyo and Keio University have unveiled the world’s fastest camera - its Sequentially Timed All-optical Mapping Photography makes it 1,000 times faster than other cameras. So fast it can catch catch the conduction of heat as it happens.That's a speed equivalent to one-sixth the velocity of light.World’s Fastest Camera Captures Chemical Reactions in Single Shot By Megumi Fujikawa, Wall Street Journal