During the Obama administration, he was concerned about vaccines causing autism and it showed when it came to guidance about swine flu vaccines. His administration banned multi-use vials because of his party's insistence that preservatives caused the disorder.
Starting Science 2.0 in 2006, I was as wide-eyed as anyone new to media could be. My first month I was sure we were about to discover life on other planets, cancer was going to be cured, chocolate was healthy, resveratrol was the one polyphenol to rule them all. Oh, and academic scientists were going to rush to write for the public because I loved science. (1)
It may not seem to make sense but most of the universe - mass - can really only account for about 6 percent of what is going on. The rest of it can be under just about any umbrella at this point. Some call it the God of the Gaps, scientists call the unknown mass Dark Matter.
What is it? No one knows, when it comes to the very large and the very small, physics does not have all the answers, but something has made the universe at least 100 billion light years in size even though it's only 13 billion years old. As you know, a light year is the distance light will travel in that time. Since nothing can go faster than the speed of light, it's long been time to think about what Nothing is.
That's dark matter. And whatever is propelling it can be called Dark Energy.
The activist army in the war on common pesticides like glyphosate (and adjacently GMOs, they don't know enough science to know they are different) is having a Gettysburg moment.(1) They are out of options so they are making a desperate charge but they are in an open field a long way off and opposing them on the other side is every legitimate science and regulatory body in the world.
If scientists and journalists want the politicization of science to stop, they have to be part of the solution, even if a guy they didn't vote for is in power. But now that he is, all the talk about "depoliticizing science" has been exposed as the farce that we always knew it was.
Though every politician and both U.S. parties claim to be pro-science, that isn't reflected in corporate media coverage. The New York Times will publish conspiracy theories drafted by US Right To Know, a corporate front group created by Organic Consumers Association. Washington Post will host a panel on food science and refuse to invite any scientists.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture Office of Inspector General recently did an audit of the National Organic Program, which is part of its Agricultural Marketing Services group.
Mothers have always been put upon culturally when it comes to how kids turn out. Though the physical costs of gestation are literally borne by mothers while fathers are basically done at conception(1), everyone feels they hav a say in telling expectant moms what to do. - Society once insisted pregnant mothers not only to abstain from participating in sports but even abstain from watching sports. The excitement would be too much for the baby, women were told. - Doctors also told women not to put their arms over their heads or the umbilical cord might get wrapped around the baby's neck.
The President has declared he is against the Estate tax, and he is not alone. For decades it has seemed punitive to levy a special tax on wealth people already paid taxes on just because the person who paid the taxes died. In North Dakota, President Trump said he would "protect small businesses and family farmers here in North Dakota and across the country by ending the death tax" and that would ease the "Tremendous burden for the family farmer, tremendous burden. We are not going to allow the death tax or the inheritance tax or the whatever-you-want-to-call-it to crush the American Dream.”
It may seem like olden days to millennials, but the late 1970s were a lot like today. America was divided due to an unpopular President, gas was expensive, the movie industry was at death's door ... and genetic engineering was a big concern.
On August 21st, from west coast to east the United States will be treated to a rare event; an eclipse of the sun. Not just a partial eclipse either. Through the entire arc, a swath of land about 70 miles wide will have a total eclipse. There's been so much excitement that social media has made "path of totality" part of the lexicon.
You'll be able to the agriculture documentary called "Food Evolution" on Hulu soon enough but for obvious reasons the filmmakers went to Netflix first. Though the streaming service has thrown $20 billion at everything, they had no interest in a pro-science documentary. They may have a good reason. Their media buyers and audience don't want science. Like all documentaries, it is a passion project so when disappointments happen, lots of speculation occurs among the fans. Some believe it's a conspiracy against science, like that Netflix is politically aligned with the groups who make their money scaring people about food. (1) Others like me give them a pass and say science documentaries are probably just not a draw for their audience.
We know that corporations go where their market is. Whole Foods sets up shop in wealthy, progressive counties while smaller companies like Monsanto market to rural farmers. What about fast food companies? The claims have been that since there are obese people near places where high densities of restaurants exist, the restaurants must cause the obesity. Less considered is that people might move to where more food choices are and where those are dense, such as in cities, people tend to be more educated.
