Science & Society

Excuse my use of the personal pronoun in this short article, but I am writing to get input as much as I am to simply observe a phenomenon. I am increasingly drawn to the connection between bench…

Another disabled person denied a transplant because of his disability. Another petition in hopes of changing the hospital's decision (go sign it, please). After the last time, with Mia…

The U.S. Department of Justice announced that Gibson Guitar Corp. entered into a criminal enforcement agreement resolving a criminal investigation into allegations that the company violated the…

PETA, People for The Ethical Treatment of Animals, doesn't always make sense.  They protest objectifying dead fish, for example, by objectifying live women.  Actually, they show more naked…

Banks and brokerage houses employ a lot of physicists - it was a big fad of the last decade because the industry discovered that physicists knew how to make models and economists did not. But…

One of the pretty boys of science writing has fallen. Jonah Lehrer has finally been called out for distorting science. Many more are going to fall. Or wait. No, wait, what? Oh – I see – he misquoted…

For as long as I can remember, academic scientists have said that applied research is great - for someone else.  But for themselves, they want to do basic research and be creative and not have…

Do you work in genetics? If so, you are out to ruin the brains of children, according to a claim at Alternet.org. The biotech industry is willing to tamper with our food supply, our kids' minds and…

Science journalism used to not have that 'science' qualifier.  It was journalism, like any other kind, but about science. Last decade, though, science journalism lost its way, as we have…

One of the things I emphasize to my students in composition classes is that claims require evidence. All claims in a paper should be backed by evidence. Not simply stated and assumed true. Not…