Cloned Cows
A recent article, "Cloned Cows: Less In, More Out" raised the question of food safety, since its sale was approved by the FDA last year.
However, my concerns are much more fundamental. The…
The Evolution of the God Gene
Gross generalizations about atheists remain in style. A letter in response to a Sunday New York Times article in the Week in Review section, by Nicholas Wade.
Dear Mr. Wade,
While I always enjoy -…
Steven Pinker on Malcolm Gladwell
In a review of Gladwell's new book:
An eclectic essayist is necessarily a dilettante, which is not in itself a bad thing. But Gladwell frequently holds forth about statistics and psychology, and his…
Mouse Brain Surgery And Mouse Welfare
As a mouse vet, my job is to suggest refinements to make cancer studies as easy as possible on the mice. Cancer researchers grow tumor cells for study. They buy them from a catalog, or they get…
I Humbly Propose A Biologically Accurate Episode Of Spongebob Squarepants
Today's scapegoat for my rant about the place of cephalopods in society is, as I predicted, Squidward Quincy Tentacles, of Spongebob Squarepants fame:
What IS that? Six appendages, a misplaced mouth…
Energy Equality & The Carbon Tax
Energy is fungible and nothing is certain but death and taxes.
All energy is like all other energy and interchangeable through one means or another. But, all energy is not created…
Cartoonifying Cephalopods
It's hard to make a good cartoon cephalopod, I guess. Yesterday I was disappointed about the Squidbillies. Tomorrow I may despair of Spongebob's pal Squidward. Today, I sigh over Nemo's little…
Natural Historians Get Their Own Facebook
After the successful introduction of myspace, facebook, twitter and however many other social networking sites that now exist, researchers at London's Natural History Museum have created a social…
"Octopusbillies" Just Doesn't Have the Same Ring, I Guess
Fascinating things can be learned from Google Search's drop-down menu. For example, if you type "squid", the suggested search items, in order, are:
squidbilliessquidoosquidbillies full episodessquid…
Science Is Not Magic
I have to delay the Sunday Science Book Club and my discussion of Voyage of the Beagle until next week. In the mean time, I'm initiating the first Post-Apocalyptic Sci-Fi Corner. Over the next few…
