Extreme Weather Events, Acceptance of Climate Science On the Rise
A new survey finds that a majority of Americans believe that weather in the United States is getting worse, and they are linking it to global warming.
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Chimps Show Lethal Side
Researchers studying different African communities of wild chimpanzees have pooled their data and found that the apes sometimes kill each other nearly everywhere they’ve been studied. Chimp homicides occurred most frequently in groups with the most adult males, anthropologist Michael Wilson reported at the American Association of Physical Anthropologists’ annual meeting. Chimps spend most of…
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Tennessee Law Allows Creationism Theory in Classrooms
Tennessee Governor Bill Haslam refused to sign a bill that would permit discussion of creationism in classrooms alongside the traditional evolutionary-based explanation of the origins of life, but allowed it to become law anyway. The legislation, dubbed the “Monkey Bill” by critics, had sailed through the conservative-leaning state’s Republican-dominated legislature. Haslam, a Republican, earlier had…
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Cooperating Mini-Brains Show How Intelligence Evolved
Working together can hasten brain evolution, according to a new computer simulation. When programmed to navigate challenging cooperative tasks, the artificial neural networks set up by scientists to serve as mini-brains “learned” to work together, evolving the virtual equivalent of boosted brainpower over generations. The findings support a long-held theory that social interactions may have…
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Misguided Science Policy
Designed to give the public a voice in policy decisions, public meetings and consensus conferences can, in some cases, provide valuable insights into the local public’s views and opinions on certain issues. But they can also have disastrous consequences when used as a policy-making tool designed to tap public opinion more broadly. The politics of…
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Facebook: Big Friend or Big Brother?
Facebook, Google, Apple, Microsoft and Amazon are the masters of this new universe. Each dominates an overlapping realm of activity and enterprise on the Internet – social media, search engine, hardware design, software and online commerce. And each is now so huge that they can kill or buy most competitors and set the standards for…
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Social Rank Linked to Immunity
A study of rhesus macaque monkeys may have solved a long-standing puzzle on a link between social rank and health. A study of 10 social groups of macaque females showed that the activity level of an individual’s immune genes was an accurate predictor of her social rank. In a paper in Proceedings of the National…
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Was Jesus Happy?
Was Jesus Happy? How you answer that question says a lot about the culture that influenced you most.
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For U.S. Science, A Crisis Looms
The United States is at risk of ceding its leadership in science, a number of physicists said, though there was less of a consensus on a clear solution to the problem. Five physicists shared their worries about America’s scientific future during a panel discussion at the April 2012 meeting of the American Physics Society, agreeing…
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The Risk of Forgoing Vaccines
Given the direct benefit to the individual of immunity against disease, vaccination, is not completely altruistic. However, immunization does provide a significant benefit to society. For those who cannot get vaccinated, we rely on herd immunity – if society is made up mostly of those who have expended the energy and cost to get vaccinated,…