The real Science Friday program -- the one I ripped off the title of these posts from -- featured a discussion on this morning's program about how the realities of the interactive online world are affecting the practice of science. New research has found that the tone and content of comments left on science articles can affect how the reader ( Read more... )

Welcome to the first Science Friday of 2013. In keeping with the spirit of the new year, we take a look back at what was, in many ways, a banner year for science and a sneak peek at what may lie ahead for this year and beyond ( Read more... )

From the science of food to the depths of space to doomsday weapons and the zombie apocalypse -- this week's Science Friday has a little bit of everything.

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  They're doing odd things with food these days. Working out of a lab at Texas Tech University, a company called MicroZap has invented a process for making bread last up to sixty days without ( Read more... )

To an average person sitting on a jury, there is nothing more reliable than an eyewitness identifying a criminal. But any cop could tell you that in most cases, witnesses are highly unreliable, due to a range of factors including the inaccuracy of human memory, a person's natural biases, interactions with other witnesses, and subtle influences ( Read more... )

Am I the only one who cringes every time I read articles describing the Higgs Boson as the "God particle"? In the first place, even as a metaphor or an analogy, the term is completely inaccurate ( Read more... )

In case anyone wasn't depressed enough by today's completely dismal jobs report or the fact that our do-nothing Congress continues to make matters worse by standing idly by when government action is desperately needed, here's something else to chew on.

The most recent Gallup poll on evolution and creationism shows that nearly half of Americans ( Read more... )

In the forward to his book The Scientists, science writer John Gribbin states that one of the greatest achievements in science is showing us that humanity isn't special. Scientists have shown us that we live on a rather ordinary planet orbiting a rather ordinary star in a rather ordinary galaxy in a universe that, if we are to believe certain ( Read more... )

"No one can really feel at home in the modern world and judge the nature of its problems -- and the possible solutions to those problems -- unless one has some intelligent notion of what science is up to. Furthermore, initiation into the magnificent world of science brings great esthetic satisfaction, inspiration to youth, fulfillment of the ( Read more... )

The National Weather Service's Storm Prediction Center, for only the second time in history, has put out a violent weather warning a day in advance. This is because a "high end life threatening" tornado outbreak is expected over the weekend in Kansas and Oklahoma. Having living in areas that have been hit by severe weather events in the past ( ( Read more... )

A few years back, I had an icon that was adapted by a friend of mine from a picture she found on one of those cheesy humor websites. I used said icon for posts about things that were so absurd, ridiculous, idiotic, or downright bat-shit crazy (or all of the above) that I didn't even know what else to say about the item. Lately, I thought about ( Read more... )