Sometimes I get frustrated when I see public officials demonstrating their lack of scientific literacy.  Sometimes I get downright annoyed.  In recent memory, a truly annoying demonstration of scientific illiteracy can be found in comments made by Congresswoman Michele Bachmann of Minnesota.  Perhaps you’ve seen her in the news making statements about carbon dioxide not being a harmful gas but, rather, being a harmless gas?  Perhaps you saw her on C-SPAN speaking from the floor of the House of Representatives making the same statements as part of an effort to convince Americans that the “threat of manmade global warming doesn’t make any sense”?  If you missed it, or just want to be reminded of the sheer absurdity of her statements, I’ve included a copy of the video.

YouTube Direct Link
I used to live in Minnesota, not very far from the State Capitol building.  There was a time when I could have (and would have) tried to meet with Congresswoman Bachmann to talk with her about her ideas and help her learn some real science.   Since I no longer live in Minnesota, I decided to write her the following letter: (Read more…)

Call me disappointed.  While recently watching an episode of Mythbusters, the popular science TV show on the Discovery Channel, the following segment/commercial aired near the end of the show.

I normally DVR-surf right past commercials. But this one caught my eye because I mistakenly thought (at 3X fast-forward) that the show had resumed.  The commercial is obviously designed to appear like an “authentic” Mythbusters segment. The camera cuts, lighting, studio setting, and Mythbusters stars Grant, Tori, and Kari, are all the same. My 7 year-old son actually thought it was part of the show.

The idea of using faux science as an advertising stunt – by a group that normally does a pretty good job remaining true to the scientific method on their show – is really sad. (Read more…)

On last week’s edition of NPR’s Science Friday, they talked about a must-see video of a sperm whale stealing a sablefish off of a fishing line near Alaska. After watching it myself, I can confirm that you should check it out.

Fisherman have been upset about stolen fish for quite some time. The problem isn’t just that the whales are stealing the fish- it’s that many of them aren’t leaving evidence. This affects the estimate of the sablefish “fishable population,” which in turn affects fishing quotas. If the fishermen could estimate how many fish were being stolen, these numbers could be included into the totals.

The video reveals not only how the whales are committing the crime, but also how fisherman might overcome the problem. Whales emit sonar pulses to hunt for food. These pulses bounce off of their prey and back to the whales, helping them gauge size and distance. In the video, these pulses can be heard quickening as the whale reaches the line. Then, instead of ripping off the fish, the whale bites down on the line and shakes the fish loose. He keeps emitting the pulses until the fish is released, but doesn’t make any more noise until he has freed his own teeth from the line.

Researchers now think that they might be able to count how often fish are being stolen by tracking patterns of these sonar pulses. However, they’re quick to point out that this video only catches one whale in the act, so much more investigation is needed.

Here’s the video from Science Friday, and here’s an article from National Geographic with a little more info. I encourage you to at least check out the video- just seeing the whale emerge from the corner of the screen, mouth open and teeth pointy, like a creepy shadow puppet, is surreal.

In 1987, my alma mater hosted a chemist from the University of Sussex named Sir Harold Kroto.  I was fortunate enough to sit in on his lecture which detailed a collaboration between Dr. Kroto and two chemists from Rice University, Robert Curl and Richard Smalley. During the lecture, Dr. Kroto showed a box with a soccer ball inside of it.  He closed the lid and waved his hand; when he opened the box the soccer ball had vanished and been replaced by a plastic model of a molecule with 60 points joining pentagons and hexagons, similar in shape to a soccer ball.  The plastic model was of C60, a new form of carbon discovered by Kroto, Smalley, and Curl, for which they would eventually share the Nobel Prize in Chemistry.

This new molecule also resembled the geodesic dome, a structure popularized by an American architect from Chicago name Richard Buckminster Fuller. Fuller was not the original inventor of the geodesic dome, but he developed and popularized the idea in the 1940s, eventually receiving a U.S. patent for it.  Fuller was interested in the geodesicdome because it was extremely strong for its weight and because a sphere has the largest volume with the least surface area.  He envisioned using the geodesic dome in all types of structures: houses, cars, museums, etc.  C60 was given the common name buckminsterfullerene (buckyball for short) in honor of Buckminster Fuller’s work. (Read more…)

Ever since graduate school, I’ve gravitated toward the nonprofit funding sector. There’s something about seeing all the people with their friends, fellow walkers, runners, dogs, and kids spending Saturday mornings walking, running or some other –athoning that makes me appreciate my paycheck a little bit more.

I’ve had the privilege of having my salary supported by more than one nonprofit through the years. I appreciate it, and it makes me work just a little bit harder, which is why it is disheartening to hear the kinds of misconceptions about medicine, science and research that seem to circle walkathons, clothing drives and support groups. I once heard that all research could be done on computers (the last time I’ll listen intently to one of the former “Bangles”), that bee stings cure multiple sclerosis and that scientists only want to study certain tumors.

At first I didn’t give comments like the last one much thought, respecting the process we all go through as we move from “un-informed” to “informed.” However, I think that widespread misstatements can be so damaging that they sometimes prevent us from getting proper care, feeling we are supported, and prevent us from taking action that will make a difference for ourselves and others. Although I respect Farrah Fawcett’s life experience and right to make statements she sees as important, I believe some of the comments she made on-tape for millions to see bear some attention. (Read more…)

How should we help our children deal with horrible events they witness or are told about from history? It’s a hard problem. Often the solution is simply to avoid the issue until an age is reached at which a young person can handle it. Then there are various approximations of the truth, made into a form that can be in some way understood by minds that are still under construction.

Here I want to tell you about another approach that could be called “therapy through play.” The idea seems to be inspired by approaches where a phobic person is slowly exposed to the situation eliciting fear, and through repetition the phobia is slowly diminished.

I’ll give two examples of this approach in action. In 2003 FEMA published a coloring book for kids about the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center. Entitled “A scary thing happened,” the book contains drawings of the towers in various states of destruction that kids are meant to color in. Here’s the cover of that book:

I can only imagine a parent intoning to their traumatized child: “That’s great Johnny, but don’t you want to color in the people jumping off the buildings?” (Read more…)

I recently stumbled across a HowStuffWorks podcast on the topic of allergy-free (hypoallergenic) cats. Nearly 20% of Americans suffer from cat allergies, including me. A company called Allerca claims to have genetically bred a cat that even I could live comfortably with. Curious about the science, I decided to probe a little further.

Turns out Allerca’s claims of a sniffle-free kitty are suspect, to say the least (see this 2006 article from The Scientist, and this ABC News report). There’s never been an independent, peer-reviewed study actually showing that the company’s cats come close to delivering on their promise. The company instead cites its own studies, complete with “scientific” data on their website.

Upon closer examination, however, this data is unquestionably shoddy. (Read more…)