The Mathematical Secrets Hidden at the Heart of Barcelona’s Sagrada Família
Is Gaudi’s tremendous Barcelona cathedra, the Sagrada Família. fractal? Or simply mathematically stylized?
Read more...Category Archives: Science and the scientific method
Coffee Break: More on American Science, An NIH Grant Long Overdue, An Experimental Model, and Further Thoughts on AI
Part the First: Back to the Past in Science and Medicine. The future of basic science in the United States looks grim for everyone from the aspiring graduate student to the full professor who has met her potential and has several graduate students, postdocs, and technicians working in her laboratory. The precipitous and arbitrary Big […]
Read more...A New Cancer Drug and the Nature of Scientific Discovery
Glen Campbell, who was a member of The Wrecking Crew, once remarked that he had worked hard for ten years to become an overnight success in 1967, with thanks to John Hartford. Without stretching too much, this same trajectory, extended by more than ten years, has been illustrated recently in biomedical research by the case […]
Read more...RFK Jr. Seeks Access to Americans’ Individually Identifiable Medical Records for Clues, Using a Bogus Autism and Vaccines Pretext
RFK Jr. wants to go fishing in medical records to substantiate debunked theories about autism and vaccines. What could go wrong?
Read more...A Peptide, a Secretive Scientist, and a Debate Over Evidence
RFK, Jr. is backing a peptide out of Zagreb, BPC-157, which has lots of fans and very little evidence. What could go wrong?
Read more...Coffee Break: Ancient Art, the Return of Analog, Science in Distress, and Death Is for Losers
Part the First: Functional Art from the Enigmatic Daunians. William Morris famously wrote, “Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful or believe to be beautiful.” Of course, his beauty in response to the immiseration of the working class was for the English rich but nothing is perfect. Our old […]
Read more...Covid and Public Health Establishment Work Together to Make Next Pandemic More Likely
Public health continues to rely on failed Covid response as it also ignores how Covid has weakened immune systems and made other outbreaks more likely.
Read more...The Credibility Crisis in Science
Albert Einstein was chosen by Time magazine as the Person of the Twentieth Century. It was a good choice (and now is a good time to read Einstein more than seventy years after his death in April 1955, here and here). As noted by Thomas Plümper and Eric Neumayer in their newly published book, The […]
Read more...Coffee Break: American Science in the Crosshairs, Nuclear Nightmares, and a Vision of a Good Life
Part the First: The Attack on American Science Continues, Unabated. A few days ago the president fired the National Science Board (NSB), all twenty-two members of a statutory twenty-five, who served staggered six-year terms that preserved institutional memory. The NSB was created pursuant to the National Science Foundation Act of 1950 to “recommend and encourage […]
Read more...China Surpasses US in Research Spending – The Consequences Extend Far Beyond Scientific Ranking and Clout
The Make America Great Again mega yacht springs another leak.
Read more...Coffee Break: Alzheimer’s Disease Still a Mystery and Books Worth Reading
Part the First: Anti-amyloid Antibodies and Alzheimer’s Disease (AD). A Cochrane review of monoclonal antibodies targeting amyloid plaques in AD has found that these drugs have little to no effect on cognitive function of AD patients. Cochrane reviews are, to use one of the favorite tropes of the current administration, considered the “gold standard” of […]
Read more...Coffee Break: Scientists Being Bad and Good, the Moon, and More Ancient Archaeology
Part the First: Dealing with Scientific Misconduct. Trust in science has declined during my professional work life. Some, but not all, of this is due to misconduct by scientists, as it should be. The recent case of Sylvain Lesné is one of the more spectacular examples. We have discussed this previously. Dr. Lesné published a […]
Read more...Coffee Break: All War All the Time, AI on the Loose, and Hope for Muscular Dystrophy Patients
Part the First: War Begets War, A Conversation. Daedalus hosted a conversation among Robert Jay Lifton (1926-2025), Neta C. Crawford, and Matthew Evangelista last year. It was preprinted recently in The MIT Press Reader. I immediately noticed the participation of Robert Jay Lifton. Back in my dark ages, when the university had a University Bookstore […]
Read more...Psilocybin Mushrooms Are Going Mainstream, but Scientific Research and Regulation Lag Behind
Less is known about psilocybin mushrooms than you might think even as their popularity and potency of products like edibles rises.
Read more...As Rocket Launches Increase, They May Be Polluting the Skies
Research suggests that rocket exhaust and debris could be threatening the ozone layer, though uncertainties persist.
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