An Astronomer Cancels His Own Research—Because the Results Weren’t Popular Astronomy seems to be in trouble, as it is increasingly populated by researchers who seem more concerned with terrestrial politics than celestial objects, and who at times view the search for truths about nature as threatening. This became obvious in recent years, once the proposed Thirty Meter Telescope (TMT) project Lawrence M. Krauss 10 Nov 2021 · 10 min read
As US Schools Prioritize Diversity Over Merit, China Is Becoming the World’s STEM Leader In a 2018 report published by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), China ranked first in mathematical proficiency among 15-year-olds, while the United States was in 25th place. Percy Deift, Svetlana Jitomirskaya, and Sergiu Klainerman 19 Aug 2021 · 13 min read
Who Will Save Us From Racist AI? The researchers analyzed multiple databases and the findings were striking—the ML models were able to predict self-reported race (classified as Asian, black, and white) with astonishing precision. Zachary Robert Caverley 15 Aug 2021 · 9 min read
Whatever It Is, It Ain’t Aliens From my knowledge of the world that I see around me, I think that it is much more likely that the reports of flying saucers are the results of the known irrational characteristics of terrestrial intelligence than of the unknown rational efforts of extra-terrestrial intelligence. ~Richard P. Feynman, The Character Lawrence M. Krauss 7 Jul 2021 · 6 min read
Looking for COVID-19 ‘Miracle Drugs’? We Already Have Them. They’re Called Vaccines The evidence that mRNA-based COVID-19 vaccines are safe, and that they work, is about as solid as medical evidence gets. Claire Berlinski and Yuri Deigin 6 Jul 2021 · 14 min read
Mate Selection for Modernity Hypergamy is an evolved sexual strategy where individuals mate with and/or marry those most capable of providing long term security. It is the act of marrying up. Vincent Harinam 28 Jun 2021 · 17 min read
Standing Up to the Gender Ideologues: a Quillette Editorial Once you sweep aside all the glitter showers, animated unicorns, and rainbow emojis, that is ultimately what gender supremacism is truly about. Quillette 24 Jun 2021 · 10 min read
The Sperm Count Culture War The authors all but ignore the science to focus on what they believe is more important—the ideological framing of the issue in socio-cultural discourse. Geoffrey C. Kabat 16 Jun 2021 · 13 min read
The Importance of Understanding the Nonspecific Effects of Vaccines A new strategy is required that balances authority with humility. David McLelland 9 Jun 2021 · 7 min read
Understanding the Unidentified With the decline of religious belief over the past century, perhaps this is what lies behind this quest to understand the unidentified. Michael Shermer 3 Jun 2021 · 22 min read
In Defense of the Universal Values of Science Until recently, it seemed inconceivable to imagine that any physical or biological scientists could become so misguided as to argue against the empirical basis of their own fields. Lawrence M. Krauss 2 Jun 2021 · 4 min read
Trauma and the Psychedelic Renaissance Negative stereotypes about psychedelics are undergoing a reassessment. James Jeffrey 22 May 2021 · 10 min read
The Social Determinants of Health: Critique and Implications This overreach of public health also bleeds into the educational sector, where schooling is yet another SDOH requiring intervention. Zachary Robert Caverley 13 May 2021 · 12 min read
Why Climate Science Is Like the Rest of Science Recent White House initiatives suggest that addressing climate change has risen to the policy forefront of government at the presidential level for the first time in US history. Last week President Biden convened an online international meeting of heads of state on the issue and committed the US to a Lawrence M. Krauss 1 May 2021 · 6 min read
Interrogating Jane In fact, the single most common technique for insisting that Austen is anti-slavery is for the critic to draw an equivalence between slavery and her depiction of social class, or her portrayal of the status of women. Lona Manning 26 Apr 2021 · 12 min read