Science Education & Policy

Minnesota is having a challenging year, so challenging they are approaching California as the wackiest state, according to other states. They have a chronic anti-Semitism problem, including a member of Congress who may soon have to register as a foreign national, a Governor so completely associated with violent protests that mainstream Democrats were baffled he was designated as their Vice-Presidential nominee in the 2024 election, and rampant distrust of science that made Robert F. Kennedy Jr. the darling of events there. That was Kennedy when the anti-vaxxers were all on the left, before…

During last evening's Republican National Convention, speakers repeatedly invoked the fentanyl crisis and blamed lax border control and unchecked illegal immigration. Democrats, on the other hand, blame Big Pharma, and argue corporate exploitation of supply chain monitoring loopholes fueled the US opioid epidemic. They are both right. Every high-profile death related to fentanyl had it purchased illegally, that is due to crime syndicates, while the other side argues that it doctors and pharmaceutical companies caused the addiction which forced them to go the illegal route. A new paper sides…

Artificial Intelligence - AI - isn't really AI at all, which may be why it has been so disappointing to companies that aren't trying to sell you a new leaf blower. Instead of doing something practical, like the dishes or laundry so you have more time to do art or music, AI is doing music and art for you. Basically, it's an over-hyped grift. These are still just Language Learning Models, LLMs, which is simply just a high-level auto-complete. That Replika girlfriend likes your sports team because you told her what team to like, and she is storing that information to sell you a new phone to…

Despite Vermont's Agricultural  Innovation Board (AIB), created to inform regulatory recommendations using science, flatly stating there was no basis for a ban on a class of safe pesticides called neonicotinoids, and agreement by Vermont’s Agency of Agriculture, Food and Markets, the Vermont Senate just passed House Bill H706, which will ban such insecticides despite decades of safe use. It is now up to Vermont Governor Phil Scott to stop this “pollinator protection bill”, which will actually do the opposite. Politicization of science doesn't need evidence-based thinking so Vermont…

In a world where we live hostages of advertisement, where our email addresses and phone numbers are sold and bought by companies eager to intrude in our lives and command our actions, preferences, tastes; in a world where appearance trumps substance 10 to zero, where your knowledge and education are less valued than your looks, a world where truth is worth dimes and myths earn you millions - in this XXI century world, that is, Universities look increasingly out of place. The role of Universities as the place where knowledge and education are propagated to new generations remains a…

Wealthy countries with natural 'breadbaskets' - places where it is easy to grow food - have so much abundance they can put special labels like 'organic' on tens of thousands of products and charge more and people will spend $100 billion on them. Other countries need science, yet it is often the case that regions like Europe dictate what science poorer nations can use. Disagree, and you cannot sell in Europe. Then they mobilize relief efforts for the countries they keep poor.  When poor people are geopolitical pawns for rich ones, can hunger ever be eliminated? Not at all. If Europe would…

When we created the Science 2.0 movement, it quickly caught cultural fire. Blogging became the thing to do, to such an extent that corporate media entered with contracts for scientists while outlets like the BBC began to explore publishing user-generated content. Social media filled the void when the blogging movement faded and while it changed journalism - articles about social media responses became common - it did nothing for knowledge creation and scientific peer review. Instead of blogging being a firewall for the public regarding science content, pay-to-publish journals claiming to…

One of the few things that can get a government union employee in a mandatory industry like education fired is hitting a student. Yet the link between increased tolerance and less accountability for students has correlated to increased violence by teachers. If there are no repercussions for behavior, behavior gets worse. Everyone seems to know this except academic psychologists, who instead argue that grades are the problem. Don't want to be assaulted? Don't have accountability for any student who will suffer no lasting repercussions if they assault you while if you defend yourself you will…

Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, government health officials went to Congress to ask for more funding to help with Ebola. Prior to that they asked for more funding to help stop Teen Vaping. Prior to that they asked for more funding to stop the Prediabetes Epidemic. After the pandemic they created regulations to keep landlords from evicting deadbeat tenants. They created regulations to force COVID-19 vaccines on everyone...except fellow government union employees.  When they were missing was during the actual pandemic. Instead of being experts who had trained and were prepared for the…

Children who had a successful first 10-14 weeks of kindergarten scored higher than others on tests of academic and social-behavioral skills at the end of the school year, according to a new demography paper. Important parts of the transition – what the scholars called a “big little leap” – included making new friends, learning to work with others and adapting to new academic demands. How can a parent prepare for that? Socialization and behavioral parameters before a school environment probably help, though it is common in the modern period for parents to want to push that off to government…