Science Education & Policy
Nearly one in three American children are overweight or obese, but sugary sweets are often on the menu at elementary school classroom parties. Previous small-scale studies have found that "kids consume a lot of calories at classroom parties," but little has been known about how state and district policies impact this aspect of the school food environment.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture has issued nationwide standards governing competitive foods and beverages in schools as required by the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010. However, USDA regulations do not address…
The Affordable Care Act is not quite ready, some of the key aspects won't be available and many large corporations are still exempt, but it is rolling out for individuals tomorrow. 76% of U.S. adults are aware of the law's individual mandate - they know the law will require them to have insurance or pay penalties - but only 40% are aware that new health insurance marketplaces are (in many cases) opening on October 1, or that financial assistance that is available to help people with low or moderate incomes pay their health insurance premiums.
The latest survey by the Commonwealth Fund, an…
Hank |
The EPA's war on science and business is nothing new. What started four decades ago as an honest effort by the Nixon administration to protect the environment from an increasingly industrialized society has instead helped cause industry to vacate America whenever possible.
And to achieve their goals, they have no problem engaging in the scientization of politics - those end-oriented beliefs they use to start with an agenda and keep creating (or cherry-picking) studies until they find something matches it. Declaring water a pollutant is one example and another is their war on energy.
The EPA…
A survey of gun dealers and pawnbrokers in 43 U.S. states found nearly unanimous support for denying gun purchases for criminals and mentally ill people who have a history of violence or alcohol or drug abuse; conditions that might have prevented Washington Navy Yard shooter Aaron Alexis from legally purchasing a firearm.
This is the third report from the UC Davis' Firearm Licensee Survey, which assessed support among federally licensed firearms retailers for a background check requirement on all firearm transfers and selected criteria for denying handgun purchases. Garen Wintemute, professor…
Wealth, more money freed from basic necessities like food and energy, invariably leads to more money available for education and culture - but wealth leads to a clash in developed nations who want to protect emerging economies from 'globalization', regardless of what those countries want.
Former US Secretary of the Navy Jerry Hultin, now Senior Presidential Fellow of New York University and President Emeritus of the Polytechnic Institute of NYU, looks past the substantial hurdle of providing basic food, medicine and energy - all highly political topics in the western world - and says…
Once size does not fit all but broad federal regulations, such as strict requirements on the use of animal manures in fresh produce production, that have been imposed by the new federal food-safety law threaten to adversely impact the mushroom industry, which relies on horse and poultry manure for a specialized growth substrate.
The Food Safety Modernization Act, signed by President Obama in 2011, brings with it a vast array of new centralized regulations and a higher level of concern from food producers.
A new study shows that heat generated during the traditional composting process,…
Extreme weather event coverage may lead people to think more seriously about climate change, according to new surveys of New Jersey college students which found that shortly after Hurricane Irene and "Super Storm" Sandy, they were more likely to show support for a politician running on a "green" platform and expressed a greater belief that climate change is caused by human activity.
The results suggest that weather events may have the power to shift the general population's automatic attitudes — their first instincts — in favor of greater government involvement in environmental policies.…
The world has plenty of water but not where people actually live. Arid regions lack both water and the energy to make water potable. Ironically, the energy needed to make water potable or ship it to arid regions will result in greenhouse gas emissions that result in less water, according to a new paper.
The authors write that current targets for greenhouse gas emissions - which would set the mean temperature increase at around 3.5°C above pre-industrial levels - will expose 668 million people worldwide to new or aggravated water scarcity.
The authors calculated that a further 11…
"For every complex problem, there is a solution that is simple, neat and wrong"
H.L. Mencken
If you have confidence in the future of science, you might be inclined to believe that a technology solution decades from now could make CO2 clean-up cheaper and more effective than what is available right now.
A group of economists argue just the opposite, they say that costs will be higher and that would make it less likely for decision-makers to ever push for a low-carbon economy. Global economic growth would be cut back by up to 7 percent within the first decade after climate policy implementation if the current international stalemate is continued until 2030, compared to 2 percent if a…