Science & Society

Christmas has become a cultural event, associated with the giving of gifts and lavish meals with friends and family. But the traditional understanding of Christmas is that it’s a Christian celebration of the birth of Jesus. The idea of giving gifts may be traced to the Bible, in which the infant Jesus was presented with gold, frankincense and myrrh by the Three Wise Men, named in apocryphal texts as Caspar, Balthasar and Melchior. This received a boost in the Middle Ages, when Boxing Day, December 26, became a holiday when masters gave their apprentices and other employees “boxes” – that is…

America is the fattest country on Earth and there are efforts being made to insure the 100 thin women still remaining don't set a bad example by not being obese. S. Bryn Austin, director of the Harvard Chan School's Strategic Training Initiative for the Prevention of Eating Disorders (STRIPED) and Director of the Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity and Expression working group is leading the call to prohibit thin fashion models from participating in fashion shows or photo shoots if they are too thin. What is too thin? Social authoritarians know it when they see it. The op-ed in …

It's the time of the year when there are jokes about politically correct people demanding equal time for a Festivus pole on the steps of City Hall and pundits on the other side are scourging culture for the fact that we have any religious events at all. Though atheists may lament that America is too religious, that is only true in their subjective sense, the same way someone on the far left fringe at SourceWatch or U.S. Right To Know (which is all of them) would insist Science 2.0 or American Council on Science and Health are too right wing by being in the middle. On the other side, religious…

The anti-evolution movement, and specifically alternative beliefs to science like Intelligent Design, are wheezing their last, but because education is local in America, it can still happen in some school districts on education. The most famous example of a legal opposition to teaching evolution began in the 1920s with the so-called Scopes Monkey Trial (science won) and the most famous recent example was the Kitzmiller versus Dover case in 2005 (science won). Basically, science has always won but the circumstances have changed. By 2005, for example, biologists in academia had become…

In 2014, the anti-vaccine beliefs of progressive elites reached an apex, both in raw numbers and in hypocrisy - and it was because of an Ebola epidemic thousands of miles away. While only one person was impacted in America, there were calls from across the ideological spectrum, including among rich elites of the American west coast, to develop a vaccine, yet they were simultaneously insisting vaccines cause autism. When it came to ordinary diseases, herd immunity would protect the children of elites so the thought process was to let poor kids get vaccines, but there is no herd immunity for…

The 2015 Monitoring the Future survey (MTF) shows decreasing use of a number of substances, including cigarettes, alcohol, prescription opioid pain relievers, and synthetic cannabinoids ("synthetic marijuana"). Other drug use remains stable, including marijuana, with continued high rates of daily use reported among 12th graders, and ongoing declines in perception of its harms. The MTF survey measures drug use and attitudes among eighth, 10th, and 12th graders, and is funded by the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), part of the National Institutes of Health. The survey has been…

Santa Claus performers struggle with fulfilling the role of jolly old St. Nicholas due to an acute awareness of the sensitivities around interactions with children in modern times, according to 15 formal interviews with Santa performers comprising 14 male Santa performers aged between 52 and 81 and one female grotto assistant who performed in the guise of an elf, aged 32. As the author of the study, Philip Hancock of the University of Essex, explains, "This relationship [between child and Santa Claus performer] has the potential to result in a condition of misrecognition as a consequence…

An analysis of trials registered in ClinicalTrials.gov shows that the private sector is doing a lot more to advance pharmaceutical science than the government. Don't be alarmed by that. Before a product can go to market, the manufacturer is required to prove safety and efficacy whereas government-funded trials are picked by a government committee and therefore not based on what may benefit the public. For that reason, it's not only good that the NIH is not funding a lot of trials, it's essential. Pharmaceuticals are one area of medicine that has not been taken over by government…

Research shows that the large proportion of Jews in positions of power can be fully explained by the available data on human intelligence. Proper statistics completely explains that the 2% Jewish population in the US contributes roughly 30% to high achievement. This research is silenced by editors of scientific journals not allowing peer review. Proper science on intelligence and behavior is effectively forbidden. It is such a taboo that even if something is helpful against anti-Semitic conspiracy theories, the establishment rather lets anti-Semitism unopposed than admitting that intelligence…

37% percent of online adults say that health and medicine is among the topics they find most interesting, while 32% identify science and technology in their top three, according to a new analysis by Pew Research Center.   But not all things appeal to all people; only 11% of online adults say ‘science and technology’ and ‘health and medicine’ are of particular interest.  The key data:   ·         52% of online women say health and medicine is among the top three topics of interest to them, compared with 22% among men.…