August 27 -31 This week, guest poster Anne Casselman reported on a fascinating group of new experiments that indicate that a real solution to climate change won’t come from engineering better biofuels as much as it will come from engineering better ways to exploit our own psychological trap doors. After all, social pressure is our […]
Miscellaneous
August 20 – 24 This week, Cassandra opened up a big, foamy can of whoop-ass all over the people who uncritically told you eggs were as bad for you as cigarettes. Cameron told us why we may get more motion sick as we get older. Ann presented an open and shut case for why you […]
I suppose you were expecting a penis? Today you’re not getting one. Let’s talk instead about Cnemidophorous uniparens, an amazon tribe of Whiptail lizard that consists only of females. Having lost all its males, it now reproduces asexually. Well, kind of. A female’s eggs begin to divide after she gets it on with another female.
August 6 – 10 This week, Cameron channels Derek Zoolander in an epic complaint about turning left. And I know we’re all about Curiosity now, but Tom’s interview with Mars rover pilot Scott Maxwell made me get a little weepy about poor old Spirit once again. Heather wonders if archaeologists should dispense with field season. […]
I shouldn’t say this. In fact, as someone who covers the field of archaeology for a living, I probably shouldn’t even be thinking this. But I find myself wondering increasingly whether it’s time for some dirt archaeologists to relinquish one of their great pleasures, namely the beloved rite of summer: field season. I say this […]
There are a lot of ways to follow the progress of the Curiosity rover as it probes the geological history of Mars. But you could do worse than following one of her drivers, Scott Maxwell, on twitter (@marsroverdriver). Sure, his tweeted celebration of Curiosity’s successful touchdown late Sunday night — “Hey, I still have a […]
I know I’m supposed to be thinking about science, but I can’t stop thinking about bikes. Last month, I was in Copenhagen, and being on a bike there seemed like more fun than it was anywhere else. Part of it was the bike—the family we exchanged houses with had a cargo trike, complete with a […]
ast weekend, my friend Sarah Gilman won the women’s woodsplitting competition at the 41st annual Mountain Fair in Carbondale, Colo., out-chopping several close rivals — including a local county commissioner — and taking home a championship tiara and an six-pound splitting maul. It was Sarah’s second tiara, and second prize maul; she first won […]
