Can we wipe out the Ivory Trade with synthetic 3D printed Ivory?

The Ivory trade has resulted in poachers seeking out and slaughtering animals such as Rhino and Elephants to such a degree that it is rapidly leading towards, not just the endangerment of species, but complete extinction. The motivation that drives the now illegal poaching is well-understood, as explained by IFLS … The belief that rhino horn treats fevers or … Read more

Synthetic Humans is now becoming a real possibility.

We have read the entire human genome, and so now a new project has been initiated to take the next step. There is now a 10 year plan to create an entire synthetic human genome. We have been pouring over the billions of base pairs within the human genome for some time now and that … Read more

Can you safely Hack your sleeping pattern?

It is commonly understood that humans need to sleep roughly about 7-9 hours each night. That of course is not a one size fits all, it varies with age – a newborn will be in the range of 11-19 hours, teens 7-11 hours, and the over 65 5-9 hours. Have we always had one continuous sleep cycle? Historian Roger … Read more

Probiotic products are of no benefit to healthy individuals

So the UK’s Guardian does a nice bit of myth-busting with an article all about Probiotics … Fans of probiotic drinks and foods may be wasting their money, according to a review of current research into the supplements that suggests they may be of no benefit to healthy adults. A Danish team looked at the results of … Read more

A New greatly extended tree of life has been published

What has become increasingly realised is that there is rather a lot of biological dark matter that we know simply nothing about at all and so the publication of a new tree of life (last Monday) that reveals quite a dramatically new picture of life is consequence of further insights. What has been happening is that a lot of new information was … Read more

Weird Weekly Claim: “Atheists use less brain function”

So for this week’s weird claim we have a Christian Web site called AmericanVision that cites a study to prove that not believing in a god requires less brain power, and yes, it is not a satire site, he is being very serious. It is actually a posting published back in Oct 2015 and so … Read more