Promoting Science and Critical Thinking
In 1990 a very ambitious project was started called the Human Genome Project. It was scheduled to take 15 years, but was actually completed in 2003, earlier than expected. As the project had progressed, technology had advanced and so it did not take as long as had been anticipated. A few quick facts … The … Read more
Over the years various health-scare stories have popped up regarding the supposed dangers of cell-phone radiation causing cancer. This plays very much into the observation that literally billions of humans now use cell phones and so if the danger is real then that is something that we should not only understand but come to terms … Read more
It’s an exciting new discovery, evidence that humans wandered out of Africa far earlier than has been previously appreciated. The media is quite rightly all over it, and has been trumpeting the details. For example … Washington Post – Scientists discover the oldest human fossils outside Africa BBC – Modern humans left Africa much earlier NPR – New … Read more
The term Yeti is a familiar one to most people. It describes the ape-like creature that supposedly dwells in the snow peaked Himalayas. For most this is simply a popular cultural myth, but some true believers do exist. Just to be clear … Quantity of actual scientific evidence that the Yeti is or was real … Read more
We know that Earth is 4.54 ± 0.05 billion years old. There are no rocks from Earth that old because the process of plate tectonics has recycled anything of that era, so the estimate for this age is based upon the probable age of the Solar System. Basically the assumption is that all the solid bodies in the … Read more
When we started vaccinating for measles back in the 1960s it had the intended effect; the decline and obliteration of Measles. We might think of it as a harmless childhood illness, but its eradication is truly a big deal. The prognosis for measles is that complications such as bronchitis, sensorineural hearing loss, and panencephalitis (which is fatal), can occur, so eradicating it … Read more