Promoting Science and Critical Thinking
Elon Musk has outlined his plan to send one million people off to colonize Mars. Not only is he being sincere about this ambition, but he also has a viable plan to get there. The astronomer Phil Plait has written a response to Mr Musk’s plans in Slate, and as you read it, you can almost hear … Read more
The claim that “Hillary Clinton Lies Because Satan Controls The Democratic Party” is of course a bit of political theatre and so when you learn who made this claim, then you will simply roll your eyes, because rhetoric like this is the norm for this guy and not an exception. It was Duck Dynasty Phil Robertson. This … Read more
We do all know that it is perhaps part of the human condition for many wacky ideas to float about, but sometimes even that knowledge does not insulate you from being surprised when something truly bizarre pops it. Perhaps the degree of surprise is in some respects source driven. Conservapedia is a well-known bastion of absurd nonsense and … Read more
I was tempted to skip writing about the Nobel Peace prize. Rather obviously my primary interest has been the three big Nobel Prizes (Medicine, Physics, and Chemistry) that I wrote up earl;lier on in the week. The “Peace” prize however does perhaps deserve some attention, specifically because the entire endeavour is at times (if I may … Read more
Back in December 2015 as many as 174 nations signed what is now known as the Paris Agreement on Climate Change, but that is simply ink on paper and is quite frankly meaningless in that it did not commit anybody to do anything. The far more important aspect is that it marked a beginning of a … Read more
And so today it is on to the third of the big three Nobel Prizes. The announcement of a Nobel award is always a surprise. If you ever hear about a claim that somebody was once nominated for a Nobel prize but did not actually win, then unless it was a nomination that is fifty … Read more