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Conspiracies or Science?
Tweet Share on Facebook February 7, 2013 CommentWhy do some people simply reject science out of hand, and drift instead towards vast, far-flung conspiracy theories to explain political or social events? Social science researchers in Australia believe they've found an answer, and published their results recently on a phenomenon called "conspiracist ideation" to explain it.
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Lying About Your Weight
Tweet Share on Facebook January 31, 2013 CommentDo men and women lie about their weight? Of course they do—but a new study from researchers in Ireland shows we're getting much worse at our ability to estimate how much we actually weigh, and it may be profoundly affecting what we know about obesity epidemics.
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The Earth Breathes
Tweet Share on Facebook January 15, 2013 CommentA sad, new record was set last month: the amount of carbon dioxide we're putting into the atmosphere is now officially more than double the rate of what it was just a generation ago, according to meticulous monthly records kept at NOAA and at the Mauna Loa Observatory in Hawaii. And it shows no sign of stopping. For those who understand compound interest, this doesn't bode well for the planet.
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The Daily Dish Move Brings New Meaning to Saliency
Tweet Share on Facebook January 8, 2013 CommentSocial scientists studying the rise and fall (and, perhaps, rise again) of American journalism and new media forms may have just found a new term as a companion to the phrase "Googled" that sits at the center of what used to be the Fourth Estate. The new term may be called "Dished."
Andrew Sullivan is moving his wildly popular, aggregated blogosphere, The Daily Dish, away from his home at The Daily Beast to a standalone site, and asked his loyal following of more than a million readers to move with him. But that isn't the news for social scientists studying how forms of journalism are going to survive in an era where Google News essentially ended most journalism business models.
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Proof Of The Simulation Argument
Tweet Share on Facebook December 17, 2012 CommentAre we all just living in the Matrix?
I sure don't know, but a few creative researchers from the University of Washington believe they've developed a way to test the theory long before we have any hope of actually waking up in our simulation pods after we discover discrepancies. In short, they believe the simulated (us, in present time) can detect the simulators (perhaps our future selves, our descendants).
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Are There Even Better "Goldilocks" Planets Out There?
Tweet Share on Facebook December 11, 2012 CommentThe search for life outside our solar system just took an interesting turn.
Nearly every researcher who has ever looked for extrasolar planets capable of harboring life has looked for ones resembling Earth just enough to be habitable. They've looked for planets in the "Goldilocks zone" – not too hot and not too cold to harbor life as we know it. It's never really occurred to researchers that there might, in fact, be planets outside our solar system that are actually more hospitable to life than Earth.
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Going Beyond Life On Mars, What About Living There
Tweet Share on Facebook December 5, 2012 CommentIt's worth paying close attention to Elon Musk, one of the true visionaries we have in our midst who is clearly willing and able to successfully bet his own fortune on his dreams. And his latest -- a plan to take up to 80,000 people a year to Mars in the near future to create a very large base there -- is clearly out of the box. But it isn't crazy, not by any means.
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Focus On Other Side of Armstrong Scandal: Clean Athletes
Tweet Share on Facebook November 2, 2012 CommentBy now, we all know the new Lance Armstrong story, the one where he doesn't get to keep his seven Tour de France medals because of blood doping allegations that have finally made it to the podium.
But I'd like to show you how athletes who chose not to blood dope to get an extra 5 percent or 10 percent boost in performance at the elite level have felt for years as their governing bodies chose not to level the playing field: cheated.
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The Marshmallow Test, Revisited
Tweet Share on Facebook October 24, 2012 CommentThe "Marshmallow Test"—the notion that a quarter of young children who exhibit self control, delay gratification, and wait to eat a marshmallow will also do better in school later in life—is one of the most famous social science experiments of the past generation. It also may be wrong.
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Why Making Choices Seems Like Hard Work
Tweet Share on Facebook October 11, 2012 CommentWe've all been there. You're staring at the breakfast table to start your day. You have two choices in front of you: the delicious chocolate doughnut, or the bowl of fruit. You really want that doughnut, but you know the fruit is healthier for you.
It's almost as if you're at war with yourself. The angel of our better selves whispers in one ear, while the demon of our secret desires whispers in the other. But that can't be possible, can it?
