It seems that all persons with blue eyes are descended from a single common ancestor. Before that moment, which occurred in a lone genetic mutation between six and ten thousand years ago, all human eyes were brown.
Continue reading →Some of you may recall a post I wrote in 2005 about Clive Wearing, the man with such profound memory loss that he lived in a single repeating and ever-changing present moment disconnected from those that had gone before. To … Continue reading →
…which is that Jews are more closely related to other Middle Eastern peoples than they are to the natives of the countries they encountered in their millenia of wanderings, and that they are also very closely related to each other: … Continue reading →
Jon A. Krosnick is a professor of communication, political science and psychology at Stanford University. As such, he no doubt knows how to spin a story, and he has done a bit of that in an op-ed he wrote that … Continue reading →
They both feel the need to be sexually appealing to men. And this may give them something surprising in common. But it’s not all rosy for heterosexual men, either. Women seem to prefer arrogant guys who engage in risky behavior. … Continue reading →
You think babies are just selfish slugs? Think again. According to researcher Paul Bloom (the article is long, but worth reading in its entirety), they have a capacity for empathy, however rudimentary: Human babies, notably, cry more to the cries … Continue reading →
Remember that ozone hole and all the brouhaha it engendered? Here’s a piece about the 25th anniversary of the discovery of the hole’s opening, and the circumstances of its more-or-less closing. The cause of the thing appeared to be the … Continue reading →
The Gulf oil spill is very disturbing in its scope. Not only did it kill eleven people, but it now threatens the huge fishing industry in the region, not to mention wildlife and beaches that are beautiful and drive the … Continue reading →
Martha Minow, Dean of Harvard Law School, has put another PC nail in the coffin of free speech at that august institution, alma mater of our president. The topic? A private email sent by third year Harvard Law student Stephanie … Continue reading →
…may have overstated the case with the volcano and its effect on airplanes: Flawed computer models may have exaggerated the effects of an Icelandic volcano eruption that has grounded tens of thousands of flights, stranded hundreds of thousands of passengers … Continue reading →
This is not—I repeat, not—an April Fools joke. For quite a while scientists who study global warming have claimed that (and there is just no way to be delicate about this) cow flatulence and excrement—or what this article refers to … Continue reading →
Do people get happier as they get older? I’d like to think so, at least. And if this sort of research can be believed, there’s a fair amount of evidence that it’s true. But it seems to me there’s a … Continue reading →