Archive for the tag "Science"

Passion and chocolate in the national health service (02/06/08)

Britain’s National Health Service is getting passionate about chocolate, erections and good science. The NHS website has a fantastic new(ish) section called “Behind The Headlines”, a rapid-response force for some of the nonsense that passes for “science” in the newspapers every day.
In the last couple of weeks the site has picked up studies that purport [...]

Morality and science: are they incompatible? (15/03/08)

Ok, we’re all Spitzered out. I had many reactions to a piece I wrote about the affair(s). Some were baffling — apparently I am anti-Semitic for implying that a man who breaks the very laws he makes might be one sandwich short of a picnic, for instance. Which at least alerted me to the fact [...]

Nerd alert: Why humans take no notice of scientists (27/02/08)

Scientists continute to agonise about why no-one takes any notice of us. Allowing the public to get hold of science by publishing important findings on line is a magnificent first step. But the wonderful, open-access Public Library of Science may have scored an own goal this week, with the publication of a paper [...]

Prozac doesn’t work: how depressing is that? (26/02/08)

Now that over 40 million people are taking Prozac and similar medication to cheer themselves up, we learn that they may as well be taking sugar-pills. Waving the Freedom of Information act as a warrant to gain access to data drug companies haven’t wanted to publish, researchers looked again at whether people popping Prozac actually [...]