Category: Science, Engineering & Technology
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A church tower in eastern Germany has overtaken the Leaning Tower of Pisa in its reckless inclination. The tower of the Church of Our Beloved Ladies by the Mountain sits on uncertain porous grounds with numerous cracks and fissures. It began tilting ever since it was built in 1382. Now it has outleaned its competitor…
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A little over a year ago during the run up to the 2006 elections, Sujatha posted an article detailing the vulnerability of the new e-slate voting system in use for the last few years. The article described how easily the system could be tampered with by introducing malicious programs into the memory card of the…
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Karl Zimmer, author of the science blog The Loom, has an article in the Science Times section of the NY Times about animal behavior in a crowd – swarms, herds, schools and gaggles. Does this shed light on human swarming instincts? Do we also play follow-the-leader when it comes to our religious, political and cultural…
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This BBC report on a possible dramatic split in the future within the human race based on superior and inferior genetics provides an interesting sci-fi twist to our recent discussions about genetics and IQ. Evolutionary theorist Oliver Curry of the London School of Economics predicts that by the end of the next millennium, human beings will fall…
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We know from experience and by intuition that it is not so much the source of danger which causes our anxiety but rather our proximity to it . This understanding is reflected in the old adage, "When the cat is away, the mice will play". A bear far down in the valley is not as…
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Which scientific discoveries had the best eureka moments in terms of serendipity, putting two and two together where others saw a brickwall or occasionally even in the dreamlike mystical nature of the revelations ? Who’s to say? Personal scientific biases play a role in compiling lists of seminal moments in scientific progress. In any case,…
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During any given week, at least one science article appearing in the New York Times is bound to provoke my contempt. This week it’s an interview with a Harvard physicist, Eric Mazur, who seems rather taken with his own remarkable ambitions and accomplishments. The headline reads, Using the ‘Beauties of Physics’ to Conquer Science Illiteracy,…
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Science blogger Bora Zivkovic (aka Coturnix) interviewed Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards about various issues pertaining to science, society and education. See the interview at A Blog Around The Clock. Good job, Bora!
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Extra-terrestrial life may be quite different from what we are capable of envisioning. The search for alien life in the solar system (and beyond?) therefore should not be restricted to the parameters currently believed to be life sustaining. A very interesting article in the National Geographic. Think life on Earth is weird? It might be…
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Like Lucy, the mother of man who came out of Africa, the mother(s) of all domestic cats might have been a resident of the middle east. Don’t worry, this is not the start of Friday Cat Blogging – I refer to a paper to be published in the June 29 issue of Science which traces the…
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We already have the A-bomb and the H-bomb. As part of its program for developing non-lethal weapons, the Pentagon has confirmed that it once had plans for the G-bomb – "G" as in "gay." The proposed Gay Bomb would not kill and incinerate indiscriminately like the other two. Instead of being a weapon of mass…
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Make what you will of this very interesting AP article after weighing all sides. It appears that two decades after the frightening accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, the area around it has become a haven for wildlife! Moose, lynx, fox, birds and small mammals have gathered in droves in a place which was…
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