I’m still trying to balance my staff job against the very long queue of freelance work that I signed up for before that job came along. Which means, sadly, no time for blogging. I haven’t given up the idea, though (I really love this blog). I just need a few more months to clear my plate. … Continue reading Happy New Year! I miss you! Here are some pictures from Alaska!
Had this article go up yesterday over at Scientific American. It was a fun piece to do because I got to revisit one of the most deeply fascinating questions in all of science: how do the basic electrical and chemical exchanges that occur in our brains produce the infinitely complicated experience of being alive? Seriously: think about it. An electric … Continue reading On the neuroscience of memory
Pictured: me and my twin brother, just a few weeks old, synchronized napping somewhere in Medellin, Colombia. Not pictured: our legs and feet don’t even come close to filling out those onesies… I have an abiding interest in any and all research on the things our biological parents pass down to us — not … Continue reading News Roundup: Our Mothers’ Microbes
Had this piece go up yesterday onYahoo Politics, in which I try to parse some of the complexity inherent in the much-discussed link between climate change and civil war (i.e. in Syria). My take-away is that yes, the link is there, but no it’s not as clear-cut as, say, Bernie Sanders would have you believe. One of … Continue reading The crooked line from drought to war
So I think we’re still quite a long ways off from sending humans to Mars. But apparently we’re not so far off that some people haven’t begun seriously thinking about it. Back in 2012, when Mars One, a non-profit dedicated to making interplanetary travel a reality, announced that it was accepting applicants for the first manned flight to Mars (room … Continue reading Meet the people who’ve volunteered to die on Mars…
On October 27, 1885, some twenty people (plus a few reporters) gathered at the home of Dr. R.A. Gunn on East 22nd street in Manhattan for an inaugural meeting of the American Anti-Vaccination Society. The group’s stated mission: “arousing the public to the evils of vaccination.” Their key arguments: Vaccines are ineffective at preventing disease. Worse yet, … Continue reading The American Anti Vaccination Society (est. 1885)
1. My boyfriend Eric has been gone for three days and I am basically living like a squatter in my own apartment. I’ve been eating donuts for lunch and frozen pizza rolls for dinner since he left. And right now I’m wearing the same stained Harvard Tee that I put on yesterday afternoon. I’m also writing … Continue reading On Love & Entropy
