Truth

"Get your facts first, then you can distort them as you please." -Mark Twain I am unimpressed with speculations that have no basis in fact, but if you can show how your claims are factually grounded and arrived at, they're certainly worth a listen to. And if your facts, logic and extrapolations are sound, you might even, as Sarah Jarosz sings, Tell Me True. Of course, if they're a little suspect instead, you can either lead people astray, or alternatively, create some of the best humor and satire ever created. This weekend, I proudly introduce to you a series of nature videos by YouTube user…
After a brief insurrection by their blue collar offspring, zombies, vampires have once more regained their prominence as the monster supreme, leaping out at us from every bookshelf, cinema screen and TV set. What better time then for Mark Jenkins to unleash his accomplished study of the bloodsucker legend, Vampire Forensics. Published through National Geographic Books and accompanied by a television documentary, Vampire Forensics delves into the long history of the vampire, one which began millennia before a certain Bram Stoker set pen to parchment. Drawing upon the latest research in…
The annual AAS meeting opened up with the award of the van Biesbroeck Prize of the society to Father Dr George Coyne, former director of the Vatican Observatory. The van Biesbroeck Prize is for extraordinary service to astronomy, in particular his role organizing the Vatican Observatory Summer Schools, and the role he has played at the juncture of science and religion. A topic that occasionally stirs sciencebloggers, and their readers, from torpor. Dr Coyne gave a brief and gracious speech, but touched on what I thought was a bit of a strawman: he appealed, and I paraphrase, for people to…
As I put it at a blogging panel last fall, "in science, it is normative to be not sure." It wasn't my most eloquent moment, but at least AAAS' president-elect Alice Huang agrees with me that one of the biggest challenges to public science literacy is understanding the contingent nature of scientific "truth". But probably the most difficult concept to get across to nonscientists is that we look at data and then use probabilities to judge those data. The public wants an absolute black-and-white answer. We may look at something that is 80 percent likely as being good enough to base decisions on…
Sometimes, I publish things on this website that are not entirely correct (and when I do, I'll own up to it). Sometimes other people do on theirs. There are bad ways and good ways to argue these points, ranging from name-calling to explicitly explaining where the flaws are in one's arguments, and what the corrections are. And I had no idea how I was going to articulate this. But then Lucas pointed this chart out to me, and it does a better job of explaining it than I ever could. You know who could explain this? Captain Picard. Imagine you got to be a Starfleet officer. Here's what he has to…
This will probably never be made into an anti-drug ad campaign, but I can't imagine a stronger deterrent. Angel's Trumpet is a flower that contains scopolamine and other alkaloids. It's known as a "biogenic drug" and presumed by naive recreational drug users to be harmless because it's a plant. However, it can cause psychosis, delirium, visual hallucinations, agitation, incoherence, aggressive behaviour, memory problems and "convulsive sobbing" as well as somatic symptoms and well, things like this incident. A case study describes an 18-year-old male with no history of mental disorders who…
Anti-drug ad parody that's also an anti-drug ad itself. This is Your Brain on Heroin: Any Questions?.
Another in the hilarious vintage BBC Look Around You series, this is 4 - Ghosts. Bwa-ha-ha.
In time for Halloween: Trailer for Central State: Asylum for the Insane. A filmmaker prowls a closed mental institution to "...uncover the mysteries left behind when the facilities closed in 1994." There's lots of shaky handheld camerawork in poorly lit tunnels, and shakier rumours of ghosts, but no exploration into the disappearance of former patients. Homelessness and prisons, that's scary, not the supposed ghosts that a supposed psychic says are "like a tornado" in the building. What's actually "menacing and still threatening" is not an old hospital but the stigma attached to mental…
It's that time of year again when the most exciting set of awards for us here at Omni Brain are announced. If you don't know what the Ig Nobels are you're missing out on a very important part of science! According to some article at MSNBC "The annual no-rules awards ceremony, where flying paper airplanes and interrupting honored speakers are commonplace, pokes fun at bizarre and improbable achievements in real-life scientific research." This year some of my favorite prizes were: NUTRITION: Brian Wansink of Cornell University, for exploring the seemingly boundless appetites of human beings,…
Artist Katelyn Sack emailed me earlier to clarify some info. She shares truth: The post you link to incorrectly states the series is composed of fridge magnets. While I can make prints, magnets, T-shirts, and even baby bubbles featuring any of my artwork, 'Baby, Be A Brain Surgeon!' as featured on The Science Creative Quarterly this Tues., Sept. 11 is oil paint on 4.25" x 4.25" ceramic tiles. You can see my original blog post on the artwork here, and I also list it for sale on my website here. In her original post, she describes the vision behind her designs. Nursery room decor for a…
It's kind of hard to imagine a child lying who barely understands language and is even less able to produce something understandable. And babies certainly don't have a very developed theory of mind! But like all areas of developmental psychology the trend is for people to be able to do things earlier and earlier and deception seems to be one of those universal abilities all humans have very early on. A Psychologist, Vasudevi Reddy, from the University of Portsmouth has identified seven different categories of ways that babies can deceive. The ways that babies deceive are essentially (…
Are you a politician or currently considering a run for office? Do you agree with Richard Nixon that drugs are "public enemy number one in the United States"? Are you worried that smoking marijuana makes you insane, turns you into a violent criminal or causes death? Do you worry daily about why prohibition failed? Do you think the War on Drugs is a great idea? Are you stressed out about these things and need an easy way out? Incarcerex may be for you! Take a look at this great spoof from drugpolicy.org! Does your politician suffer from Chronic Re-Election Paranoia (CREEP)? Do you think our…
I loved Mr. Wizard growing up. Don Herbert Died of Cancer on Tuesday at 89.
An oldie but goodie starring I Dream of Jeannie as god ... Enjoy! Here's Ned Flanders dealing with an evolution exhibit. And here's the evolution vs. creationism debate starring Lisa.
It was one year ago today that I made the first post to Omni Brain. I never imagined we would do this well. In the last year Omni Brain has undergone many many changes, the biggest of which have been Sandra of Neurofuture fame joining the blog, and moving to ScienceBlogs. We started with not-even 3000 page views in our first full month and now receive tens of thousands of page views and visitors - which is pretty great for a smart ass little science blog! Our Technorati ranking has also grown by leaps and bounds; near 14,000 today. Thanks everyone, for reading and for all your lively…
Here's the truth so far... - A WEB EXPERIMENT - (In no particular order) 1. Cigarettes are bad for you. 2. Men and Women are equal. 3. Global Warming is real. 4. It's not all relative. 5. Intelligent Design is wrong. 6. Over consumption is a serious problem. 7. The Millenium Development Goals are worthy*. 8. Wilco is good, sometimes exceptional, but often inconsequential. 9. Shit happens. 10. Creationism is silly. (also, see 5) 11. Science, for better or for worse, is all around. ------------------------------------------------------------------ What the hell is this? See here