In keeping with Kevin Vranes’ dictum that “it’s up to the bloggers to highlight the papers that didn’t make Science, Nature, JAMA or NEJM” because those half-wits in the mainstream media won’t, here’s an interesting paper on climate variability and food in Africa. Leif Christian Stige of the University of Oslo and colleagues used crop …
Some stuff I wrote elsewhere on how dry it is (sub. req.): If we don’t get any rain in the next week— a good bet— the past four months will go into the record books as the driest winter in Albuquerque history. With 0.14 inches since Nov. 1, Albuquerque is on the verge of shattering …
OK, if you smarty-pants scientists wanna do something useful with your time, here’s what I need to know. What effect will global warming have on my allergies?
Some snark from me on my Journal blog about Benny Peiser’s reaction to the new WMO handy hurricane science guide. Some actual non-snarky thoughtful discussion between Benny and myself in the comments on Roger Pielke Jr.’s post on this.
reading 1: Andrew Dessler’s Prometheus post on scientific uncertainty and the making of policy sparked a good discussion. And a copy of his new book, The Science and Politics of Global Climate Change, with Edward Parson, arrived over the weekend. Good so far. reading 2: Back when I first started thinking about drought in the …
I finally slunk into the 21st century this week, purchasing a portable pod device with which to play audio files. The tipping point came when a friend explained that you can get podcasts of Le Show. Nora wisely points out that “podcast” is really just a fancy marketing word for “mp3 file you can download …
It was a Saturday family lunch at the Pie Shack that sealed the deal. Family restaurant decisions are a bit of a tangle at our house, with everyone having preferences and problems getting them all to overlap. An alternative to the usual choices? Let Andrea decide for us. Last month’s ode to the Pie Shack …
Rufus asks: It’s Feb. 16th…. Why haven’t you updated your blog since 2/12????. Good question, Rufus.
A friend sends along Jim Brady’s column from today’s Washington Post: For all the good things it has brought our society, the Web has also fostered ideological hermits, who only talk to folks who believe exactly what they do. This creates an echo chamber that only further convinces people that they are right, and everyone …
Dan Sarewitz is so predictably right that it’s become comical. “(S)cience,” Sarewitz argues, “supplies contesting parties with their own bodies of relevant, legitimated facts about nature, chosen in part because they help make sense of, and are made sensible by, particular interests and normative frameworks.” In the resulting hoohaws, Sarewitz argues, the debate happens on …