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Author Archives: The Science-Minded Citizen
A New Look at Animal Evolution
By Adam D.A. Manning (@AdamManning)
The evolution of life is an endlessly fascinating subject to study. The richness of the ever-changing chronicle of living things is part of the beauty of nature and in recent decades a new approach to viewing the evolution of the terrestrial vertebrates (that is the reptiles, birds, and mammals) has emerged which challenges our conventional categories.
Reptiles, birds, … Read more
Posted in The Science-Minded Citizen
Tagged birds, dimetrodon, Evolution, mammals, reptiles, synapsids
1 Comment
Spirituality and “Inner” Life
I have come across many scientists who say: “I do not subscribe to any religion, but I am a spiritual person.” What exactly is spirituality? Here are a couple of definitions:
The term “spirituality” lacks a definitive definition, although social scientists have defined spirituality as the search for “the sacred,” where “the sacred” is broadly defined as that which is set apart … Read more
Posted in The Science-Minded Citizen
Tagged Body, brain, Definition, development, Dreaming, History, Kurzweil, Logic, Meditation, mind, Mystical, Personal, Physics, Ray, religion, research, science, skeptics, Spirituality, Vinod, Wadhawan
14 Comments
Only a Theory?
By Laurie Hatton (in collaboration with her local Brights Community Cluster)
Sherlock Holmes commonly stated to Watson, “I have a theory.” The word “theory” means that something is a guess or speculative idea. Right? Well, yes it can. However, when a scientist uses the term theory, he or she means something totally different. A scientific theory is an idea that has a lot of evidence … Read more
Posted in The Science-Minded Citizen
Tagged Brights, Evolution, Hatton, Hypothesis, Idea, Laurie, Only, scientific, Supported, Tested, Theory
32 Comments
Belief
By Fran Evanisko
(in collaboration with his local Brights Community Cluster)
To my dad, the old days were either better or worse than the present, depending on the point he was trying to make. If he wanted me to appreciate all of the good things I had, he would emphasize how bad things were during the depression. If he wanted me to feel bad about … Read more
Posted in The Science-Minded Citizen
Tagged acceptance, Aristotle, belief, believe, disagreements, Earth, evidence, faith, Galileo, objective, philosophy, proposition, Pythagoras, religion, science, truth, worldviews
2 Comments
Does Literary Fiction Help You Read Minds?
Article by Dan Arel
I read a lot. However, I mostly focus on history, politics or science. I rarely break out a good piece of literary fiction. Though, after reading this recent study from the New School for Social Research, in which they studied the correlation between what people read and how well they read faces….
In the study, recently published in the journal Science… Read more
The Know It All Effect
Article by Dan Arel
Do people who claim to have a strong understanding of science challenge their views? - Do people who claim religious affiliation read scientific studies that oppose their worldview?
S. Mo Jang of the University of Michigan set out to answer such questions. He recently published findings in Science Communication.
In his paper, “Seeking Congruency or Incongruency Online? Examining Selective Exposure … Read more
Posted in The Science-Minded Citizen
Tagged media, opposing views, religious affiliation, science, understanding, worldview
3 Comments
Error and Uncertainty Lead to Confidence
Article by Davis Jacobson
“Doubt is our product, since it is the best means of competing with the ‘body of fact’ that exists in the minds of the general public. It is also the means of establishing a controversy.”
–Brown and Williamson, 1969 (internal memorandum, found here)
It is often lamented that there are misunderstandings of scientific findings in the general public. There’s no … Read more
Posted in The Science-Minded Citizen
Tagged accuracy, confidence, confusion, doubt, error, interval, mathematical, measurements, precision, scientific, uncertainty
1 Comment
Parking Perplexity
Article by Davis Jacobson
Who wants to waste time walking if you could just drive? If only there were a perfect way to find a parking space in a big lot….
Spoiler alert: There isn’t! But there are glimmers of ways that are reliably not as bad as the worst you could do! It turns out that this problem fits within a category called … Read more
Fish Fights
Article by Davis Jacobson
I saw a bit in the Telegraph regarding the problems surrounding all the mackerel in Iceland and the Faroe Islands. Yes, the mid-latitude Atlantic fish, and yes, the smallish island countries between Scandinavia and Greenland. Plus Russia.
A lot of science comes together here: climate science, biology, political science, economics…. (Today I’m using “science” in a broad sense like the German … Read more
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