Category Archives: Science

Are Some Folks Beyond Rational Thinking?

Posted on Friday 24 January 2014 by Mark R. Kelly

A classic post from Alternet that popped up in my Fb feed today for some reason — Human Stupidity Is Destroying the World. Do you believe in angels? Forty-five percent of Americans do. In fact, roughly 48 percent – Republicans … Continue reading →

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Vast Universe

Posted on Thursday 16 January 2014 by Mark R. Kelly

A Huffington Post by MIT physicist Max Tegmark — promoting his new book, in part — discusses the implications of recent physics that implies our universe is just one in a multiverse. That our universe is approximately described by mathematics … Continue reading →

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Debate Consternation

Posted on Monday 13 January 2014 by Mark R. Kelly

There is some consternation in the science/atheist community that Bill Nye, the Science Guy, has agreed to debate Ken Ham, the Kentucky Creation Museum guy, about evolution vs. creationism. The attitude many others in the science community (names too numerous … Continue reading →

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Why Drugs Are Expensive

Posted on Thursday 9 January 2014 by Mark R. Kelly

A Scientific American blog, via Andrew Sullivan: http://dish.andrewsullivan.com/2014/01/08/not-because-we-are-evil-because-we-are-stupid/ Often you will hear people talking about why drugs are expensive: it’s the greedy pharmaceutical companies, the patent system, the government, capitalism itself. All these factors contribute to increasing the price of … Continue reading →

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End of 2013 Links and Comments

Posted on Saturday 4 January 2014 by Mark R. Kelly

It’s been busy over the holidays, with family events and whatnot, so here is a belated list of links and comments from the past couple weeks. Salon: 10 signs that religious fundamentalism is going down One could hope. Religious fundamentalism … Continue reading →

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Hitchens and the Speculative End of Religion

Posted on Wednesday 18 December 2013 by Mark R. Kelly

There have been several online articles in recent days about Christopher Hitchens, author of god is not great [lower cases intentional], who died just two years ago. Jerry Coyne checks in on rival takes on Christopher Hitchens, both on Salon, … Continue reading →

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Getting Along without Knowing

Posted on Sunday 8 December 2013 by Mark R. Kelly

Interesting interview with Patricia Churchland, UCSD ‘neurophilosopher’ in Slate today, originally from New Scientist, about the dismay some people feel at the notion that, to quote the interview’s intro, “our hopes, loves and very existence are just elaborate functions of … Continue reading →

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A Celebration of Human Ingenuity

Posted on Monday 25 November 2013 by Mark R. Kelly

Andrew Sullivan’s The Dish on The Inevitabilty In Beauty. Theoretical physicist Nima Arkani-Hamed and novelist Ian McEwan recently discussed the relationship between art and science, often agreeing that what might unite them is beauty. I like McEwan’s response: I would … Continue reading →

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Why Science Is Not About Faith

Posted on Tuesday 19 November 2013 by Mark R. Kelly

Great post at Slate by Jerry Coyne — the original headline on the homepage has disappeared, so I’m reproducing from memory in this link: Why Scientists Have No Faith in Science The point is science isn’t about faith, not even … Continue reading →

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Gravity

Posted on Sunday 6 October 2013 by Mark R. Kelly

[Capturing my Facebook post as a blog post.] Just back from seeing Gravity. It’s quite a ride — spectacular in many ways. Terrific effects, portrayal of people in orbit over Earth, and even the simulated zero-G (or micro-G) movements look … Continue reading →

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