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Biodiversity Nears Point of No Return

Thu, 01/28/2010 - 14:03

2010 is the International Year of Biodiversity, so I thought I would have a look at some of the issues that are being raised this year and, in particular, comments from Hilary Benn, the Government’s Environment Secretary, in a blog on the BBC website. The full article can be found here.

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SciDebate: a depressing night out for nerds

Sun, 01/17/2010 - 20:16

It has started. Last week we all went off to the Campaign for Science and Engineering at the Institute of Engineering and Technology for the debate between Lord Drayson, Dr Death, and the other guy -- that is, Baron Drayson of Kensington, the science minister; Dr Evan Harris MP, the Lib Dem science spokesman; and some other guy MP, the Tory shadow science minister (played here by Adam Afriyie). You can watch it yourself, here.

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Haiti: teetering on the brink of ecological catastrophe even before the earthquake

Sat, 01/16/2010 - 06:54

When I think of Haiti, the image that comes to mind is of the view I saw from the air, flying over the island of Hispaniola en route between Puerto Rico and Miami in 2003. A striking feature of that island was a sharp demarcatation between a verdant, apparently forested eastern half and a barren dirt-brown western half. Upon glimpsing that demarcation, I first wondered if we were maybe flying over a national park boundary - for that's where I'm used to seeing such a stark constrast back in India. It turned out that I was looking at an international boundary - between the nations of the Dominican Republic (the green east) and Haiti (the brown west). Here's a satellite image of this boundary, courtesy of the NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center - Scientific Visualization Studio:

via cnas.org

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The Pod Delusion #15 2009 Awards

Sat, 01/02/2010 - 14:19
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The Pod Delusion #13

Fri, 12/11/2009 - 10:33
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The Homeopathy Evidence Check Part 1

Tue, 12/01/2009 - 09:36

Earlier today, Minister for Health Services Mike O'Brien, the Department of Health's Chief Scientist David Harper, and Kent Woods, Chief Executive of the MHRA were questioned by MPs as part of the Science and Technology Select Committee's "Evidence Check" on homeopathy.

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Scapegoat science

Fri, 11/06/2009 - 22:41

The financial crisis of 2008 was heralded as the end of the West's love affair with free-market capitalism. The combined crashes of banking industry and real estate market should have been the final nail in the coffin for the unbridled power of corporations, who for decades have flaunted all social responsibility in search of profit. Why is it then, as we see the dust slowly settling, that nothing appears to have changed?

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