Is there really any place for peer review in modern scientific publishing? It seems to me that this process, grounded in 18th century gentlemanly science, has little or no place in a world with such wonders as the internet. At best, the submission of research to a group of scientific peers (also sometimes know as ’scientific rivals’) is rather quaint. At worst, if we are to believe the complaints levelled this week in the field of stem cell research, it is corrupt. Read the rest of this entry »

In the recent cold spell there was a bit of a competition, around these parts, to build the biggest snowman. My own efforts were not particularly impressive, and in any case the results have long since found their way back into the water cycle, but it still an exercise that was well worth doing. Read the rest of this entry »

It’s a sure sign of increasing confidence in an industry when anouncements of mergers and acquisitions start to increase. Over the years I have noticed a distinct ebb and flow of these, mimicking the general economic cycle as what economists call a leading indicator. When M and A activity drops noticeably, it is the calm before the storm: businesses are failing, and their value is hard to work out. Nobody wants to buy something that turns out to be worthless, so mergers stop. A few months later the markets crash. Read the rest of this entry »

Synchronicity may be little more than a new way of saying ‘coincidence’, but I had to smile all the same. Read the rest of this entry »

Astonishing news this week, reported in (among other well-known scientific journals) the UK Daily Mail, about the discovery of accurate geometric patterns in the positioning of prehistoric monuments. Detailed analysis of over 1500 ancient sites, such as Stonehenge and Silbury Hill, have revealed a secret triangulation pattern that is so sophisticated that its discoverer has refused to rule out extraterrestrial help in their alignment. Read the rest of this entry »

Well that about wraps it up for the noughties, a decade of extraordinary events both within and without the world of science and technology. Read the rest of this entry »

Don’t you love it when new research overturns a fact so widely understood that it has become a cliche? The history of science is littered with revelations that turned received wisdom on its head, ranging from the profound to the inane. Read the rest of this entry »

Trust me, I’m a scientist. I’m not sure if those words rang completely true, but they certainly don’t these days on issues of widespread public interest like GM foods, climate change, or stem cells. Everybody and his dog, bolstered by ill-informed newspaper articles and skimming-the-surface TV documentaries, has an insight into these and other topics. Once, these would have been called opinions - nowadays those holding them are likely to claim that they are something much more valuable: truth. Read the rest of this entry »

First of all, my apologies to those of you who received a slightly garbled version of last week’s newsletter (and my thanks to those who pointed it out). An error in production meant that some copies were filtered through the wrong spillchucker, with predictable results. Ah, technology. I console myself with the knowledge that at least we are in good company, and have been prompted by this experience to look back through some of the dafter examples of what happens when the machinery takes over. Read the rest of this entry »

I do love a bit of pseudo-science, on the side, to provide some light
entertainment. These days, thanks in large part to the witchcraft that
is the internet, it is not hard to find examples of crackpot theories
and plain old wrongheadedness. If anything it is too easy,
paradoxically making it harder to find the truly mental examples among
the flotsam of countless blogs, tweets, and other emissions. Read the rest of this entry »