The first time I heard of NCSE was in a mass email from one of my professors. This particular professor sent tons of these emails over the semester with potential job opportunities for us experience-hungry students. Most of the time when I researched the positions being offered, I would find…
I just love it when scientists respond to criticism by rolling up their sleeves and doing science. This is especially heartening during magical thinking, er, I mean, campaign season. What follows is a two-step story of science making an effort to get it right when facing internal doubt. In the…
I have a confession. When I was discussing a misrepresentation of Ernst Haeckel a while back (in “Riled about Haeckel”), I mentioned that L. L. Pickett quoted the passage in question (“Most modern investigators have come to the conclusion” etc.) in his book God or the Guessers (1926). But…
NCSE is pleased to announce that the latest issue of Reports of the National Center for Science Education is now available on-line. The issue — volume 36, number 2 — is the second issue in the newsletter's new, streamlined, and full-color format. Featured are "Taking the…
We talk about cephalopods (such as squids, octopoduses [or octopodes, not octopi!]), and cuttlefish) a lot at NCSE. Not because we need to but because we like to. As regular readers know, while xenarthrans rule as my favorite all-time vertebrate group, cephalopods reign supreme in my…
If you had two minutes with John S. Watson, the CEO of oil industry giant Chevron, what would you ask? Climate scientist and NCSE Board member Ben Santer recently got that opportunity, when he attended the company’s annual shareholder meeting in San Ramon, California. You would be correct in…
Not as cuddly as a bunny, but cute nevertheless, it’s Streptaster! One of the Edrioasteroidea, a class of echinoderm, Streptaster “is distinguished by the very high, long, and strongly curved ambulacra, all of which curve counterclockwise,” as the University of Georgia…
It’s a long weekend. We don’t want you to find yourself with nothing to read (or listen to). So here’s a long list of interesting articles and one podcast that will keep you supplied with plenty of science-based conversational fuel for your Memorial Day gatherings. Also, if you were running low on…
There are worse places to spend Independence Day than rafting on the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon. The Grand Canyon is an iconically American site, one full of American history and the spirit of independence and exploration. Native tribes believe that the first humans emerged from one…