Fidget spinners: "their alleged benefits remain scientifically unfounded"

Fidget spinners , those spinning toys that have taken the world by storm in recent months, are great little things. My brood have several an...

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Is Eating Your Boogers Really Good for You?

On 4/26/17, a variety of media sources reported that a scientific study claimed that eating your own boogers is healthy for you. Given the ...

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The Law of No Restraint

T here's a new law of science reporting or, perhaps more accurately put, of the science jungle.  The law is to feed any story, no matter...

causationcertaintysciencescience journalism

The continuing trials and tribulations of PACE

I honestly hadn't intended talking about the PACE trial  - " pacing, graded activity, and cognitive behaviour therapy: a randomised...

behaviourCBTChronic fatigue syndrome (CFS)graded exercise therapy (GET)myalgic encephalomyelitis (ME)PACE trialsciencescientific method

Reforming research funding and universities

A ny aspect of society needs to be examined on a continual basis to see how it could be improved.  University research, such as that which d...

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Paid To Prey (PTP) journals

I n the bad old days if you as a scientist had something worth saying, a journal would (after vetting through a mainly fair confidential rev...

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Post-truth science?

T his year was one that shook normal politics to its core.  Our belief in free and fair elections, in the idea that politicians strive to te...

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Is genetics still metaphysical? Part III. Or could that be right after all?

I n the two prior parts of this little series ( I and II ), we've discussed the way in which unknown, putatively causative entities we...

Empiricismevolutiongeneticsmetaphysicsnatural lawsciencetheory

Is genetics still metaphysical? Part II. Is that wrong?

W hat is the role of theory vs empiricism in science?  How do these distinctions apply to genetics? Yesterday, we discussed some of the his...

Empiricismevolutiongeneticshistory of sciencesciencetheory