CarlZimmer

This is Carl. I have to say my mind has now been blown by a virus with an immune system. I learned about this a couple weeks ago, and I can say that I NEVER thought such a thing was possible. And that was after writing a book on the friggin things. And yet the evidence is pretty overwhelming. AND it could help cure cholera. Mind blown. Details here: http://phenomena.nationalgeographic.com/2013/02/27/the-virus-that-learns/

We are so prone to think about the future existence of mankind, as if our species is about to go totally extinct. I just think we are far too cockroach-like (in a good way) to suffer that fate soon, no matter how we make life difficult for ourselves. I don't think a new virus will wipe out our species. I do think that 50 million people might well die in a short period of time in a pandemic in the next century, leading to huge social disruption. And we will say goodbye to a lot of our low-lying cities due to rising sea levels unless we really get our act in gear. Again, we will still exist, but we will lost something important.

Statistics is a pet peeve of mine, because it is so important to everyday life. Everything from choosing a medical procedure to understanding the effects of climate change depend on understanding standard deviations, trends, etc. Why do we force students to take trig? Swap in statistics I say!

How long before I can print out my own bat with a 3-D printer? That's MY question.

This is Carl--Brossard and her colleagues have done a very elegant study in which they had people read blog posts about nanotechnology accompanied by comments. There were two sets of comments, almost identical, except that one was rude. That rudeness altered how people interpreted the science itself. Rude comments made them think it was more risky.

Here's a page with more details: http://www.news.wisc.edu/21506

Managing my comment threads has been a lot of work for me for the ten years I've been blogging. I like a lot more rough-and-tumble than a lot of other bloggers. I like having creationists leave comments on my blogs about evolution, and I like having scientifically informed readers fire back. Better than looking the other way, I say. But trolls can really drag down the conversation--and, it turns out, alter the perception of what I write in the main blog post. So I want to find out more about this research--and I want more of it done!