Stream of Reading (Prepare to be Forwarded) – An Archive of What I'm Reading
A leading scientist has declared homeopathy a “therapeutic dead-end” after a systematic review concluded the controversial treatment was no more effective than placebo drugs. Professor Paul Glasziou, a leading academic in evidence based medicine at Bond University, was the chair of a working party by the National Health and Medical Research Council which was tasked…
The Purse That Blinds Paparazzi And 4 Other Things You’ll Be Wearing In The Future The celebrities at last night’s Met Gala red carpet weren’t half as cool as this by Tasbeeh Herwees , Jordan Crucchiola Source: Red Hair Could Be The Key To Eternal Youth—Or At Least Looking Younger | GOOD
The national suicide rate is at its highest in nearly 30 years. Why? (Photo: Silvia Sala/Flickr) So much for a country built on boundless optimism. More Americans are committing suicide now than at any other time in the last 30 years, according to a new analysis by the National Center for Health Statistics. The NCHS…
Hide captionBaby spotted eagles open wide for the camera in the Polessye State Radioecological Reserve in Belarus. END CLASS=”IMAGECAPTION” END CLASS=”HSLIDE” END CLASS=”AUX” END CLASS=”HSLIDEWRAP” Valeriy Yurko/Polessye State Radioecological Reserve END CLASS=”PHOTOCREDIT” Hide captionA herd of ponies in the brush. Researchers studying large mammals in the area around Chernobyl found robust population numbers. END CLASS=”IMAGECAPTION”…
I’m pissed at myself right now. I’m a science writer, and I just turned in one of my biggest articles to date. Over the course of several months I interviewed nearly a dozen researchers and scientists around the globe to get the scoop on the pretty cool uses of a new technology. But as my…
Every year, tens of millions of experiments are performed on living mice, rats, birds, fish, frogs, or invertebrates. Usually, when the test is finished, the animal is killed. Recently, I was allowed into a secure animal-testing facility on the condition that I not reveal its name or location—the testing is highly controversial—and I witnessed an experiment on…
Twenty years ago, Sesame Street ran a special segment warning US children about the risks of lead. And 20 years later, Last Week Tonight‘s John Oliver brought the Sesame Street cast to his show to highlight America’s continuing lead epidemic. As Oliver told Elmo (who offered $1.76 from his piggy bank to help), America’s lead…
We’re a month away from going over budget in using this year’s planetary resources. One way to balance our ecological books is to eat more insects. By mid-summer of each year, we use up the Earth. Known as Earth Overshoot Day, it’s the day, sometime in August, when our yearly demand for ecological resources exceeds…
One of those homes had been Anna and Davey’s, and now it was just Davey inside with the doors locked and bed sheets blocking the windows. His mother’s medications were still stacked on the counter. Those were her clothes strewn across the living room, her microwaved jambalaya leftovers in the sink and her $8.75 liter…
SpaceX has finally landed its Falcon 9 rocket on a drone ship at sea, after launching the vehicle into space this afternoon. It’s the first time the company has been able to pull off an ocean landing, after four previous attempts ended in failure. Today’s success is a crucial milestone for SpaceX, as it shows the…