HEDGEHOGS AND FOXES
THE ANCIENT GREEK poet Archilochus remarked that a fox knows many things, whereas a hedgehog knows only one big thing. Twentieth-century philosopher Isaiah Berlin expanded on this idea in The … Continue reading
MARCH FOR SCIENCE—FULLERTON, CALIFORNIA
MARCHES FOR SCIENCE took place yesterday, Earth Day, April 22, 2017. They started in New Zealand and Australia and ran through time zones around the world. In Berlin, a March … Continue reading
ROMANCE OF THE SABRE-TOOTH CAT
LA BREA Tar Pits of 12,000 years ago are linked to a 1942 Romance of the Ranchos radio program and also to The New York Times published only yesterday. The … Continue reading
THIS VIDEO GAME IS ON ME
I ENJOY the time-gobbling hobby of building virtual GMax craft for use in Microsoft Flight Simulator. So it is with interest that I read the article “Video Games: The Bad, … Continue reading
MEASLES REDUX—AN IGNORANCE OF SCIENCE
ON SEPTEMBER 27, 2016, the Pan American Health Organization declared that “The Region of the Americas is the first in the world to have eliminated measles, a viral disease that … Continue reading
LOCKHEED MARTIN F-35—THE FINAL GENERATION?
MY INTERESTS in aviation are few beyond its Golden Age of the 1930s. However, I’m fascinated by the overwhelming technicalities of the Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II Joint Strike Fighter. … Continue reading
SCIENCE AND “AIR QUOTES”
ACCORDING TO White House press secretary Sean Spicer, we’re supposed to identify “air quotes” in presidential tweets about surveillance. And, says presidential senior advisor Kellyanne Conway, we’re to acknowledge “microwaves … Continue reading
SCIENCE AND GOVERNMENT POLICY
TWO SUCCESSIVE issues of Science magazine have multiple articles on science and government policy. Here I glean tidbits from two pieces in particular: Informing Policy with Science was a Science … Continue reading
HEY! YOU! GET OFF MY CLOUD!
PROFESSORS AT Worcester Polytechnic Institute’s Vernam Group hacked Amazon Web Services, the Cloud computing business that earned Amazon more than $6 billion in 2015. Then, honest guys that WPI’s Thomas … Continue reading
MAKE TOMATOES GREAT AGAIN!
MODERN TOMATOES don’t taste as good as they did in the old days. Nor are today’s commercial varieties as tasty as their heirloom counterparts. How come? Is there any hope … Continue reading
Simanaitis Says 