Special Report Special Report Viral lies, overwhelming uncertainty, and leadership that amplifies falsehoods and fear: no wonder we feel anguished by our information environment. During an election season of great consequence, what would make society less vulnerable to division? Policy & Ethics Stop arguing with people about what is true. Instead ask how they are […]
Sometimes it is the strange similarities and symmetries of unrelated historical moments that most clearly display the patterns of human experience. Archives separated by oceans can be in dialogue with each other. A case in point: in the National Library of Scotland and the national archives in Cuba, you can find unsettling documents detailing the […]
The confluence of misinformation and infectious disease isn’t unique to COVID-19. Misinformation contributed to the spread of the Ebola epidemic in West Africa, and it plagues efforts to educate the public on the importance of vaccinating against measles. But when it comes to COVID-19, the pandemic has come to be defined by a tsunami of […]
How would you feel about a new therapy for your chronic pain, which—although far more effective than any available alternative—might also change your religious beliefs? Or a treatment for lymphoma that brings one in three patients into remission, but also made them more likely to vote for your least preferred political party? These seem like […]
The risk factors for COVID-19 are many: old age; obesity; heart conditions. But early genetic studies have identified another trait that some people who develop severe COVID-19 seem to share: a cluster of genetic variations on their third chromosome. And that DNA sequence likely derives from Neanderthals, says Hugo Zeberg of the Max Planck Institute. […]
A truly great scientist not only makes significant technical contributions but also reshapes a discipline’s conceptual landscape through a commanding depth and breadth of vision. Theoretical physicist John D. Barrow, who passed away on September 26 at the age of 67, was one such individual. Barrow’s career spanned the golden age of cosmology, in which […]
In mid-September, with much of the American West engulfed in flames, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration announced that the Northern Hemisphere just experienced its hottest summer on record. Reports like this are increasingly common, and with each one climate change continues to morph from a vague notion of far-off future catastrophe to an unsettling reality […]
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“By now, I’ve lost any hope of educating my senior colleagues,” I joked after a lengthy debate about the educational implications of COVID-19 at a recent online faculty meeting. “Oh, stop it,” others protested. And in fact, the truth is that I do have hope. It rests squarely on the shoulders of the younger generation, […]
The items below are highlights from the free newsletter, “Smart, useful, science stuff about COVID-19.” To receive newsletter issues daily in your inbox, sign up here. David Tuller at Kaiser Health News reports that saliva tests for SARS-CoV-2 are catching on in the U.S., but only represent a “small percentage of the more than 900,000 […]