Back when I was starting out in science and parenthood, more or less simultaneously, behaviorism was all the rage: Provide the right stimulus, you’ll get the right response.
Photo by Jelleke Vanooteghem on Unsplash
Photo by Vincent Chin on Unsplash
The bestseller we keep rewriting
“When the pulse of the first day carried it to the rim of night, First Woman said to First Man, ‘The people need to know the laws. To help them we must write the laws for all to see’”
The Cydonia region of Mars, as imaged by the Mars Express spacecraft • ESA / DLR / FU Berlin / Kevin M. Gill (CC BY 2.0)
On Mars, it’s a matter of saving face
Hi folks, I’m your host, Chet Raymo, and this is your favorite talk show, “Let’er Rip.” Our guest today is Barney Bunkum, whose book, “Face-Off on Mars,” takes a hard look at the latest NASA photos from the Red Planet.
Composite image of the four Galilean moons of Jupiter • NASA/JPL/DLR
Adam, Badam, bo-Badam
Legend has it that Adam was allowed by the Creator to name all the creatures of the Earth.
Photo by Sophie Dale on Unsplash
We’re just one big happy family
Summertime! The season of family reunions. And this year I was fortunate enough to be invited to the first-ever Primate Family get-together, as representative of the Homo sapiens branch of the family.
Photo by Ekaterina Shakharova on Unsplash
Whatever are grandmothers for?
Let me ‘fess up: I’m happily married to a grandmother.
A parapsychological experiment • Image by Francis Wickware (Public Domain)
Is it mind over matter, or mind over data?
In a basement lab of Princeton University’s engineering school, a group of scientists is investigating the powers of mind over matter.
Artist's impression of an Earth impacting asteroid• Illustration by Kevin Gill (CC BY 2.0)
When your hour is up
Doc, you’ll remember me. I am the fellow who was here a little more than a year ago — worrying about rocks from the sky.
A tiger swallowtail • Photo by Tom Raymo
Beauty and the brain
It was one of those blessed days. In the morning I saw a tiger swallowtail butterfly.
Photo by Renee Grayson (CC BY 2.0)
Kindred spirits
“A lifetime can be spent in a Magellanic voyage around the trunk of a single tree,” writes Harvard biologist Edward O. Wilson in his autobiography.