If you've ever wondered why birthers, inside jobbers, and other conspiracy theorists won't simply take the truth at face value, two researchers at OSU have found that we tend to ignore - and reject - instant corrections to data.
The study, performed by R. Kelly Garrett and Brian Weeks, examined what happens when untruthful information is immediately corrected in a news story.
TED is dedicated to ideas worth spreading. And that leaves many wondering exactly which ideas have been spread the most widely in the six years that TEDTalks videos have been available online. Here, a list of the 20 most-watched talks on all the platforms we track: TED.com, YouTube, iTunes, embed and download, Hulu and more, as of November 2012.
From education to brain function to inspiring messages to techno-possibilities, this list represents quite a breadth of topics.
Maybe it's the Euro crisis that seems to have turned the brains of the European Union's (probably male) image-makers soft. You can hardly spend all week trying to bail out Greece, hang onto Spain and keep Germany from getting surly (never a good idea) without making a mistake or two somewhere else.
We all know that birthdays can be full of hazards – candles in close proximity to hairspray, excessive alcohol consumption, aggressively forced merriment, the realization of our inevitably advancing decrepitude -- but “Happy Deathday To You” doesn’t quite have the same ring to it, does it?
Yet researchers who have studied more than two million people over the course of two decades have found that the term might be apt: we are more likely to die on our own birthday than any other day of the year.
I'm not going to make a joke about "playing with your food." I think we're all above that. But you should all know that some MIT students have developed a bit of tech that will allow you to make your excess produce into a musical instrument.
Actually, the MaKey MaKey is even cooler than that -- I just wanted to pick an application that's relevant to Grist, and I figured, food, right?
Horseshoe crabs have bright blue blood. They are like aliens. (Does this one not look like a dead alien?) Nature, you are weird.
Robert Krulwich explains why the crabs’ blood is so beautifully blue:
Their blood kind of sloshes around in their bodies carrying oxygen to various organs, as our blood does.
Our blood is red because we use hemoglobin to move oxygen around.
From Science Made Cool: On her blog, anatomist Diane Kelly explores her thought process as she prepares to give a serious talk about science -- in 12 minutes. The key? Careful editing and a good story. From the piece:
Classes and department seminars usually take about 45 minutes. The TEDMED limit? 12 minutes. Obviously, as Carl Zimmer pointed out in…
Manhattanhenge is cool, but it happens twice a year. Ditto Supermoons. Solar eclipses are less common, but nothing like today's astronomical weirdness. This afternoon and evening, Venus will pass in front of the sun, for the last time in your lifetime unless you are a robot or a Time Lord. Here's why you should try to watch it, and how.
Professor Stephen W. Morris explains why a domino can knock over another domino about 50% larger than itself.
The oldest recorded supernova was observed by the Chinese in 185 A.D., when documenting a mysterious guest star that remained in the sky for eight months. This is a multi-wavelength view of all that remains of the oldest documented supernova, named RCW 86. Data from four different space telescopes were used to create this image.
A young and exceptionally bright supernova remnant in our Galaxy. Located toward the center of the Milky Way, about 14,700 light years from Earth.
160,000 light years away in a large magellanic cloud 2,400 massive stars in the center of 30 Doradus are producing intense radiation and powerful winds as they blow off material.
At a distance of 1,500 light years the Orion Nebula is one of the closest star formation regions from Earth.
Massive young stars captured by NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory.
The first flight of Gossamer Penguin, a solar-powered aircraft, took place in California, 1979.
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On the Redbird Reed, off the coast of Delaware, subway cars have been intentionally sunk to construct artificial reefs supplementing the marine habitat. The diving researchers defied the poor visibility of the green waters, and detected a vital marine life growing on the cars.
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Neil deGrasse Tyson address the importance of prioritizing the American space program and igniting scientific curiosity in the general public.
Michael Huemer, an expert at formulating logical arguments, details the irrationality of politics.
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