1. Analyzing John Brooks’ Dream About Scoring the Winning Goal Source: Time.com, ‘HEALTH’ section (17 June) One-line summary: A US soccer player scored a goal and then says he previously had a dream about doing so. So then, can your dreams predict or influence your future? Scientists say maybe or maybe not. By which they mean: […]
Yesterday morning I watched an interesting breakfast TV show here in Accra, on Ghana’s GTV. Interesting for three reasons: (a) because it illustrated the passionately articulate and comfortably personable nature of many Ghanaians, with whom just about any quick chat can escalate into an eloquent debate within seconds; (b) because […]
The search for the missing Malaysian Airlines flight MH370 is a vastly complex endeavour. But it’s an empirical endeavour — it requires valid and reliable measurement and scanning methods, and an ability to objectively verify and triangulate all incoming data in order to draw logical conclusions about where to look next. […]
Is it me, or are sample sizes just getting smaller? I mean, last time round we had that scare story warning us that the art of parenting is being destroyed by smartphones — you know, the one based on observations of 40 adults in a fast food restaurant in Boston. Turns out that 40 […]
I’ve concluded that they’re right. Mobile phones DO addle the brain. They DO interfere with competent cognition. They DO cause people to become rambling, incoherent, and negligent thinkers, and to talk ever-more-ridiculous garbage. But their effects are quite subtle. They cause this result in some people simply by existing: all these folks […]
I’m on a bus, ploughing its way through an excessive headwind as yet another Atlantic storm blasts us to colour-coded distress (we are Code Red now; there are no more colours left). But even in distress, we have clever scientifically literate headlines. Fair play to RTE’s news website people for […]
