This week’s Feedback column (that I write) in New Scientist magazine has four segments. Here are bits of each of them: A jerk and a creep — “Hidden jerk in universal creep and aftershocks” may sound like the name of a Hollywood movie – and maybe some day it will be. But for now, it is exclusively […]
Category: Extra-Improbable columns
Our columns in other publications — The ‘Feedback’ column in New Scientist magazine, beginning in September 2022, and the “Improbable Research”column that ran for 13 years in The Guardian newspaper.
Tea sugar, Packaging philosophy, Leftist food (Bento), Superpower
This week’s Feedback column (that I write) in New Scientist magazine has four segments. Here are the beginnings of each of them: A spoonful of sugar? — Should one take sugar in one’s tea? Feedback is mindful of two things about this question. For one, nearly everyone, in the UK especially, considers (or pretends to consider) the […]
Uber-Prolific Publishing, Hanging, Standing, Punching
This week’s Feedback column (that I write) in New Scientist magazine has four segments. Here are bits of each of them: Publish but be damned — … The article explains that Luque, whose full name is Rafael Luque Alvarez de Sotomayor, has already published about 700 papers, and that “so far this year, Luque has published 58 […]
Does “the earthquake chewed my data” trump “the dog ate my homework”?
This week’s Feedback column (that I write) in New Scientist magazine has five segments. Here are the beginnings of each of them: Earthquake snack — The traditional excuse “the dog ate my homework” has a new counterpart: “the earthquake chewed my data.” … Strained fishy pun — Andrew Knapp and colleagues have added to the history of […]
Aesthetic scrotums, Workaday, Me-in-a-museum
This week’s Feedback column (that I write) in New Scientist magazine has three segments. Here are the beginnings of each of them: Aesthetic scrotums — Surprises abound in “The scrotum: A comparison of men’s and women’s aesthetic assessments”, a study done by plastic surgeon Carolin Eimer in Hamburg, Germany, and two colleagues at the Medical School of […]
Spacey & Timely Superpowers, Life in Triplicate, Man Sniffs Dog
This week’s Feedback column (that I write) in New Scientist magazine has four segments. Here are the beginnings of each of them: Spacey superpowers — Some people have a superior knowledge, and maybe control, of space and direction. That is evident in the harvest from Feedback’s call to identify trivial superpowers – a person’s ability to reliably do […]
Dickens Electrified / Catatonia From Catalonia / Unmasked Cochrane Report
This week’s Feedback column (that I write) in New Scientist magazine has three segments. Here are bits of each of them: Helluva Twist — CHARLES DICKENS and his writings are still being “interrogated” (that’s the word in use) by scholars, at least one of whom is almost electrified by what might be there.Jeremy Parrott, an antiquarian bookseller […]
Emperor’s Missing Heart, Vibrant Gut, More Trivial Superpowers, Greenfieldwashing
This week’s Feedback column (that I write) in New Scientist magazine has four segments. Here are bits of each of them: Find the emperor’s heart — Holy Roman Emperor Otto the Great certainly wasn’t, in the purest medical sense, heartless. But now he is. The search is on to find his missing heart, though it isn’t abundantly […]
Hypergunk, Nasal Warfare, and Musical-Taste Calcification
This week’s Feedback column (that I write) in New Scientist magazine has three segments. Here are bits of each of them: Nihilism and hypergunk — Irreducibly collective existence and bottomless nihilism aren’t for everyone. Or maybe they are. Jonas Werner, a philosopher at the University of Bern, Switzerland, published a crisp, perhaps irresistible, 16-page-long jotting called “Irreducibly […]
Arachnonecrocapitalism / Climate change nasality / Collision siding / Trivial superpowers
This week’s Feedback column (that I write) in New Scientist magazine has four segments. Here are bits of each of them: Arachnonecrocapitalism — The death of a spider in Texas has led to the birth of a philosophical movement, with Rice at both ends. This life-and-death saga began with a recent, almost instantly famous experiment at Rice University […]