Black Hole Lane, Rauks (Rocks), Worm on the Tree of Life

This week’s Feedback column (that I write) in New Scientist magazine has three segments. Here are bits of each of them: Mapping black holes — Richard Notley has been wondering down a dark path… and found enlightenment in remarks made by mathematician Roger Penrose (New Scientist, 19 November 2022) about the structure of the universe. He writes: “Roger […]

Double Standards Days / Non-AI Sheep-counting / Science vs. Judiciary Laws

This week’s Feedback column (that I write) in New Scientist magazine has four segments. Here are bits of each of them: Double standards— World Standards Day 2023 will arrive soon, two days after it arrives. As Feedback noted last year (17 September 2022), having double Standards Days is standard behaviour. This year, most of the world will officially celebrate […]

Ig Nobels in my column this week in New Scientist

This week’s Feedback column (that I write) in New Scientist magazine is about the new Ig Nobel Prize winners. The Feedback column was created and edited by John Hoyland. I first knew Feedback (and John’s work) as a subscriber to New Scientist. Every year the column would have an especially fun and interesting writeup of the new Ig […]

Posthumous phoning / Gaming with Freud / More trivial superpowers

This week’s Feedback column (that I write) in New Scientist magazine has four segments. Here are bits of each of them: When conversation dies — “Can the dead communicate with cell phones?” asks the headline of a press release from King’s University College, Canada…. The press release explains: “Dr. Imants Barušs, Professor of Psychology, has been awarded a $44,500 […]

Improbable Research