Slate
Podcast: Why do people donate kidneys to strangers? Is altruism an evolved human trait?
Penny Lane gave up months of wages and weeks of her life to have her kidney cut out and given ...
Today’s anti-vaccination protests have roots in a long-running and often lurid American ‘medical freedom movement’
In the 1820s and 1830s, acolytes of New Hampshire autodidact Samuel Thomson fought the imposition of medical licensure requirements, arguing ...
Treating manic depression and mental illness is the ‘final frontier’ of CRISPR gene therapy
Since the 1980s, scientists have been searching for the genetic root of manic-depression, to better understand it and treat it, ...
Tune out the media noise: Vaccine mandates are mostly being embraced — and they’re working
Apparently some editors have decided it’s just a fine idea to blast out the tidbit that Americans are quitting their ...
‘Simple and ugly’: Reddit group named after Republican COVID denier Herman Cain grimly catalogues those who died after mocking seriousness of the coronavirus
HermanCainAward, one of the fastest-growing subreddits on Reddit.com, is exactly what it sounds like: an archive of those who have ...
How do religious COVID vaccine exemptions work — and how do you prevent people from abusing them?
The idea of a religious exemption as a concept has a long and complicated history in the U.S., but it ...
Musician Nicki Minaj hesitates to get a COVID vaccine because it ‘caused a friend of a friend to become impotent’. Let’s review the evidence
Nicki Minaj turned a lot of heads [September 13] when she told her 22 million followers on Twitter that she ...
‘Last and only hope’: With global banana crop under siege from fungal disease, CRISPR may be only remaining solution
The banana as we know it is in trouble. Emerging reports suggest the fruit’s deadliest disease has been spotted in ...
Brains make the difference: Here’s the root of human self-reflection and self awareness
Editor’s note: This is an excerpt from Know Thyself: The Science of Self-Awareness by Stephen M. Fleming. What is it ...
‘Stop conflating all biotechnology with genetic engineering’: The case for more refined USDA regulations
Policymakers had known for years that the U.S. regulation of crop biotechnology was out of date, and by 2016, discussions ...
Promises and pitfalls of treating aging like a disease
Over the years, the movement to classify aging as a disease has gained momentum not only from longevity enthusiasts but ...
Viewpoint: China’s coronavirus is getting all the attention, but this year’s flu season is more frightening
What we appear to be having this year is a flu-the-trickster season. And while that new coronavirus is getting a lot of attention, ...
Was Darwin wrong about ‘survival of the fittest’? Collaboration may be just as natural as competition
To put it simply, we have let Darwinism set the horizon of possibility for human behavior. Competition has become a ...
‘Genome doping’: Gene-edited babies could change the world of athletics
With the taboo on human gene editing in the process of being shattered, children whose genomes have been modified before ...
Accused sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein’s obsession with scientists: ‘He collects beautiful minds’
As the New York Times reported [July 31], [Jeffrey] Epstein’s “passion for cutting-edge science” at times verged into eugenics. Multiple ...
‘The numbers’ tell us that anti-vaxxers may not be to blame for recent measles outbreaks
On June 5, the number of measles cases in the U.S. this year passed 1,000, a milestone the country last ...
Viewpoint: ‘Astrology-style answers’ show the darker side of consumer genetic tests
[T]he same thing that drives some people toward astrology drives others toward mail-in test kits: People want to learn more ...
Podcast: Is the ‘bliss gene’ real?
In the interview, Maria Konnikova is back for another round of “Is That Bullshit?” Because Mike experiences less anxiety than ...
‘Crisis-level precautions’: How hospitals fight new era of superbugs
[Superbug Candida auris can] survive for weeks outside a patient—on sinks and mattresses, door knobs and bedside tables. To eradicate ...
Viewpoint: No, we don’t need a moratorium on germline gene editing
Should researchers put the brakes on genetically engineering babies? Leading scientists and ethicists recently called for a moratorium on clinical applications of germline ...
Fears of gene editing in the US could be stoked by Russian disinformation attacks
[There’s a] risk to gene drive research that has flown under the radar. This threat combines legitimate concerns about the ...
Should we strive to engineer better humans?
While proposals like cognitive or moral enhancements to help create a less doomsday-prone population are quite speculative (and on occasion, ...
Artificial intelligence could manage our health. But can we trust it?
In May, [startup Beta Bionics] received Food and Drug Administration approval to start clinical trials on what it calls a “bionic pancreas ...
Don’t expect ‘instantaneous eureka moment’ in search for alien life
From War of the Worlds and Arrival to SETI and Stephen Hawking, both pop culture and scientists feed the expectation that the discovery of extraterrestrial life will ...
Viewpoint: Here’s why the controversial field of epigenetics is ‘so alluring’
I think of stories I’ve been told about my grandmother in 1945 Japan. … It feels plausible, and poetic, to ...
Viewpoint: It’s time to stop ‘connecting race to intelligence’
The race-and-IQ debate is back. The latest round started a few weeks ago when Harvard geneticist David Reich wrote a ...
Viewpoint: Population declines are a greater crisis than extinctions
Forget extinctions. Population decline is a much greater crisis. ... We watch for extinctions like those with the thought that, ...