Science Controversies
‘Plasticity’: Can psilocybin support healthy aging by transforming the brains of older adults?
The study, known as PLASTICITY (Psychedelic Longitudinal Aging Study In Cognitively Healthy Older Adults), is the first psychedelic neuroimaging study specifically ...
Trump administration pushes to bring AI “doctors” into U.S. healthcare. The promise — and the risks.
Today, chatbots can only legally offer medical guidance with a disclaimer attached: Neither the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, nor ...
Viewpoint: The booming longevity anti-aging skin care hoax
Historically, anti-aging has been rooted in prevention (think sunscreen or retinoids for wrinkles), not instant results. ... Driven by the broader ...
Kennedy’s nutrition prescription for medical schools: Real problem, bad cure
Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. has turned a recognized challenge — medical students receive too little ...
Texas Air Force base flu outbreak soars to over 220 cases, and one soldier has died after Secretary Hegseth scrapped mandatory military flu shots
In a new social media post, a U.S. Congressman is demanding answers about what led to a major flu outbreak ...
Which is better for building healthy farm soil? Organic offers no special edge.
Soil health is driven by soil organic matter, which is driven by plant biomass inputs, which are driven by photosynthesis ...
Viewpoint: How the Trump administration is thwarting the will of Congress and starving American science
Although research has bipartisan support in the US Congress, and trust in science is above 75% across the country, the ...
The American Medical Association doctors declare war on RFK, Jr.’s attack on safe vaccines
At the American Medical Association’s annual meeting ..., members of the group’s House of Delegates are sending a clear message ...
Viewpoint: As the International Association for Research on Cancer loses influence, activists and trial lawyers scramble to protect a lucrative playbook
This past week, US Department of State, together (nominally) with the Department of Health and Human Services, effectively discredited any ...
Daubert for Dummies—Scientific Reliability in U.S. Courts: Daubert, Rule 702, and Made-for-Litigation Evidence
A New York federal appeals court is poised to decide one of the more consequential courtroom battles over scientific evidence ...
COVID lab leak? Making a case that the Wuhan market origins theory is wrong
It is imperative that those of us who support and defend biotechnology confront the strong possibility that a foolish and ...
Viewpoint—Protecting baloney science: Far right senators move to protect the phony homeopathy industry
Senators Mike Lee (R-UT) and Tommy Tuberville (R- AL) have recently introduced a bill that would limit the FDA’s ability ...
Viewpoint: Embryos are becoming the newest battleground of love, loss, and legal uncertainty
Who owns a future-person? As IVF outpaces the law, embryos are becoming the newest battleground of love, loss, and legal ...
Activist organization accuses Trump of protecting methane-generating stripper wells to benefit billionaire and donor Jeffrey Hildebrand
This story was originally published by ProPublica. It was before dawn on a Friday in January when a Gulfstream G600 ...
Viewpoint—Recursive self-improvement: AI leader Anthropic calls for AI slowdown
For most of AI’s history, humans drove every step in its development cycle. But at Anthropic, we are delegating a ...
Trump-appointed cancer panel head backed by supplement and anti-vaccine companies promotes discredited support for ivermectin as a potential cure
The chair of the President’s Cancer Panel is a co-author on a new paper promoting ivermectin as a cancer treatment ...
AAP v. Kennedy: While a court challenge grinds on, RFK Jr. quietly advances his anti-vaccine conspiracy agenda
The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) v Kennedy litigation is now running on two parallel tracks. Legal actions are under way both ...
Facts & Fallacies Podcast: The truth about vitamin K shots
Social media has been awash in panic as one influencer after another wrongly warns prospective parents against the routine (and ...
Viewpoint: Behind the effort to re-purpose the tobacco attack strategy to fight ultra-processed foods
Tobacco companies spent decades honing marketing strategies, flavor engineering and processing technologies that helped addict consumers to cigarettes. Then, in ...
Viewpoint: ‘Steroid Olympics’ marketing stunt: ‘It seemed less like a sporting event and more like a loss leader to peddle testosterone injections, GLP-1s, and peptides’
Testosterone. Methenolone. Nandrolone. Human growth hormone and EPO. Meldonium, modafinil, and mixed amphetamine salts. Clomiphene, anastrozole, levothyroxine, and liothyronine. Patches ...
Turmeric supplements: More risks than benefits
Turmeric supplements have become a booming “natural” health product, promoted for everything from inflammation and joint pain to general disease ...
Viewpoint: While unvaccinated children are dying overseas, Congress challenges Trump and Kennedy’s block on aid
A bipartisan group of US lawmakers is calling on the Trump administration to restore US funding for Gavi, the Vaccine ...
Viewpoint: COVID lab leak? Misguided backers of the lab leak theory refuse to give up
[W]hen I learned that Lord Matt Ridley had been invited to speak at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) about ...
Six key health insights from taking weight-loss drugs
Tens of millions of people around the world are now taking drugs like Ozempic — a kind of real-time experiment ...
Selective Pressure, Selective Silence
Human evolution, particularly of the brain, ended a long time ago—at least that is what many educated people, wary of ...
Will hi-tech genetic fortune-telling really help parents make healthier children?
Like high-tech fortune-telling, the screening estimates the chances that embryos will produce children at risk for thousands of illnesses, from ...
‘Toxin’ detox: A gastroenterologist weighs in on $71 billion health trend
In 2025, the detoxification industry worldwide was valued at over $71 billion, and some estimates have that number approaching $120 ...
