Genetic Literacy Project
Viewpoint: Is Trump turning against RFK, Jr.’s vaccine rejectionism?
Every fall, I scramble to get my garden hoses into storage before the first deep freeze. Like clockwork, every spring, ...
Trump administration’s gutting of USAID fuels a health and science crisis
In the rice-growing region of Nueva Ecija in the Philippines, smallholder farmers who supply local markets have long relied on ...
Here’s why some foods need to be ultra-processed—and how to make better food choices
If you’ve read nutrition headlines lately, you’ve probably seen “ultra-processed foods” thrown around with increasing urgency, most likely framed as ...
Viewpoint: How wrong was Paul Ehrlich about population’s negative impact on growth? Just look at India
In 1968, a little-known ecologist named Paul Ehrlich published The Population Bomb, which aimed to bring attention to the perceived ...
Shilajit Ayurvedic sex drive-boosting myth: Tar-like ooze extracted from Himalayan rocks doesn’t work
Shilajit is the latest supplement marketed online as a “natural testosterone booster”. Promoted by influencers, wellness brands and biohacking communities, ...
Viewpoint: Researchers claiming living near nuclear energy causes cancer botched their research
In December 2025, researchers led by Yazan Alwadi at Harvard’s T.H Chan School of Public Health published a paper in ...
Viewpoint — RFK, Jr. vs. fluoride: The next big health brawl—science be damned
The EPA recently took its first step toward determining safe levels of fluoride in drinking water, publishing a "Preliminary Assessment ...
What are the consequences of agriculture misinformation—and how to fight back
Is organic farming better than non-organic farming? Should farmers feed antibiotics and steroids to their animals? Such debates about food ...
Hypnagogic state: The twilight zone between sleep and wakefulness is a creative sweet spot. Here’s how you can make it work for you
The Beatles’ song Yesterday was written in what psychologists refer to as the “hypnagogic state”. This is the twilight zone ...
Why the herbicide glyphosate is key to sustainable agriculture
Here are some reasons why there could not be sustainable agriculture without herbicides like those containing glyphosate. Sustainable Farming: The ...
Netflix plastic documentary is scare nonsense packaged as science
Netflix, which has made simplified propaganda many times before (See: Dopesick), sticks to a familiar formula in a thoroughly slanted ...
GLP podcast: Overdose crisis—Illicit opioids spread like drug-resistant bacteria?
The harder the government cracks down on a drug, the more deadly its illicit replacement that emerges from the black ...
Viewpoint: Is vaping a pathway to tobacco addiction or quitting tobacco altogether? It depends
In November, I got a LinkedIn message from a consultant who works for one of the major vape (aka e-cigarette) ...
Microplastic scare claims take another turn—Study suggests lab gloves may be key culprit
It seems like every day a new study finds tiny plastic particles called microplastics where they should not be: in ...
Ultra-processed food: The term UPF is less than 20 years old. Here’s its social justice origins
Ultra-processed foods now make up more than 50% of the American diet. They are also less expensive and better tasting ...
Viewpoint: Worried about Big Ag and Big Pharma? They’re nothing compared to the grifting hypocrisy of the MAHA wellness movement
RFK Jr. rails endlessly against Big Pharm and Big Food. And, in many instances, for good reason. But there is ...
From ideology to engineering: As green opposition to nuclear energy softens, the debate shifts to what can scale
For years, the country’s major environmental groups stood shoulder to shoulder against nuclear power. That unanimity may be starting to ...
How liberal Paul Ehrlich’s 1970s “Population Bomb” panic helped shape today’s anti-immigration ideology
Paul Ehrlich opened his 1968 book “The Population Bomb” with a scene recounting returning to his hotel through a crowded ...
Viewpoint: The activist ‘harm reduction’ movement has hit a brick wall with its targeting of food
Activists are never wrong. When their policies miss, they just move the goalposts. When their jobs (and income) are based ...
A longer leash on life: The no longer quixotic quest to extend our dogs’ golden years
Dog owners do many things to keep our canine companions happy and healthy, and I’m no exception. I flew from ...
‘No fury like scorned MAHA moms’: Will RFK, Jr.’s anti-vaccine policies tear coalition apart?
Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is fielding pressure from the White House to relax his controversial ...
Viewpoint — Glyphosate: Ecological villain or environmental scapegoat?
Glyphosate may just be the most polarizing chemical in modern agriculture, if not modern society. Since the World Health Organization’s ...
Viewpoint: There are dangerous consequences to firing credible scientists and gutting U.S. health agencies
In the past year, more than half of the leaders of the Institutes and Centers (IC) at the National Institutes ...
Congress created a mechanism to address rare vaccine injuries. RFK, Jr. is poised to tear it apart
For nearly four decades, Americans who believe they have been harmed by a vaccine have had access to a little-known ...
Viewpoint: In defense of plastics (and a rebuttal of ideology-infused misinterpretations of risk science)
Close observers will note that journalists in the legacy press have a perplexing habit of engaging in outright activism for ...
Send women to jail for decades for having an abortion? Extremist Republicans get pushback, even from some in their own party
When a trio of Republican state lawmakers introduced a bill last year that would subject women who obtain abortions to ...
GLP podcast: Does industry funding corrupt science? The ‘shill gambit,’ debunked
It's a charge many scientists face: they post a factual tweet refuting common misinfo about vaccines, pesticides or some other ...
RFK, Jr. and the Trump administration’s political purge of scientists echoes the darkest days of the McCarthy period
Something sinister and yet vaguely familiar has been happening in American public health policy. This week’s federal court decision reversing ...
