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The odd thing about the Pfizer story is that it is old news.  Fierce Pharma href="http://www.fiercepharma.com/story/pfizer-takes-2-3b-bextra-charge/2009-01-26">wrote about it on 26 January 2009, and Neuron Culture href="http://scienceblogs.com/neuronculture/2009/01/…

...and the steel hits the flesh.  Mark Rosenberg, MD, representing the href="http://www.researchamerica.org/pgr_society">Paul G. Rogers Society for Global Health Research, had an opinion piece published in the Boston Globe.  He makes a good point about health.  It is not just…

The health care reform process is getting extremely ugly.  href="http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/healthcare/la-na-healthcare-insurers24-2009aug24,0,6925890.story"> href="http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/healthcare/la-na-healthcare-insurers24-2009aug24,0,…

href="http://www.researchblogging.org"> alt="ResearchBlogging.org" src="http://www.researchblogging.org/public/citation_icons/rb2_large_gray.png" style="border: 0pt none ;"> A fair amount has been written about the topic of motivated reasoning.  Jonah Lehrer href="http://…

Some irreverent souls have taken to Sunday blogging on a freethinking themes.  I choose to Ozymandize* that which we worship the most: our economic system. That plant in the middle is href="http://scienceblogs.com/corpuscallosum/2009/07/color_of_the_year_mimosa.php">my mimosa ( href="http…

IEEE href="http://spectrum.ieee.org/green-tech/fuel-cells/hydrogen-helper">reports that chicken feathers are superior to carbon nanotubes: src="http://photos-g.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc1/hs148.snc1/5494_920199924833_2254023_51033310_7917444_s.jpg" align="left" height="86" width="130">…

It is refreshing to see something like this.  Both drugs are available as generics, so the financial motivation for a study like this is not great.  But the clinical benefit could e substantial, albeit for a small subset of patients. Clozapine is considered to be the most efficacious…

At the Lawrence Hall of Science, at the University of California - Berkeley, there is a children's playground.  On the playground, theere is a whimsical sculture based on DNA.  Lots of people like it.  Indeed, Dr. Stemwedel wrote href="http://scienceblogs.com/ethicsandscience/2007/…

I haven't been a good blog-citizen lately.  And no, it is not because of fatigue.  Anyway, I've going to try to get back to looking at other people's blogs more, and not just here at ScienceBlogs.  Dr. Serani kindly href="http://drdeborahserani.blogspot.com/2009/08/5-reasons-you-…

The way that the debate over health care is being conducted is brazen and disturbing. If it turns out to be a flashpoint for violence -- as it may -- it will be profoundly ironic: our efforts to improve health care delivery, end up being a catalyst for generalized thuggery.

This is good.  Indeed, it may qualify as the type specimen ( href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holotype">holotype) of snark.  From The New Yorker: href="http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/hendrikhertzberg/2009/08/clinton-north-korea.html">It's So Obvious From Avi Zenilman,…

There is a short open-access article about whole-body neuronal MRI, in the most recent NEJM.  The authors describe a technique of visualizing peripheral nerves.  Normally, these are not seen very well on MRI.  This limits the usefulness of MR imaging for nerves outside of the central…

Botanical names drive me nuts, sometimes.  Every plant that is worth anything has many names.  The supposed gold standard, the (Latin) Linnaean taxonomical name, gets changed every so often.  So there is no constancy.  You'd think it would be easier to research something if it…

The Knowsley Safari Park wants their visitors to know that the babbons are smart.  They have figured out how to open car-top cargo carriers. This is not actually a candid photo.  It was staged, in order to educate the visitors about his potential problem with their Papio anubis…

Natalie Angier has another href="http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/21/science/21angier.html?sq=behavior%20what%20animals%20do&st=cse&scp=1&pagewanted=print">interesting article in the NYT.  In the article, she discusses the meaning of the word behavior.  Apparently, this all…

Alabama has decide to not allow a particular wine to be sold.  The reason is that the label contains "some nudity." MONTGOMERY, Ala. -- A wine label showing a nude nymph is too much for Alabama's liquor control agency, which has told restaurants and stores not to sell the product. The label…

We grow catnip in the garden outside the home-office window.  Our cat likes to lay in front of the window, and stare wistfully at the catnip. style="display: inline;"> But today, he saw something unexpected.  The neighbor's cat was laying in the catnip.

style="display: inline;"> The href="http://www.pantone.com/pages/pantone/pantone.aspx?pg=20634&ca=10">Pantone color of the year for 2009 happens to be: PANTONE 14-0848 Mimosa.  Something about this captured my attention. I was casually sipping from the Internet firehose when I…

This is one of those sickening things that is href="http://www.pamshouseblend.com/tag/Tasers">all too common: href="http://www.cnjonline.com/news/tucumcari-34303-year-chief.html?wap=0"> href="http://www.cnjonline.com/news/tucumcari-34303-year-chief.html?wap=0">Tucumcari police chief…

I got a kick out of this illustration.  It's from the coloring book at Neuroscience for Kids, showing what neuroscientists look like: style="display: inline;"> Neuroscience for Kids (link to pdf coloring book) Neuroscience for Kids (link to website)

href="http://annarbor.com/2009/07/didnt-get-enough-of-the-art-fairs-last-week-check-out-this-time-lapse-video.html">AnnArbor.com (HT: href="http://vielmetti.typepad.com/vacuum/2009/07/soft-launch-day-16.html">Edward Vielmetti) has a youtube time-lapse video at the href="http://en.wikipedia…

I was off-line for several days, because the modem toasted itself.  I didn't do it, honest!  It had been acting up for a couple of weeks, causing random "web site not found" errors.  If it happened very much, I'd reboot the thing and it would be better for a while. Finally, it…

A friend sent me a link to an article about the upcoming fifth edition of the American Psychiatric Association's Diagnostic and Statistical Manual.  The article speaks of flaws in the process, and warning of dire "unintended consequences." href="http://www.psychiatrictimes.com/print/article/…

Went for a Sunday drive.  Saw this: White Sands National Monument Drove a little farther, saw this: Odocoileus hemionus You might have guessed, I did not take the first picture.  It is a view from Earth orbit.  The second picture, I did take; it is a view through my…

A chart on Clusterstock (great name) by Kamelia Angelova (another great name) shows what I've suspected for a while: all the jobs created in the USA, during the Bush II years, were unsustainable.  All have been lost.  Meanwhile, the population has increased by about 23 million. …

Comparative Effectiveness Research (CER) has been controversial, as href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/03/16/AR2009031602913.html">noted in the Washington Post.  Admittedly, most of the controversy has been contrived.  Fortunately, the process is moving…

Psychology is turning out to be a rather important field these days.  Nate Hagens has a post on The Oil Drum, href="http://www.theoildrum.com/node/5519">The Psychological and Evolutionary Roots of Resource Overconsumption Revisited.  He reviews the evolutionary psychology of poor…

OK, folks, explain this to me.  It is a bicycle.  Bicycles are cool.  But from the looks of this thing, it seems as though it would be like riding an anvil around town.  Sure, it'd be great if you got hit by a Hummer.  The bike would be fine. style="display: inline;">…

PhysioProf commented about this back in 2006 after Alex Palazzo 's post, href="http://scienceblogs.com/transcript/2006/12/silent_mutations_inactivates_p.php">A silent mutation affects pain perception? That post discussed mutations that affect pain perception.  Now, there is a bit more…

It was the second-most-blogged article on the NYT when I got up this morning; now, it is the first-most-blogged.  It is the article that reports on a survey that shows 72% support for a government-run health insurance program.  The program would be similar to Medicare, but would be…