Back the summer of 2002 I recall a friend of mine telling me, "so you're a pundit now!" I'd been blogging for a few months, and I didn't feel like a pundit, whatever that meant. ~10 years on I guess I am a pundit. In that vein I was discussing with a friend what it... Read More

This morning on Twitter the estimable Carl Zimmer stated that I had "reported" on the recent paper on European skin pigmentation evolution. I wondered, wait, am I a reporter? I don't really know, and this really is rooted in the "am I a journalist" thread. I'm starting to get worn down by those who claim... Read More

Wanted to ping by readers on this: Since I'm a judge a few friends have asked if this is for real. Yes, it is.

I need to rationalize my process of modulating the stream of comments I get. Toward that end I am going to be posting an "open thread" once every week (I've scheduled the next month already). If you have the urge to leave an off-topic comment on a post immediately, just put it here. You can... Read More

This is probably relevant if you have a blog or run a webzine of some sort. It'll be much more abstract if you are a commenter, and can't relate concretely to weirdo creeps who persistently spam your comments and contact you via email. In relation to bloggingheads.tv my own two primary complaints from my experience... Read More

Interesting discussion on the nature of media today, and the tendency toward driving traffic via the information equivalent of Twinkies. Below are my top 10 posts since moving to Discover Magazine measured by visits. The numbers to the right is the ratio of visits of the post over the past 2 years to the rough... Read More

Apropos of the discussion below, Classic SNL Clip Of The Day: Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer. Probably one of the best arguments against resurrecting Neandertals.

There's something about this 1995 single from Collective Soul, The World I Know, which is redolent to me of the Pacific Northwest.* Yes, it's precious, but the Pacific Northwest is a bit precious. The land of misty mornings, SWPLs, and strong coffee. The shadows alternating with colorized high key lighting common in these alter-rock videos... Read More

Bora Zivkovic has what is basically a short history of science blogging up. I was one of those who was there at the beginning, and I honestly can't say that he left anything of great relevance out of the narrative. In normal circumstances I don't think much about what I do, I do. But one... Read More

I've been thinking that I should post about what it's been like being a blogger for 10 years. 1/3 of my recollected life! (I recall fragments of being 3, but continuity of self starts somewhere at the end of my 4th year) Actually, I always assumed I would do this post in 2012 when I... Read More

I highly recommend Åse Fixes Science, in light of our recent conversations about psychology. It's a fascinating and important discipline, but it is hard to make heads or tails of it all.

Just a heads up, Dr. Joseph K. Pickrell has begun moving on the Malagasy Ancestry Project. More information: Again, thanks to the people who contributed to genotype the second person. Second, there were several complaints in the origin

I'm not big into music, being of the aesthetically retarded set, but as I age memory becomes more important, and that is strongly colored by music. The 80s anthems of the Beastie Boys were part of the cultural firmament for me, but at that stage I was more of a Transformers kind of guy. In... Read More

Update: Actually, I was going to put up a post "10 years in blogging." But right now I don't have the time, seriously. 10 years is a LONG time though, so I now feel more comfortable talking about events "offline" which date to over half a decade in the past. One thing to note is... Read More

A "test" post showed up on this website earlier. I've been told it was probably an error by IT. I had no idea that it was even up because I was off the internet and not checking my phone for ~18 hours for various reasons. Just thought I'd pass that on....

They're bbbaaaccckkkk!

A regular issue that comes up on this weblog is that many of my posts are difficult to understand. I am aware of this. Unfortunately a problem is that there is a wide variation in fluency in genetics knowledge among the readership. To get a better sense I have created a survey with 60+ questions.... Read More

I haven't posted one of these in a long time. My own assumption is that I know the core readership of this weblog through various means relating to comments (many of you connect your email addresses to Facebook, and usually I can do an IP trace if that's not feasible). But I know many people... Read More

How U.S. Lost Out on iPhone Work: The story emphasizes that labor costs are not the primary issue here. There is the natural discussion of skill levels, and the sheer number of Chinese works coming online. But there simply is no way that Foxconn City could exist in the United States today. There is no... Read More

Because of scheduling conflicts* I can't make ScienceOnline2012 (I had planned to make it). But I thought I would put in an announcement here that in a month and a half I'll be at the Moving Secularism Forward conference put on by the Center for Inquiry. I'm going to be on a political panel on... Read More

With the collapse various North African regimes there has been a great concern about the migration of people from the southern shore of the Mediterranean to the northern. The of the reasons for this concern is that there is an imbalance in population growth. So I thought I'd review some of the data on Mediterranean... Read More

People often make "year end predictions." I haven't done that because I just haven't bothered. But, it's probably a nice way to see how full of crap you are. You can look back at how many mistakes you made, suggesting to you that you're really a lot more ignorant of the shape of reality than... Read More

That's the question a commenter poses, albeit with skepticism. First, the background here. New England was a peculiar society for various demographic reasons. In the early 17th century there was a mass migration of Puritan Protestants from England to the colonies which later became New England because of their religious dissent from the manner in... Read More