Is human development straight or branching? How important were long legs and big brains?
Category: Latest News
Welcome to our archive of news stories relevant to the project of fighting fashionable nonsense. The stories are drawn from the electronic pages of the world’s media. On this page, you’ll find links to those stories that have been featured on Butterflies and Wheels during the current year. At the bottom of the page, you’ll find links to separate archives of stories from previous years.
We’re always pleased to hear about news stories that you think should be featured on Butterflies and Wheels. Just send an email here, if you want to point one out to us.
A note about links
Inevitably links go out of date. We suggest, therefore, that you make hard-copies of the stories that particularly interest you.
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Guardian List of 101 Women ‘Intellectuals’
Desperate list includes singers, actors, novelists, fashion designers.
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Tony Judt on Edward Said
Frowned on overfamiliarity with “theory” at the expense of close textual reading.
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EU Commissioner Nails Vatican ‘Bigotry’
Opposition to condoms ‘hurting and bringing into great danger the lives of millions out there.’
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Orders to Get Religion Get Blunter Every Day
‘If Kerry’s really secular, he’s abnormal.’
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Polio Vaccinations can Resume in Nigeria
Confirmation that Kano will start vaccinating again is huge relief to WHO.
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Letters to the Guardian on GM Food
‘If scientific evidence cannot be accepted as good grounds for decision-making, what can?’
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It Takes a Big Brain to Make a Trickster
Machiavellian intelligence, complex social skills, large primate brains go together.
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Carl Zimmer on Machiavellian Monkeys
Big brains and theory of mind are useful for lying and manipulating.
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More than 4000 Scientists Protest
Scientists accuse Bush administration of twisting science for its own ideological ends.
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Whither the US Public Intellectual?
Decline, advance? Better, worse? More insular, more public? Yes. Or no.
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Dale Peck and Tom Eliot: Cool Pair
Criticism, gangster rap, extreme makeovers – all part of the entertainment industry.
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The Guardian Considers ‘Presentism’
How far off the hook should we let morally obtuse people who are long gone?
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Problems With the Precautionary Principle
Our obsession with keeping safe can expose us to new dangers.
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Cellphones and Actor-observer Paradox
Mobiles give delusions of grandeur and a segregating sense of superiority.
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West and Central Africa at Risk of Polio
Officials announced a 22-country synchronized vaccination campaign for autumn.
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Astronomer Martin Rees Considers the Future
Our Final Century says we are on thin ice.
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Vetting of Government Scientists on WHO Panels
Science is supposed to be an open process, not a government-approved one.
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Horrible Prediction
‘Ten or fifteen years from now, appeals to religious Americans will be an accepted part of liberal politics.’
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Not Worth Doing? Not Worth Doing Well
Daniel Dennett on chmess and the wilting of 995 flowers.