Now on ScienceBlogs: My Mother's Hairbrush and the Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
David Dobbs on science, nature, and culture.
I write on science, medicine, nature, culture and other matters for the New York Times Magazine, The Atlantic, Slate, National Geographic, Scientific American Mind, and other publications. (Find clips here.) Right now I'm writing my fourth book, The Orchid and the Dandelion, which explores the hypothesis that the genetic roots some of our worst problems and traits — depresison, hyperaggression, violence, antisocial behavior — can also give rise to resilience, cooperation, empathy, and contentment. The book expands on my December 2009 Atlantic article exploring these ideas.
I've also written three books, including Reef Madness: Charles Darwin, Alexander Agassiz, and the Meaning of Coral, which traces the strangest but most forgotten controversy in Darwin's career — an elemental dispute running some 75 years.
If you'd like, you can subscribe to Neuron Culture by email. You might also want to see more of my work at my main website or check out my Tumblr log.
July 29, 2009
Category: Brains and minds
When you (or I, anyway) enter the process of writing a long piece, the very immersion that makes it so rewarding and entrancing is also something you resist, for you know that there you will disappear.
Posted by David Dobbs at 10:34 PM • 0 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
July 13, 2009
Category: Culture of science
The turf between science and religion is -- well, it's a gray area. And it seems perfectly fine to me to treat it the way Gray did: as a region not to tread in your day job. Science was empirical, and if it wasn't empirical, it wasn't science. Religion was belief -- a domain beyond proof. That's why they call it faith.
Posted by David Dobbs at 9:21 AM • 21 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
July 10, 2009
Category: Brains and minds
A look at runners who forget suffering, writers who forget they're stealing, mountain scenes that aren't, and swine flu that resists Tamiflu.
Posted by David Dobbs at 5:51 AM • 0 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
July 9, 2009
Category: Brains and minds
Good times never seemed so good, indeed. I would never have imagined what an impossibly infectious, joyful thing that could be. It was the most incredible large-group social event I've ever been a part of.
Posted by David Dobbs at 10:41 PM • 2 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
July 8, 2009
Category: Culture of science
I think it helps to have a sense of the history of science, which embeds in a writer or observer a sense of critical distance and an eye for large forces at work beneath the surface. Machinations in government surprise no one who has studied the history of government and politics. Likewise with science.
Posted by David Dobbs at 11:16 AM • 3 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
I must keep my nose on the not-beta, hidden-till-last-minute, writing-Not-For-FREE grindstone, where it's getting shredded to bits -- but in the meantime, wanted to pass on these worthy web distractions, worthy of full engagement if you've the time
Posted by David Dobbs at 9:51 AM • 1 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
July 7, 2009
Category: Brains and minds
The story's opening, which tells of a parent seemingly overeager to medicate a child who didn't need it, gives an idea of why this question is more important than we might like.
Posted by David Dobbs at 3:52 PM • 0 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Culture of science
As prominent neuroscientist Jane Costello resigns in protest from the DSM-V committee, Danny Carlat says the process near meltdown:
Posted by David Dobbs at 3:00 PM • 5 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
July 4, 2009
Category: Digital culture
In case you missed them (or miss them, and want to read again ...)
Posted by David Dobbs at 2:22 PM • 0 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Matters military
"There's a reason that counterinsurgency mantras include Get Off The FOB and Don't Commute To The Fight. The greater the distance -- not just physically, but also culturally -- from a populace, the fewer opportunities U.S. troops have to demonstrate to that populace that U.S. actions are in their interest."
Posted by David Dobbs at 10:49 AM • 1 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
