Science Advocacy
Science Advocacy
“Get Tinder, everyone has it!” I hear that from my peers too many times. “All you need to do is sit back, relax, and swipe!”
For those who don’t know: Tinder is a location-based social dating app that has over 50 million users worldwide1 and it works through a simple principle: look at a person’s pictures and swipe right if you’re interested, or swipe left if you’re not. On Tinder, everyone can have virtual autonomy and the opportunity to select their potential dating mates based on their pictures.
As a biologist, the big questions I have are: What do evolutionary and neurobiological theories tell us about the most common parts of the online dating process? Although culture and heritage highly influence the perception of beauty and the visual aspects of attraction, some studies suggest that our preferences may be influenced by evolutionary biology. So, let’s explore the steps from getting a match on Tinder to the actual date, and see what evolutionary and neurobiological theories can tell us about the dating process.
On July 12th, a group called The Coalition for Safer Food Processing and Packaging published a report online in which they claim to have detected a class of chemicals called phthalates in several boxed macaroni and cheese products. Phthalates are “plastisizers,” meaning that they are commonly used to improve flexibility and durability in many of the plastics used today. In the weeks that followed, the story spread across the internet and was reported by numerous news outlets and blogs. That such a story would be so widely reported is not surprising – mac & cheese is a very common food for kids these days (as well as poor college students) and no one wants to hear they are poisoning their children. But in this case, how the story was reported was perhaps even more interesting (at least to UYBFS contributors!), because it tells us a lot about how scientific information is communicated in our modern media landscape.
Before we get to that, let’s start with a discussion of risk. Is there any risk to children (or those poor college students) from the phthalates found in these products? Despite what many sources reported, the risk is almost certainly very low. Phthalates are definitely toxic in rats, where they act as endocrine disruptors. (An endocrine disruptor is a chemical that interferes with normal sex hormone signaling, and in the case of phthalates, they can alter sexual development and also cause changes in neurological development in rats.) Do they have the same effects in humans? Well, that’s not so clear. Some studies say that they do, others show no evidence of it. The uncertainty comes from the fact that humans are less sensitive to the endocrine effects of phthalates and the fact that while most people are exposed to phthalates, they aren’t exposed to very much.
Welcome to Ask a Scientist, where we answer questions from our readers on a wide range of scientific topics. Got a scientific question? Drop us a line.
Chemtrails aren’t real, right? – A.S. Riverhead, NY.
No, they are not.
Ok, now that this is out of the way, let’s have some fun and learn a bit more about what may be the most wildly preposterous modern conspiracy theory.
Q) What are chemtrails?
A) The word “chemtrail” is used to describe the cloudy trails of condensation (actually called “contrails”) that high altitude planes leave behind them in the sky that conspiracy theorists believe are actually chemicals being sprayed by planes into the atmosphere in an attempt to poison the human race.
Q) Wait, what?
A) That’s right – just read that last sentence again. Give it some time to sink in.Continue reading…
Almost everyone knows that the Earth is a sphere. Someday, we’ll be able to drop the “almost” from that sentence. Unfortunately, today is not that day. Two different flat Earth societies have now raised enough money for billboards. First, “The Infinite Plain Society” put up a billboard outside of Philidelphia that says “Research Flat Earth”. Soon afterwards, “The Flat Earth Society”, which somehow has over 80,000 likes on Facebook, probably not all of which are ironic, put up a billboard in Oklahoma that asks the question “Is the Earth flat?”
Just to be clear, the answer to this question is a very definitive “no”.
At UYBFS, we have written about the flat Earth people before. However, the billboards are a distressing new twist to this sad story. The folks at The Flat Earth Society are even claiming to be “persecuted” for their beliefs. “We get accused of being idiots, of doing it for money,” lamented Bob Knodel, a flat-Earther from Denver.
Everyone in this country has the right to “believe” what they want and flat Earthers have the right to talk about their theory too. However, I think persecuted is the wrong word here. Flat Earth is not a religion, a way of life, or value system. It is a statement of implied fact: “I believe the Earth is flat.”Continue reading…
People eat organic food for many reasons. Some people think it’s healthier. Some say it’s safer. Some just like the way it tastes. One of the most common reasons is to avoid pesticides. But is there any evidence for these ideas about organic food? Are any of these things actually true? UYBFS has the answers! Let’s start with the facts about what the term “organic” really means, in a legal sense, in the United States.
OK, now that we have basics covered, one benefit you’ll often hear is that organic food is “safer” or “pesticide-free”. Unfortunately, this is not true. Damn you facts! Always busting up our preconceived notions! Here are the facts:
Welcome to Bad Science on the Internet! Here, we highlight some of the crazy and sometime dangerous stuff people post online, and then give you the facts.
The bad science: There is a viral post making the rounds on Facebook claiming that mixing tomatoes and cucumbers together is “not beneficial to your health”. Several people have asked me about this – thanks, Maureen H!
What do they claim? I’m going to quote the entirety of their argument, because it’s funnier this way:
“Tomatoes and cucumbers have different digestion time and mixing them can cause health complications. The bad food combination can trigger digestive problems such as stomach ache, gas, nausea and bloating. Cucumbers also contain a substance that destroys vitamin C in tomatoes. So it is more beneficial to our health to eat cucumbers without any additions.”
This is actually all over the internet! I found another site that claims this combination could kill you! They make no mention of how this could kill you, but they do say that you should never eat a watermelon with another kind of melon, because “these fruits were meant to be eaten alone, not in combination with any other fruit”. As if the watermelon plant’s feelings might be hurt if you mixed the flesh of it’s fruit that that of another species. That’s melon racism, and it’s not cool.
GMOs have a bad name. This is a fact. The reaction of many people to the term “GMO” is negative. That negative reaction likely stems from several vague concerns: that of humans recklessly altering that which is “natural,” or of the potential to damage “natural” biodiversity, or the loss of freedom of choice that comes with unknowingly ingesting GMO food. However, the most common, and most serious concern of all is that of safety. How could we possibly know that GMOs are safe? There are diseases out there that seem to be increasing in prevalence and we don’t know what causes them – could it be the relatively recent introduction of GMOs?
Science can help with the questions of alteration of “natural” organisms and biodiversity, though these are questions we will not try to answer in this post. The question of freedom of choice, or consent, or “right to know” is strictly an ethical one. The one question here that science is most equipped to answer is one about safety. That is because we have developed very sophisticated methods for hazard identification and risk assessment over the years (and after learning some very hard lessons in the past), and because the government regulatory agencies around the world have dictated, right from the start of the GMO revolution, that new products need to be scientifically proven to be safe. Today, we will look objectively and scientifically at the available data to answer this most basic of questions.
Welcome to Bad Science on the Internet! Here, we highlight some of the crazy and sometime dangerous stuff people post online, and then give you the facts.
The bad science: There is a viral post making the rounds on Facebook claiming that Heinz Katchup is dangerous
What do they claim? They make vague claims that Heinz Ketchup is poisonous and dangerous and maybe even causes cancer
Are they trying to sell you something? Only misinformation as far as I can tell. Maybe alternative ketchup brands?
Is any of this true? No. This article was clearly written by someone who doesn’t really understand basic science. Let’s look at each baseless claim one at a time!
