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.
March 27, 2009
Category: Art
The shepherds responsible for the sheep art I featured earlier (i.e., Sheep + LEDs - Mona Lisa, Fireworks, etc.") explain...
Posted by David Dobbs at 2:02 PM • 1 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
March 26, 2009
Category: Journalism
Tuesday, March 31, at 6 pm, at 20 Cooper Square in NYC, I'll be giving a talk/discussion on blogging and long-form journalism -- particularly on the different demands, pros and cons, possibilities and constraints, and reader and writer experiences those two different modes of writing (and reading) impose and offer. ... Instead we'll talk, at least for starters, about what this story's genesis, development, writing, and publication -- along with the blog reactions afterwards -- suggest about the differences between blogging and long-form, "slow-bake" journalism.
Posted by David Dobbs at 9:50 PM • 0 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Journalism
From Jay Rosen:As the crisis in newspaper journalism grinds on, people watching it are trying to explain how we got...
Posted by David Dobbs at 9:32 AM • 2 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
March 24, 2009
Category: Culture of science
I've received several critiques of "The Post-Traumatic Stress Syndrome," both privately and in blogs and public letters, that disagreed sharply with my argument. These other critiques have ranged from thoughtful and considered to and savage and threatening, but all offered genuine arguments or genuine reactions. Bremner -- the third most-cited PTSD researcher on earth, as he's happy to tell you -- offered self-indulgent, insubstantial snark.
Posted by David Dobbs at 11:20 PM • 9 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
March 23, 2009
Category: Food and Drink
Now this makes my day: I've been nominated for a James Beard Foundation Journalism Award. Beard, foodees know, was a...
Posted by David Dobbs at 2:38 PM • 6 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Books
I've had mixed reactions to Gladwell's writing over the years: I always enjoy reading it, but in Blink, especially, I was troubled not just by what seemed an avoidance of neuroscientific explanations but by an oversimplified argument. I was also troubled by ... well, I couldn't put my finger on it. But Joseph Epstein has:
Posted by David Dobbs at 9:34 AM • 5 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
March 22, 2009
Category: Culture of science
The balloon rises wonderfully, they're getting signals from the GPS and the camera indicating all is in good order ... and then, with the camera and rig well out of sight, the batteries on their laptops start to run out and they have to switch to another laptop: "...but the surprise was great: the Google Earth not working!"
Posted by David Dobbs at 11:01 PM • 1 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
March 20, 2009
Category: Culture of science
"A bunch of sheep dogs are sent away to another land to protect the sheep from wolves. While there they essentially become wolves in order to survive. They return to the herd of sheep as wolves but are expected to live as sheep dogs again -- or in the case of National Guardsmen, they are expected to become sheep."
Posted by David Dobbs at 3:17 PM • 6 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
March 19, 2009
Category: Art
Were the makers of that sheepherding-art video I put in an earlier post (and further below in this post as...
Posted by David Dobbs at 3:40 PM • 2 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: History/philosophy of science
"Faith" is a fine invention For gentlemen who see -- But microscopes are prudent In an emergency. Emily Dickinson, poet...
Posted by David Dobbs at 2:01 PM • 0 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
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