On Sticker Charts and Shoddy Science

Introduction I hate flossing. My mouth is small, my teeth crowded, the spaces between them difficult to reach. Twice a year, my dental hygienist entreats me to floss more frequently. Sometimes I assent, and mean it, and actually manage to make it work for a few months until I invariably get sick or injured or […]

Catch me if you can’t

Recently I had cause to doubt someone’s credentials in a situation where credibility was key. Not to worry, I thought, That’s what university registrars are for. You simply call them up and verify that said person is a graduate, right? Not right. It turns out—and maybe everyone else already knew this—you can’t verify a job […]

Writing in Analog

I’ve been talking with other writers about AI. We huddle in our conversations like anarchists. Some have been using ChatGBT as a tool and are quite happy. Some fear for their careers and think recent, rapid advances in large language models are very, very bad.  I’ve turned off autocorrect on my computer. Is that enough? […]

Counting Sheep

I’m currently reading anthropologist Alice Roberts’ book The Celts: Search for a Civilization. It’s fascinating to see how she goes about reconstructing a pre-literate culture that coexisted with the much louder (historically speaking) Romans. One way to form a picture is through the ancient stories that rise again in modern contexts and can be traced […]

The Marshmallow Test is Wrong and Bad

I have a new mantra. Live your life, kids. Sure, have the chocolate muffin for breakfast. Wear the nice shoes on the playground. Use the fine china. Eat the marshmallow. Life is short. You might not get another marshmallow, despite what people tell you, so enjoy what you have while it lasts. My older daughter […]

Look, It’s A Bear! Again!

Last week, I was wiping up crumbs when brown motion out the window caught my peripheral vision. It was not random. It was deliberate, but quick, and it was dark. It was not my dog, because she was under the high chair seeking the crumbs I was wiping. It was not my neighbor’s dog, who […]

The Seven Deadly Sins: Greed

This essay originally appeared on LWON in 2012 as part of a series on the seven deadly sins. Since then, sociopathy hasn’t gone away, so we’re reposting it here. I wuz robbed. A few months ago a scientific discovery that I had covered in depth in my most recent book became the subject of a […]