Author: Mike White

Genomes, Books, and Science Fiction

Why I don’t read science press releases…

…and you shouldn’t either. Larry Moran makes the catch.

The press release:

Researchers at Weill Cornell Medical College have made a discovery that once again forces us to rewrite our textbooks. This time, however, the findings pertain to RNA, which like DNA carries information about our genes and how they are expressed. The researchers have identified a novel base modification in RNA which they say will revolutionize our understanding of gene expression…Although mRNA was thought to contain only four nucleobases, their discovery shows that a fifth base, N6-methyladenosine (m6A), pervades the transcriptome.

Continue reading “Why I don’t read science press releases…”

Sunday Poem

In honor of Walt Whitman’s May birthday, this week’s poem is “There Was a Child Went Forth”, which captures both Whitman’s omnivorous spirit, as well as the innate curiosity of children that lies, or at least should lie, at the root of every scientist’s drive to comprehend the world.

Contrary to what many think about the practice of science, the key to scientific success is not to master some authoritative corpus of knowledge; it is to know how to ask questions. The ever quotable Richard Feynman put it this way: “We have found it of paramount importance that in order to progress, we must recognize our ignorance and leave room for doubt.”

Children seem to naturally have this ability to recognize that they don’t know something, and to leave themselves open to new discoveries about what is real, and “the thought if after all it should prove unreal.” Continue reading “Sunday Poem”

Mandating open access science publishing

Suzy Khimm writes:

Taxpayers fund a ton of government research — and the results can get stuck behind a paywall that tops $20,000. Should they be able to see them without paying a second time around?

It sounds like a reasonable argument, but scientific journals make the counterargument that they add essential value to published research via their editorial and publication process, and thus they need subscription fees to stay in business.

The red herring in all of this is that the best argument for open access is that the public pays for research and thus deserves access. Continue reading “Mandating open access science publishing”

CSHL Biology of Genomes Wrap-Up

After five grueling but interesting days, the Cold Spring Harbor Labs Biology of Genomes has wrapped up. So where is genomics heading?

A few lessons: Continue reading “CSHL Biology of Genomes Wrap-Up”

Book club: It’s a digital world and we just live here

Welcome to the first Finch and Pea Book Club. Grab your favorite brew and pull up a chair. Our inaugural book is George Dyson’s recently published Turing’s Cathedral. Have you read the book? Got an opinion? Let’s hear about it in the comments.

On the eve of World War II, when much of the world was beginning to mobilize its industrial and scientific resources in preparation for yet another exercise in mass slaughter, Abraham Flexner, the driving force behind the modernization of America’s higher education, wrote a plea for basic research, “The Usefulness of Useless Knowledge” (PDF). Flexner argued that much of the transformational technology on which our society relies is the consequence of esoteric, abstract, curiosity-driven scientific research that was conceived without specific, practical applications in mind. George Dyson’s Turing’s Cathedral is the story of how the useless knowledge of abstract mathematics and logic led directly to the birth of today’s digital, computerized society, in the boiler room of that most pallid of ivory towers, the Princeton Institute for Advanced Studies. Continue reading “Book club: It’s a digital world and we just live here”