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On the day the iPad was launched, Apple sold over 300,000 of the tablet computers. Since then, over 3 million iPads have been sold. Our society is infatuated with technology, and this affects us in ways both obvious and subtle. Here I want to examine how our adoration of technology influences the way we think about science, and in turn how we see our whole world. I should note that I write this as a scientist, and someone with a long-time interest in, and fascination with technology. Because the words science and technology are often paired, their meanings tend to be conflated. But science can be pursued with few technological spin-offs (as is the case with astrophysics, for example) and technology can be developed without the use of science (as was the case with the early technologies developed by trial and error in prehistory). Certainly scientific discoveries can often be used to develop new technologies, and existing technologies can be evaluated scientifically. But science itself...

MSNBC recently reported that a new study suggests "U.S. states whose residents have more conservative religious beliefs on average tend to have higher rates of teenagers giving birth". (I learned of this on Rationally Speaking .) The study itself is Open Access, so all the details are freely available . The scatterplot illustrates the strong association the authors found. Now, the authors were reasonably cautious in how they interpreted their findings. The trouble is, the general public may not be. A common error is to conclude the study shows that religiosity causes higher teen birth rates. But correlation does not imply causation . It could be that higher teen birth rates cause religiosity. Or perhaps a third, unidentified factor causes both. But isn't the strength of association still impressive? It is. But what if, as I just suggested, there are other variables involved? Such confounding variables (or confounders, as they are commonly known) can wreak havoc on this...

In a valid deductive argument, the conclusions follow necessarily from the premises. This is a proof in the mathematical sense of the word. Provided we know that the premises are true, we can establish with complete certainty that the conclusions are true. For example, identifying a single unicorn would establish without a doubt that unicorns exist. Unfortunately much of the time this type of certainty isn't possible. Consider another example from the realm of mythology: weapons of mass destruction (WMD) in Iraq. Here's what Donald Rumsfeld had to say on the subject in 2002 (the boldface is my addition): There's another way to phrase that and that is that the absence of evidence is not evidence of absence . ... Simply because you do not have evidence that something exists does not mean that you have evidence that it doesn't exist. But surely hunting high and low for WMD month after month and not finding any ( absence of evidence ) supports the inference that there ar...

Searching Google for "no evidence" yields "about 21,300,000" hits. It seems we're keen to deny that there is any empirical support for countless different claims. For example, scientificblogging.com reports that there is "No Evidence For Fish Oil Benefit In Arrhythmias" based on a systematic review just published in BMJ. (Full disclosure: I have previously participated in research on omega-3 fatty acids, however I have no related financial interests.) What does the review itself say? This is the first systematic review attempting to evaluate whether the protective mechanism of fish oil supplementation is related to a reduction of arrhythmic episodes determined either by a reduction in implantable cardiac defibrillator interventions or a reduction in sudden cardiac death. We found a neutral effect on these two outcomes. The confidence intervals for these outcomes were wide and a beneficial effect up to a 45-48% relative risk reduction cannot be exclu...

Well Margaret Wente is at it again. In a column last week titled Yellow duckies and other killers , she claims that "Mothers across Canada have been prostrated by the plastics scare." It's hard to be a good mother these days. Deadly perils lurk everywhere. Take that yellow bathtub ducky, contaminated with a dangerous substance known as BPA. But why stop there? Wente proceeds to list other putative hazards: toxic mould, pesticides, perfumes, "death-rays from the sun", walking barefoot in the grass. The message is clear: stop worrying already! We forget how negligent our own parents were. They gave us naked sunbaths and let us suck on plastic duckies and roll around on pesticide-drenched lawns. It's astonishing how ignorant they were, and how many of us managed to grow up. Now Margaret Wente is no scientist (what was your first clue?), so she needs an outside authority: Dr. Elizabeth Whelan is president of the American Council on Science and Health [ACSH], a...

In the April 19th edition of the Globe and Mail ("Canada's National Newspaper") columnist Maragaret Wente had a piece titled "The great plastics panic". Wente reports that at an elementary school near where she lives, plastic water bottles have been "banished": The kids know what's at stake. Plastic is death! At home, their anxious parents have stopped microwaving with plastic wrap. They've thrown out their plastic baby bottles and replaced them with ones made of glass. Leading retailers ... have banished plastic containers, baby bottles, sippy cups and pacifiers containing one offending chemical from the shelves. No wonder. A barrage of media reports have warned that the chemical in question - bisphenol A, or BPA - may be linked to breast and uterine cancer as well as lowered sperm count, early-onset puberty, obesity, hyperactivity, miscarriages, diabetes and other horrors. "So," she asks, "how worried should you be?" ...

It has been noted that when trying to explain almost anything , I have a habit of declaring—"It's complicated ..." And of course, it is (whatever it is). But is that just a cop-out? Complexity is particularly challenging when decisions have to be made. There may be many factors beyond our control, that we understand poorly, or that we're not even aware of. And how these factors interact is often unclear. Complexity brings with it uncertainty, and uncertainty is always unsettling. One solution is to do nothing, and sometimes that's the best choice, as expressed in the aphorism " first do no harm ". But, as in the case of climate change , the decision to do nothing ("more studies are needed") is often a poor choice. Coping with complexity Faced with complexity, we simplify. That is, we employ models that make it easier to think about the situation. This comes so naturally to us that we're often completely unaware that's what we...

Goodbye, dear friend . I learned of Ram 's death on Tuesday evening, from the mother of Ram's wife (Rita, who is also a dear friend). She added that Rita has requested that people not try to contact her. It's now early Wednesday morning, and I am going to bed.

As I noted the other day , a large part of the media has obediently lined up to proclaim the glories of Apple's "revolutionary" new iPhone. It seems that simply putting an i at the beginning of the name confers the blessing of the zeitgeist. With such an auspicious title, surely the iPhone couldn't flop. It's unsinkable unthinkable! Or is it? Check out Kirk Sato's 10 reasons IPhone is going to be a Flop . (He also links to a hilarious Stephen Colbert segment .) A purportedly potent rodent And another thing: the iPhone has no buttons . Reminds me of another Apple product: the Mighty Mouse , which came with my iMac. The advertising copy is seductive: Thanks to a smooth top shell with touch-sensitive technology beneath, Mighty Mouse allows you to right click without a right button. Capacitive sensors under Mighty Mouse’s seamless top shell detect where your fingers are and predict your clicking intentions, so you don’t need two buttons — just two fingers. A smo...