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ICYMI: Emmy Noether, Stay-at-Home Dads, and the War on Experts

Teen Skepchick

The Physics Philes, lesson 84: My Damp Collection
Mindy examines how oscillations slow to a stop.

What it Means to be a Woman in Nerd Culture: The Fake Geek Girl
Alice discusses one aspect of what it’s like to be a lady nerd.

Mad Art Lab

What Can You Tell from a Color-Coded Chromosome?
Color-coded cells are beautiful, but they also help expose complicated biology.

Emmy Noether Solves the Universe
Dale tells the story of physics and math pioneer Emmy Noether.

What Color is Your Sheep?
Beth makes up for her lack of childhood creativity.

Escéptica

Raising Crows: Natural Contraceptives? (en español)
In this month’s parenting column, Elara takes a look at the effectiveness (or lack there of) of natural contraceptive methods.

Hero of the month / Quack of the month (en español)
The quack of the month award goes to Reticare, a company that sells “ocular protectors” for your electronic devises. The hero of the month is Rubén Pascual, a blogger who has been exposing the problems with Reticare’s claims.

Queereka

Some of Us ARE Joiners
Who says atheists don’t want a community?

School of Doubt

Education as Collateral Damage in the War Against Experts
As education becomes more like a business and knowledge has been democratized, the value of expertise has decreased.

Second Attach on Evolution Education in Missouri
Tori points out the fatal flaws in Missouri’s science-denying bills.

Pop Quiz: Brrrr…It’s Too Cold outside! Keep Those Students at Home!?
Is cold weather enough to shut down school?

Skepchick Events

Fundraising: Atheists of Maine
Help the Atheists of Maine raise money for a camp for children with life-threatening illnesses.

Women’s History Month
Secular Women is looking for writers for Women’s History Month.

Grounded Parents

Unnecessary Medicine – Trying Not to Demand Magic
Deek has sympathy for parents who insist on giving their kids medicine when they get sick. But it still might not be the best idea.

Abuse isn’t Always on the Outside
Tori tells her story of being in an abusive relationship…and how she got out.

Stay at Home Dads Need Mums to Step Back
It’s hard to give up on the ideal of The Perfect Mommy, but for dads to thrive it might be necessary.

Featured image credit: Michael Veroef via Flickr

Mindy

Mindy is an attorney and Managing Editor of Teen Skepchick. She hates the law and loves stars. You can follow her on Twitter and on Google+.

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2 Comments

  1. On unnecessary medicine, an old medical joke goes “If you get the flu, you can eat chicken soup, wave a rubber chicken around, pray, use a homeopathic remedy, or use an antibiotic, in order of decreasing plausibility.” I can understand why parents do it; people feel the need to be in control, even when they really aren’t. But I also understand that, again, it’ll have no more benefit than a placebo, and the placebo has no side effects. And I understand that people do irrational things; for instance, I refuse to go to this one restaurant where I saw parents just one booth down changing their son’s diaper on the table, even though I know it’s had months worth of regular cleaning.

  2. I suspect that another factor in the distrust of experts happens on a day-to-day basis with the lack of expertise in customer service areas. People call utility companies and computer support, go to quick-service garages and find people who only know a certain number of steps from their script or rule book but can’t actually do anything or have real knowledge of their system/program/autos/etc. This leads to a (largely justified) “I know more than these idiots” reaction.

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