Thirty-four days ago, George Will published a column in the Washington Post that was loaded with erroneous statements about global warming. Many people, your humble scribe included, laid out the fact-checking. The Washington Post editorial page editors claimed that they checked the column repeatedly, yet their ombudsman granted that perhaps it might have been a nice idea if somebody had called the scientists Will invoked as his authorities–scientists who themselves refuted him. Yet the Post has not published a correction to Will’s column. Instead, they published a second column on the subject from Will, in which he reiterated some of his earlier misleading statements and even managed to slip some new ones in.
Bat in wind tunnel from Carl Zimmer on Vimeo.
When the evenings get particularly thick with mosquitoes where I live, I sometimes sit out in the yard with my daughters and look up at the fading sky. Before too long, a single bat will usually flit out of the nearby trees and start flying circles around the house, scooping up bugs along the way. We can barely make out the bat’s wings as it takes its laps, a flicker of membranes. And so it was a revelation to spend some time earlier this week with two Brown University biologists, Dan Riskin and Sharon Swartz , watching slow-motion movies of bats in flight. There’s a lot going on up there.
Chris Mooney has invited me to participate in an intriguing conference in New York in May called “The Two Cultures.” From the meeting website:
I’ve only been put under general anesthesia once in my life, and ever since I’ve wondered what exactly happened to me during those lost hours. It turns out nobody really knows. But if they ever find out, they may get a little closer to solving the riddle of consciousness. That’s the subject of my newest brain column for Discover. Check it out.
Originally published March 17, 2009. Copyright 2009 Carl Zimmer.
Discover, March 16, 2009
I was looking forward to my first experience with anesthesia. I had been laid out on a stretcher, and nurses and doctors were prepping my midsection so they could slice it open and cut out my appendix. After a bout of appendicitis, a short vacation from consciousness seemed like a pleasant way to spend a few hours. I had no idea what anesthesia would actually feel like, though, and suddenly I was seized by skepticism. I tried to hoist myself up, already swabbed in iodine, as I suggested that I ought to pop into the men’s room before the scalpels came out. I wouldn’t want to interrupt the surgery with a bathroom break. “Don’t worry,” one of the nurses replied. “We’ll do that for you.”
Continue reading “Could a Dose of Ether Contain the Secret to Consciousness?”