Corylus Cornuta For Tearless Teething…

[A re-post but with some good stuff that you might otherwise have missed - more medical nonsense and some stuff about teeth.] “…it is a tale Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, Signifying nothing.” Macbeth Act 5 Scene 5 I often hear it said that ‘even a child of 12′ knows enough […]

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Two Cultures…

I apologise in advance for the whimsical nature of this post. If you don’t want ‘philosophy’, you might prefer to read this, this or this; all of which are rich in sciency goodness and have unanswered questions awaiting your comments. I was listening to Flanders and Swann (audio link at the end) and was minded […]

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Gravity Powered Light…

A pair of designers based in London has raised $200,000 towards developing their design for a gravity powered lamp – GravityLight. The idea is that these can be used in communities where access to electricity is restricted. As you may remember from our lessons spent running up flights of stairs, gravitational potential energy (Joule) = […]

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Wiltshire Gazette & Herald…

When I am visiting my parents in Wiltshire, my main regional paper is the Wiltshire Gazette & Herald. There are other more local ones but this is the one that we have always taken. When I was very young I used to scour its pages for crimes or mysteries in my nearby villages that I […]

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Hunting Again…

I went to the Boxing Day meet of the Avon Vale Hunt in Lacock yesterday; much as I did last year. The Daily Mail has a splendid photo of the meet in which you might spot a Summerfieldian. It was quite an interesting day because last week the RSPCA successfully prosecuted the Heythrop Hunt for […]

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Faerie…

A little bit more about ‘selective breeding’ with reference to flower production in the video below. Please sit through it to the end as it contains a twist! Some pretty sound Mendelian genetics and a simple explanation of how breeders produce the strains of plants and animals we commonly see. Then the host fires in […]

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Naughty Or Nice…

Happy Christmas! It has been suggested that Father Christmas uses cards to decide whether children receive good presents or bad ones. Each card has either Naughty or Nice on one side and a good present (e.g. Xbox) or a bad present (e.g. Egg Box) written on the back. Four of these cards are set out […]

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Monkey Morals…

Where does our moral behaviour come from? It’s a question that is often asked and discussed in philosophy classes but a lot of work is also done on the subject by biologists. As a member of a social species that evolved in groups, evolution will have played a part in the development of the moral behaviour […]

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Mozart…

I have heard it said that the music of Mozart has a uniquely helpful effect upon the brain; that it changes the brain in ways that no other music can. Indeed, you can buy specially selected collections of Mozart pieces on CD to play to yourself to improve your performance in tests or to increase […]

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Rise Of The Retrovirals…

I watched Rise of the Planet of the Apes this evening, which had been recommended (and lent) to me by JHB. He is very kind with such things, even though it sometimes takes me several years to return a DVD. I expect most of you have seen it and marvelled at the effects that seamlessly integrate […]

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Colour Changing Card Trick…

Sile will know why I have posted this video from the brilliant Professor Wiseman when he sees it! It follows a common theme that I write about…

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Counting Dilemma…

I told 5C today, after we had watched a video about the brain (which I will also post here soon), that everything we see, hear or otherwise experience is generated by our brains and cannot always be trusted. The scientific method allows us to determine what evidence can be trusted by filtering out the biases that […]

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