The Ed's Up #154
And as always, you can buy copies of the book here. And here are a few of my upcoming book events:
- September 27th – New York, NYU’s Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute
- October 3rd - Washington DC, Smithsonian Museum of Natural History
- October 4th - Washington DC, AAAS Hitachi Lecture
- October 12th – London, London Literature Festival
- October 16th – Ilkley, Ilkley Literature Festival
- October 21st - Norwich, Norwich Science Festival
- October 24th – Sheffield, Off the Shelf Festiva
Scientists Have Found Another Crow That Uses Tools
"In 2013, Christian Rutz travelled to Hawaii, and presented two crows with a log containing several small holes. These had been baited with meat, but were too small and deep for the crows to reach with their beaks. “Within literally seconds, one of the birds came down, looked for a stick, began probing into the holes, and started extracting the food,” he says. The crow had been raised in captivity and had never done anything like this before. And yet, it was wielding the stick like a pro. “I could tell from its dexterity that it wasn’t just a fluke. It was one of those rare moments when you know you’ve made a big discovery.”" (Image: Ken Bohn) 
The Inevitable Evolution of Bad Science
"Over time, and across many simulations, the virtual labs inexorably slid towards less effort, poorer methods, and almost entirely unreliable results. And here’s the important thing: Unlike the hypothetical researcher I conjured up earlier, none of these simulated scientists are actively trying to cheat. They used no strategy, and they behaved with integrity. And yet, the community naturally slid towards poorer methods. What the model shows is that a world that rewards scientists for publications above all else—a world not unlike this one—naturally selects for weak science." (Image: Peter Nicholls)
American Whalers Killed Way More Than Just Whales
For the first time, Joshua Drew from Columbia University has quantified this collateral damage. By studying dozens of logbooks from that era, he and his students showed that the whalers slaughtered their way through walruses, ducks, cod, and many other animals, including surprising species like polar bears, reindeer, and even a couple of kangaroos. The legacy of these other kills still affects the ecosystems of the Arctic and the health of its indigenous people. (Image: Joel Garlich-Miller) 
How Male Widow Spiders Avoid Being Cannibalized During Sex
"It seemed like Andrade had figured out the redback’s weird behavior. Then, one day, her student Dani Baggio noticed something strange. She had housed young redbacks together, and noticed that the males would often try to mount immature females, making it very hard to pull them apart. “I told her to watch their activity closely and come back to me if she saw this again,” says Andrade. “She did. And this time she said: I think they are mating. I told her to go away and isolate the females and watch to see if they produced viable eggs. She did. And they did.”" (Image: MCB Andrade)
Stingrays Chew? Who Knew?
Plenty of animals bite, but mammals were once thought to be the only ones to chew, at least as it’s usually defined: moving our toothy jaws up, down, and side to side to tear through tough food. But chew on this: the ocellate river stingray, a beautiful spotted fish from the Amazon River, also chews its food. (Image: Waterframe, Alamy) More good reads
- Bad science misled millions with chronic fatigue syndrome. Julie Rehmeyer on the quest to fight back.
- Charles Seife investigates how the FDA manipulates the media.
- The sad story of how the last rhino in Vietnam went extinct. By Chris Baraniuk
- Scientists find a new form of fire—a swirling blue flame. By James Gorman
- The United Nations just declared antibiotic resistance “the greatest and most urgent global risk.” Maryn McKenna on what they’re going to do about it.
- What maths looks like in the minds of sighted and blind people. By Adrienne LaFrance
- David Attenborough is talking nonsense about aquatic apes. Alice Roberts and Mark Maslin set him straight.
- Power-posing, social priming, imitative babies: 10 classic psychology findings that have proven hard to replicate. By Christian Jarrett
- Can CRISPR redeem genetically modified foods? Sarah Zhang reports.
- XKCD on the rate of climate change
And that's it! Thanks for reading.
-Ed