This is a tiny ray of light in what has been a gloomy year for science-based federal health policy. Recently U.S. District Court Judge Brian Murphy in Boston ruled that the actions of RFK Jr. as HHS Secretary to fire the entire Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) did not follow procedure and is therefore not valid. Further, he concluded that the new ACIP, packed with anti-vaxxers, made capricious and arbitrary decisions that did not follow established science-based procedure. His ruling is a preliminary injunction that has delayed meetings of the ACIP and stays the revised vaccine schedule. The ruling is in a case brought by a coalition of medical professional societies, including the American Academy of Pediatrics. They are celebrating the ruling as “a momentous step toward restoring science-based vaccine policymaking.”

There are a few layers to this story. The first is RFK Jr. himself and what he has been doing as HHS secretary. I have not written much about him here, because posts about him and other Trump health appointees have dominated the SBM blog over the last year. This has been an “extinction level event” for rational federal health policy, and we have documented it and analyzed it every step of the way. David Gorski has done a great job specifically documenting what RFK Jr. has done to vaccines in the US in his series – “RFK Jr. is definitely coming for your vaccines”, in which he just published part 8. He did a great job not only documenting all of RFK Jr’s harmful actions but actually predicting them. Essentially, RFK is systematically using every lever at his disposal to dismantle the vaccine infrastructure in the US to reduce vaccines as much as possible. Given his actions he clearly straight-up lied to the confirmation committee when he said he was not anti-vaccine and would not take away American’s vaccines.

We, of course, recognized exactly what RFK Jr was doing during the hearings, because we have been following his nonsense for 30 years. He said, for example, “If we want uptake of vaccines, we need a trustworthy government,” Kennedy said. “That’s what I want to restore to the American people and the vaccine program. I want people to know that if the government says something, it’s true.” He then promised “gold standard science”. I would argue he has done the exact opposite. But what this statement is is classic denialism. Just claim you want to review the science, that everything is open to examination, and you just want the highest standards of science. These principles are great, but they can be used as a weapon, not just a tool. You can deny well-established scientific conclusions by arbitrarily claiming we need yet higher standards. Also, claiming you want to “restore” faith in the vaccine program assumes there is currently a lack of faith, which is rich coming from the person who has done the most to undermine that faith with pseudoscience and false claims. That is another denialist strategy – make a well-established science seem controversial, then argue that because it’s controversial we need to reexamine it and call it into question.

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How common is life in the universe? This is one of the greatest scientific questions, with incredible implications, but we lack sufficient information to answer it. The main problem is the “N of 1” problem – we only have one example of life in all the universe. So we are left to speculate, which is still very useful when based on solid scientific evidence and reasoning. It helps guide our search for signs of life that arose independently from life on Earth.

One important question, therefore, is where is it possible for life to exist? We know life can arise on a rocky planet with a nitrogen and CO2 atmosphere in a temperature range that allows liquid water on the surface. We also know that such life may create and sustain large amounts of oxygen in the atmosphere. It therefore makes sense to focus our search on similar planets. But life does not have to be restricted to Earth-like life. Scientists, therefore, try to imagine what other conditions might also support some kind of life. It is possible, for example, that life arose in the vast oceans under the ice of moons like Europa or Enceladus. Such life would be very different than most life on Earth. It would be dependent on chemical processes for energy (chemosynthetic), rather than sunlight.

Knowing how many different kinds of places life could possibly exist affects our estimate of the number of locations in our galaxy that might harbor life. The current estimates for how many Earth-like exoplanets there are in the Milky Way galaxy ranges from 300 million to 40 billion, depending on various assumptions and how tightly you define “Earth-like”. There are 100-400 billion stars in the galaxy, but about a third of those stars are in multi-star systems, so that means there are tens to up to 100 billion distinct stellar systems in the Milky Way.  One estimate from observed multi-star systems is that about 89% of them could allow for a stable orbit of a rocky planet in the habitable zone.

But perhaps we should not limit the calculations of how many worlds in the galaxy may support life to Earth-like planets. I am not just talking about life in oceans under icy moons. Astronomers have also been considering the possibility of life on moons that orbit free floating gas giant planets. A free floating planet (FFP), also called a nomadic planet or rogue planet, does not orbit a star at all. At some point, likely early in the life of its parent star, it was flung out of its system and now wanders freely between the stars. Astronomers estimate there may be hundreds of billions of such planets in the Milky Way. But this means the planet is dark, without any sunlight to keep it warm or fuel life. What about the moons of an FFP, however?

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Creationism, in all its various manifestations, is sophisticated pseudoscience. This makes it a great teaching tool to demonstrate the difference between legitimate science and science denial dressing up as a cheap imitation of science. Creationist arguments are a great example of motivated reasoning, providing copious examples of all the ways logic and argumentation can go awry. It has also been interesting to see creationist arguments (at the leading edge) “adapt” and “evolve” into more complex forms, while maintaining their core feature of denying evolution at all costs.

I am going to focus in this article on young Earth creationists, specifically Answers in Genesis, and something that is a persistent element of their position. Essentially they do not understand the concept of nested hierarchies. I have a strong sense that this is because they are highly motivated not to understand it, because if they did the entire structure of their YEC arguments would collapse.

This AiG article is a great example – Speciation is Not Evolution. The article is more than a bit galling, given that the author seeks to lecture scientists about the use of precise definitions. It begins by patronizingly explaining the humor in the famous “Who’s on First” skit (gee, thanks for that), then accuses scientists of not being precise with their definitions. This is, of course, the opposite of the truth. Good science endeavors to be maximally precise in terminology (hence the jargon of science), and it is creationists who habitually use vague and shifting definitions – such as their abuse of the word “information” and for that matter “evolution”.

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Researchers have recently published a discovery that could lead to more efficient photosynthesis in many crops. It’s hard to overstate how impactful this would be, as this could significantly increase crop yields while decreasing inputs. The growing human population makes such advances critical. Even without that factor, increasing yields decreases the land intensiveness of agriculture, which has a dramatic impact on our environment and sustainability. Improved photosynthesis would be a win across the board.

Before we get into the study there are a couple of points I want to explore. When I first learned of the various research efforts to improve photosynthesis my first reaction was – why hasn’t evolution already optimized something that is so critical to all life. The first photosynthetic organisms evolved at least 3.4 billion years ago. That’s a lot of time for evolutionary tweaking. So why is efficiency still an issue? There are a couple answers, but the primary one appears to be the constraints of evolutionary history. What this means is that evolution can only work with what it has, and it cannot undo its history. Once development leads down a certain path, evolution can make variations on the path but it cannot go back in time and take a completely different path. All vertebrates are variations on a basic body plan, for example.

So what are the evolutionary constraints of photosynthesis? Photosynthesis involves using the energy from sunlight to combine carbon dioxide (CO2) with water (H2)) to make glucose and oxygen. Critical to this reaction is an enzyme, ribulose-1,5-bisphosphate carboxylase/oxygenase (RubisCO), which fixes the carbon from CO2 into organic compounds. This enzyme, RubisCO, is responsible for over 90% of all carbon in living things. It is the most common enzyme in the world and is a cornerstone of living ecosystems, which mostly depend on energy from the sun.

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If we are going to have an enduring presence on either the Moon or Mars, or anyplace off of Earth, we will need to grow food there. It is simply too expensive, inconvenient, and fragile to be dependent on food entirely from Earth. In fact, any off-Earth habitat will need to be able to recycle most if not all of its resources. You basically need a reliable source of energy, sufficient food, water, and oxygen (consumables) to sustain all inhabitants, and the ability to endlessly recycle that food, water, and oxygen.

The ISS has achieved 98% recycling of water, which is what NASA claims is the threshold for sustainability of long space missions. The ISS also recycles about 40% of its oxygen. However, the ISS grows none of its food. It is all delivered from Earth, with a 6 month supply aboard the ISS. There are experiments to grow plants on the ISS, and these have been successful, but this is not a significant source of nutrition for the astronauts.

Doing the same on the Moon is not practical for long missions, although we will certainly be doing this for a time. But the goal, if we are to have a lunar base as NASA hopes (NASA plans a lunar base at the Moon’s south pole by 2030) is to grow food on the Moon (and eventually on Mars). On the ISS the big limiting factor is microgravity. The Moon has lower gravity than Earth, but it has some gravity and so that will likely not be a major problem, especially since we can grow plants on the ISS. We can also grow plants hydroponically pretty much anywhere, and I suspect this will happen on any lunar base. But a fully hydroponic system has its limits as well.

Hydroponics on the Moon would be challenging for several reasons. First, it is energy intensive, and energy may be a premium on a lunar base, especially early on. Second, it requires a precise balance of nutrients in the water, and those nutrients would have to be sourced from Earth. So it doesn’t really solve the problem of dependence on Earth. And third, hydroponics requires a lot of equipment which would have to be shipped from Earth. We could theoretically leach nutrients from lunar regolith, and this might help a bit, but is also energy intensive and would not be a source of nitrogen.

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A recent study shows pretty clearly that highschoolers benefit from a little extra sleep. We will get to the study in a bit, but first I want to note that this information is not new. Teenagers tend to stay up late, and yet we make them get up super early to be at class, often by 7:00 AM. This is not good for their health or their learning. So why do we do it?

The primary reason is logistical, which is tied to cost. School systems have tiered start times for elementary, middle school, and high school because this allows them to use the same fleet of buses and drivers for all three. Starting high school later, at the same time as middle school, would mean increasing the size of the fleet. There are other stated reasons, but honestly I think this is the real reason and everything else is a backend justification. The other reasons are more tradeoffs, that benefit some people but not others. For example, a parent with a long commute could drop off their highschooler on the way to work. There is more time for after school clubs, sports, and jobs. While some older teens may get home early to watch their younger siblings until their parents get home.

This all points to a main reason our civilization is frustratingly sub-optimal (to be polite). The default is to follow the pathway of least resistance  – everyone just does what’s best for themselves, with people in power doing their best to solidify more power, with vested interests putting the most consistent effort into making the system work for their narrow interest. What is often lacking is any kind of systemic planning, and when that does occur (even with the best intentions) the law of unintended consequences often results in a net wash or even detriment. The world is complex, and we are just not very good at managing that level of complexity. What we need are institutions that can accumulate evidence-based institutional knowledge to incrementally make things work better. But that’s a lot of work, and it’s too easy for vested interests to sabotage such efforts.

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The news is abuzz with talk of a potential universal respiratory vaccine. It’s definitely interesting research, but may not be what you think. In this case, the reporting has been quite good on the whole, but the headlines can be misleading if you are not deeply steeped in the complexities of mammalian immunity. Let me start with the biggest caveat – this is a mouse study. This is therefore encouraging pre-clinical research, but we are still years away from translating this into an actual vaccine. Also, most interventions that are encouraging at the animal stage don’t make it through human testing. So don’t expect any revolution based on this treatment anytime soon. Having said that – there is great potential here.

To understand how this new approach works, let’s review some basics of immunity. (Note – the immune system is incredibly complex, and I can only give a very superficial summary here, but enough to understand what’s going on.) Mammalian immune systems have two basic components, innate immunity and adaptive immunity. The adaptive immune system is probably what most people think about when they think about the immune system and vaccines. Adaptive immunity targets and recognizes specific antigens (such as proteins) on pathogens like viruses, bacteria, or fungi. Antibodies attach to these antigens, flagging them to be targeted by immune cells like macrophages which then eat them. The macrophages in turn display the antibody-flagged antigens on their surface, triggering a greater and more specific reaction to those specific antigens. Adaptive immunity is considered slow (it takes days to ramp up), specific (it targets specific antigens on specific pathogens) and durable (it has memory, and will react more quickly and robustly to the same pathogen in the future).

By contrast, the innate immune system is fast, non-specific, and short-lived with no memory. The innate immune system consists of physical barriers, like skin and mucosa, and immune cells that target pathogens based on broad patterns that are not learned but are innate (hence the name). There are Toll-like receptors (TLRs – the name Toll comes from the German for “fantastic”, allegedly said by a researcher upon discovery). The Toll gene was first discovered in fruit flies and then similar genes were later discovered in mammals, hence “Toll-like”. TLRs detect pathogen-associated molecular patterns (PAMPs), which are highly conserved features of types of pathogens. In other words –  a TLR might recognize a snippet of RNA as a pattern typical of RNA viruses, or proteins that tend to occur on pathogenic bacteria. “That looks like an RNA virus, so let’s attack it.”

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Fascination with UFOs (unidentified flying objects) is endless. I get it – I was into the whole UFO narrative when I was a child, and didn’t shed it until I learned science and critical thinking and filtered the evidence through that lens. I credit Carl Sagan for initiating that change. In his excellent series, Cosmos (still worth a watch today), he summarized the skeptical position quite well. To paraphrase – after decades, there isn’t a single hard piece of evidence, not one unambiguous photo or video. He gave a couple of examples of evidence (widely cited at the time) that were completely useless. Now -four decades later – the situation is the same. The evidence, in a word, is crap. It is exactly what you would expect (if you were an experienced skeptic) from a psychocultural phenomenon, without any evidence that forces us to reject the null hypothesis.

So why does belief in UFOs (meaning that some of them are alien spacecraft) not only persist but are experiencing a resurgence? Ostensibly this was triggered by the release of the Pentagon videos. I have already dealt with them – they are just more low-grade evidence. In fact, as I have argued, the low-grade quality of the images is the phenomenon. UFOs, or UAPs as the Pentagon now calls them, are not an alien phenomenon, they are an “unidentified” phenomenon. Mick West has arguably done the most thorough analysis of these videos. He convincingly shows how they are just misidentified birds, balloons, and planes. If you look at the videos you will see that they are blobs and shadows and lights. They are not clear and unambiguous images of spacecraft. Believers must infer that they are spacecraft by their apparent properties – and that is where the technical analysis comes in. A sprinkle of motivated reasoning, or simply lack of expertise, is enough to convince yourself that these are fast moving large objects. But a better analysis (again, see Mick West above) shows this is not the case. They are small, moving with the wind, or flying at the speed of a bird.

But the US military is taking UAPs seriously. This is actually not a surprise – unidentified anomalous phenomena might be Chinese spy balloons, or Russian fighter planes. This has always been at the core of the government’s interest. it is now policy to scramble fighter jets for visual confirmation of anything not identifiable on radar. And now that they are doing that – 100% of UAPs so far have been identified as mundane objects, mostly balloons. In fact, the US military is happy to encourage public belief in “UFOs” because it is a convenient cover for their own top secret projects. It is not a coincidence that UFO sightings tend to cluster around military bases.

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It’s not easy being a futurist (which I guess I technically am, having written a book about the future of technology). It never was, judging by the predictions of past futurists, but it seems to be getting harder as the future is moving more and more quickly. Even if we don’t get to something like “The Singularity”, the pace of change in many areas of technology is speeding up. Actually it’s possible this may, paradoxically, be good for futurists. We get to see fairly quickly how wrong our predictions were, and so have a chance at making adjustments and learning from our mistakes.

We are now near the beginning of many transformative technologies – genetic engineering, artificial intelligence, nanotechnology, additive manufacturing, robotics, and brain-machine interface. Extrapolating these technologies into the future is challenging. How will they interact with each other? How will they be used and accepted? What limitations will we run into? And (the hardest question) what new technologies not on that list will disrupt the future of technology?

While we are dealing with these big question, let’s focus on one specific technology – controllable robotic prosthetics. I have been writing about this for years, and this is an area that is advancing more quickly than I had anticipated. The reason for this is, briefly, AI. Recent advances in AI are allowing for far better brain-machine interface control than previously achievable. Recent advances in AI allow for technology that is really good at picking out patterns from tons of noisy data. This includes picking out patterns in EEG signals from a noisy human brain.

This matters when the goal is having a robotic prosthetic limb controlled by the user through some sort of BMI (from nerves, muscles, or directly from the brain). There are always two components to this control – the software driving the robotic limb has to learn what the user wants, and the user has to learn how to control the limb. Traditionally this takes weeks to months of training, in order to achieve a moderate but usable degree of control. By adding AI to the computer-learning end of the equation, this training time is reduced to days, with far better results. This is what has accelerated progress by a couple of decades beyond where I thought it would be.

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There are many ways in which our brains can be hacked. It is a complex overlapping set of algorithms evolved to help us interact with our environment to enhance survival and reproduction. However, while we evolved in the natural world, we now live in a world of technology, which gives us the ability to control our environment. We no longer have to simply adapt to the environment, we can adapt the environment to us. This partly means that we can alter the environment to “hack” our adaptive algorithms. Now we have artificial intelligence (AI) that has become a very powerful tool to hack those brain pathways.

In the last decade chatbots have blown past the Turing Test – which is a type of test in which a blinded evaluator has to tell the difference between a live person and an AI through conversation alone. We appear to still be on the steep part of the curve in terms of improvements in these large language model and other forms of AI. What these applications have gotten very good at is mimicking human speech – including pauses, inflections, sighing, “ums”, and all the other imperfections that make speech sound genuinely human.

As an aside, these advances have rendered many sci-fi vision of the future quaint and obsolete. In Star Trek, for example, even a couple hundred years in the future computers still sounded stilted and artificial. We could, however, retcon this choice to argue that the stilted computer voices of the sci-fi future were deliberate, and not a limitation of the technology. Why would they do this? Well…

Current AI is already so good at mimicking human speech, including the underlying human emotion, that people are forming emotional attachments to them, or being emotionally manipulated by them. People are, literally, falling in love with their chatbots. You might argue that they just “think” they are falling in love, or they are pretending to fall in love, but I see no reason not to take them at their word. I’m also not sure there is a meaningful difference between thinking one has fallen in love and actually falling in love – the same brain circuits, neurotransmitters, and feelings are involved.

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