David Ropeik
Big Think Contributor, "Risk, Reason & Reality"
David Ropeik is a science journalist and consultant. He formerly taught at Harvard University, wrote a science column for the Boston Globe, and was a Knight Science Journalism Fellow at MIT. He is the author of Curing Cancerphobia.
It rose up out of the sea, a fearsome roaring monster unlike anything humans had ever seen, horrible, primeval, unstoppable, towering, breathing radioactive fire and leaving total destruction in […]
Dear Biosphere, While you are well aware of the physical inputs we humans inject into your system, you may be blind to the human politics and polling and psychology about […]
Proposed U.S government regulations to curtail carbon dioxide emissions from power plants are rightfully being hailed as major progress in the fight against climate change. Major environmental groups are applauding. […]
A few thoughts on your lazy brain. But just a few because, well, you know, the brain likes things nice and easy. The brain normally operates on what […]
Clean energy. GREEN energy. Energy that can solve global warming. Environmentalists are all for it. And as a direct result, no matter what the benefits, conservatives are absolutely against it. […]
The National Climate Assessment released today by the White House is a masterful piece of science and risk communication Susan Joy Hassol, Senior Science Writer, who turned massive contributions […]
Eaten any cheese lately? It was probably made with genetic engineering. Anything with sugar in it? Good chance that was made with genetic engineering too. Anything with ingredients containing […]
Psychologists have known for a long time the emotional truth captured in Joseph Stalin’s chilling (reputed) observation, “One death is a tragedy. One million deaths is a statistic.” This […]
If you’re running a little short on potable water, you might want to take some empty jugs up to Portland Oregon, where for the next few days they will be […]
Toms River, by a friend, Dan Fagin, came out a year ago, to deservedly great reviews. It’s an epic piece of science journalism and a powerful human story, intelligently woven […]
A lot of work on climate change these days is trying to address what seems to be a major part of the problem; people don’t care all that much. […]
The goal of this blog is to help raise awareness of what I call The Risk Perception Gap the danger that arises when we worry about some things more […]
More than 20 people are dead and at least 90 are missing and presumed dead after a huge hillside of mud and clay and rock collapsed and slid down into […]
By 2002, Golden Rice was technically ready to go. Animal testing had found no health risks. Syngenta, which had figured out how to insert the Vitamin A-producing gene from carrots […]
The news is full of scary stories about threats to our health; from industrial chemicals, or the newest unfamiliar disease, or from the seemingly mundane things in life that […]
I was just thinking, which, it turns out, the brain does not like to do. At least not the purposeful, effortful, stay-focused kind. It’s work to think, to pay attention.
Anyone who has followed the fuss over fracking has heard opponents of the process claim that it causes earthquakes. According to a new report from the U.S. Geological Survey, […]
I participate in a Unitarian Universalist spiritual community. The UU faith has some basic beliefs, largely universal truths about how to be a good person, but when it comes […]
Global leaders seriously worried about climate change are having trouble getting more people to share that concern. One big reason is that climate change just doesn’t have the psychological […]
Should scientists advocate on policy issues, or, to protect their personal credibility and the credibility of their findings, should they just quietly do their work and avoid making policy […]
What do you know about fracking, the process of injecting water and sand and chemicals under high pressure into deep rock, cracking the rock open and allowing recovery of […]
The Frankenstein metaphor that opponents of genetically modified food use to promote their fears is more apt than they realize. Yes, the monster is an unnatural life form created […]
You know that old philosophical question; If a tree falls in the forest and no one hears it, did it fall? Here’s a variation; If a tree falls in the […]
At one second past midnight on Tuesday, the day will change to Wednesday, a normally unremarkable transition that happens every day, with no significance. But somehow this change, which […]
Hey, all you natural food fans. You die-hard anti-Monsanto opponents of genetically modified food, who say it’s dangerous because, well, it’s unnatural. You may want to think twice before you […]
You know those national debt counters, with the numbers that rapidly get bigger and bigger? Or those global population counters that do the same thing? Well now comes a […]
An intriguing piece of research has added an unexpected category of things that evolution may have taught us, down in our DNA, to be afraid of. Plants.
I just read an alarming piece on what the world will look like, possibly soon, when the efficacy of our current arsenal of antibiotics really starts to fade. There […]
It’s no mystery that fear sells, and for good reason. News stories, products, politics…it doesn’t matter what it is or where you hear about it, if something suggests danger, […]
Have you heard about the Echinacea that was actually ground-up Parthenium hysterophorus, an invasive exotic weed in Asia and Africa which doesn’t do much for a cold but causes […]