Briggs

Ask A Scientific Ethicist: Boy Who Thinks He’s A Boy & More

This week, three letters from concerned readers. Bobby's Bad Behavior Dear Scientific Ethicist, Our eight-year old child has been acting out, speaking out of turn, making shapes of weapons with…

Fun Statistics

Godzilla’s Changing Height: A Statistical Analysis

I grew up watching Channel 50's Creature Feature and Channel 7's 4 pm Monster Week movies, many of which featured Ultraman, Rodan, Gamera, Gargantua, and, of course, Godzilla. Too, I…

Philosophy Statistics

Frequentists Are Closet Bayesians: Confidence Interval Edition

Actually, all frequentists and Bayesians are logical probabilists, but if I put that in the title, few would believe it. A man might call himself an Anti-Gravitational Theorist, a science…

Statistics

William M. Briggs Sez: Keep That Impressive Middle Initial

You can take it from William M. Briggs, and also from the Today show: sporting a middle initial is a mark of sophistication, intelligence, and rugged manliness---or womanliness, as the…

Statistics

Researchers: Calling Girls Fat Makes Them Fat

Whatever you do, don't call somebody a "researcher". It could condemn them to a nasty, brutish, and short-tempered life. The kind where most of their time is spent scrambling for…

Philosophy SAMT

Summary Against Modern Thought: The Office Of A Wise Man

The title is my liberal but reasonable translation of St Thomas's Summa Contra Gentiles, a book which we will go through, post by post---which is to say, his chapters are,…

Fun

Well? What Do You Think? Or, New & Improved!

You may say absolutely anything you like, except that you don't like it. Well, you may say it, but I have my palms over my eyeballs so I won't see…

Philosophy

Neil deGrasse Tyson’s Scientism

The other day on Twitter, I saw somebody quote approvingly these words by Neil deGrasse Tyson: The good thing about Science is that it's true whether or not you believe…

Brian (bulaoren) on What Are The Chances Of All These Scientists Dying, Killed, Or Going Missing?April 20, 2026
@Cary Motorcycle accident? No, that was due to covid.
Cary D Cotterman on What Are The Chances Of All These Scientists Dying, Killed, Or Going Missing?April 20, 2026
In the mid '70s I was the janitor at Cal Tech's Kerkhoff Marine Laboratory, where they studied the effects of…
Brian (bulaoren) on What Are The Chances Of All These Scientists Dying, Killed, Or Going Missing?April 20, 2026
I'm waiting for members of the California Coastal Commission to start disappearing.
Bill Hankel on What Are The Chances Of All These Scientists Dying, Killed, Or Going Missing?April 20, 2026
Thank you for your application of common sense (and math!) to this issue. I have never been a conspiracy theorist,…
Lucy Tucker on What Are The Chances Of All These Scientists Dying, Killed, Or Going Missing?April 20, 2026
You’re the best?????