PopSci decides Internet comments are “bad for science.” That’s lazy and wrong.

Slate’s Will Oremus has a nice counterpoint to Popular Science’s recent decision to disallow comments on its web stories.

Now, I get as annoyed as the next right-thinking person when Internet commenters misconstrue scientific research—let alone when they regale me with tales of their aunt’s third cousin who makes $73 an hour working from home. But I couldn’t help but notice an almost religious zeal in LaBarre’s framing of her magazine’s mission. Spreading the word of science? Undermining bedrock scientific doctrine? Substitute “Christianity” for “science” and “Christian” for “scientific” in those two phrases and perhaps you’ll see what makes me uncomfortable here. These aren’t the words of a scientist. They’re the words of an evangelist.

via Future Tense.

Was Goldsboro’s Broken Arrow more broken than announced?

As I mentioned before, I have become captivated by the 1961 Goldsboro B-52 crash which resulted in two thermonuclear weapons being dropped in Faro, NC field. This Broken Arrow incident was in the news when a declassified document was released claiming one switch stopped an enormous nuclear detonation (is there any other kind?) from obliterating eastern North Carolina.

My concern when first learning about this incident was that just a flimsy switch protected the first bomb. After reading multiple interviews with Jack ReVelle, it seems the first bomb wasn’t the worry at all. The second bomb has been the one shrouded in mystery and ReVelle’s interviews seem to indicate that this bomb was always the concern.
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