The Science Category deals mostly with discussion and analysis of scientific research. A list (not exhaustive) of things I am particularly interested in:
- Neuroscience
- Cognitive science
- “Hard” forms of psychology (i.e., research-based, rigorous methodology, data-driven)
- Artificial intelligence and its applications
- Health studies (think PubMed)
In general, however, I’m not picky, so I may end up writing about a pretty wide spread of science topics as things catch my eye.
I’m a stickler for methodological rigor in research, and will consequently end up slamming much that purports to be science. The only things that really count must have a few characteristics:
- They must be experimental rather than observational/retrospective, where possible.
- They must control what lurking variables they can and effectively randomize in an attempt to minimize the rest.
- They must have methodological and statistical rigor (avoiding obvious response bias and having large enough sample sizes, for example).
- They must have a control group (where applicable), be double-blind (where applicable), and have a placebo (where applicable).
- They must be conducted by researchers without problematic conflicts of interest or other apparent biases. Exceptions can be made upon reasonable explanation.
- They must be funded by entities without some axe to grind. Exceptions can be made upon reasonable explanation.
The above is what I define as “science”; everything else is just pretending. There’s an enormous amount of poorly conducted research out there.