In a recent blog post I wrote about studies in New York and Los Angeles, which showed that police officers involved in shootings had a hit ratio of about 33%. I concluded that either police officers in New York and Los Angeles, despite extensive training, were lousy shots, or perhaps it was very difficult to hit a target with a handgun, even when the target wasn’t returning fire.



A five-year study released by the FBI entitled “Violent Encounters: A Study of Felonious Assaults on Our… Continue

“Heartless” was a television drama produced back in 1997. It told the fictional story of a shy young woman who received a heart transplant and then underwent a personality change that may have been connected to the murdered donor. The movie was poorly reviewed, but the theory of cellular memory was an interesting idea at the time, and one that still generates interest among some members of the scientific community.



Cellular memory theorists suggest that the cells in our bodies… Continue

We will never know for certain whether Bruce Ivins, the Army scientist who committed suicide last week, was solely responsible for the anthrax attacks that killed five people in 2001. Though the evidence against him is compelling, much of it is circumstantial. It is just as likely that a good defense could have convinced a jury that he was innocent as it is likely that the prosecution could have convinced a jury that Ivins was guilty.



So let’s set aside his guilt or innocence and… Continue