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Waiting to exhale

Breath the buzz
A nervous little chill ran through me as I stared at the Chapstick-size tube sitting on my desk.
By CASSANDRA LANDRY | December 28, 2011

Cronenberg's dramatization of the rise of psychoanalysis
Perhaps the three characters in David Cronenberg's handsome, eloquent dramatization of the birth and near demise of psychoanalysis represent the parts of the psyche that the movement would eventually hypothesize.
By PETER KEOUGH | December 20, 2011

Photos: Selections from Science Ink: Tattoos of the Science Obsessed

Science Ink
Used with permission from Science Ink by Carl Zimmer, Sterling Publishing © 2011.
By PHOENIX STAFF | December 28, 2011

Science fare

The chemistry of haute cuisine
This week, Chang is coming to Harvard to take part in "Science and Cooking: From Haute Cuisine to the Science of Soft Matter," a new lecture series devoted to the science of food that pairs renowned chefs with Harvard scientists.
By CASSANDRA LANDRY | November 14, 2011

Voices carry

Marty hears things that aren't there. Doctors say she's schizophrenic. A new movement says she's just human.
She can hear a baby crying. She searches the house, each cluttered room, the closets, under the bed. She checks the cupboards. She checks behind the shower curtains. There is no baby.
By S.I. ROSENBAUM | October 21, 2011

URI’s ''Are You Ready For the Future?'' colloquium in brief

Robots and lab-grown bladders
The future is about more than the singularity, of course. It's about robots, lab-grown organs, and watching hopelessly as the Chinese pilfer our military secrets.
By DAVID SCHARFENBERG | September 28, 2011

Dark side of the future

Utopia or the end of humankind? A URI forum explores “the Singularity”
When the University of Rhode Island kicked off its invigorating "Are You Ready For the Future?" speakers series a few weeks back, there was only one man for the job: inventor and provocateur Ray Kurzweil.
By DAVID SCHARFENBERG | September 28, 2011

Deval's Green Blues

Long supported by the state's environmental organizations, Governor Patrick has started a war with them over biomass
The document in question contains the final regulations for the state's biomass subsidies, and according to environmentalists, the Patrick administration is planning to reverse its pre-election position — and fly in the face of good science — for the benefit of a handful of developers who stand to make money off of burning trees for energy.
By DAVID S. BERNSTEIN | August 31, 2011

The Year in Monkey News

Primate dispatches from around the globe
Simian news items, compiled for your reading pleasure.
By DAVID EISENBERG, JAMES P. FITZPATRICK, NATE HOMAN, AND KATIE LANNAN | August 04, 2011

George Kimball, 1943-2011

In Memoriam
George Kimball, Phoenix sports editor (back when there was such a thing) for nearly 10 years, Boston Herald columnist for 25 more, and truly one of the great boxing writers of our time, passed away last week at his home in New York City. He was 67.
By SEAN KERRIGAN | July 13, 2011

Love and Robots in Death and the Powers: The Robots' Opera

In Tod Machover's new opera, Death and the Powers , high technology meets high anxiety
A third of the way through the opera Death and the Powers: the Robots' Opera , the leading man becomes a machine.
By CHRIS DAHLEN | March 18, 2011

So you thought you were special

Literati
Reading Hannah Holmes's work is enlightening and entertaining — even when it's at its most depressing.
By JEFF INGLIS | February 16, 2011

At RISD: Art, science, and what's wrong with ATMs

Confabs
Among the most prominent solutions offered up for our present economic malaise and the broader decline of the republic: a robust investment in STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) education.
By DAVID SCHARFENBERG | January 19, 2011

Interview: Harold McGee

Dr. Food
Before Alton Brown had even opened a culinary-school brochure, Harold McGee had written On Food and Cooking .
By LINDSAY CRUDELE | December 01, 2010

Gold diggers: El Salvador vs. Pacific Rim Mining

Mine. Not yours.
If Chilean miners can maintain vast media attention for two months, then human-rights advocates may be in pole position to lure spotlights toward other underground issues below the border.
By CHRIS FARAONE | October 27, 2010

Interview: Oliver Sacks, on The Mind's Eye

Oliver Sacks floats some thoughts on biophilia, smoking pot, and anti-science lunacy
Over the past 40 years, since the publication of Migraine in 1970, neurologist Oliver Sacks has written 10 books and countless articles, examining what happens when specific parts of a human brain go haywire or stop working.
By AMY FINCH | October 21, 2010

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Review: Steampunk at the Players' Ring

Metallic myths
Since they began gaining mass popularity in the '80s, the antique copper laser-guns, cog-studded corsets and alternate electronic empires of the steampunk genre have been buzzing the cultural circuitry ever more.
By MEGAN GRUMBLING | October 06, 2010

By | January 01, 0001

Dropping Science

Hot shit
HOT SHIT
By SCOTT FAYNER | September 22, 2010

SCVNGR

Play the Phoenix's Boston Photo Scavenger Hunt
We’ve mapped out your ﬁrst month in Boston.
By BOSTON PHOENIX STAFF | September 02, 2010

Not giving up on the climate-change bill

Going green
This summer, US politicians gave up. Faced with backroom roadblocks and scattered priorities, Democratic leaders announced in July that they were abandoning attempts to pass a comprehensive energy and climate-change bill.
By DEIRDRE FULTON | September 01, 2010

Maine breaches

Cybersecurity
When many Mainers think of "cybersecurity," they probably remember the 2008 HANNAFORD SECURITY BREACH , when 4.2 million credit- and debit-card numbers were stolen from shoppers at the grocery chain's stores.
By JEFF INGLIS | September 01, 2010

Higher education: How to do drugs in Boston

If you choose to partake, at least do it right
The leaves are changing color, and it's not because you ate a special mushroom pizza. The air is crisp, the nights are getting longer, and you're drinking coffee at 4 am. It's fall, and time to go back to school.
By VALERIE VANDE PANNE | September 01, 2010

Review: Nobody's Perfect

Niko von Glasow gets right down to it
German documentarian Niko von Glasow has a knack for the blunt. First he asks his interviewees whether they want to kill themselves; then he asks them to pose nude.
By ZAK JASON | August 26, 2010

By | January 01, 0001

Down and dirty

The race to find the world's deepest hole
For most sane people, caving is an inexplicable pastime. What, after all, is the appeal of claustrophobic crawls, frigid swims, extreme heights (even underground), oceans of insects, no toilets, and ever-present, absolute darkness?
By KENNY WOOTON | July 13, 2010

Rhode Island’s birth control contretemps

Medicine
Recently OB-GYN Associates, a respected women's health care practice with offices in Rhode Island and Massachusetts, admitted to Rhode Island Department of Health officials that it had implanted in patients birth control intrauterine devices (IUDs) apparently manufactured in Canada and not approved by the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA).
By MARY ANN SORRENTINO | July 07, 2010

A towering mystery in Newport

Puzzles
The Newport Tower stands unheralded in a Touro Park in Newport. Most saunter by it without a second thought. Little do they know it is one of the oldest structures in the state — with a provenance, some say, as mysterious as Stonehenge.
By PETER VOSKAMP | July 07, 2010