Nevermind

Is a rock more capable of feeling hungry than a sentient robot? Would you rather harm the Mona Lisa than Lucas Dobson, a heroin addict desperately searching for his next fix? These are the sorts of far-reaching questions that have allowed Harvard psychologists to research the way we (Internet users with too much time on our hands) perceive the minds of others. Even you can take the test here. Prove that your mother was wrong when she said that you'd never amount to anything.
Over 2000 Internet users answered the call to waste some time participating in this test. The results were that humans perceive the minds and morals of their fellow man along two dimensions: agency and experience. Experience is defined as the ability to feel emotions; agency is defined as the ability to exercise judgement and self-control. This is ground-breaking and fascinating because, according to the press release, there has always been a tradition which views the minds of humans along a single dimensional continuum. Never before have psychologists realised that we are capable of perceiving, say, something with experience but no agency (a newborn?) or with agency but no experience (the idea of God?). It would seem we have a lot to thank this team for.
It may not have been clear to people who lack the razor sharp intuitions of the psychologists behind this research that I was being sarcastic. I was. The research, or at least the presentation of same in this press release, is utterly facile and probably - I'm being generous here- a complete waste of the talents involved. The most galling part is that the press release is worded as if they had invented the wheel or discovered a cure for cancer. The only statement of any note in it is the fact that some people think an unborn foetus has experience and some don't. I want to end this on a high note, so let's all put our hands together for the Harvard team having conducted an electoral issue public opinion poll. It's been a good day for science.

The Causality of Obesity

The worldwide shortage of pirates is causing global temperatures to rise! As pirate numbers have decreased since the halcyon, pirate friendly days of the 18th and 19th centuries global temperatures have risen, damaging ecosystems, causing sea-levels to rise and even threatening coastal cities with utter annihilation. Surely a bit of good-natured piracy is preferable? It certainly worked for Johnny Depp.
There are, as Benjamin Disraeli said, three types of lies: Lies, damn lies, and statistics. Just because there is a correlation between decreased swashbuckling and increased temperatures, does that mean that there is a causal relationship? It seems pretty clear that there is not. The same logic, however, is used often in the popular media and even in serious scientific publications. Recently, in articles about obesity, "scientific articles" have been cited as stating that urban sprawl causes obesity. Look!, they say, there are fat people living in the suburbs, so the suburbs must cause people to be fat. It's a tempting jump to make. People in the suburbs do spend more time in their cars, and they do tend to walk less. But does living in the suburbs make people fat? Probably not, or at the very least there is not enough evidence to prove it. Several studies, in fact, have come to the conclusion that low-density areas merely attract inactive people who are prone to obesity.
It is extremely tempting to make statements which are based on a correlation and phrase them in such a way as to imply a causal relationship. It makes for interesting reading and adds a veneer of respectability, but science it is not. It pays to use a skeptical eye when reading the news, just remember the pirates.