Man Attacked by Mountain Lion, Saved by Bear A northern California man who says he was attacked by a mountain lion while out on a hike has a helpful hand - or claw - to thank for his life. Robert Biggs, 69, of Paradise, Calif., says he was saved by a helpful bear. Biggs set out Monday morning for one of his usual hiking and gold-panning trips near Whiskey Flats when he came across a mother bear, yearling, and cub sitting on a stream bank. Biggs said he stopped to watch the bears for a few moments, but, as he turned to leave, something jumped on his back and knocked him to his knees. "My backpack raises up over my head and a mountain lion ... Continue reading →
In our new series “Natural Habitat,” we invite science writers to share their working spaces — offices, spare bedrooms, coffee shops, hammocks — and the accoutrements that help them do their best work. (If you’d like to nominate your office to be featured at Natural Habitat, let us know.) Here, we visit the working lair (and local pub and deer-filled park) of Ed Yong, London-based freelance science journalist and creator of the award-winning Discover blog Not Exactly Rocket Science. (Caution for those with small children hovering: Ed has a bit of a potty mouth midway through. Just a bit. It’s mild. The kids’ll be fine.) Continue reading →
Charles Q. Choi is a frequent contributor to Scientific American. His work has also appeared in The New York Times, Science, Nature, Wired, and LiveScience, among others. In his spare time, he has traveled to all seven continents. Follow on Twitter @cqchoi.More » Charles Q. Choi is a frequent contributor to Scientific American. His work has also appeared in The New York Times, Science, Nature, Wired, and LiveScience, among others. In his spare time, he has traveled to all seven continents. Follow on Twitter @cqchoi.More » In the series, “From The Writer’s Desk,” I’ll describe what I do for a living as a writer and ideas I have for advancing my craft. The stories you read often seem the sole work of the writer named ... Continue reading →
Charles Q. Choi is a frequent contributor to Scientific American. His work has also appeared in The New York Times, Science, Nature, Wired, and LiveScience, among others. In his spare time, he has traveled to all seven continents. Follow on Twitter @cqchoi.More » Charles Q. Choi is a frequent contributor to Scientific American. His work has also appeared in The New York Times, Science, Nature, Wired, and LiveScience, among others. In his spare time, he has traveled to all seven continents. Follow on Twitter @cqchoi.More » In the series, “From The Writer’s Desk,” I’ll describe what I do for a living as a writer and ideas I have for advancing my craft. The stories you read often seem the sole work of the writer named ... Continue reading →
Last week Alex Knapp at Forbes published an article criticizing my Nikola Tesla comic. I don't normally respond to these kinds of thing, but since it's' Forbes I figured a proper response was in order. Continue reading →
Bobby’s next event: HolyBOS Check it out May 17th by Bobby Continue reading →
Brian Harkin for The New York Times From left, Nicholas Thompson, Evan Ratliff and Jefferson Rabb of The Atavist. It sounds like the setup for a very old, stale joke. Three guys walked into a bar in Brooklyn to complain about the state of journalism ... except by the time these guys were done chatting and plotting, they had come up with an actual business. Brian Harkin for The New York Times The Atavist has published 15 works of long-form journalism and licensed its software to multiple outfits. That business is The Atavist, which helps produce multimedia storytelling for digital devices. Last week I found out that the idea was appealing enough to have attracted $1 million of what will eventually be $1.5 million in ... Continue reading →
ANY teenage boy will confirm that older boys make it impossible to get the girls. Young male orang-utans with the same problem have a unique and unexpected solution: they don't grow up until they are strong enough to challenge the dominant males. Male orang-utans can reproduce from around age 15, but in order to attract a mate they also have to develop secondary sexual characteristics - the equivalent of men growing chest hair. These include conspicuous cheek flanges. Yet Sumatran orang-utans often delay acquiring flanges, sometimes for over 10 years. No other primates do this, not even Bornean orang-utans. Gauri Pradhan of the University of South Florida in Tampa and colleagues noted another difference between the species: unlike Bornean males, Sumatran males can monopolise females ... Continue reading →
