In 1920, Jackson Scholz set the men’s 100m world record at 10.6 seconds. The 100m race is one where progress is very hard; we’re getting towards the limit of human possibility. It’s very tricky to squeeze out another secon…

By Brian D. Earp See Brian’s most recent previous post by clicking here. See all of Brian’s previous posts by clicking here. Follow Brian on Twitter by clicking here.   UPDATED as of 27 May, 2013. See the bottom of the post. The AAP re…

Lance Armstrong may be stripped of his 7 Tour De France wins after he announced today that he will mount no defence against USADA’s charges of doping throughout his career. USADA have claimed this as a victory, calling the result “a reassur…

By Charles Foster Y chromosomes are on the way out, thinks Aarathi Prasad, a geneticist from Imperial College, London: they’re degenerating. If they go, then so do humans – unless an alternative method of reproduction can be devised. It can…

Tony Nicklinson is 58, and suffers from locked-in syndrome. His mind is as sharp as it ever was, but for the last seven years, as the result of a stroke, he has been entirely physically dependent on others, able to move only his eyes and ey…

The British government is about to introduce compulsory lie detector tests for sex offenders released on parole.   The British police want to use lie detectors in the detection of crime. Is this the right thing to do? The answer to that que…

Alastair Croll has written a thought-provoking article, Big data is our generation’s civil rights issue, and we don’t know it. His basic argument is that the new economics of collecting and analyzing data has led to a change in how it is us…

This morning, the men’s Olympic under 80 kg Taekwondo competition takes place. However, the British competitor widely regarded as the world’s best fighter in that category will not be taking part. Instead, a competitor ranked 59th in the wo…

Another article discusses the morality of different methods of organ transplant. Strangely absent from the discussion, is any indication of the scale of the problem – something that should be front and centre. The numbers are strangel…