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The 500-Year-Long Science Experiment
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Testing the longevity of bacteria
In 2014, scientists started a 500-year experiment to determine the longevity of bacteria.
The experiment consists of 800 glass vials containing either Chroococcidiopsis or Bacillus subtilis that has been hermetically sealed with a flame.
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Studying bacteria: The long-term plan
For the 500-year experiment to succeed, scientists are supposed to test the dried bacteria for viability and DNA damage every other year for the first 24 years and then every quarter-century for the next 475.
The team left a USB stick with instructions as well as a hard copy on paper. As neither is foolproof, the team asks that researchers will at each 25-year point copy the instructions, so they remain linguistically and technologically up to date.
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Well-being of adults
- Studies show that most adults' happiness declines through their 30s and 40s, then hit a low in their early 50s.
- After that, studies show that, in wealthier countries, most peop...
The memory of past success
Current achievements provide happiness, but the memory of past accomplishments do not appear to produce long-lasting happiness.
The waning of ability in people of high accomplishment is particularly difficult psychologically. Retired athletes struggle profoundly after their sports career ends. They are prone to depression, addiction, or suicide.
"Unhappy is he who depends on success to be happy. For such a person, the end of a successful career is the end of the line. His destiny is to die of bitterness or to search for more success in other careers and to go on living from success to success until he falls dead. In this case, there will not be life after success."
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Meat from labs
Meat might have finally met its match. Some meat is now being cultured and grown into slabs that mimic meat.
It currently goes by names such as in-vitro meat, cultured meat, lab-grown mea...
Labeling lab-grown meat
- In 1869, margarine was invented as a butter replacement. The dairy farmers raised the alarm in the United States; They convinced the U.S. Government to tax margarine and lobbied against the use of yellow dyes to make the butter replacement look more buttery.
- Dairy farmers objected to soymilk and almond milk being called milk, but the FDA hasn't done anything to stop brands from using the word.
Unlike margarine or soymilk, cultured meat is biochemically identical to the substance it's competing with.
Making the rules
The USDA (responsible for overseeing agriculture) and the FDA (regulating drugs and dietary supplements) both could have some say in how lab-grown meat is labeled.
- From a production standpoint, cultured meat is more in line with the way drugs and additives are made in a lab.
- From a final product, if lab-grown meat is going to end up next to the traditionally slaughtered meat, the USDA should take charge.
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Living in the age o doubt
We live in a time when all scientific knowledge (the safety of fluoride, vaccines, climate change, moon landing, etc.) faces coordinated and vehement resistance.
The acces...
We now face risks we can’t easily analyze
Our existence is invaded by science and technology as never before. For many of us, this brings comfort and rewards, but this existence is also more complicated and sometimes agitated.
Our lives are full of real and imaginary risks, and distinguishing between them isn’t easy. We have to be able to decide what to believe and how to act on that.
Marcia McNutt - Geophysicist
“Science is not a body of facts. Science is a method for deciding whether what we choose to believe has a basis in the laws of nature or not.”