News & Science News

The American media seems to only focus on one science topic at a time, which is a little frustrating for those of us who know there's a lot happening in the world of science.

If they're only going to cover one topic, I'm glad to see that the media has, for the most part, replaced the Evolution -vs- Creation debate with Global Warming... but only because the Evolution/Creation discussion was so lame.

Still, I'd rather see science news focus on things like alternative energy (which has implications that are environmental, cultural, economic, geopolitical, etc). Or how about bio/genetic science, which is shaping our future in unseen (& popularly unexamined) ways? Over 43,000 people die in car crashes every year - let's talk about technologies to help reduce that number. How about the Automotive X-Prize or the $100 laptop? Or, yeah, we could continue shouting at each other about evolution, or whether the planet is getting hotter.

This all points to a more basic issue - what is news, and why are so many networks so bad at doing it? There's a lot happening in the world - please spare us the latest twists in the Anna Nicole or Britney Spears sagas.

And speaking of news, my condolances to the Virginia Tech community, as they deal with the aftermath of this tragic attack.