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Researchers have created the first living synthetic bacterium made from non-living parts by killing a bacterial cell and then transplanting the genome of another species into it, blurring the boundary between life and death

Researchers identified nearly 10,000 websites where API keys could be found, exposing details that could let attackers access sensitive information

A judge recently ruled that HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. went too far in his drive to turn ACIP into a an antivax committee. Meanwhile, ProPublica reports on where we are heading; it's not good.

The post RFK Jr. is definitely coming for your vaccines (part 9): ProPublica reports, and a bump in the road to remaking ACIP first appeared on Science-Based Medicine.

Scientists in Australia have demonstrated a prototype quantum battery that could revolutionize energy storage. By harnessing quantum effects, it can absorb energy in a rapid “super absorption” event, enabling much faster charging than conventional batteries. Even more surprisingly, the system becomes more efficient as it scales up. The research opens the door to ultra-fast, next-generation energy technologies.

A decades-old superconducting mystery just took a surprising turn. Strontium ruthenate, a material that conducts electricity with zero resistance at low temperatures, has long puzzled scientists with hints of an exotic, complex superconducting state. But by carefully twisting and distorting ultra-thin crystals, researchers found something unexpected: the material barely reacted at all. This challenges years of assumptions and suggests its behavior may be far simpler—or far stranger—than previously thought.

Scientists have created a new kind of time crystal using sound waves to levitate tiny beads in mid-air. These particles interact in a one-sided, unbalanced way, breaking the usual rules of motion and creating a steady, repeating rhythm. The system is surprisingly simple yet reveals complex physics with big implications. It could help advance quantum computing and deepen our understanding of biological timing systems.

As usual, I watched the NBC Evening News last night, even though some of its reporting has seemed slanted against Israel.  Since I wrote about the Guardian article yesterday, though, I’ve become more sensitized to how the media uses language to express political opinions—even in supposedly objective news reports.

Here’s a video showing all the NBC Evening News from last night, but you don’t have to watch it all unless you want to see bodycam video of a clearly inebriated Justin Timberlake being arrested for DUI (17:05).  The part that made me prick up my ears is at 4:07, when the news shows cute little Lebanese Muslim kids getting presents at the end of Ramadan. But they are not in their homes.  The narration says this (bolding is mine):

While across the Muslim world, the end of Ramadan means presents for children.  These kids are among the one million people displaced in Lebanon by Israel’s expanding offensive against Hezbollah.

The rest of the short segment seems designed to evoke the viewers’ sympathy for Lebanese people—especially the kids—displaced by the wicked Jewish state.  And indeed, it’s sad that people have to flee their homes. HOWEVER, the report neglects to mention that there had been a cease-fire between Israel and Hezbollah that largely held until March 2 of this year. Then, on March 2, three days after the U.S. and Israel struck Iran, Hezbollah in fired a barrage of missiles and drones from Lebanon at northern Israel, explicitly saying that this was in response to the killing of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and what Hezbollah called were “repeated Israeli aggressions” (there were minor attacks by both sides during the ceasefire, with UNIFIL and the Lebanese government failing to rein in Hezbollah, as they are supposed to. Israel responded big time, but to construe that as an “expanding offensive” minimizes the defensive nature of Israel’s attacks, designed to stop Hezbollah’s rockets and drones for once and for all.

Again, it’s a small remark, but a telling one. “Expanding offensive” implies that Israel started the attacks in Lebanon going on now.  It didn’t, just as Israel didn’t start the war with Hamas on October 7.

But at the end you might want to see the inevitable “there’s-good-news-tonight” segment (several nice pieces starting at 18:05, with an especially moving bit at 19:54 as a woman is assigned to take the final call from an Air Force officer as he leaves the military—an officer who happens to be her dad).    As the world is falling apart, nearly all the major television news stations like to leave viewers with a good taste in their mouths.

There’s simply no news today, I’m exhausted from lack of sleep, and as I looked at the latest draft posts I have (there are over 2,600 drafts, most of which will never see the light of day), I was not inspired to write anything, though there are two science posts that I’ll be working on. We’ll see if anybody reads them.

Ergo, enjoy Bill Maher’s comedy-and-politics bit from his latest episode of Real Time. In this 8.75-minute segment,  Maher decries Terminally Online Disease (TOD), one of whose symptoms is the fervent need to express an opinion on everything. (The video begins by excusing cat haters, who include Oscar-winning actress Jessie Buckley—not a propitious start.) Maher then goes on to criticize people who spend all their time doomscrolling through social-media sites on “devices”, mistaking what they read for a national or international consensus and apparently anxious to get outraged.  The scrollers are contrasted with regular people who have “shit to do.”

All told, it’s a pretty curmudgeonly bit and not as funny as his usual shticks.  But it’s all I got.

The guests were Tristan Harris, co-founder of the Center for Humane Technology, Paul Begala, CNN contributor and Democratic strategist, and Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-FL). 

Today we have some travel and wildlife photos from reader Jan Malik.  Jan’s captions are indented, and you can enlarge the photos by clicking on them. (Don’t miss the Taiwan barbet!)

Here are a few pictures I took during my short stay in Taipei, Taiwan (Republic of China) in 2016. Business trips usually allow very little time for sightseeing — the familiar, morbid cycle of airport → hotel → conference room → hotel → airport — but on this occasion I had a few free hours in the afternoon. Naturally, I decided to explore the nearby Taipei Botanical Garden with a birding lens that mysteriously strayed into my suitcase:

On my way to the Botanical Garden, I visited the National Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Park and Hall, the latter built in the late 1970s after the President’s death. I include it here for documentary reasons — who knows how long it is going to survive, given the volatile political situation.

Inside stands a larger‑than‑life sculpture of the Generalissimo. Taiwan’s history is typical of right‑wing dictatorships which, like South Korea, Spain, or Portugal, began as oppressive authoritarian regimes and then evolved into genuine democracies. Conversely, left‑wing dictatorships typically resist fundamental change and persist until their eventual collapse:

Onward to wildlife. The entrance to the Mausoleum was guarded by a lion (Panthera leo var. lapideus):

Already in the Botanical Garden, I encountered a cat, doing what cats do best – contemplating:

In one of the alleys I came upon a sizable crowd — people were observing local celebrities, a pair of nesting Oriental magpie‑robins (Copsychus saularis). The birds seemed completely unfazed by the attention, the male singing and standing guard at the nest;

These birds are bold and well adapted to human habitats. The female does most of the feeding; here she brings an unidentified moth to her chicks in a rotted‑out branch stump:

At a nearby pond I spotted a duck. It was likely a domestic bird, possibly with a dash of wild Mallard  (Anas platyrhynchos) ancestry:

The pond was full of lotus plants, which provided excellent habitat for the Common moorhen (Gallinula chloropus). Like all rails, these birds have relatively small wings and strong feet, well suited to foraging on land as well as in water. They swim well despite lacking webbing between their toes. These traits help explain why, when rails successfully colonize remote predator‑free islands, they often evolve reduced flight or complete flightlessness;

Moving further along the park alleys, I spotted a Taiwan barbet (Psilopogon nuchalis) looking out of its nest cavity. As an endemic species, it was a special find for me. Barbets vary widely in sexual dimorphism — in the Taiwan barbet the sexes are practically indistinguishable, in others (like the Coppersmith barbet) the differences are subtle, and in still others (such as the Red‑and‑yellow barbet) they are striking. I wonder why, in this species, bright coloration in females is not maladaptive. Perhaps the fact that they are obligate cavity nesters shields incubating females from predators. The same logic applies to woodpeckers, whose sexes are also similar aside from modest red patches in males:

Shortly after the barbet, I hit another jackpot in my endemics count — the Taiwan blue magpie (Urocissa caerulea). Like other corvids, it is social and omnivorous, and like Taiwanese barbets, it is sexually monomorphic. Corvids also evolved cooperative breeding: fledglings often remain with their parents and help raise the next brood. This likely evolved through kin selection. Why does it work so well in corvids and not in most other birds? Perhaps in environments with limited resources, young birds have better reproductive success by helping relatives than by attempting to breed independently?:

Having spent some time observing the magpie, I moved on — my remaining time before the flight was getting short. Soon I saw another first for me, though a common sight in Southeast Asia: the light‑vented bulbul (Pycnonotus sinensis). An omnivorous bird, here it was about to snatch a ripe fig:

Moving on, I photographed a dragonfly, which I believe is a male Crimson Marsh Glider (Trithemis aurora). These insects are sexually dimorphic, with olive‑colored females. This male appears to be orienting its abdomen toward the sun to reduce the surface area exposed to solar radiation and prevent overheating — a behavior known as “obelisking”:

Near the Botanical Garden exit I saw the last animal in this series, the Eurasian tree sparrow (Passer montanus). They always bring a smile to my face. Unlike many other sparrows, the sexes are alike. In 1958 they were targeted during China’s “Four Pests” campaign, a fine example of how ideology can override basic biological understanding:

While driving toward the airport that evening, I saw a Buddhist temple by the roadside, adorned with a symbol that, in European cultural circles, evokes entirely non‑religious sentiments. It was adopted in the 1920s by the National‑Socialist German Workers’ Party, but in Asia it is an ancient religious emblem. It is not identical to the Hakenkreuz — it “rotates” counterclockwise — and its meaning here is entirely benign:

 

Researchers have uncovered friction without contact—driven entirely by magnetic interactions. As two magnetic layers slide, their internal forces compete, causing constant rearrangements that dramatically increase resistance at certain distances. This creates a surprising peak in friction instead of a steady rise, breaking a long-standing physics law.

Astronomers have uncovered surprising evidence of a thick atmosphere surrounding TOI-561 b, a scorching, fast-orbiting rocky planet once thought too extreme to hold onto any gas. Using NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope, researchers found the planet is far cooler than expected for a bare rock, hinting at a heat-distributing atmosphere above a churning magma ocean. This strange world—where a year lasts just over 10 hours and one side is locked in eternal daylight—may even be rich in volatile materials, behaving like a “wet lava ball.”

“A brain biased toward seeing meaning rather than randomness is one of our greatest assets. The price we pay is occasionally connecting dots that don’t really belong together.”1 –Rob Brotherton

For nearly a decade, a mysterious ailment known as “Havana Syndrome” has been portrayed as proof that American diplomats and intelligence officers have been attacked by a foreign adversary using a secret energy weapon. Few outlets have promoted this narrative more forcefully than the CBS television News Magazine 60 Minutes, which has presented the saga as a chilling geopolitical mystery. Yet after years of investigation, the U.S. intelligence community has concluded that such attacks are “highly unlikely.” So how did one of America’s most respected news programs become so invested in a story that the evidence increasingly contradicts? The answer tells us less about the shadowy world of spycraft and secret weapons, and more about the psychology of belief, the power of social contagion, and the media’s enduring fascination with invisible enemies. 

60 Minutes is widely regarded as one of the most prestigious and successful news programs in American television history. For decades it has been the gold standard in investigative reporting and has won every major award in broadcast journalism since its inception in 1968.2 Over the past decade the program has aired four exposés on “Havana Syndrome,” a mysterious clustering of health complaints first noticed by U.S. government officials in Havana, Cuba in 2016 (hence the name).3 However, for the past three years its reputation has been tarnished by two separate intelligence assessments that have challenged and discredited key elements of their investigations.4 

Immediately after their third report aired in March 2024, which claimed that an elite Russian military unit was targeting Americans with an energy weapon, the segment prompted calls for a renewed congressional investigation.5 Yet the CIA Director in the Biden Administration, William Burns, responded to the broadcast by issuing a firm assurance that the claims had been thoroughly investigated and were unfounded.6 This conclusion was reaffirmed in an updated intelligence assessment that was issued in 2025.7

On Sunday March 8, 2026, 60 Minutes aired its fourth investigation into “Havana Syndrome” in nine years, once again making dramatic claims that American spies, diplomats, and military personnel have been targeted by a mysterious weapon, first in Havana, and later around the world.8 The three previous segments were critiqued in the pages of Skeptic as they relied heavily on speculation with limited physical evidence, while largely excluding skeptical perspectives.9 The latest chapter in this saga is no different, repeating old, discredited claims and introducing a striking new allegation that the government purchased a Havana Syndrome-type device on the Russian black market.10

The “Attacks” on Chris and Heidi

In the latest segment, narrator Scott Pelley interviews Chris (last name withheld) who worked on top secret spy satellites near Washington DC, and claimed to have been attacked several times between August and December 2020. Pelley implies that Chris had been targeted with an energy weapon, describing him as having been “struck by an unseen force.” He said the first incident felt like someone punched him in the throat, his left ear was clogged, and a sharp pain shot down his left arm. During the second incident, in the kitchen of his Virginia home, he suddenly felt like a vice was squeezing his head, and he became disoriented, confused, and dizzy. A third episode occurred in his living room when he was stricken with a cramping of his back muscles “like a charley horse,” accompanied by a hot, sharp pain. In the final episode, he woke up feeling like a vice was gripping his brainstem and he experienced “a full body convulsion.” 

While the segment frames Chris’s experience as a targeted strike, his clinical presentation is consistent with common neurological and psychological conditions such as migraines and anxiety disorder. Migraines often cluster over several months and grow progressively worse before resolving. His description of vice-like pressure is commonly reported by migraine sufferers. Symptoms typically involve head pressure and pain, dizziness, confusion, disorientation, muscle spasms, and throat sensations. They often include unilateral symptoms (affecting one side of the body) such as the clogging of his left ear and the shooting pain down his left arm.  

That he experienced several distinct episodes with differing symptoms raises further questions about the likelihood of an attack. Why would the same weapon produce such different effects? Chris’s other symptoms such as throat tightness (globus) and muscle spasms that grew progressively worse, may reflect anxiety from someone who was working in an extreme stress environment (a classified spy satellite program). The least likely explanation for his symptoms is an attack by a directed energy weapon. 

The 60 Minutes narrative survives primarily through a strategic omission of key facts.

His partner Heidi described waking up with joint pain that was concentrated in her left shoulder. Pelley said that “bones in her shoulder were dissolving,” and she was diagnosed with osteolysis, which required an operation. The implication was that she too had been struck with the same mysterious weapon. But osteolysis of the shoulder is a well-known condition that is becoming increasingly diagnosed in women. It is associated with repetitive strain injuries, weightlifting, trauma, and inflammation, not mysterious external agents.11 Heidi’s shoulder condition is an entirely different pathology from that of Chris. It is far more probable that two people living together simply developed two unrelated conditions.  

Pelley then mentions several other victims who supposedly had similar symptoms: an FBI agent who experienced a drilling sensation in her right ear; a Commerce Department official who reported severe head pressure and ear pain; and the wife of an official who felt a piercing pain and pressure in her left ear and a headache. He asserts that a striking aspect of these stories is that “people who never met tell it the same way.” A more plausible explanation is that they were suffering from vestibular disorders: conditions that affect the inner ear and parts of the brain that regulate balance and spatial awareness. The symptoms described in the 60 Minutes interviews include ear pain and pressure, headaches and head pressure, and unusual sounds and sensations in the ear. The descriptions of the victims would be familiar to any vestibular neurologist treating migraines and inner ear conditions including unusual ear sensations, stabbing pains, or a perception of drilling, pulsation, or vibrations.12 It is estimated that one-third of adults over 40 will experience vestibular dysfunction.13

The Omission of Key Information

The 60 Minutes narrative survives primarily through a strategic omission of key facts. It fails to mention that the foundational studies in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) that gave rise to the belief that a mysterious weapon had injured American personnel in Cuba, were mired in controversy. This included internal ethics complaints, the withdrawal of authors, and accusations of scientific misconduct. In doing so, the program presents a house of cards as a fortress of settled science. The first study appeared in JAMA in February 2018, and caused a sensation with claims that the patients suffered brain damage.14 Prior to its publication, UCLA neurologist Dr. Robert Baloh, who developed some of the tests that were used in the study, was asked by the editors to review the findings. He found the manuscript to be laden with inconsistencies, described the claims as “science fiction,” and recommended against acceptance.15

Three of the study’s original authors removed their names just prior to publication as they were refused access to the data or earlier revisions of the manuscript. One of them—Dr. Carey Balaban, an ear, nose and throat specialist at the University of Pittsburgh, was so disturbed by this that he filed an ethics complaint over what he described as potential scientific misconduct.16 When the study appeared, there were calls by neurologists for their methods to be clarified or the study retracted.17 A later attempt to clarify the study’s findings was described by University of Edinburgh neurologist Sergio Della Sala as incomprehensible.18 Prior to its publication, information had been leaked to the media that several of the patients suffered white matter tract changes in their brains, prompting dramatic headlines about brain damage. However, when the study appeared, the prevalence of white matter changes fell within a normal range.19 

A second JAMA study in 2019, was equally controversial. It found brain anomalies in a small group of victims, once again prompting sensational headlines about brain damage. The study’s lead author, Dr. Ragini Verma, even described the differences in brain images of “Havana Syndrome” victims and a control group as “jaw-dropping.”20 Yet such findings are common in small cohorts and are consistent with what one would expect to see in a group of people under prolonged stress. The authors even admitted that the anomalies were so minor that they could have been caused by individual variation.21 Another problem was that 12 of the Havana Syndrome patients had pre-existing histories of concussion compared to none in the control group. Despite this, many media outlets had a field day citing a few rogue scientists who proclaimed that it was clear evidence of an attack by a microwave weapon. 

Dubious Beginnings 

The 60 Minutes segment also failed to mention that social contagion may have played a role in the initial spread of “Havana Syndrome.” CIA analyst Fulton Armstrong would later reveal that the undercover intelligence agent in Havana who first reported the mysterious sounds and believed they were responsible for his health issues, had engaged in a vigorous campaign to persuade colleagues that the sounds were significant. “He was lobbying, if not coercing, people to report symptoms and connect the dots,” Armstrong said.22 The man, who has since been dubbed “patient zero,” later attended a gathering of embassy personnel and played the recording of his “attack,” encouraging them to report their symptoms as he was convinced that they too had been targeted. His recording was analyzed by government scientists and identified as crickets.23 In fact, eight of the first group of victims in Cuba who reported feeling unwell and hearing sounds, recorded their “attacks.” They were later identified as the mating call of the Indies short-tailed cricket.24

Soon American and Canadian diplomats stationed in Havana were on the lookout for strange sounds and health complaints. Eventually the U.S. government alerted all of its active military personnel and embassy staff around the world to be vigilant for mysterious sounds and “anomalous health incidents.” In response, there were over 1,500 reports of possible attacks. The problem with these alerts is that “Havana Syndrome” symptoms are common in the general population and include headaches, nausea, dizziness, forgetfulness, difficulty concentrating, tinnitus, fatigue, facial pressure, hearing loss, ear pain, trouble walking, depression, irritability, and even nose bleeds.

One study found that the average person experiences five different symptoms in any given week. Thirty-six percent noted fatigue; 35 percent reported headaches. Nearly 30 percent said they had insomnia, while 15 percent had difficulty concentrating, 13 percent reported memory problems; roughly 8 percent noted nausea and dizziness.25 These symptoms overlap with those attributed to “Havana Syndrome.” When one eliminates claims of brain damage and hearing loss (which were never demonstrated), one is left with an array of exceedingly common symptoms.

A Fixation on David Relman

The 60 Minutes segment includes extensive interviews with Stanford University microbiologist David Relman who headed two panels that both concluded that pulsed microwave radiation was likely involved in some cases. As with the earlier 60 Minutes investigations, the government intelligence assessments on “Havana Syndrome” have rejected his conclusions. One of Relman’s panels said it was not possible to assess the involvement of social contagion as there was no data on the early spread.26 Yet, the spread from “patient zero” to fellow spies and diplomats in Havana has been well-documented and was widely known over a year before the panel issued their findings in December 2020.27 The same panel interviewed fringe figures such as Dr. Beatrice Golomb, a researcher at the University of California, San Diego, known for her extreme views on mass psychogenic illness, which she believes does not exist.28 His 2022 panel concluded that social contagion could not have affected spies and diplomats operating in Havana because they were highly educated and trained to deal with stress.29 This is a common fallacy.30 These conclusions may not be surprising given that Relman’s panels failed to interview a single prominent skeptic.  

The enduring lesson of “Havana Syndrome” is not secret weapons but the psychology of belief.

Scott Pelley complains that the panels’ conclusions have been ignored by the intelligence community. Relman told Pelley that it was embarrassing and insulting that the victims have been “dismissed as malingerers or people who are manufacturing things.” Pelley concurred by saying that the American government “has doubted their stories” and they have been labelled as “delusional.” These claims are misleading. In 2023, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence stated unequivocally that it was the consensus of the intelligence community that the symptoms exhibited by “Havana Syndrome” sufferers are real, but it was “highly unlikely” the stimulus was a directed energy weapon from a foreign adversary. Instead, they attributed the complaints to an array of factors including pre-existing conditions, conventional illnesses, environmental causes, and social factors (a clear reference to mass suggestion and social contagion). The intelligence assessment explicitly states that their findings “do not call into question the very real experiences and symptoms that our colleagues and their family members have reported.”31 A second intelligence assessment issued in 2025 reached a similar conclusion,32 while a recent study by the National Institutes of Health found no evidence of brain damage.33  

The Portable Microwave Device

The 60 Minutes segment also reported that in 2024 undercover U.S. government agents obtained a portable microwave weapon from a Russian criminal network and have tested it on animals. They said that the Pentagon-funded mission to obtain the weapon cost about $15 million. For being the centerpiece of this story, they provide few details. Pelley said “Our confidential sources tell us the still classified weapon has been tested in a U.S. military lab for more than a year. Tests on rats and sheep show injuries consistent with those seen in humans.” The problem with this claim is that there is no credible evidence that the victims of “Havana Syndrome” were injured by a weapon. 60 Minutes didn’t break this story; that distinction goes to CNN, who this year reported on their investigation into the same device, but their perspective was in sharp contrast to the 60 Minutes claims. The CNN sources said there was an ongoing debate and skepticism over attempts to link the device to “Havana Syndrome.”34

The claims by 60 Minutes are based on anonymous sources rather than technical reports, there are no test results, and they did not even obtain a picture of the device! Even after the device was acquired, the updated assessment on “Havana Syndrome” that was published in 2025 continued to maintain that the involvement of an adversarial weapon was highly unlikely. The U.S. and foreign governments have long conducted research on potential new weapons, so the existence of the Russian device should come as no surprise. Yet there is a big difference between testing, and producing an effective, practical weapon, with a major impediment being the laws of physics. The details surrounding the device and who created it, are nebulous. For instance, how could a Russian criminal syndicate obtain such a highly classified device and offer it for sale on the black market, without the knowledge of Russian intelligence, or U.S. intelligence for that matter?  

A Media Zombie That Won’t Die

This is not the first claim of its kind. In February 2026, the Washington Post reported that a Norwegian government researcher had built a device that was purportedly behind the Havana Syndrome “attacks.”35 Unnamed sources claimed that after exposing himself to pulsed microwave radiation, he developed neurological symptoms consistent with the victims. The report stated that after the Norwegian government informed the CIA, officials from both the White House and Pentagon visited Norway on two occasions to learn more. However, the Norwegian government says they know nothing about it. An investigation by one of the country’s leading newspapers was unable to identify any such researcher, while a microwave expert at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Trym Holter, said any such study would have required ethics approval and been carried out in a controlled fashion with test subjects. He said for someone to have conducted such an experiment on themselves would have been “completely crazy” and he questioned whether any such experiment had ever occurred.36

Perhaps the most troubling reason for this one-sided reporting is a glaring conflict of interest: the producers behind all four 60 Minutes segments, are marketing a book on the subject.

This pattern of credulous reporting is not limited to CBS News or the Post. Recently British journalist Nicky Woolf wrote a sensational article in the Sunday Times claiming that the evidence for a directed energy weapon is now overwhelming, while omitting the US intelligence community’s own conclusions to the contrary.37 He stated (falsely) that “many of the early cases didn’t know about each other,” and repeated the debunked claim that during the recent US raid in Venezuela, the American military used a directed energy weapon to incapacitate enemy soldiers.38

Historical Precedents

Unfortunately, 60 Minutes has repeatedly focused on one side of the story instead of presenting competing perspectives. A key problem when evaluating controversial claims is that once investigators become convinced that a hidden adversary exists, the belief itself can shape how evidence is interpreted. History is replete with examples. During the Salem witch-hunts of 1692, an idea spread that witches were attacking members of the community. Before long, over 200 residents were accused of consorting with the devil. During the “Red Scare” of the 1950s, a belief spread that communist sympathizers had infiltrated communities across the United States. In response, scores of innocent people were blacklisted, often on the flimsiest of evidence.

The enduring lesson of “Havana Syndrome” is not secret weapons but the psychology of belief. The producers at 60 Minutes continue to focus on exotic explanations while ignoring mundane ones. The colloquial term for this is “doubling down”—the stubborn persistence of clinging to a discredited hypothesis in the face of compelling evidence to the contrary. In the case of CBS News, it may be a subconscious attempt to avoid the embarrassment of having to correct the record after having been mistaken. The continued advocacy by David Relman and Scott Pelley for the microwave weapon hypothesis despite intelligence assessments to the contrary, exemplifies what psychologists refer to as “belief perseverance.” This is the well-documented tendency to maintain deeply held beliefs in the face of contrary evidence. 

Perhaps the most troubling reason for this one-sided reporting is a glaring conflict of interest: the producers behind all four 60 Minutes segments, are marketing a book on the subject. The Havana Syndrome: Secret Weapons, a Government cover-up, and the Greatest Spy Mystery of Our Time, is scheduled to be published this fall, with an introduction by none other than Scott Pelley himself.39 By continuing to air these “exposés,” CBS News is effectively providing a multi-million-dollar infomercial for a product that relies on a spy mystery narrative to drive sales. The authors say their reason for writing the book is “to tell the whole story” including “the cover-up.” This is ironic given that their reports have consistently left out key parts of the narrative.40  

Chasing Shadows

The history of science and journalism are replete with examples of how institutions can cling to persuasive stories long after the evidence begins to unravel. In the 1840s Hungarian physician Ignaz Semmelweis produced strong empirical evidence that handwashing among midwives dramatically reduced the deaths of mothers from childbed fever, yet his findings were resisted for decades by the medical establishment.41 More recently, in the lead-up to the Iraq War many media outlets published erroneous stories that Saddam Hussein had obtained weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) even though United Nations weapons inspectors in the field insisted they had found no clear evidence.42 This led to an apology by The New York Times for publishing claims that were never independently verified, and the Washington Post acknowledging that skeptical stories were frequently “pushed to the back of the paper” while pro-WMD claims dominated the front pages.43

This pursuit of unicorns over horses is a cautionary tale of how fear, expectation, and sensational storytelling can create a phantom menace where there is no concrete evidence that one exists.

When investigators become convinced of the existence of a hidden adversary, ambiguous evidence can take on new meaning and be seen as patterns in a grand conspiracy. Anonymous sources become credible witnesses. Coincidences can appear to be coordinated acts of aggression, and mundane symptoms are redefined as signs of an attack. As physicist Richard Feynman famously warned: “The first principle is that you must not fool yourself—and you are the easiest person to fool.”44  Throughout history, when a seductive explanation takes root—whether in the form of germs, hidden arsenals, or mysterious attacks—ambiguous signs are reinterpreted as confirmation rather than treated with skepticism. 

The promotion of ghostly enemies while omitting key facts is a dangerous game because it expends valuable resources at a time of confirmed threats to our homeland. This pursuit of unicorns over horses is a cautionary tale of how fear, expectation, and sensational storytelling can create a phantom menace where there is no concrete evidence that one exists.

Beliefs Have Consequences 

Unfounded beliefs and pseudoscientific ideas can have serious consequences by distorting scientific understanding, propagating myths, and shaping public policy.

Shortly after the airing of the 60 Minutes episode, the House Intelligence Committee met on March 19th with its chair, Republican Rick Crawford, asserting that the 2023 and 2025 assessments about that the involvement of an energy weapon was “highly unlikely,” were influenced by members of the Biden administration who have been covering up the ‘real’ cause – attacks by a foreign adversary.

National Intelligence Director Tulsi Gabbard, FBI Director Kash Patel, and National Security Agency acting director William Hartman all agreed that there was an urgent need to retract the current assessment.

The last major hearing on ‘Havana Syndrome’ was conducted by the House Committee on Homeland Security on March 8, 2024. The hearing was titled: “Silent Weapons: Examining Foreign Anomalous Health Incidents Targeting Americans in the Homeland and Abroad.”

The title reflects the biased nature of the hearing. Not surprisingly, the witnesses were all supporters of the energy weapon hypothesis.

I was originally asked if I would be willing to testify at this hearing, only to be later told my testimony was no longer required.

Marie Mortreux, an assistant professor in the University of Rhode Island’s College of Health Sciences, is part of an international team of researchers studying how the Mars’s gravity would affect astronauts’ skeletal muscle.

Today we again have three items plus lagniappe, and I will keep on with Caturday posts for at least a month.

First, we have a four-minute video of Marvin the Cat getting a “rave bath”, whatever that is.  The YouTube notes give a link and a caption:

So I asked Grok what a “rave bath for a cat” is. The AI answer:

A “rave bath” is a fun, creative bath-time setup for a cat (specifically one that actually enjoys water—rare for most cats!) where the owner turns the bathtub into a glowing “party” atmosphere.

It comes from a popular 2024 viral video by The Dodo featuring a cat named Marvin, who is obsessed with baths. His owner came up with the idea to make bath time even more exciting:

• They turn down the lights in the bathroom to make it dark.
• They add glow sticks (the kind you crack and shake) floating in the water for Marvin to swat, chase, and play with.
• Sometimes they include a light layer of pet-safe bubble bath or bath bombs for extra splashing fun.

The result looks like a mini rave or underwater wonderland with colorful glowing lights reflecting in the tub. Marvin goes wild splashing around and clearly loves it.

The term “rave bath” stuck because of how the owner describes it in the video: “We came up with the cutest thing ever. It’s a rave bath… It’s like a Wonderland.” The video has millions of views across YouTube, TikTok, and Facebook, and people now sometimes use the phrase for any glow-stick-enhanced bath for water-loving pets.It’s basically the opposite of a normal stressful cat bath—pure pampering and play for cats like Marvin who beg for water time instead of running away from it. If your cat hates baths, this probably won’t convert them, but it’s adorable to watch! You can find the original video by searching “Woman Throws A ‘Rave Bath’ For Her Cat Who Loves Bath Time | The Dodo.” [JAC: note the disco music during the rave bath.]

This is a woman who loves her cats!

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You should all know by now that Turkey is probably the most cat-loving country in the world. I’ve seen it for myself on several visits: one of the notable aspects is the groups of cats that congregate in outdoor restaurants, with the customers occasionally feeding them. Here’s a photo I took in March, 2008 in Istanbul:

From the Facebook site Fact Fuel: we learn that some Turks erect minature ladders to keep cats dry (and note the cat houses):

Winter in parts of Turkey can blanket cities in heavy snow, leaving stray cats searching for warmth along icy streets. In response, some apartment residents have installed small, cat-sized ladders leading from the ground up to their balconies. These narrow wooden or metal pathways are carefully secured against building walls, giving outdoor cats a safe route upward instead of forcing them to remain exposed to freezing temperatures below.

Once on the balcony, many residents place insulated boxes, blankets, or small shelters where the cats can curl up and rest. The ladders act as bridges between street life and temporary refuge, especially during storms. For animals accustomed to navigating rooftops and alleyways, the climb becomes a familiar path to safety.

The gesture reflects a cultural affection for street cats that runs deep in many Turkish communities. Rather than ignoring their presence, neighbors adapt their living spaces to include them. In the quiet snowfall of winter nights, these modest ladders stand as vertical lifelines — proving that compassion can be built step by step, right alongside everyday homes.

The ladders:

And if you click on the screenshot below you’ll go to an Instagram video:

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And we return to the perennial problem described in this NYT column, which refers to a paper in the Anatomical Record by a team of Japanese authors (second secreenshot). You can access both sites by clicking on the titles (the NYT goes to an archived link).  The key is the way a cat’s spine is configured.

From the NYT article:

In a paper, published last month in the journal The Anatomical Record, researchers offered a novel take on falling felines. Their evidence suggests new insights into the so-called falling cat problem, particularly that cats have a very flexible segment of their spines that allows them to correct their orientation midair.

Greg Gbur, a physicist and cat-falling expert at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte who was not involved with the paper, said the study was the first he knew of that explored “what the structure of the cat’s spine tells us about how a cat turns over while falling.” He added that the research uncovered many remarkable details about how cats maneuver while falling.

People have been curious about falling cats perhaps as long as the animals have been living with humans, but the method to their acrobatic abilities remains enigmatic. Part of the difficulty is that the anatomy of the cat has not been studied in detail, explains Yasuo Higurashi, a physiologist at Yamaguchi University in Japan and lead author of the study.

“Physicists have tried to model the behavior in relatively simple equations,” said Ruslan Belyaev, a zoologist at the Severtsov Institute of Ecology and Evolution in Moscow who was not involved in the study. But, he added, “the real cat” is anything but simple.

Modern research has split the falling cat problem into two competing models.

The first, “legs in, legs out,” suggests that cats correct their falling trajectory by first extending their hind limbs before retracting them, using a sequential twist of their upper and then lower trunk to gain the proper posture while in free fall.

The second model, “tuck and turn,” suggests that cats turn their upper and lower bodies in simultaneous juxtaposed movements.

In the new study, Dr. Higurashi and his colleagues scrutinized different segments of cat spines using donated cadavers. They also conducted dropping experiments on a pair of live cats, from about three feet up.

But wait! There’s more:

The researchers found that the feline spine was extremely flexible in the upper thoracic vertebrae, but stiffer and heavier in the lower lumbar vertebrae. The discovery matches video evidence showing the cats first turn their front legs, and then their lower legs. The results suggest the cat quickly spins its flexible upper torso to face the ground, allowing it to see so that it can correctly twist the rest of its body to match.

They measured the spinal flexion in cat cadavers whose spines had been removed, and they twisted the removed spines until they “failed”. Here’s a figure from the paper:

(from the paper): (a) Schematic diagram of the testing apparatus used to twist a spinal region until failure. The rotary table was operated manually to rotate the caudal end of the spinal region counterclockwise relative to the immobilized cranial end at a quasi-static loading rate. Torque was measured using the transducer between the table and specimen. The rotation of both the table and specimen was filmed using a digital camcorder. (b) Torque-angular displacement curves obtained for Cat A, illustrating the mechanical properties measured in this study. Torque was recorded at every 5° of angular displacement. The neutral zone (NZ) was defined as the part of the curve with minimal resistance to vertebral rotation. The lumbar spine had no NZ. Stiffness was measured as the ratio of the change in torque to the change in angular displacement in the linear part of the curve. Max, maximum torque; ROM, range of motion.

“The thoracic spine of the cat can rotate like our neck,” Dr. Higurashi said.

Experiments on the spine show the upper vertebrae can twist an astounding 360 degrees, he says, which helps cats make these correcting movements with ease. The results are consistent with the “legs in, legs out” model, but definitively determining which model is correct will take more work, Dr. Higurashi says.

The results also yielded another discovery: Cats, like many animals, appear to have a right-side bias. One of the dropped cats corrected itself by turning to the right eight out of eight times, while the other turned right six out of eight times.

Here’s a figure from the paper showing the cats being dropped (onto soft pillows, mind you). Note that in (b) the anterior part of the cat rotates faster than the rear part,  This cat looks scared, with its tongue sticking out. The caption tells you what’s going on.

From the paper: (a) A representative frame sequence illustrating sequential rotation of the anterior and posterior trunk without counterrotation during air-righting. In this sequence, a cat rotates to the right. (1) The dorsal sides of both the anterior and posterior trunk are initially oriented downwards. (2) Upon release, the anterior trunk becomes oriented laterally, while the posterior trunk remains oriented downwards. (3) The anterior trunk is oriented upwards, indicating that its rotation has been completed, whereas the posterior trunk is oriented laterally. (4) The anterior and posterior trunk are both oriented upwards, indicating the completion of posterior trunk rotation. (b) Bar charts with individual data points showing the time required to complete anterior and posterior trunk rotation during air-righting for each of the two cats (Cats H and I). Error bars represent ±1 SD from the mean. The start of free fall was defined as time zero. Significant differences were assessed using paired Student’s t-tests. **p < 0.01.

If you want to see the paper, click below:

Here’s an enlightening video of how cats spin their bodies (front first) to land on their feet. It’s clearly instinctive, i.e., reflecting a behavioral-genetic program molded by natural selection:

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Lagniappe: Larry the 10 Downing Street cat has put out a video about what’s going on in his block. Most important, the Brits have decided to replace historical figures on their banknotes (they once included Darwin), with wildlife. Larry makes a strong case that he’s both wildlife and a historic figure!

 

Extra lagniappe: A CBS news report on the rescue of Biscuit, a stranded moggy:

And a third lagniappe item. This photo and caption arrived just half an hour ago from Robert Lang. His caption:

Yesterday I and some friends did a hike to a little-visited waterfall in the San Gabriels. At the trailhead, which is shared with some other popular trails, we met this person who was bringing his moggie along for their hike:’

h/t: Carl, Robert

James Blilie is back with some black-and-white photos from his perambulations and climbs.  Jim’s captions are indented, and you can enlarge his photos by clicking on them. And Jim tells us he’s recovering well from a knee replacement.

Here is another set for your consideration:  Black and white landscape images from those I posted on that previously mentioned FB page for B&W images.

First up are two shots from our attempt to climb Mount McKinley (as it was named at the time) in May 1987.  We did not summit (“worst May weather since 1960-something”):

Rocky outcrop in the Kahiltna Glacier, scanned Tri-X Pan

Camp on the Kahiltna Glacier with the summit in the background, scanned Tri-X Pan:

Our local mountain, Mount Adams, but from the other side, the north side, 1987.  I climbed it three times, always from the north.  The “standard” route is on the south side.  Scanned Tri-X Pan:

Skiers in Garibaldi Provincial Park, British Columbia, 1988, scanned Kodachrome 64:

Dinner preparation, Nepal, 1991, scanned Tri-X Pan:

The Vietnam War Memorial, Washington, DC, January 1992, scanned Tri-X Pan

Letchworth State Park, New York, November 1992, scanned Tri-X Pan:

Elephants, Amboseli National Park, Kenya, 1991, scanned Kodachrome 64:

Bonneville Salt Flats, Nevada, June 2013:

Mount Hood, taken from our driveway, December 2023:

Kalaloch Beach, Olympic Peninsula, June 2025:

Equipment:

Current:

Olympus OM-D E-M5, micro-4/3 camera (crop factor = 2.0)
LUMIX G X Vario, 12-35MM, f/2.8 ASPH.  (24mm-70mm equivalent, my walk-around lens)
LUMIX 35-100mm  f/2.8 G Vario  (70-200mm equivalent)
LUMIX G Vario 7-14mm  f/4.0 ASPH  (14-28mm equivalent)
Leica DG Vario-Elmar 100-400mm, F4.0-6.3 II ASPH., Power O.I.S. (200mm-800mm equivalent)

The scanned images:

Pentax camera bodies:  LX, K-1000, ME-Super, MX
Various Pentax M-series and A-Series lenses:
20mm f/4
20mm f/2.8
50mm f/2.0
200mm f/4
Tokina ATX 80-200mm f/2.8

Qilimanjaro is selling a relatively cheap kit with everything you need for a quantum computer – you just need to be able to put it together

Scientists at Harvard have built a miniature device that can twist and tune light in real time. By rotating two stacked photonic crystals and adjusting their spacing with a tiny mechanical system, they can control how light’s “handedness” behaves. This allows the chip to distinguish between left- and right-circular polarized light with remarkable precision. The advance could lead to smarter sensors, faster communications, and new quantum technologies.

A routine quantum optics technique just revealed an extraordinary secret: entangled light can carry incredibly complex topological structures. Researchers found these hidden patterns reach up to 48 dimensions, offering a vast new “alphabet” for encoding quantum information. Unlike previous assumptions, this topology can emerge from a single property of light—orbital angular momentum.

A routine quantum optics technique just revealed an extraordinary secret: entangled light can carry incredibly complex topological structures. Researchers found these hidden patterns reach up to 48 dimensions, offering a vast new “alphabet” for encoding quantum information. Unlike previous assumptions, this topology can emerge from a single property of light—orbital angular momentum.

On Tuesday, CERN will transport antiprotons on a truck for the first time, testing the plan to deliver antimatter by road to research labs across Europe