A bit late to my own story here, as a reporting trip intervened, but but a couple weeks ago I wrote an essay for Buzzfeed about the overselling of medical genomics, which goes beyond hype in a way that distorts funding, science, and the public’s ideas about genetics. We live in an age of hype. […]
Continue reading →Today I was on WNYC’s Leonard Lopate Show talking about “The Social Life of Genes,” a feature I wrote that will appear appeared in Pacific Standard’s Sept/Oct issue. Day by day, week by week, your genes are in a conversation with your social world. Your neighbors, your friends, your family: They don’t just get under your […]
Continue reading →Five years ago, guitar player, raconteur, writer, genome geek and Duke professor Misha Angrist surrendered his DNA to the eyes of the public, and to his own restless, rambunctious curiosity. Over at the fine site LabLit, Richard Grant takes a smart, lively look at the smart, lively book that resulted: The history of science and medicine […]
Continue reading →John Hawks ponders the day, very soon to come, when high school students will run their genome sequences in bio lab instead of their blood types. He’s riffing off an article by Ronald Bailey in Reason about Bailey’s experiences with his own genomic knowledge (“I’ll Show You My Genome. Will You Show Me Yours?”) Some […]
Continue reading →The Onion, picking up the news that Ozzy is having his genome sequenced, got an inside line, managed to get early results, and reports them thusly : Last month, the Cambridge, MA company Knome began mapping the complete DNA sequence for heavy metal singer and former reality star Ozzy Osbourne. Here are some of the discoveries made so far: His DNA contains vast sequences of mumbly code that are almost completely indecipherable Subliminal genes that must be unraveled backwards Brain unique in that it possesses not just opiate receptors, but powerful transmitters as well Gene responsible for making Jack Daniel’s unappealing in any amount less than a fifth Shares a close genetic link with no other living creature and so on.
Continue reading →This isn’t something we’ll figure out in a couple workshops; it’s something the industry and the broader genomics community will need to consider carefully over the next few years, even as it rapidly grows.
Continue reading →I’ve got a three-day run starting next Sunday in which I’ll be talking to authors and journalists about book proposals; NY science writers about the future of social media; and to genomic geeks about genes and temperament.
Continue reading →Daniel McArthur and Daniel Vorhaus have a beef:
Earlier this month, the Sunday Times published an op-ed piece by Camilla Long critiquing the practice and business of direct-to-consumer (DTC) genetic testing (“When DNA means do not ask”). It is Long’s right, of course, to express her opinions, but the article is peppered with factual inaccuracies and exaggerations that demand correction.
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