Because they were extracted from human blood, the first-generation hepatitis B vaccines developed in the early 1980s had significant drawbacks, including high cost, low availability, and the possibility of unsuspected contamination (HIV/AIDS). This was the impetus for dev...

Someone once said (it may have been me): "There is no dull information, only dull writers."

We have all had the misfortune of reading very dull texts and sitting through very dull presentations. But were they inherently dull? Or were they made that way because t...

We all live with misconceptions about the world. This is quite normal. No one can be an expert in everything, so we simplify our learning into easy-to-remember snippets, which are often very close to the truth, but never quite there.

Generally, our misconceptio...

As someone once said (it may have been Einstein, but it may have been someone else): "The universe is not only stranger than we imagine, it's stranger than we can imagine."

Whoever may have said it, in 1929 a certain Robert Ripley took the message to heart and s...

In virtually all walks of live -- business, education, politics, research, etc. -- documents of more than a few of pages consist of the body and an executive summary. Unfortunately, most writers treat the executive summary as an afterthought rather than forethought.

Part 14 of an occasional series

I am a collector of quotations. I have been ever since I learned how to write, I mean professionally, not in primary school.

I am particularly fond of what I like to call "pithy prose". These short quotations can cover ...

To open the discussion, let's deal with the point of view that God is the source of morality; therefore, morality is whatever He defines it to be. Agreed.

So let's change the premise. Can Man ever fully understand what is moral and what isn't?

Clearl...

Part 13 of an occasional series. Follow-up to Pithy Prose: The Wit & Wisdom of Anon (Part 7)

I am a collector of quotations. I have been ever since I learned how to write, I mean professionally, not in primary school.

I am particularly fond of what I ...

"Why are Americans so poor at learning to speak other languages?" is asking the wrong question, because the answer is obvious. They don't learn to speak other languages because they don't need to. Or more pertinently, they have little or no opportunity to do so even it th...

Writing a corporate image brochure is truly a study in futility. Two things are certain about these expensive, glossy booklets:

1) Almost all companies of any size feel compelled to produce them.

2) Virtually no one ever reads them.

It is no...