“Welcome to the Post-Pasteurian Age” (my HealthFOO Ignite talk that never happened)
I was blessed with an invitation to HealthFOO this year, here in nearby Cambridge. Alas, the event was cancelled due to the intense events after the Boston Mara...
Category: The Narrative
Why can’t health be a sufficient incentive?
There have been a slew of consumer healthcare devices that have come to market ranging from fancy pedometers and activity meters to apps that track your every m...
Think mobile when designing a mobile app
One of my favorite radio stations in the Boston area, Phoenix WFNX 101.7, died an inglorious death last year. But, like the phoenix, it rose from its ashes as a...
Looking back on 2012: I am a “fermentos”
At the start of each year, I write down a few things I’d like to accomplish or focus on for the year. Usually, it’s a behavior I’d like to see improve or do mor...
Do you set goals for the heck of it?
Last November, I participated in NaNoWriMo, a month long writing frenzy with the sole goal of writing 50,000 words (“quantity, not quality”). Not on...
Ego play: My Erdős–Bacon number is 7, sort of
Paul Erdős was the most prolific publisher of mathematics papers (more than Euler). Much like Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon, mathematicians have an number to conne...
Brief commentary on App.net, the new social network “that aspires beyond chat and ads”
I’ve been meaning to comment on App.net, a new for-fee social networking service. To me, it seems that App.net is trying to build an alternative social we...
Ideas are not unique, no matter how far-fetched – a personal story
Last Christmas-time, I was driving to go get my parents (they live a few states away) and was listening to a Science Friday about Mars. The guest was an advocat...
Saturday morning thoughts on the evolutionary history of IBD in Eastern European Jews
Of course, as is usual with me on the weekend, I started reading all my open tabs in my browser. And the first one I read was a paper where they crossed two pur...
Mixing meaning into disease research – Treato
I wasn’t so sure how to describe Treato. It’s really interesting – mixing semantic analysis, social media, medical records, and analysis ̵...