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It is long past time the US eliminated gerrymandering, the drawing of district lines specifically for the purpose of favoring one political party, across the board. This requires either a 50 state agreement, or action at the federal level. This has been a problem since near the beginning of our democracy, and seems to be getting worse. We are now in the middle of a mid-decade tit-for-tat rash of gerrymandering that is extremely anti-democratic, so it’s a good time to raise this as an issue voters should definitely understand and prioritize.

As a quick aside – this is not a “political” blog, which does not mean that I never discuss political issues or topics with a political dimension. It partly means that I try my best to by non-partisan, and to avoid purely political value-judgements. I recognize this is an impossible ideal – we all have our biases and perspectives that color our thinking on topics in subtle ways. But we can try. Also, this is not a strictly science blog, it covers science, critical thinking, and media savvy, which are part of what we call scientific skepticism. Recently I started a video podcast, Political Reality, with co-host Andrea Jones Roy, who is a political scientist, for the purpose of applying scientific skepticism to political topics. This is also not a partisan show, and is mostly part civics lesson and part fact-checking. With that in mind, I thought I would write about what science and critical thinking have to say about gerrymandering, given that this is a topic in the news recently, although not as much as I think it should be. We also did cover this topic on Political Reality.

The term gerrymander dates back to 1812 when Massachusetts Governor Elbridge Gerry redistricted his state’s representative districts in order to favor his party, the Democratic Republicans. One of the districts looked like a salamander, leading the Boston Gazette to quip that it was really a “Gerry-mander”, and the name stuck. (Ironically, the two parts of that term, gerry and mander, both kinda sound like they mean “rig”, but the word has nothing to do with that.) Since then all political parties have used gerrymandering to gain unfair advantage. This stems from some features of US politics.

First, we have single representative districts, in a winner-take-all system. Senators are elected state-wide, and so gerrymandering is not an issue. Many countries have multi-representative districts, with representatives being apportioned to the votes – if your party wins 40% of the votes, you get 40% of the representatives. This also, by the way, is part of why we have such a dominantly two-party system – you need to earn a plurality of votes in order to have any representation. A party representing 10% of voters, without a local power base, would have zero representation. Districting, in a fair world, would be designed to share power roughly according to the population. In a state that is 60% party A and 40% party B it seems intuitively fair that party A, on average, should net about 60% of the representatives and party B 40%. Also, districts can be drawn to keep people with similar demographic interests together enough to have their interests represented. This would be partly geographic, but also partly urban vs rural, cultural, and racial.

Gerrymandering happens when one party controls the process of redistricting, usually because they control the state legislature. In our hypothetical 60/40 state, with let’s say 10 representatives, you could draw districts so that all 10 are 60/40, meaning party A would likely win all 10 representatives. You could also use redistricting to specifically disenfranchise specific demographics of voters. With modern data and computers you could theoretically do this with “surgical precision” (as one judge put it).

Partisan gerrymandering causes several problems for democracy. It is often referred to as politicians choosing their voters, rather than voters choosing their politicians, and this is apt. It makes districts less competitive, and often non-competitive, which reduces voter choice. This shifts the real election battle to the primary, which tends to favor more extreme partisan candidates. There is then no incentive to appeal to the middle in the general election because the outcome of that election is all but predetermined. So gerrymandering disenfranchises voters, reduces voter choice, and favors more extreme partisan politicians. This results in greater political polarization among our politicians, which causes dysfunction in Congress. How do we stop this?

The 2019 SCOTUS decision on Rucho vs Common Cause determined that federal courts have no roll to play in deciding questions of redistricting, which should be left entirely to the states. This is a deep issue unto itself – in our federalist system, what rights do congress and federal courts have in controlling how the states manage elections? Under Rucho vs Common Cause, however, Congress still has the right to pass laws to regulate redistricting. So it could be as simple as passing an anti-gerrymandering law. This would be ideal, rather than dealing with this state-by-state, which hasn’t worked. We are seeing what happens when this is left to the states. Some hold to principles, and leave redistricting in the hands of non-partisan committees, or some other reasonable fair process. But many states use their control to unfairly gerrymander their state, which then leads other states to do the same in retaliation. The best solution would therefore involve all 50 states at once.

Congress, however, has failed to pass anti-gerrymandering laws, most recently in 2025. This is typically blamed on political polarization, but also on the fact that many congressmen benefit from gerrymandering, on both sides, and would not want to see their favorable district suddenly become competitive. About 85% of House seats are not competitive (even lass after the recent round of gerrymandering), so that is most representatives. It is likely that only extreme pressure from voters will break this logjam and get us the anti-gerrymandering law we deserve. In fact, I would prefer a constitutional amendment. This is a higher bar to cross, but that’s the point – it would also be far more difficult to undue.

Gerrymandering makes America less democratic, it reduces voter choice, disenfranchises some voters, and increases political extremism and polarization. When asked, 70% of voters say that gerrymandering is bad and we should do something to eliminate it. However, those same voters seem to be OK with it when it is done to the advantage of their own party, justifying it by saying it is necessary because the other side does it. This is another reason why action at the federal level is needed, because that would affect everyone all at once. This is not going to happen, however, unless it comes from the bottom up. Voters need to take control of their own voting rights.

The post We Need to Ditch Gerrymandering first appeared on NeuroLogica Blog.

Quantum physics once shocked scientists by revealing that particles can behave like waves—and now, that strange behavior has been pushed even further. For the first time, researchers have observed wave-like interference in positronium, an exotic “atom” made of an electron and its antimatter partner, a positron. This breakthrough not only strengthens the weird reality of quantum mechanics but also opens the door to new experiments involving antimatter, including the possibility of testing how gravity affects it—something never directly measured before.

The ongoing closure of the Strait of Hormuz has seen energy prices soar, but thanks to solar panels and a home battery, Alice Klein pays just A$25 (£13) a month for her electricity, even when charging an electric car or running an air conditioner

Using nothing but a laser beam, scientists at Texas A&M University have demonstrated that tiny engineered devices can be lifted and steered in three dimensions without any physical contact. This breakthrough could one day form the basis of a propulsion system capable of reaching our nearest neighbouring stars in decades rather than centuries.

Researchers at the Institute of Science Tokyo have developed an origami inspired foldable antenna for CubeSat satellites that weighs just 64 grams yet in orbit, it deploys to two and a half times its stowed size. The antenna folds away neatly for launch and deploys automatically in space, achieving high gain communications performance from a package small enough to fit in your pocket and could one day support missions as far away as the Moon.

“Chiropractors are my kind of people.” RFK Jr. to Chiropractors Not certain who was more insulted, although it appears both sides considered it a compliment. He went on to say, The people who are drawn to this field are people who do critical thinking, who are willing to question orthodoxies and have the courage to stand up against these orthodoxies. Well, critical […]

The post Not Mine first appeared on Science-Based Medicine.

A revolutionary cancer treatment is now being applied to a wide range of autoimmune disorders. Columnist Michael Le Page finds it is proving to be even more effective than expected

This Internet legend claims the Earth's gravity will shut off for seven seconds in 2026.

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A massive cosmic milestone has just been reached: scientists have completed the largest high-resolution 3D map of the universe ever created. Built using data from over 47 million galaxies and quasars, this map could unlock new clues about dark energy—the mysterious force driving the universe’s expansion. Despite setbacks like wildfire disruptions, the international DESI collaboration powered through, gathering an unprecedented dataset that already hints dark energy may behave in unexpected ways.

A massive cosmic milestone has just been reached: scientists have completed the largest high-resolution 3D map of the universe ever created. Built using data from over 47 million galaxies and quasars, this map could unlock new clues about dark energy—the mysterious force driving the universe’s expansion. Despite setbacks like wildfire disruptions, the international DESI collaboration powered through, gathering an unprecedented dataset that already hints dark energy may behave in unexpected ways.

Researchers have, for the first time, directly visualized how electronic patterns known as charge density waves evolve across a phase transition. Using cutting-edge microscopy, they found these patterns form unevenly, breaking into patches influenced by tiny structural distortions. Unexpectedly, small pockets of order persist even above the transition temperature. This reveals that electronic order fades gradually rather than disappearing all at once.

Space travel has taught us valuable lessons for living and working in outer space, specifically regarding how microgravity (often mistakenly called zero-gravity) impacts the human body during short- and long-term spaceflight. This includes decreased muscle and bone mass, fluid shifts, reduced heart rate, psychological health, compromised immune system, and radiation exposure. But with agencies like NASA aspiring to build a lunar base and establish a long-term presence on the Moon, and eventually Mars, how could space travel impact potentially having babies in space?

The Milky Way has a sizable retinue of dwarf galaxies, and they may hold important clues about conditions in the early Universe. However, they're difficult to observe because many of them are so faint. The tiniest ones are called Ultra-faint dwarf galaxies, and a new simulation aimed at how they form is showing how these faint collections of stars and gas mirror the conditions of the early Universe.

These images, released on April 14, 2026, show two open star clusters, Trumpler 3 (left) and NGC 2353 (right). They represent a recent study from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory that shows how young Sun-like stars are dimmer in X-rays than previously thought. This latest study looked at eight clusters of stars between the ages of […]

I heard this song yesterday on Facebook, where the melody was used as background for a video of a man walking two kimono-clad cats in Kyoto.  I hadn’t heard “Sukiyaki” in many years (it came out in the U.S. when I was 13), but I remembered the tune instantly, though the words of course are in Japanese. The Japanese title was changed for play in other countries, but changed into the name of a dish, for crying out loud. And I didn’t know how popular the song was (see below).

It’s a song of loneliness, though it inspired by politics. The details below are from Wikipedia.

Ue o Muite Arukō” (Japanese: 上を向いて歩こう; “I Look Up as I Walk”), alternatively titled “Sukiyaki“, is a song by Japanese crooner Kyu Sakamoto, first released in Japan in 1961. The song topped the charts in a number of countries, including the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 in 1963. The song grew to become one of the world’s best-selling singles of all time, selling over 13 million copies worldwide.

Sakamoto died at 43 in a plane crash.

“Ue o Muite Arukō” (pronounced [ɯeomɯiteaɾɯkoꜜː]) was written by lyricist Rokusuke Ei and composer Hachidai Nakamura. The lyrics tell the story of a man who looks up while he is walking so that his tears will not fall, with the verses describing his memories and feelings. Ei wrote the lyrics while walking home from participating in the 1960 Anpo protests against the U.S.–Japan Security Treaty, expressing his frustration and dejection at the failed efforts to stop the treaty. However, the lyrics were purposely generic so that they might refer to any lost love

In the US, “Sukiyaki” topped the Billboard Hot 100 chart in 1963, one of the few non-English songs to have done so, and the first in a non-European language. It was the only single by an Asian artist to top the Hot 100 until the 2020 release of “Dynamite” by the South Korean band BTS. “Sukiyaki” also peaked at number eighteen on the Billboard R&B chart, and spent five weeks at number one on the Middle of the Road chart.

Can you name an American chart-topper in a European language? I can!

Here’s “Sukiyaki,” which has both the Japanese words written in English transliteration as well as the English translation.

Scientists were shocked to find that the Houtman Abrolhos Islands’ coral reefs survived a prolonged extreme heatwave in 2025 virtually unharmed, which may reveal how to protect corals elsewhere

Here we have Bill Maher kvetching about people who say that the rich don’t pay taxes, and about “progressives” who say that multimillionaires and billionaires should be taxed much more heavily. In this tirade against “progressives,” Maher also argues that the U.S., despite the plaints of Bernie Sanders and his ilk, already has a lot of socialism, including Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, unemployment compensation, and so on.

His point is a bit obscure to me, but seems to be that there’s too much income inequality in America, so that a few people make a lot, while many make bupkes.  And prices continue to rise, putting stuff like concerts and Disneyland, not to mention Lego kits, out of reach of the middle class. And don’t even mention healthcare!   So what’s new?

The guests last week were Governor Wes Moore (Democratic Governor of Maryland), Chris Cuomo (NewsNation Host), and Sarah Isgur (ABC News Analyst and Contributing Editor at The Dispatch). Cuomo and Isgur show up in this clip. 

All in all, Maher seems to be complaining both about the super-rich and their failure to help the poor (beyond paying taxes), and also about income inequality.  What is he asking for?

Out of curiosity, I asked Grok what Maher’s net worth is. The answer is below: he’s about one-seventh of a billionaire:

Bill Maher’s net worth is estimated at $140 million.

This figure is consistently reported across reliable sources as of late 2025 and into 2026, including Celebrity Net Worth (the primary reference used by most outlets) and recent articles from TV Insider, Yahoo Entertainment, and others.

A big part of his wealth comes from his long-running HBO gig: he reportedly earns about $10 million per year as host of Real Time with Bill Maher (which he’s done since 2003, after earlier runs hosting Politically Incorrect).

Another major boost was a smart 2012 investment: he bought a minority stake (roughly 4%) in the New York Mets for around $20 million and sold it in 2020 when the team changed hands, netting an estimated $80 million profit.

His earnings also include stand-up tours, comedy specials, acting roles, producing projects (like the documentary Religulous and the series Vice), and his podcast Club Random. He’s known for being relatively frugal with his spending despite the high income.

Keep in mind that celebrity net worth estimates are approximate—they’re based on public data about salaries, investments, real estate, and other assets, minus expenses and taxes—but $140 million has been the stable consensus for several years with no major contradictory reports.

You may think of the high-fat, low-carb eating plan as a faddish way to lose weight. But the keto diet is now being used to tackle conditions from severe depression to bipolar disorder and anorexia, with transformative results

Just before and during my trip to Savannah, I started noticing that people are asking for tips everywhere, including when you buy bread at a bakery or food at McDonald’s.  And by “asking”, I mean that when you pay with a credit card directly or on your phone, a lit-up sign appears at the register asking “Do you want to leave a tip?” And then, helpfully, suggesting tips, usually starting at 20% and going up to 30%. (There’s an option for a “custom tip”.)  This is a form of unwarranted pressure on consumers to tip for things that, historically, didn’t require tips. It’s the capitalistic equivalent of grade inflation.

Here are a few of the places that asked me for tips in the last ten days. I left a tip for only the last one:

A $3.00 baguette I bought at a local Hyde Park bakery (from the counter, for crying out loud)

Ice cream served from the counter at Leopold’s in Savannah

Two double cheeseburgers from McDonald’s in the Savannah airport (takeaway counter service).  And don’t shame me about McD’s: my plane was leaving and I needed food after a 7-hour wait. I haven’t eaten this kind of fast food in over a year, but I needed nourishment—if you call that “nourishment”.  Actually, it did the job, but my tip was zero.

My Uber ride from Midway Airport to home.

Now I always leave a tip for Uber drivers, even though only 20% of customers tip and Uber itself says that tips can be given, but only for exceptional service.  Tips make up only 10% of the salaries of Uber and Lyft drivers, while they constitute about half the incomes of  those who deliver food and groceries. And yes, I tip when I am delivered cooked food at home, but that happens only about once very two years. (To me, food delivery feels too much like I’m a king or something.)

Because Uber rides are pleasant and cheaper than taxi fares, I usually leave about 10% of the fare as a tip.  But in the past you would leave the Uber tip some hours after the ride, and after the driver had rated you as a passenger.  In this last case, however, a screen was affixed to the back seat asking me to leave a tip for the driver, whose name was Muhammed.  That was unfair, as that makes you tip before the driver rates you, and you’re supposed to be rated on your conduct as a passenger, not for how much extra money you give. NeverthelessI left a tip as usual, though not until the next day.

The services I usually tip for, and about 20% on average, are haircuts, non-Uber taxi rides, sit-down service in a restaurant, the people who service my cabin on cruises (less than 20% of the price!, plus a group tip for the service staff), and a few other services I can’t remember.  But I refused to tip when just buying a hamburger or getting ice cream or bread to take away. I usually don’t tip when I carry out food, either, but it varies.

If this importuning for tips reflects a real deficit of salary in an establishment, I would much prefer that they raise their prices than put me in a guilt-trippy situation where I have to tip on the spot.

I’m not the only one who feels this way.  I found this story in USA Today about tip inflation in American institutions.  Click below to read the story for free.

A few exccerpts:

Has tipping gotten out of hand?

In a new survey by Popmenu, more than 3 out of 4 people or 78% said they believed that tipping practices have become ridiculous. Forty-four percent say they’re tipping less this year than last year.

Consumers aren’t shy about expressing their tip fatigue online and on social media sites.

“I can’t enjoy a weekend without at least 5 prompts to tip for doing absolutely nothing,” one user on Reddit said about tipping fatigue. “The anxiety that comes from this false pressure to tip a percentage on every bill is ludicrous.”

. . .People feel that “tipping has become maybe ubiquitous and that now we’re being asked to tip for everything all the time, even for things that we didn’t feel were customary or normal,” Brendan Sweeney, CEO of Popmenu, told USA TODAY.

Popmenu, which is a restaurant tech company, has been surveying customers about tipping for more than five years, Sweeney said.

Tipping really increased during the COVID-19 lockdown era and after when the hospitality industry was hurting and consumers started leaving tips for take-out or tipping more “as a warm and fuzzy” feeling, Sweeney said.

“But then I think we got to a point where it was like, wait.. is this still an emergency? Is it still we’re helping people? At the same time, people are really feeling the pinch of inflation,” he said.

But tip fatigue is starting to tell!

And more digital register systems at businesses have the tipping screen built into the software, Sweeney said.

Still, Sweeney said guilt tipping, or feeling guilted into leaving a tip to avoid the awkwardness, is a thing.

When a digital screen asks for a tip, 59% of the respondents said they feel compelled to leave one. But that’s down from 66% in September 2025. And the share of people who say they tip on a weekly basis at places where it isn’t warranted also fell from 44% to 39%. Over the last 12 months, consumers estimate they spent about $130 on tips they didn’t think were necessary, down from $150 when the same question was posed in September 2025.

. . . The percentage of consumers tipping 20% or higher for restaurant servers and delivery drivers fell over the last six months:

• 41% of consumers tip restaurant servers 20% or more, which is down from 45% in September 2025. Twenty nine percent of people said they tip servers 15%, which is similar to September 2025.
• 15% tip restaurant delivery drivers 20% or higher, down from 23% in September 2025.
• 27% tip delivery drivers 15%, which is similar to September 2025.

Tips at places other than restaurants also changed.

• 39% of consumers tip at coffee shops, down from 46% in September 2025.
• 27% tip at food trucks, down from 32% in September 2025.
• 22% tip at fast food restaurants, down from 27% in September 2025.
• Separate from the survey, Popmenu also tracked tipping on online orders received through its platform. Pickup orders with a digital tip declined from 78% in 2022 to 62% in 2026.

. . . Three in four consumers (74%) say they have noticed restaurants raising the minimum suggested tip on digital screens. Here’s what people said they did when they saw that screen:

• 36% typically leave a custom tip
• 17% choose the lowest suggested tip
• 32% choose the mid-tier tip
• 7% choose the highest tip
• 9% don’t typically tip

Consumers in the survey said they were willing to pay higher prices instead of tipping. If given a choice, 56% of consumers are willing to pay more for meals and beverages to provide higher wages for workers and eliminate gratuities.

What’s that, you say? If I buy an ice cream cone, there is labor involved in making the ice cream and scooping it out to put in a cone. Shouldn’t we pay for that labor? No—the workers should get a decent wage  and costs should be folded into the prices. In the past I’ve heard arguments that if labor is involved, tips should be given, but that’s always the case and, at any rate, such sentiments were covid-related.

I much prefer the French system, which applies especially at restaurants. The menu says explicitly that labor costs are included in the menu prices, and if you like the service, you can leave a couple of euros on the bill plate, regardless of what the meal cost.  There the pressure is off, and you don’t feel guilty about having to choose between a 15% tip and a 30% tip.  And you never are expected to tip when you take food away.

Of course you’re welcome to weigh in. How much and when do you tip, and do you feel pressured to tip in circumstances where you don’t think it’s necessary?

A team of scientists at the University of Virginia is using a telescope in Arizona to study cosmic structure and the result is the largest 3D map of the Universe ever created. The Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI) at Kitt Peak National Observatory is their tool, and the ultimate goal is to get a handle on the mystery of dark energy by charting the positions of galaxies.