science

“Daddy, What Did You Do in the Suburbs?” Patrick Vitale on High-Tech Pittsburgh

In the 1979 cult classic The Fish That Saved Pittsburgh, a down-on-their-luck basketball team called the Pittsburgh Pythons is desperate for a change of fortune. They lose constantly, despite being led by the legendary Julius “Dr. J” Erving, and in a strange twist they turn to an astrologer (Stockard Channing) for help…

What Can ‘Animal Crossing’ Tell Us About the Past and Present of Natural History Museums?

Amid the COVID crisis, museums are being reinvented online in ways that harken back to past ways of representing the natural world.

When duty texts, remember that you have read-receipt on

A jittery world watches fascism on the march from Bolivia to India, and Twitter importantly doubles down on Indian food.

This Week’s Farm-to-Table Aneurysms: The Agony and the Ocasio

This week proved that, in the Trump era, one week can actually not be more horrible than the […]

The Deep, Frustrating, Complicated History of the Anti-Vax Movement

Do you feel feverish? Impotent? Suffer from ADD? You might have been vaccinated! Call the attorneys at Tropics […]

Tropics of Meta “Staffers” Pick the Best of 2014

Each year, Tropics of Meta’s intrepid team of cultural critics reports on the best of the year’s music, movies, […]

Using Science Fiction to Teach History (or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Distant Future)

I have been reluctant to use fiction in my courses.  This is despite the fact that my own […]