[NEWS] Six notes about science: birds, Julie Payette, agriculture, wood in space, Enceladus, minds

[rfmcdonald]

• Can parrots, capable of speech, be witnesses in criminal cases? Maybe. Atlas Obscura reports.


• Julie Payette's speech in defense of science, regarding climate change and the like, might well have been a bit more politic. (Maybe.) MacLean's looks at the controversy.


• Was sedentary agricultural civilization a mistake, as some suggest? The New Republic reports on the state of the debate.


• Scientific American reports on the United States' 1960s probes Ranger 3 through 5, built partly of wood.


• Universe Today notes a new model suggesting that a porous rocky core could help Enceladus keep a liquid water ocean for billions of years.


• The Walrus reports on how two conjoined twins, who seem to have access to each other's consciousness, are proving very interesting theories of mind.