Most online dating sites like to try to give themselves a somewhat scientific, methodical veneer. However, a recent study concluded that dating sites as they currently exist are not scientific in the least bit. In fact, the study found that none adhered to any scientific methodology, and that their practices were flawed in principle and well as execution. Does this mean I need to stop obsessively checking OkCupid on my phone?

After twenty years and 2.2 miles of drilling, a Russian scientific team has reported that they have breached the ice cap above Lake Vostok some 3,768 meters beneath Antarctica. Though many had theorized the existence of lakes beneath the antarctic ice since the 19th century, conclusive proof of one did not exist until 1993 when satellite data confirmed that an ancient fresh water lake did indeed exist. Untouched for nearly 15 million years, breaching Lake Vostok could have wide ranging effects on our understanding of life itself.

Television, specifically run-of-the-mill procedurals, has a reputation for either not getting anything right when it comes to computers, or at the very least, the scenarios in which computers are used to progress the episode’s plot are designed by people that actually know how computers work, but are trolls of the highest order. In this installment, we take a look at Bones, a show about Leonard McCoy’s life after the Enterprise – nah, actually it’s a show about solving crimes because of bones or something. In this episode, we see a character’s computer burst into flames because a malware fractal that was imprinted on bones shut the computer’s fans off when the bones were scanned into the computer, thus uploading the virus. It’s all very scientific. Watch the clip after the jump.

Science sure is neat when it is either presented in a way that doesn’t put you to sleep, or is so mind-blowingly interesting that you couldn’t possibly fall asleep. Unfortunately, within the scientific community, scientists may be manipulating their facts and numbers in such a way that molds their findings to whatever they’re trying to prove. This, of course, isn’t science, it’s just misrepresentation. It may be more rampant than you think.

What are thought to be the world’s oldest human beds were recently found in a cave in South Africa. Considering how primitive they were, perhaps the better term would be “sleeping mats,” but in either case, these are the oldest beds or sleeping mats that have ever been found. Previous sleeping mats dated back 20,000 or 30,000 years, but these new ones — or rather, these old ones — are more squarely in a 50,000 to 70,000 year old ballpark.

Because what better way to spend a Saturday afternoon than having your mind completely blown?

NASA’s Mars Science Laboratory, called Curiosity, blasted off today from Cape Canaveral, FL atop an Atlas V rocket on its way to Mars. The ambitious mission will place the most advanced space rover yet conceived on the red planet, in hopes of discerning whether Mars has ever been home to microbial life. Following today’s successful 10 AM launch, the rover will cruise to Mars arriving in August 2012.

See video of this morning’s launch, after the break.

At the end of October, it came to light that a paragon among the European psychology community, Diederik Stapel, had admitted to falsifying the data in his publications, and the data he provided as coauthor. According to the University of Tilburg in the Netherlands, a probe into Stapel’s work has founded “dozens” of publications which used falsified data and 14 PhD theses supervised by Stapel. Among these was a study we reported on back in April.

According to the Chronicle of Higher Education, Stapel said that he, “was not able to withstand the pressure to score points, to publish, to always have to be better.” In the end, it was his own students who questioned his methods, and blew the whistle on his rampant academic dishonesty.

The only thing more mind-blowing than what’s going on inside your head when you experience déjà vu, presque vu, or jamais vu.This video is a bit on the long side, but it is completely worth your time. That’s the great thing about learning how your brain works, it changes how you look at everything.

Are you into science, but don’t like the stuffy feel that is generally associated with science? Want to sport your love of beakers and discoveries, but still want to get invited to all the cool parties? With the Monsters of Grok t-shirts, which take band symbols and band fonts and replace the words with history’s great scientists and thinkers, you can now smash an electric guitar into an amp and stage dive into a crowd of the cool kids wearing spiky wristbands and belts in the name of science.