William Saletan asked how he can improve his column for the coming year. Good on him for asking - not many journalists would bother.

Let's talk about what William got right, first.

He covered a wide beat. His curiosity leads him anywhere and everywhere science and culture might intersect. I never know what to expect, and that's a good thing.

He was irreverent. There aren't many sacred cows he isn't willing to gore. Even the dreaded child pornography topic is fair game. That's a good thing, too.

He rarely forgot that when it comes to science, what is unknown beats what is known hands-down. While this does not exactly make him humble, it does cause him to be careful about drawing sweeping conclusions from scanty data. Also a good thing.

Though a conservative (poor fellow), he rarely lets ideology push him into his conclusions.

In 2008, because of these virtues, William's column was on my short list of indispensable internet destinations.

My advice for 2009, encapsulated, is: don't muck it up, Will. You have a good formula. Stick to it.

Oh, there were a few things I'd have liked to see in 2008 that weren't there.

When William talked about obesity, he was incurious and judgmental. News flash, there are dozens of variables affecting obesity beyond "poor personal decisions." I hope he'll look more deeply before he sounds off again on the subject.

He also seemed incurious about the thousands of ubiquitous industrial toxins in the products we consume, the foods we eat, the air we breathe, and the water we drink. Perhaps he is afraid of losing his conservative credentials, should he delve into the science that exists about these substances. Mind you, I'm not telling William what to conclude; I'm only asking that he allow his curiosity free reign and draw his own conclusions.

For 2009, I'd also like to see a wee bit more in the way of useful suggestions for readers appearing in the column.

Things are changing, you see. CO2 in the atmosphere is rising at an unprecedented rate, judged by the geological record. The world population is frankly exploding. Cheap hydrocarbon sources of energy are turning out not to be endlessly cheap and abundant, nor without consequences. Our infrastructure is neglected, and it's costing lives. The need for water is outstripping the supply in many states. Jobs are leaving the country, and it turns out that we can't make an economy thrive by selling each other real estate and lending each other money. The economic bible we've been following since Reagan appears to be so much wasted paper. We're all looking at each other with amazed expressions, wondering what we ought to be doing to secure a comfortable and peaceful future for ourselves and our children.

To the extent that science and technology have answers, I hope we'll see them in William's column, together with his usual insightful commentary.

I'd like to second this. But I am disappointed with the 2008 format. I found the blog much more interesting and useful in the 2007 format. Quick summary, arguments pro/con or various viewpoints, Saletan's conclusion.

I'm a new reader so I'll bow to Urgelt's assessment up to "don't muck it up, Will. You have a good formula. Stick to it.".

What I didn't see, and perhaps it's just because it didn't appear on the front page, are any articles pertaining to personal communications devices.

I've been house-bound on the farm in rural Manitoba, Canada since 2002 due to illness. I don't have a cell phone, a Blackberry or a laptop computer. I've never sent nor received a text message. We don't have cable television, just an antenna on the roof and four over-air non-digital TV stations. Don't know what we're going to do in 2011 when Canada goes to completely digital TV as you will do in 2009. By a fluke, or stroke of very-good luck and where our farmland is situated, we do have our own DSL line for our internet connection.

Surprisingly I'm as up-to-date on current events, if not more so, than my "in the world" family and friends. I do have a lot of free time to surf. The internet has literally saved my sanity.

In the past few years our daughter has moved across the country to attend University and our ability to keep in touch is truly amazing. Specially when I consider my time spent in the Arctic in the early 1980's when we were limited to Canada Post and $2.00/minute phone calls. That's also the time-frame that the Beta/VHS debate was raging. We "lost" when our employer spent their money on the Beta technology. Somewhere in the Canadian Arctic is one of the most extensive, eclectic Beta collections, but I digress. Strange how the word Beta now has a totally different connotation.

Over this holiday season I've been re-watching "The West Wing" on DVD. I'm only at the beginning of Season 4 and I was struck by how technology has changed so much in such a short time-span.

I learned about computers by coding FORTRAN onto punch-cards over a teletype circuit to our city's University. I was extra-ordinarily fortunate to attend a high school that even offered a computer science program that even had access to a computer.

My daughter was considered extraordinarily fortunate that she had the opportunity to load a pinball game onto a personal computer via floppy disk at age 14 months. Today I'm mildly concerned that my cousin won't let her tween daughters online. They don't know how to email or throw up a basic web page.

In the first season of The West Wing, they had pagers. Somewhere around the end of season one/beginning of season two we start seeing CRT monitors on everyone's desk. Season three shots of the empty Mrs. Landingham's desk show ergonomic keyboards and "the guys" have flat screen monitors. When Toby, Josh, and Donna are lost in hinterland USA, they have cell phones. I haven't yet seen, but am looking for, when the first Blackberry type devices appear.

This has all had me pondering the rapid advance of personal communication devices and how they have changed the way we live.

I found "Human Nature" because I read a local news article today on the extra second pf time we're getting this evening. There was a phrase "international consortium of timekeepers". I was curious as to what such a consortium was. Googling the phrase produced a gazillion of news articles using the phrase but only Slate's Explainer telling me what the phrase meant. Cool. My kinda website. I was exploring Slate further and "Human Nature" resonated with me and here I am.

Don't know if I have the cognitive abilities to "play" in here but I know I will read more of your writings by the time you return from holiday. This has been on my mind lately and here seemed as good a place as any to share. I used my Stumble Upon account to bookmark the site and I was the first SU user to discover Slate. Hmmm...

Lost-in-a-FibroFog, on the farm, rural Canada.