Science
Should Biden take a cognitive test? Here's what it would — and wouldn't — tell us
It seemed like a sensible suggestion for assessing the capabilities of an 81-year-old man seeking voters’ approval to remain in the White House until January 2029.
To reassure the American people, ABC’s George Stephanopoulos asked President Biden, would he be willing to take a cognitive test and share the results with the American people?
Biden demurred. In carrying out his duties as leader of the free world, he said, “I have a cognitive test every single day.”
Though the president dismissed the suggestion, medical experts said the idea of having Biden — along with his 78-year-old challenger, former President Trump — take some kind of cognitive exam had merit.
“Let’s give it to both of them,” said Dr. Louise Aronson, a geriatrician at UC San Francisco.
Kevin Duff, a neuropsychologist at the Oregon Health & Science University’s Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center, likened the proposal to the long-standing practice of asking presidential contenders to release their tax returns.
There would be several types of tests to choose from. A simple screening exam could involve just a handful of questions and be completed in minutes. An in-depth evaluation could take a full day.
When former White House physician Dr. Ronny Jackson evaluated Trump in 2018, he opted for the popular Montreal Cognitive Assessment, or MoCA Test. Over the course of about 15 minutes, patients are asked to recall a list of five words, draw a clock with its hands set to a particular time, do subtraction with double-digit numbers, and come up with the names of animals in a drawing, among other tasks. At the time, Trump scored a perfect 30 out of 30.
Whether long or short, a good test measures multiple “domains of cognition,” Aronson said. There’s short-term memory and long-term memory. There’s the ability to communicate through both spoken and written language. There’s attention, comprehension, judgment, reasoning, problem-solving, decision-making and more.
“If a person completely aces a test, that tells you something,” said Dr. Laura Mosqueda, a professor of family medicine and geriatrics at USC’s Keck School of Medicine. “And if they bomb a test, it tells you something.”
A score that’s somewhere in between can be trickier, experts say.
An abnormal result on a cognitive test doesn’t necessarily mean that a patient has a true cognitive problem. In about 10% of cases, it can be chalked up to a side effect of medications, an infection, a thyroid problem, a vitamin deficiency, a mood disorder such as anxiety or depression, or something else that’s reversible.
“The thing we see constantly as geriatricians are medication reactions,” Aronson said. “I can’t tell you how often we withdraw medications and then the person goes back to normal.”
Sometimes it’s even simpler than that.
“I’ve seen people diagnosed with dementia who’ve actually had a hearing problem but didn’t want to admit it,” Mosqueda said. “They couldn’t hear the questions and so they were giving weird answers.”
Some cognitive changes are a normal part of the aging process. Thinking speed is a prime example.
“As we age, we will do things more slowly,” Aronson said. That isn’t necessarily a sign of cognitive impairment, she said, recalling a 101-year-old patient who missed only one point on a test but needed extra time to complete it.
If a patient’s cognitive problems persist, or if caregivers want to get a better handle on the subtleties of their condition, a more in-depth assessment may be in order.
The tasks are more challenging, Duff said. For instance, instead of seeing whether a patient can remember five words after five minutes, a neuropsychologist might give a patient 15 words and see how many they recall half an hour later.
On the MoCA Test, a score of 25 or lower is considered abnormal regardless of any other factors. With a more sensitive test, the results are compared with the performance of other people of the same age, educational background, career history and other characteristics, Duff said.
A person with Biden’s background would probably perform well on a MoCA test even if his cognition has declined, experts agreed.
“In certain patients who are particularly verbal, they won’t remember the word they want but they can work their way around it,” Aronson said. In such cases, a normal score on the test “would not necessarily rule out cognitive impairment.”
Duff said it would be like having an IndyCar driver who wants to compete in the Indianapolis 500 take the same behind-the-wheel test that the DMV uses for 16-year-olds.
“My concern is that a relatively easy test still doesn’t mean you’re up to the challenge of leading one of the most powerful countries in the world,” he said.
This isn’t an issue limited to presidential candidates. It may be appropriate to ask airline pilots, bus drivers, surgeons and other people with jobs that entail a high degree of responsibility to take cognitive tests as they get older, experts said.
“I think you can argue this is a job where your brain should be working pretty well,” Aronson said.
There is no expert consensus on whether to screen all older adults for cognitive impairment. The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force weighed the issue in 2020 and determined there wasn’t enough evidence to make a broad recommendation one way or the other.
One of the reasons for the hesitation is that screening tests aren’t good enough, said Dr. Colleen Christmas, a geriatrician at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine.
“You’re going to catch a lot of people who don’t have issues, and you’re going to miss a lot of people who do,” she said.
There’s also the fact that the aging process varies greatly from person to person.
“It’s incredibly heterogeneous,” Christmas said. “There’s no way to say 80 equals old whereas 75 equals young.”
Besides, no test, no matter how sensitive, can provide a full picture of a patient’s cognitive function. Doctors also need the results of blood tests, brain scans, and information from family members, among other things. If an MRI revealed evidence of several small strokes in parts of the brain that align with the patient’s cognitive deficits, for example, it would suggest a diagnosis of vascular dementia.
“It’s like putting a puzzle together,” Mosqueda said.
Biden may be in a unique position, but his bristling reaction to the idea of taking a cognitive test was pretty typical, Christmas said.
“I think people are so afraid of the diagnosis of dementia that it’s upsetting to have your doctor or a family member suggest that you need cognitive testing,” she said. “It’s a really scary prospect.”
Our universe might be chock-full of cosmic wonder, but you can observe only a fraction of astronomical phenomena with the naked eye. Meteor showers, natural fireworks that streak brightly across the night sky, are one of them.
The latest observable meteor shower will be the Lyrids, which has been active since April 14 and is forecast to continue through April 30. The shower reaches its peak April 21 to 22, or Tuesday night into Wednesday morning.
According to NASA, the Lyrids are one of the oldest known meteor showers, and have been enjoyed by stargazers for nearly 3,000 years. Their bright, speedy streaks are caused by the dusty debris from a comet named Thatcher. They appear to spring from the constellation Lyra, which right now can be seen in the eastern sky at night in the Northern Hemisphere.
The moon will be about 27 percent full tonight, appearing as a thick crescent in the sky, according to the American Meteor Society.
To get a hint at when to best watch for the Lyrids, you can use this tool, which relies on data from the Global Meteor Network. It shows fireball activity levels in real time.
And while you gaze at the heavens, keep an eye out for other stray meteors streaking across the night sky. Skywatchers are reporting that the amount of fireballs is double what is usually seen by this point in the year.
Where meteor showers come from
There is a chance you might see a meteor on any given night, but you are most likely to catch one during a shower. Meteor showers are caused by Earth passing through the rubble trailing a comet or asteroid as it swings around the sun. This debris, which can be as small as a grain of sand, leaves behind a glowing stream of light as it burns up in Earth’s atmosphere.
Meteor showers occur around the same time every year and can last for days or weeks. But there is only a small window when each shower is at its peak, which happens when Earth reaches the densest part of the cosmic debris. The peak is the best time to look for a shower. From our point of view on Earth, the meteors will appear to come from the same point in the sky.
The Perseid meteor shower, for example, peaks in mid-August from the constellation Perseus. The Geminids, which occur every December, radiate from the constellation Gemini.
How to watch a meteor shower
Michelle Nichols, the director of public observing at the Adler Planetarium in Chicago, recommends forgoing the use of telescopes or binoculars while watching a meteor shower.
“You just need your eyes and, ideally, a dark sky,” she said.
That’s because meteors can shoot across large swaths of the sky, so observing equipment can limit your field of view.
Some showers are strong enough to produce up to 100 streaks an hour, according to the American Meteor Society, though you probably won’t see that many.
“Almost everybody is under a light-polluted sky,” Ms. Nichols said. “You may think you’re under a dark sky, but in reality, even in a small town, you can have bright lights nearby.”
Planetariums, local astronomy clubs or even maps like this one can help you figure out where to go to escape excessive light. The best conditions for catching a meteor shower are a clear sky with no moon or cloud cover, sometime between midnight and sunrise. (Moonlight affects visibility in the same way as light pollution, washing out fainter sources of light in the sky.) Make sure to give your eyes at least 30 minutes to adjust to seeing in the dark.
Ms. Nichols also recommends wearing layers, even during the summer. “You’re going to be sitting there for quite a while, watching,” she said. “It’s going to get chilly, even in August.”
Bring a cup of cocoa or tea for even more warmth. Then lie back, scan the sky and enjoy the show.
Where weather is least likely to affect your view
Storm systems sweep across the country in early spring, and some will be obscuring skies tonight. But there will still be plenty of areas with clear skies, particularly in parts of the central United States.
“The best spot is going to be in the Upper Midwest,” said Rich Bann, a meteorologist with the Weather Prediction Center.
Minnesota, Wisconsin and Iowa will offer especially good sky-viewing weather and a beach on the Great Lakes could be a nice spot to look up at the stars.
But don’t expect to view the show from Chicago, as Illinois could see some thunderstorms. The weather will be better in the Northern and Central Plains, particularly the eastern Dakotas.
High, wispy clouds are expected over the Ohio and Tennessee Valleys and into parts of the Mid-Atlantic. But, Mr. Bann said, “you may be able to see some shooting stars through thin clouds.”
Clouds will be draped across much of the Southeast and the Northeast, though there could be some clearing in Florida, Georgia, the Carolinas and Virginia. Remember, the meteors could be visible all night long. If you look outside and see clouds, try again later.
Catching the spectacle will be challenging across much of the West, particularly from Washington into Northern California, where a storm system is bringing rain and snow. That system will move east overnight.
There are likely to be some pockets of clear skies at times across southern Nevada, northwest Arizona and southwest Utah, Mr. Bann said.
Amy Graff contributed reporting.
WASHINGTON — Amid growing national security concerns, the FBI said Tuesday that it has launched a broad investigation in the deaths or disappearances of at least 10 scientists and staff connected to highly sensitive research, including four from the Los Angeles area.
“The FBI is spearheading the effort to look for connections into the missing and deceased scientists. We are working with the Department of Energy, Department of War, and with our state and state and local law enforcement partners to find answers,” the agency said in a statement.
The FBI’s announcement comes after the House Oversight Committee announced that it would investigate reports of the disappearance and deaths of the scientists, sending letters seeking information from the agencies involved in the federal inquiry as well as NASA, which owns the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in La Cañada Flintridge, where three of the missing or dead scientists worked.
“If the reports are accurate, these deaths and disappearances may represent a grave threat to U.S. national security and to U.S. personnel with access to scientific secrets,” Reps. James Comer (R-Ky.), chairman of the committee, and Eric Burlison (R-Mo.) wrote in the letters.
President Trump told reporters last week that he had been briefed on the missing and dead scientists, which he described as “pretty serious stuff.” He said at the time that he expected answers on whether the deaths were connected “in the next week and a half.”
Michael David Hicks, who studied comets and asteroids at JPL, was the first of the scientists who disappeared or died. He died on July 30, 2023, at the age of 59. No cause of death was disclosed.
A year later, JPL physicist Frank Maiwald died at 61, with no cause of death disclosed.
Two other Los Angeles scientists are part of the string of deaths and disappearances.
On June 22, 2025, Monica Jacinto Reza, a materials scientist at JPL, disappeared while on a hike near Mt. Waterman in the San Gabriel Mountains.
On Feb. 16, Caltech astrophysicist Carl Grillmair was fatally shot on the porch of his Llano home. The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s department arrested Freddy Snyder, 29, in connection with the shooting. Snyder had been arrested in December on suspicion of trespassing on Grillmair’s property.
Snyder has been charged with murder.
There is no evidence at this point that the deaths and disappearances, which occurred over a span of four years, are connected.
A spokesperson for NASA, which owns JPL, said in a statement on X that the agency is “coordinating and cooperating with the relevant agencies in relation to the missing scientists.
“At this time, nothing related to NASA indicates a national security threat,” agency spokesperson Bethany Stevens wrote. “The agency is committed to transparency and will provide more information as able.”
Representatives from Caltech, which manages JPL, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The sun had barely risen over the Pacific Ocean when a small motorboat carrying a team of Indigenous artisans and Mexican biologists dropped anchor in a rocky cove near Bahías de Huatulco.
Mauro Habacuc Avendaño Luis, one of the craftsmen, was the first to wade to shore. With an agility belying his age, he struck out over the boulders exposed by low tide. Crouching on a slippery ledge pounded by surf, he reached inside a crevice between two rocks. There, lodged among the urchins, was a snail with a knobby gray shell the size of a walnut. The sight might not dazzle tourists who travel here to see humpback whales, but for Mr. Avendaño, 85, these drab little mollusks represent a way of life.
Marine snails in the genus Plicopurpura are sacred to the Mixtec people of Pinotepa de Don Luis, a small town in southwestern Oaxaca. Men like Mr. Avendaño have been sustainably “milking” them for radiant purple dye for at least 1,500 years. The color suffuses Mixtec textiles and spiritual beliefs. Called tixinda, it symbolizes fertility and death, as well as mythic ties between lunar cycles, women and the sea.
The future of these traditions — and the fate of the snails — are uncertain. The mollusks are subject to intense poaching pressure despite federal protections intended to protect them. Fishermen break them (and the other mollusks they eat) open and sell the meat to local restaurants. Tourists who comb the beaches pluck snails off the rocks and toss them aside.
A severe earthquake in 2020 thrust formerly submerged parts of their habitat above sea level, fatally tossing other mollusks in the snail’s food web to the air, and making once inaccessible places more available to poachers.
Decades ago, dense clusters of snails the size of doorknobs were easy to find, according to Mr. Avendaño. “Full of snails,” he said, sweeping a calloused, violet-stained hand across the coves. Now, most of the snails he finds are small, just over an inch, and yield only a few milliliters of dye.
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