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Started by Kai, July 30, 2008, 10:04:06 PM

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Kai

Quote from: LMNO on August 21, 2008, 06:40:21 PM
Haven't most humans almost always thought that their generation reached the end of knowledge?

It seems almost an inborn trait.

I think it has to do something with both the human complacency when they are in comfort (or comfortable fear) of their environment, and technological plateau which makes them believe that everything to be learned has been.

When people feel uncomfortable with their surroundings, when they want change, and when new technology is challenging the status quo, I think you see less and less of this. Education plays a role because, at least in biology, you have a tendency to be bombarded with the great achievements of the past as the basis for current knowlege and the process tends to be very slow at incorporating new knowlege, which seems to be old, been done, has been by the time its taught.

Also: PEOPLE ARE VERY AFRAID OF MAKING MISTAKES.
If there is magic on this planet, it is contained in water. --Loren Eisley, The Immense Journey

Her Royal Majesty's Chief of Insect Genitalia Dissection
Grand Visser of the Six Legged Class
Chanticleer of the Holometabola Clade Church, Diptera Parish

Iason Ouabache

Quote from: Ratatosk on August 21, 2008, 04:51:23 PM
Quote from: Rev. What's-His-Name? on August 21, 2008, 04:12:41 PM
It is interesting.  As our technology has advanced, allowing us to gather in more visual and scientific information about our Solar System, we discover more and more that we have to redefine our models.  It was easy with just the handheld telescopes of yesteryear, when you could just make out the planets. 

Kind of a nice BIP corrolary really.  The more information you allow to come into focus, the more you realize you didn't know as much as you thought you did before. 

And I think it is that corrolary that many of the New Atheists seem to miss... those ones that think Dawkins and Darwin solved all of life's mysteries....

At Pennsic I had a conversation with a couple hardcore Atheists... both seemed to think that we'd already discovered pretty much everything we needed to understand Life, The Universe and Everything. One, a younger kid just preparing for college, actually said  that he was getting into astrophysics because it was the only area of science left with mysteries. Biology and the other fields, in his mind, had already been figured out.

*headdesk*



Teenagers know absolutely everything there is to know about the universe.  Just ask them. 
You cannot fathom the immensity of the fuck i do not give.
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Vene

Quote from: Kai on August 21, 2008, 10:11:37 PM
Also: PEOPLE ARE VERY AFRAID OF MAKING MISTAKES.
This.  What is so terrifying about a complete and total fuck up?  That's the best way to learn.  I love being proven wrong.

Kai

Quote from: Vene on August 22, 2008, 03:31:19 AM
Quote from: Kai on August 21, 2008, 10:11:37 PM
Also: PEOPLE ARE VERY AFRAID OF MAKING MISTAKES.
This.  What is so terrifying about a complete and total fuck up?  That's the best way to learn.  I love being proven wrong.

Its less about the mistake itself and more about not wanting to be embarrassed or humiliated.

Fact: many people fear public speaking first above even death. Why? Because they fear public embarrassment or humiliation more than anything.
If there is magic on this planet, it is contained in water. --Loren Eisley, The Immense Journey

Her Royal Majesty's Chief of Insect Genitalia Dissection
Grand Visser of the Six Legged Class
Chanticleer of the Holometabola Clade Church, Diptera Parish

Vene

Quote from: Kai on August 22, 2008, 04:07:49 AM
Quote from: Vene on August 22, 2008, 03:31:19 AM
Quote from: Kai on August 21, 2008, 10:11:37 PM
Also: PEOPLE ARE VERY AFRAID OF MAKING MISTAKES.
This.  What is so terrifying about a complete and total fuck up?  That's the best way to learn.  I love being proven wrong.

Its less about the mistake itself and more about not wanting to be embarrassed or humiliated.

Fact: many people fear public speaking first above even death. Why? Because they fear public embarrassment or humiliation more than anything.
I don't understand, what is this "embarrassed" you speak of.  I take great pride in acting like a damn fool every day.

And the public speaking thing makes me lol.  I don't care that I've heard it before, it's still so damn funny.

Kai

Its the honest truth. People are deathly afraid of being embarrassed in public. Some cultures took it so far as to kill themselves to leave the pain of being "dishonoured" or loosing face (i.e. the Japanese). As social creatures we subconsciously worry what our peers think of us and where we stand in relation to other people hierarchically because our standing, at least classically, determined the resources that were available for us. That isn't as boldly true anymore, but it still resonates within some aspects of society.

I know I feel it. I don't feel its the worst thing ever but I still have difficulty getting up and speaking to a group of my peers.
If there is magic on this planet, it is contained in water. --Loren Eisley, The Immense Journey

Her Royal Majesty's Chief of Insect Genitalia Dissection
Grand Visser of the Six Legged Class
Chanticleer of the Holometabola Clade Church, Diptera Parish

LMNO

Yeah, in one of my performance classes, the professor actually forced us to really dig down and say what's the worst thing to happen if we get on stage and mess up in front of an audience.

For most of the class, it boiled down to "people won't like me/find me attractive," or "I won't feel superior to them."


AFK

I don't get nervous like I used to when it comes to presenting information and public speaking.  It helps that in Maine, once you've gone to a couple of events in any given field, you've pretty much met everybody in that field and so you get to know people pretty quick.  So it helps when you have people in the audience that you know and who know you are sharp and know what you are talking about.

Otherwise, it's kind of that fear of not presenting to your audience a sense that you are educated and knowledgeable about what you are speaking about.  You know you know it, because it's right there in your head, but your audience can't see that.  So I think that's a big fear too, being able to project your personal knowledge "appropriately". 
Cynicism is a blank check for failure.

Vene

Quote from: Kai on August 22, 2008, 10:51:04 AM
Its the honest truth. People are deathly afraid of being embarrassed in public. Some cultures took it so far as to kill themselves to leave the pain of being "dishonoured" or loosing face (i.e. the Japanese). As social creatures we subconsciously worry what our peers think of us and where we stand in relation to other people hierarchically because our standing, at least classically, determined the resources that were available for us. That isn't as boldly true anymore, but it still resonates within some aspects of society.

I know I feel it. I don't feel its the worst thing ever but I still have difficulty getting up and speaking to a group of my peers.
Yeah, I do realize that.  I'm just a freak and tend not to give a damn.

Quote from: LMNO on August 22, 2008, 02:10:26 PMFor most of the class, it boiled down to "people won't like me/find me attractive," or "I won't feel superior to them."
You don't have to feel you're superior, you have to be superior.

LMNO

Ok, we get it, you don't have stagefright.


Sheesh.

Vene

New research has discovered that humans can taste calcium, and it isn't a good taste.  This may explain why so many people have calcium deficiencies.
link

Scientists have found a neurological cause for weight gain as we age.  It looks as if the cells the suppress appetite degenerate over time and the foods that cause the most damage are carbohydrates.
link

A new catalyst has been found to be effective for the generation of hydrogen from biofuels.  It's 0.1% the cost of traditional catalysts.
link

An organism that is able to use arsenic instead of water for photosynthesis has been discovered.
link

Climate change has been shown to be responsible for an abnormally low amount of rain in the southwest United States.

Kai

August 25, 2008
A Teacher on the Front Line as Faith and Science Clash

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

ORANGE PARK, Fla.—David Campbell switched on the overhead projector and wrote "Evolution" in the rectangle of light on the screen.

He scanned the faces of the sophomores in his Biology I class. Many of them, he knew from years of teaching high school in this Jacksonville suburb, had been raised to take the biblical creation story as fact.

His gaze rested for a moment on Bryce Haas, a football player who attended the 6 a.m. prayer meetings of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes in the school gymnasium. "If I do this wrong," Mr. Campbell remembers thinking on that humid spring morning, "I'll lose him."

http://snipurl.com/3jjn4

Undecided Voter? There May Be No Such Thing

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Can't decide between Barack Obama and John McCain? Chances are your brain already has.

Using a simple word association test to look inside voters' heads, Canadian and Italian researchers found that many voters who thought they were undecided had unconsciously made up their minds.

Their decisions arise less from careful deliberation of the facts than from deep-seated attitudes that they have little awareness of, the study found. Inside their brains, undecideds are often partisans, although "they do not know it yet," said Bertram Gawronski, a University of Western Ontario psychologist and senior author of the study.

http://snipurl.com/3itbb

"Water Mafias" Put Stranglehold on Public Water Supply

from National Geographic News

Worldwide corruption driven by mafia-like organizations throughout water industries is forcing the poor to pay more for basic drinking water and sanitation services, according to a new report.

If bribery, organized crime, embezzlement, and other illegal activities continue, consumers and taxpayers will pay the equivalent of U.S. $20 billion over the next decade, says the report, released [last] week at the World Water Week conference in Stockholm, Sweden.

The water sector is one of most corrupt after health and education, added Håkan Tropp, chair of the Water Integrity Network (WIN), an advocacy group and report co-author. That's because the poor often don't have a voice in strategic water policy decisions ...

http://snipurl.com/3isrb

How RFID Tags Could Be Used to Track Unsuspecting People

from Scientific American

If you live in a state bordering Canada or Mexico, you may soon be given an opportunity to carry a very high tech item: a remotely readable driver's license.

Designed to identify U.S. citizens as they approach the nation's borders, the cards are being promoted by the Department of Homeland Security as a way to save time and simplify border crossings.

But if you care about your safety and privacy as much as convenience, you might want to think twice before signing up.

http://snipurl.com/3issy

Gravity Is Not the Main Obstacle for America's Space Business

from the Economist

In the spring of 2006 Robert Bigelow needed to take a stand on a trip to Russia to keep a satellite off the floor. ... It was, says the entrepreneur and head of Bigelow Aerospace in Nevada, "indistinguishable from a common coffee table."

Nonetheless, the American authorities told Mr Bigelow that this coffee table was part of a satellite assembly and so counted as a munition. During the trip it would have to be guarded by two security officers at all times.

Exporting technology has always presented a dilemma for America. ... If export rules are too lax, foreign powers will be able to put American technology in their systems, or copy it. But if the rules are too tight, then it will stifle the industries that depend upon sales to create the next generation of technology.

http://snipurl.com/3isvs

At Conference on the Risks to Earth, Few Are Optimistic

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

ERICE, Sicily—This ancient hilltop town ... is hosting a very modern gathering: a conference on global risks like cyberterrorism, climate change, nuclear weapons and the world's lagging energy supply.

More than 120 scientists, engineers, analysts and economists from 30 countries were hunkered down here for the 40th annual conference on "planetary emergencies."

The term was coined by Dr. Antonino Zichichi, a native son and a theoretical physicist who has made Erice a hub for experts to discuss persistent, and potentially catastrophic, global challenges. The participants were not particularly optimistic.

http://snipurl.com/3jjn6

Global Warming Sign? Huge Petermann Glacier in Arctic Is Cracking

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

In northern Greenland, a part of the Arctic that had seemed immune from global warming, new satellite images show a growing giant crack and an 11-square-mile chunk of ice hemorrhaging off a major glacier, scientists said Thursday.

That has led the university professor who spotted the wounds in the massive Petermann glacier to predict disintegration of a major portion of the Northern Hemisphere's largest floating glacier within the year.

... The question that now faces scientists is: Are the fractures part of normal glacier stress or are they the beginning of the effects of global warming?

http://snipurl.com/3jjn8

Sky Survey Yields New Cosmic Haul

from BBC News Online

Astronomers looking through the data from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, the world's largest survey of galaxies, have found a new haul of objects closer to home—including one with a potentially exotic origin.

By searching through a survey region known as Stripe 82, a team led by Dr Andrew Becker of the University of Washington, has discovered almost 50 new asteroid-sized bodies in the outer regions of our Solar System.

As part of a search for supernovae—exploding stars in distant galaxies—the robotic Sloan telescope in New Mexico revisited this area of the southern sky every three days. By comparing images taken on different nights, the Washington team was able to detect the asteroids as they moved across the sky.

http://snipurl.com/3jjnc

Virus-Infecting Virus Fuels Definition of Life Debate

from National Geographic News

The discovery of a massive virus that suffers from another virus has reignited debate over whether the microscopic agents of infection should be considered living things rather than bags of genes.

Earlier this month scientists reported a new strain of giant virus called mamavirus, which was first detected in amoebas from a water-cooling tower in Paris.

In a recent study, electron microscopy revealed a much smaller virus attached to the mamavirus, which the study authors say made the host virus grow abnormally and damaged its ability to replicate. The tiny satellite virus, dubbed Sputnik, is the first described virophage—so named because its behavior resembles that of bacteria-targeting viruses known as bacteriophages.

http://snipurl.com/3jjni

Seeing in Four Dimensions

from Science News

Three dimensions can be so limiting. Mathematicians, freed in their imaginations from physical constraints, can conjure up descriptions of objects in many more dimensions than that.

... There is the minor difficulty that our nervous systems are only equipped to conjure images in three dimensions. But that doesn't stop Étienne Ghys of the École Normale Supérieure in Lyon, France, from visualizing the four-dimensional dynamical systems he studies: "I live in dimension four," he says.

And you can too. Ghys has now created a series of videos teaching others to visualize four dimensions the way he does.

http://snipurl.com/3jjnm
If there is magic on this planet, it is contained in water. --Loren Eisley, The Immense Journey

Her Royal Majesty's Chief of Insect Genitalia Dissection
Grand Visser of the Six Legged Class
Chanticleer of the Holometabola Clade Church, Diptera Parish

Kai

August 29, 2008

Ancient Urban Network Mapped in Amazon Forests
from National Geographic News

Dozens of densely packed, pre-Columbian towns, villages, and hamlets arranged in an organized pattern have been mapped in the Brazilian Amazon, anthropologists announced [yesterday].

The finding suggests that vast swathes of "pristine" rain forest may actually have been sophisticated urban landscapes prior to the arrival of European colonists.

"It is very different from what we might expect using certain classic models of urbanism," noted study co-author Michael Heckenberger, an anthropologist at the University of Florida in Gainesville. Nevertheless, he said, the repeated patterns within and among settlements across the landscape suggest a highly ordered and planned society on par with any medieval European town.

http://snipurl.com/3kyq8


U.S. Salmonella Outbreak Linked to Jalapenos Appears Over
from USA Today

The largest outbreak of food-borne illness in the past decade may finally be over. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Thursday that the salmonella outbreak tied to tomatoes, jalapeno and serrano chilies appears to have ended. The Food and Drug Administration has also lifted its advice to consumers to avoid eating raw jalapenos and serrano peppers grown or packed in Mexico.

A total of 1,442 people were infected with the rare bacterial strain known as salmonella saintpaul. At least 286 were hospitalized. The CDC says the infection, which can cause diarrhea and dehydration, may have contributed to at least two deaths.

The first documented case began on April 16, and the last occurred on Aug. 11. Most fell ill in May or June. The only states with no documented cases were Alaska, Delaware, Hawaii, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota and Wyoming.

http://snipurl.com/3kyqd


Beetle Drive
from the Economist

One of the lies regularly promulgated by creationist ideologues is that you cannot see evolution in action right now. For microorganisms this is obviously untrue. The evolution of new viral diseases, such as AIDS, is one example.

The evolution of antibiotic-resistant bacteria is another. But bacteria and viruses breed fast, so natural selection has time, within the span of a human life, to make a difference. For species with longer generations, examples are less numerous. But they do exist.

A new one has just been published, appropriately, in Evolution. It concerns dung beetles. Harald Parzer and Armin Moczek, of Indiana University, have been studying a species called Onthophagus taurus. Or, rather, it was a species 50 years ago, but it is now heading rapidly towards becoming at least four of them.

http://snipurl.com/3kyqg


Gene Linked to Eye Disease
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

LA JOLLA—An international team led by a UCSD eye researcher has found the first genetic link to dry age-related macular degeneration, the most common form of progressive blindness.

A study by the team describes a genetic variant in about 66 percent of the population that appears to protect people from certain kinds of viral damage, a leading suspect in the development of the eye disease. People who lack this variant are not protected and thus more vulnerable to dry macular degeneration.

The discovery was spearheaded by Dr. Kang Zhang of the Shiley Eye Center at the University of California San Diego School of Medicine in La Jolla. About 900,000 people in the United States have been diagnosed with dry macular degeneration, and up to 10 million are at risk.

http://snipurl.com/3kyqo


Fly's Brain 'Senses Swat Threat'
from BBC News Online

Researchers in the US say that they have solved the mystery of why flies are so hard to swat. They think the fly's ability to dodge being hit is due to its fast acting brain and an ability to plan ahead.

High speed, high resolution video recordings revealed the insects quickly work out where a threat is coming from and prepare an escape route.

The research suggests that the best way of swatting a fly is to creep up slowly and aim ahead of its location. The study has been published in the journal Current Biology.

http://snipurl.com/3kyqs


A-Beta on the Brain
from Science News

Amyloid-beta is a thinking brain's protein. A new study involving people with severe brain injuries shows that as neuronal activity increases, levels of amyloid-beta in the brain also go up.

A-beta, as the protein is sometimes called, is best known for causing plaques in the brains of people with Alzheimer's disease. It is a normal component of the brain, but scientists don't know what it does.

Traumatic brain injuries increase the risk for Alzheimer's disease. So to find out if brain injuries cause a spike in amyloid-beta levels that could lead to plaque formation, a team of researchers from Milan, Italy, and Washington University in St. Louis sampled fluid from the brains of 18 comatose patients.

http://snipurl.com/3kyqx


Purdue, Citing Research Misconduct, Punishes Scientist
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

An appeals committee at Purdue University has upheld findings of misconduct on the part of a professor who claims to have created energy-generating fusion in a tabletop experiment, the university announced on Wednesday.

With the findings, William R. Woodson, the university's provost, has imposed punishment on the professor, Rusi P. Taleyarkhan. Dr. Taleyarkhan remains on the Purdue faculty, but his distinction as a "named professor" has been removed, along with an annual allotment of $25,000 that accompanied it.

In addition, he is prohibited from serving as a thesis adviser to graduate students for at least the next three years. John Lewis, a lawyer for him, said Dr. Taleyarkhan was considering his options, among them challenging the sanctions in court.

http://snipurl.com/3kyr3


University's Plans for Milton Friedman Institute Spark Outcry
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

CHICAGO, Aug. 27—Plans by the University of Chicago to establish a research institute named after legendary free-market economist Milton Friedman have caused an uproar at the school on the city's South Side.

More than 100 tenured faculty members have signed letters and a petition opposing the institute, which would be paid for by private donations and would conduct research in economics, medicine, public policy and law. Critics say that they are concerned the institute will be a partisan, elitist organization and that it shouldn't be under the auspices of a university.

"There are a lot of aspects that look like a right-wing think tank. I'm very worried about that possibility," said Bruce Lincoln, a professor of the history of religions who helped draft the letters and petition. "People are concerned about the blurring of the line between Friedman's technical work in economics and his fairly well-known persona as a political advocate of a very pure, free-market conservative or neoliberal position, where the market is the solution to everything."

http://snipurl.com/3kyq5


Photographs of Dead Sea Scrolls to Go Online
from the Guardian (UK)

Scientists and scholars in Jerusalem have begun a programme to take the first high-resolution digital photographs of the Dead Sea Scrolls so that they can be shown on the internet.

The Israel Antiquities Authority ends a pilot project this week which prepares the way for a much larger operation to photograph the 15,000-20,000 fragments that make up the 900 scrolls. The scrolls, first photographed in the 1950s after their discovery by shepherds in caves near the Dead Sea, have been kept in monitored conditions in a vault. Only four specially trained curators are allowed to handle them.

In a project that could take five years and cost millions of dollars, the fragments will be photographed first by a 39-megapixel digital camera then by another digital camera in infra-red light. Finally, some will be photographed using a sophisticated multi-spectral imaging camera.

http://snipurl.com/3kyr4


Portable GPS Units Establish Defendants' Whereabouts
from the Chicago Tribune (Registration Required)

(Associated Press)—Like millions of motorists, Eric Hanson used a GPS unit in his Chevrolet TrailBlazer to find his way around. He probably didn't expect that prosecutors would eventually use it too—to help convict him of killing four family members.

Prosecutors in suburban Chicago analyzed data from the Garmin GPS device to pinpoint where Hanson had been on the morning after his parents were fatally shot and his sister and brother-in-law bludgeoned to death in 2005. He was convicted of the killings earlier this year and sentenced to death.

Hanson's trial was among recent criminal cases around the country in which authorities used GPS navigation devices to help establish a defendant's whereabouts. Experts say such evidence will almost certainly become more common in court as GPS systems become more affordable and show up in more vehicles.

http://snipurl.com/3kyr7



If there is magic on this planet, it is contained in water. --Loren Eisley, The Immense Journey

Her Royal Majesty's Chief of Insect Genitalia Dissection
Grand Visser of the Six Legged Class
Chanticleer of the Holometabola Clade Church, Diptera Parish

Requia ☣

Undecided Voter? There May Be No Such Thing

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Can't decide between Barack Obama and John McCain? Chances are your brain already has.

Using a simple word association test to look inside voters' heads, Canadian and Italian researchers found that many voters who thought they were undecided had unconsciously made up their minds.

Their decisions arise less from careful deliberation of the facts than from deep-seated attitudes that they have little awareness of, the study found. Inside their brains, undecideds are often partisans, although "they do not know it yet," said Bertram Gawronski, a University of Western Ontario psychologist and senior author of the study.

http://snipurl.com/3itbb
[/quote]

Heuristic modules do not imply counciousness follows suit  :argh!:

The only thing these tests determine is decision making capability when you strip the agent of the ability to think about what they are doing.  Useful for talking about latent tendancies and studying societal imprints, not useful for predicting premeditated behavior.
Inflatable dolls are not recognized flotation devices.

Iason Ouabache

Quote
Gene Linked to Eye Disease
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

LA JOLLA—An international team led by a UCSD eye researcher has found the first genetic link to dry age-related macular degeneration, the most common form of progressive blindness.

A study by the team describes a genetic variant in about 66 percent of the population that appears to protect people from certain kinds of viral damage, a leading suspect in the development of the eye disease. People who lack this variant are not protected and thus more vulnerable to dry macular degeneration.

The discovery was spearheaded by Dr. Kang Zhang of the Shiley Eye Center at the University of California San Diego School of Medicine in La Jolla. About 900,000 people in the United States have been diagnosed with dry macular degeneration, and up to 10 million are at risk.

http://snipurl.com/3kyqo

Well, looks like I'm fucked.  Three generations of my family have had surgery for macular degeneration and I will more than likely be next.  :sad:
You cannot fathom the immensity of the fuck i do not give.
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