Here's a great TED video about Captcha, Recaptcha, and DuoLingo, and the massive-scale online collaboration to translate books and the internet.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Ht4qiDRZE8
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Space ROBOT! And we thought regular drones were scary. WTF is this thing doing in space for 469 days? Does it just hang out in orbit?

Pretty cool.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/12/12/x37b_launch/

SomeRandomGirl... That was a really good video. Thanks. I didn't think I would listen to the whole thing, but it turned out to be really cool.

Here's another TED I enjoyed recently. In a bloody brit accent and logically superior metric standards, but still...

Specifically at 6:35, he explains how the US Apollo program contributed to the US economy. For every $1 spent on the Apollo program, it contributed to $14 dollars being introduced into the US economy.

www.Penny4NASA.org

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"Nothing is more fatal to the progress of the human mind than to
presume that our views of science are ultimate. That our triumphs are
complete. That there are no mysteries in Nature and that there are no
new worlds to conquer." ~ Sir Humphry Davy

Nature is a bitch sometimes..

This is a juvenile form of the Cereal leaf beetle (Oulema melanopus) after being parasitized by Tetrastichus julis, a parasitoid wasp which lays its eggs inside the larva of the beetle. They eggs hatch within the larvae and begin to feed while it is still alive, before they burst out and kill it. These parasites are often used as a biological control, as the Cereal leaf beetle is considered a pest and regularly feeds on crops.

http://img217.imageshack.us/img217/6...0541088292.jpg

And this is a grown Cereal leaf beetle...

http://img259.imageshack.us/img259/8...beetle1571.jpg

So a shit ton of wasps are better than one beetle that eats leaves and cereal?
I don't get it...

Wasps are assholes. So are Hornets.

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Also... "Parasitized". Awesome ****ing word of the week.

par·a·sit·ize (pr-s-tz, -s-)
tr.v. par·a·sit·ized, par·a·sit·iz·ing, par·a·sit·iz·es
To live on or in (a host) as a parasite.

A.K.A the Wendler

Making science fun! Here's a teacher inhaling sulphur hexaflouride. The opposite of helium...

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Are we in the Matrix? Science plans to find out...

http://img853.imageshack.us/img853/1191/redorblue.jpg

Scientists plan test to see if the entire universe is a simulation created by futuristic supercomputers

US scientists are attempting to find out whether all of humanity is currently living a Matrix-style computer simulation being run on supercomputers of the future.

According to researchers at the University of Washington, there are tests that could be done to begin to work out whether we are in fact real, or merely a simulation created by a futuristic android on its lunch break.
Currently, computer simulations are decades away from creating even a primitive working model of the universe. In fact, scientists are able to accurately model only a 100 trillionth of a metre, with work to create a model of a full human being still out of reach.

By looking for underlying patterns, physicists believe that it may be possible to work out if we are existing in a computer created universe, created many years in the future. Looking at constraints imposed on simulations by limited resources could show signs that we are mere bit-part players in a Matrix-style film plot.

It will take many years to reach the computational power to give a real glimpse of whether we are living in a simulation, the scientists contend, but even by looking at the tiny portion of the universe that we can currently accurately model, it may be possible to detect 'signatures' of constraints on physical processes that could point to a simulation.

The researchers suggest that a signature could show up as a limitation in the energy of cosmic rays, for example. By testing the behaviour of cosmic rays on underlying 'lattice' frameworks governing rules of physics that could exist in future models of the universe, the researchers could find patterns that could point to a simulation.

“This is the first testable signature of such an idea,” one of the researchers, Martin Savage, said.

Aside from the rather mind-boggling proposition that we may be part of a computer simulation, another researcher pointed out that this would bring up the possibility of inter-universe computer platforms, and the potential to communicate across these.

“Then the question is, ‘Can you communicate with those other universes if they are running on the same platform?’” UW graduate student, Zohreh Davoudi, asked.

That's awesome! ROFL

Arguably the dumbest thing we could expend research efforts on.

Wow, this could really change things...

Using Light to Transmit Information --A Seminal New Breakthrough

http://img198.imageshack.us/img198/7379/35807286.jpg

IBM announced today a major advance in the ability to use light instead of electrical signals to transmit information for future computing. The breakthrough technology – called "silicon nanophotonics" – allows the integration of different optical components side-by-side with electrical circuits on a single silicon chip using, for the first time, sub-100nm semiconductor technology. Silicon nanophotonics takes advantage of pulses of light for communication and provides a super highway for large volumes of data to move at rapid speeds between computer chips in servers, large datacenters, and supercomputers, thus alleviating the limitations of congested data traffic and high-cost traditional interconnects.

"This technology breakthrough is a result of more than a decade of pioneering research at IBM," said Dr. John E. Kelly, Senior Vice President and Director of IBM Research. "This allows us to move silicon nanophotonics technology into a real-world manufacturing environment that will have impact across a range of applications."
IBM Silicon Nanophotonics technology is capable of integrating optical and electrical circuits side-by-side on the same chip. The amount of data being created and transmitted over enterprise networks continues to grow due to an explosion of new applications and services. Silicon nanophotonics, now primed for commercial development, can enable the industry to keep pace with increasing demands in chip performance and computing power.

Businesses are entering a new era of computing that requires systems to process and analyze, in real-time, huge volumes of information known as Big Data. Silicon nanophotonics technology provides answers to Big Data challenges by seamlessly connecting various parts of large systems, whether few centimeters or few kilometers apart from each other, and move terabytes of data via pulses of light through optical fibers. Building on its initial proof of concept in 2010, IBM has solved the key challenges of transferring the silicon nanophotonics technology into the commercial foundry.

By adding a few processing modules into a high-performance 90nm CMOS fabrication line, a variety of silicon nanophotonics components such as wavelength division multiplexers (WDM), modulators, and detectors are integrated side-by-side with a CMOS electrical circuitry. As a result, single-chip optical communications transceivers can be manufactured in a conventional semiconductor foundry, providing significant cost reduction over traditional approaches.

IBM's CMOS nanophotonics technology demonstrates transceivers to exceed the data rate of 25Gbps per channel. In addition, the technology is capable of feeding a number of parallel optical data streams into a single fiber by utilizing compact on-chip wavelength-division multiplexing devices. The ability to multiplex large data streams at high data rates will allow future scaling of optical communications capable of delivering terabytes of data between distant parts of computer.

So can we travel on beams of light yet?

No, but eventually you can broken down atom by atom, destroyed, then reconstructed with new material after your info has been transmitted via light.


AKA "beaming".

No, this is mainly to combat porn buffering....

Real limit to that is computing power to "remember" exactly where the atoms were originally.

Quantum computing may be able to aid that however

Let me get this straight. IF the atoms were able to "beam" with a sufficient level of accuracy, you would basically clone yourself (while the "original" is destroyed). Would your consciousness be cloned as well? I guess it would. Interesting.

If THAT were true, you could store a "backup" of yourself to be recreated anytime. Even after death.

Aye that's the question that makes it interesting. Who wants to go first? Hopefully it doesn't mean a digital lobotomy.

Wouldn't it depend on the method of information storage. If your atomic structure were to be stored traditionally would you even need to be destroyed?

I've also read of a way to bypass the massive amount of information needed, using quantom entanglement but the original is always destroyed opon recreation

What if you were terminally ill? Take a "backup" as I mentioned a couple of posts ago, and "delay" the beaming till after there's a cure? Like Walt Disney's head, but on a bigass hard drive.

More like the size of a small building, especially since modern computers have a nearly impossible time modeling anything bigger than Hydrogen

That's true today, but 50 years from now, who knows?

Its the nature of physics that limits it sadly. Quantum computing is our only hope

Everyone else would be happy but the dead "You". The dead you, which is currently you, would proceed to the afterlife, or cease to exist. The clone would think he is you, but the dead you wouldn't give a shit because you are dead.

Clear?

Pretty morbid.

Simple version: Picard has been killed hundreds of times. In fact, every time he is transported he dies, but a new copy of him is constructed out of new material to the EXACT specs that were scanned.

Aye. And if that were true, why not just stay in the computer? Have a nice programmed life exactly the way you want it on the holodeck? Multiple copies. Safer that way.

DARPA battle wound emergency care.

DARPA FOAM COULD INCREASE SURVIVAL RATE FOR VICTIMS OF INTERNAL HEMORRHAGING

December 10, 2012

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Technology developed under DARPA’s Wound Stasis System program resulted in 72 percent survival rate at three hours post-injury in testing

The Department of Defense’s medical system aspires to a standard known as the “Golden Hour” that dictates that troops wounded on the battlefield are moved to advanced-level treatment facilities within the first 60 minutes of being wounded. In advance of transport, initial battlefield medical care administered by first responders is often critical to injured servicemembers’ survival. In the case of internal abdominal injuries and resulting internal hemorrhaging, however, there is currently little that can be done to stanch bleeding before the patients reach necessary treatment facilities; internal wounds cannot be compressed the same way external wounds can, and tourniquets or hemostatic dressings are unsuitable because of the need to visualize the injury. The resulting blood loss often leads to death from what would otherwise be potentially survivable wounds.

DARPA launched its Wound Stasis System program in 2010 in the hopes of finding a technological solution that could mitigate damage from internal hemorrhaging. The program sought to identify a biological mechanism that could discriminate between wounded and healthy tissue, and bind to the wounded tissue. As the program evolved, an even better solution emerged: Wound Stasis performer Arsenal Medical, Inc. developed a foam-based product that can control hemorrhaging in a patient’s intact abdominal cavity for at least one hour, based on swine injury model data. The foam is designed to be administered on the battlefield by a combat medic, and is easily removable by doctors during surgical intervention at an appropriate facility, as demonstrated in testing.

Because it wouldn't be real and thus not worth "living"

Hence why I thought the effort to discern whether or not we're living in a universal simulation as a waste of money, nay a bad idea.

If the eggheads figure out we're in the Matrix, then what's stopping people from saying "**** it, nothings 'real', let's **** shit up?"

Nothing. Give me the ****ing blue pill every goddamn time.

Why wouldn't it be "Real"? "Real" is just how we perceive our reality. From the perception of the person, there would be no discernable difference. One wouldn't feel more "Real" than the other. Unless you could experience both, you couldn't have an opinion could you? The reality you were currently experiencing would always seem like the "Real" one. So your choice on red or blue pill would be irrelevant in saying which one was "Real"...

Maybe our reality is just a thought exercise of God?

Luz~
I'm ok with that...

Pack your bags, we found a new home. I'll get the warp drive warmed up.

http://gizmodo.com/5969697/astronome...ium=socialflow

Astronomers Discover Potentially Habitable Earth-Like Planet Very Near Us

This is really exciting: an international team of astronomers has discovered that Tau Ceti, the closest single star like our Sun, has planets just like our solar system. But more importantly, one of these planets orbits in the habitable zone around the star.

Tau Ceti is very close to Earth. It's only 12 light-years away, which in cosmic terms is just around the corner. It's so close that we can see it with the naked eye at night.
The most exciting news is about the Earth-ish planet found in this solar system's goldilocks region, the circumstellar zone in which, theoretically, life could develop.

The artist's impression above shows its five planets with masses that range between two to six times the mass of Earth. The astronomers, who used more than six-thousand observations and three different instruments to gather the results, say that this is "the lowest-mass planetary system yet detected."

This is an important discovery, as it shows once again that almost every star has planets. According to UC Santa Cruz professor of astronomy and astrophysicist Steve Vogt—one of the authors of the study that is going to be published in the scientific journal Astronomy & Astrophysics—"this discovery is in keeping with our emerging view that virtually every star has planets, and that the galaxy must have many such potentially habitable Earth-sized planets."

The sightly bad news is that the universe seems to give rise to systems that have planets with orbits less than 100 days. According to Vogt, "this is quite unlike our own solar system, where there is nothing with an orbit inside that of Mercury. So our solar system is, in some sense, a bit of a freak and not the most typical kind of system that Nature cooks up."

Still, the evidence seems pretty overwhelming. With an estimated 100 thousand million stars in the Milky Way alone, and millions and millions and galaxies in the universe, the statistical probability of planets full of life just like ours is overwhelming. We now just need to visit. And 12 light years away is a perfect place to start—just in our own neighborhood.

So you don't see any problem with a revelation that we're in an artificial simulation?

Well of course there would be problems. A discovery like that would change quite a bit. But it wouldn't change what was "Real", and certainly wouldn't remove all the value from life. There wouldn't be any flip of the switch moment where people would say "**** it, nothings 'real', let's **** shit up?" Because the revelation wouldn't change people's outward feelings toward their current world. A person's emotions are still just as valid. The real physical world would still be indistinguishable from a simulated one from the perspective of a person inside. Unless you could experience both simultaneously, it wouldn't matter which you were experiencing.

I get this, but I still think people wouldn't take a rational view of the situation.

I certainly wouldn't be "rational." If I'm just a computer model, then what's the point? Do I have "free will?"

Society is schizophrenic enough as it is. It wouldn't surprise me if such a revelation would cause more massacres like Newtown and Columbine from jacked up people.

What would change for you if you found out you were living in a computer simulation? Would you stop loving your family? Would the experiences you've had with your family suddenly lose their meaning?

Most people can't even really define what "Life" is, or why we're here. This article is simply saying "What if it's this?" If we can't even make a guess with any assurance right now, saying "What if it's this?" isn't any worse than any other theory. If we don't currently know, we can't really feel bad if the truth is slightly different than what we imagined.

And I have no idea how you could say this would cause massacres. I just can't see that at all. Nothing is being taken away from anyone. Emotions are still just as real. Pain still hurts, and loved ones are still missed. Why would knowing something about the structure of reality make experiencing that reality any less valuable?

Squeeze some titties today. But be sure and explain this first.....

To revert breast cancer cells, give them the squeeze
By Sarah Yang, Media Relations | December 17, 2012

Researchers at the UC Berkeley and the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory have put the squeeze — literally — on malignant mammary cells to guide them back into a normal growth pattern.

The findings, presented Monday, Dec. 17 at the annual meeting of the American Society for Cell Biology in San Francisco, show for the first time that mechanical forces alone can revert and stop the out-of-control growth of cancer cells. This change happens even though the genetic mutations responsible for malignancy remain, setting up a nature-versus-nurture battle in determining a cell’s fate.

“We are showing that tissue organization is sensitive to mechanical inputs from the environment at the beginning stages of growth and development,” said principal investigator Daniel Fletcher, professor of bioengineering at Berkeley and faculty scientist at the Berkeley Lab. “An early signal, in the form of compression, appears to get these malignant cells back on the right track.”

Throughout a woman’s life, breast tissue grows, shrinks and shifts in a highly organized way in response to changes in her reproductive cycle. For instance, when forming acini, the berry-shaped structures that secrete milk during lactation, healthy breast cells will rotate as they form an organized structure. And, importantly, the cells stop growing when they are supposed to.

One of the early hallmarks of breast cancer is the breakdown of this normal growth pattern. Not only do cancer cells continue to grow irregularly when they shouldn’t, recent studies have shown that they do not rotate coherently when forming acini.

While the traditional view of cancer development focuses on the genetic mutations within the cell, Mina Bissell, Distinguished Scientist at the Berkeley Lab, conducted pioneering experiments that showed that a malignant cell is not doomed to become a tumor, but that its fate is dependent on its interaction with the surrounding microenvironment. Her experiments showed that manipulation of this environment, through the introduction of biochemical inhibitors, could tame mutated mammary cells into behaving normally.

The latest work from Fletcher’s lab, in collaboration with Bissell’s lab, takes a major step forward by introducing the concept of mechanical rather than chemical influences on cancer cell growth. Gautham Venugopalan, a member of Fletcher’s lab, conducted the new experiments as part of his recently completed Ph.D. dissertation at UC Berkeley.

“People have known for centuries that physical force can influence our bodies,” said Venugopalan. “When we lift weights, our muscles get bigger. The force of gravity is essential to keeping our bones strong. Here we show that physical force can play a role in the growth — and reversion — of cancer cells.”

Venugopalan and collaborators grew malignant breast epithelial cells in a gelatin-like substance that had been injected into flexible silicone chambers. The flexible chambers allowed the researchers to apply a compressive force in the first stages of cell development.

Over time, the compressed malignant cells grew into more organized, healthy-looking acini that resembled normal structures, compared with malignant cells that were not compressed. The researchers used time-lapse microscopy over several days to show that early compression also induced coherent rotation in the malignant cells, a characteristic feature of normal development.

Notably, those cells stopped growing once the breast tissue structure was formed, even though the compressive force had been removed.

“Malignant cells have not completely forgotten how to be healthy; they just need the right cues to guide them back into a healthy growth pattern,” said Venugopalan.

Researchers further added a drug that blocked E-cadherin, a protein that helps cells adhere to their neighbors. When they did this, the malignant cells returned to their disorganized, cancerous appearance, negating the effects of compression and demonstrating the importance of cell-to-cell communication in organized structure formation.

It should be noted that the researchers are not proposing the development of compression bras as a treatment for breast cancer. “Compression, in and of itself, is not likely to be a therapy,” said Fletcher. “But this does give us new clues to track down the molecules and structures that could eventually be targeted for therapies.”

The National Institutes of Health helped fund this research through its Physical Science-Oncology program.

Think that for every Klebold or Lanza, there are 3 or 4 other people who have left the reservation yet still have enough sanity to not shoot up a school because they still have a life of sorts with people to care about.

Tell those guys that life is not "real" and is, at its simplest, is a simulation in another existence and thus their existence is akin to to a character in a videogame.

And I'm not trying to sensationalize or over dramatize things. There are people who are pretty broken and definitely do not think like people who are "normal" but still hold on to their life as having value, and if logic, reason, and science say that this value is in fact completely empty and without value..

Even if you weren't a computer model, do you have free will?

http://www.chiefsplanet.com/BB/showp...&postcount=380

If people found out, they'd still have the same life of sorts with people to care about. That life and loved ones wouldn't just go away at that point.

Logic, reason, and science don't say that a discovery like this would make life empty and without value. YOU are saying that. And you still haven't really said WHY something like that would remove the value from existence.

Life is still life, whether it's hosted in a big empty physical universe or in a complex universe computer sitting on some alien's workbench. Why should either be any less valid from the experience of those in it? We can't even define what "Real" is, so how could we be disappointed if "Real" turns out to be in an alien's computer?

When people proved that the world was round and not flat, did they start rioting because they were wrong about the nature of their world? How would this be different?

Like the last :30 of this:

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Personally if I found out I was a simulation... I'd do much of nothing. No aspirations, no drive, nothing. Just enough "to survive" and stay out of the way of psychos. Unless there's a way to manipulate the simulation to my benefit .

But I easily understand the mindset of those who would disregard morals and start harming people who aren't "real."

Here, we'll just take your heart out, and plug this in. There ya go.

Thanks Science!

UCLA doctors remove man's heart, replace it with total artificial heart
Portable power supply allows patient to go home while he awaits new heart

http://img11.imageshack.us/img11/975...ashingtonc.jpg

Imagine living without a heart. It is possible — if you have a new artificial heart pumping blood through your body. You can even go to the supermarket, watch your kid's soccer game or go on a hike.

Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center has performed its first procedure to remove a patient's diseased heart and replace it with a SynCardia Temporary Total Artificial Heart.

Chad Washington, 35, underwent the seven-hour transplant surgery at UCLA on Oct. 29, led by Dr. Murray Kwon, an assistant professor of cardiothoracic surgery.

The temporary pump will act as a "bridge" until Washington receives a new donor heart.

"Historically, patients with a total artificial heart had to remain hospitalized while they waited for a transplant because they were tethered to a large machine to power the device," Kwon said. "Today, however, this device can be powered by advanced technology small enough to fit in a backpack."

"It sounds like a loud grandfather clock going 'tick-tock' in my chest, but it doesn't feel foreign. It's there to help," Washington said of the artificial heart. "I'm so glad to be living in an age where technology is moving so fast."

Washington, an aspiring chef is who is married and has a 4-year-old son, has suffered from heart disease since he was born. From the time he was 10 days old through adulthood, he underwent a series of heart-repair surgeries and had pacemakers and a defibrillator implanted.

Then his heart deteriorated. He received a heart transplant in February of this year, and for the first time in his life, he knew what it was like to live with a healthy heart. It gave him energy, and he was amazed that he could run 25 minutes on a treadmill.

Unfortunately, after six months of functioning perfectly well, the donor heart started showing signs of a serious form of rejection that did not respond to therapy. Washington's condition worsened. An immediate re-transplantation with a new donor heart was not an option because his body had built up antibodies that would likely attack a new heart.

Thankfully, the artificial heart offered hope.

"By removing the patient's diseased donor heart, we removed the source of his end-stage heart failure," said Dr. Ali Nsair, an assistant professor of cardiology at UCLA. "The total artificial heart — and being off immunosuppressant medications — allows his body to recover and get ready for a heart transplant in a few months."

Dr. Mario Deng, a professor of cardiology and medical director of the UCLA Advanced Heart Failure/Mechanical Support/Heart Transplant Program added that since the pump's energy source is portable, Washington can go home and resume normal activities with his family while he waits for a new heart.

"This ability to be at home with family is an important element in helping the patient to maintain a positive outlook during the waiting period," Deng said.

Approved by the Federal Drug Administration in 2004, the SynCardia Total Artificial Heart replaces both failing heart ventricles and the four heart valves. It works by providing a high volume of blood-flow through both ventricles, which helps to speed the recovery of vital organs and make the patient a better candidate for transplant surgery.

Once the total artificial heart is implanted, it is connected by two small air tubes known as "drivelines" to a large external driver that powers the heart while the patient remains hospitalized. When the patient's condition stabilizes post-operatively, he or she can be switched over to the smaller 13.5-pound Freedom portable driver, which can be carried in a backpack, thus giving the patient the freedom to leave the hospital.

"This technology offers a lifeline for patients who are in severe heart failure and dying," said Dr. Richard J. Shemin, professor and chair of cardiothoracic surgery at UCLA and surgical director of the UCLA Mechanical Circulatory Support Program. "These patients have run out of medical options and require a heart transplant. The total artificial heart offers advantages over other devices used for mechanical support of patients awaiting a heart transplant. With the new Freedom driver for powering the device, the patients can leave the hospital, live at home and undergo rehabilitation, improving their clinical condition and quality of life as they await their transplant."

Oh yeah...

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Wild Sex. The series. Learning science with a semi boner...

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Technically........

http://img194.imageshack.us/img194/3...1501211144.jpg

http://www.launchphotography.com/End...ight_Deck.html

These rare photos capture the Flight Deck (cockpit) of the Space Shuttle Endeavour, fully powered for one of the final times. Just a few weeks later, at 9:58am EDT on May 11, Endeavour was powered down for the final time in history. It was the last of the three space shuttles to have power. Below, other views show the mid-deck, gutted of its lockers and storage areas, and three final photos show the white room entrance in the Orbiter Processing Facility, signed by thousands over the years.

Awesome. Thanks for sharing.

Too many switches / Omaha Astronaut

I am a big nerd for this stuff.

Good Lord that's a lot of buttons.

Your goldfish is smarter than you thought...

http://img21.imageshack.us/img21/799...7123791278.png

I went to Space Camp for Educators in Huntsville, Ala a few years ago. I commanded the Shuttle mission for our group. The model was more from the Columbia instead of the Endeavor but yes-buttons, switches oh my.

I was thinking it would be technologically advanced-but my classroom has more technology. The shuttle was based on 1970's computers and memory. Our phones have more memory than the shuttle. The screens are programmed by a number pad. A code needs to be entered to move to a different screen. My smart board can do those things faster.

Great experience

A true application of the butterfly effect.. Your mother's large size has been effecting the rotation of the planet since the Triassic period.

Yo mama's so fat that she expresses her weight in scientific notation.

Yo mama's so fat that a recursive function computing her weight causes a stack overflow.

Yo mama's so fat that the long double numeric variable type in C++ is insufficient to express her weight.

Yo mama's so promiscuous that electrons have a positive charge when they're around her.

Yo mama's so fat that IEEE is working on a wifi protocol so people can get the signals to reach users on opposite sides of her. It's called 802.11 Draft Fat Momma

If we were to code your mom in a C++ function she would look like this: double mom (double fat){ mom(fat);return mom;}; //your mom is recursively fat.

The only thing your mother splits worse than infinitives is her Lane Bryant panties, which is fine because I've been using them for bathmats.

Yeah, I schtupped your mother. I'm not proud of it, but it was something that simply had to be done.

That and I had a bag of flour opened and figured it wouldn't be good to let it go to waste so I rolled her in it to find the wet spot.

And another promising CP thread hits bottom.

You're free to post an insightful science related article at your leisure.

Also: you're move Fishy boy.

Genetically modified mosquitoes. What could go wrong? :)

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http://www.foxnews.com/science/2013/...ook-like-this/


Good Read

Neil Tyson is one of my heroes. And I love his approach to parenting and education here...

Let your kids break things... Let them be curious. Inspire their curiosity. Let them break things, teach them to fix them. That's how our next generation makes things better...

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Blinking. It's not just about lube...

http://img694.imageshack.us/img694/8...onblinking.gif

Why Do We Blink So Frequently?

We all blink. A lot. The average person blinks some 15-20 times per minute—so frequently that our eyes are closed for roughly 10% of our waking hours overall.

Although some of this blinking has a clear purpose—mostly to lubricate the eyeballs, and occasionally protect them from dust or other debris—scientists say that we blink far more often than necessary for these functions alone. Thus, blinking is physiological riddle. Why do we do it so darn often? In a paper published today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, a group of scientists from Japan offers up a surprising new answer—that briefly closing our eyes might actually help us to gather our thoughts and focus attention on the world around us.

The researchers came to the hypothesis after noting an interesting fact revealed by previous research on blinking: that the exact moments when we blink aren’t actually random. Although seemingly spontaneous, studies have revealed that people tend to blink at predictable moments. For someone reading, blinking often occurs after each sentence is finished, while for a person listening to a speech, it frequently comes when the speaker pauses between statements. A group of people all watching the same video tend to blink around the same time, too, when action briefly lags.

As a result, the researchers guessed that we might subconsciously use blinks as a sort of mental resting point, to briefly shut off visual stimuli and allow us to focus our attention. To test the idea, they put 10 different volunteers in an fMRI machine and had them watch the TV show “Mr. Bean” (they had used the same show in their previous work on blinking, showing that it came at implicit break points in the video). They then monitored which areas of the brain showed increased or decreased activity when the study participants blinked.

Their analysis showed that when the Bean-watchers blinked, mental activity briefly spiked in areas related to the default network, areas of the brain that operate when the mind is in a state of wakeful rest, rather than focusing on the outside world. Momentary activation of this alternate network, they theorize, could serve as a mental break, allowing for increased attention capacity when the eyes are opened again.

To test whether this mental break was simply a result of the participants’ visual inputs being blocked, rather than a subconscious effort to clear their minds, the researchers also manually inserted “blackouts” into the video at random intervals that lasted roughly as long as a blink. In the fMRI data, though, the brain areas related to the default network weren’t similarly activated. Blinking is something more than temporarily not seeing anything.

It’s far from conclusive, but the research demonstrates that we do enter some sort of altered mental state when we blink—we’re not just doing it to lubricate our eyes. A blink could provide a momentary island of introspective calm in the ocean of visual stimuli that defines our lives.



Read more: http://blogs.smithsonianmag.com/scie...#ixzz2HBLttFZA
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Interesting. I'd venture to guess that as we've evolved, the rate of blinking on average would have been far LESS back in the day. There is a TON more visual stimulation these days, and that would imply that we need far more "quick breaks" today.


And that dude in the pic is freaking me out. I've never seen anyone not blink with both eyes at once.

Exactly. It seems to me we blink more than necessary b/c we're strategically blinking to maximize efficiency in our intake of visual information.

I only have recently discovered Dr. Tyson, but he is one of my heroes now as well. He really articulates a fantastic case for science education, which I'm 100% on board with.

LMFAO at the juxtaposition of your post and your avatar.

Amazing science...

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Flesh-eating flies map forest biodiversity
DNA in insects' guts reveals inventory of rare mammals.

Ed Yong
04 January 2013

The blowflies and flesh flies that settle on dead animals aren't just feasting on the carrion — they're sampling their DNA. Scientists in Germany have now shown that this DNA persists for long enough to be sequenced, providing a quick and cost-effective snapshot of mammal diversity in otherwise inaccessible rainforests.

Researchers stumbled on the grisly cataloguing technique while studying a form of anthrax that kills chimpanzees in Côte d'Ivoire. They started sampling flies to see whether the insects could harbour the anthrax bacterium after feasting on infected bodies, but soon realized “that detecting mammal DNA from flies could also be an extremely cool tool for assessing biodiversity”, says team leader Sébastien Calvignac-Spencer, an evolutionary biologist at the Robert Koch Institute in Berlin.

By baiting nets and traps with meat, the team collected carrion flies from Taï National Park in Côte d'Ivoire and Kirindy Reserve in Madagascar, and found that 40% of them carried mammal DNA. The researchers sequenced this material to identify 16 mammals in Côte d'Ivoire, including six of the nine local primate species, as well as Jentink’s duiker (Cephalophus jentinki) — an endangered antelope of which fewer than 3,500 remain. In Madagascar, the team identified four mammal species — including two lemurs — representing one in eight of all the island’s mammals. The work will appear on 7 January in Molecular Ecology1.

Saw this yesterday, thought it was neat:link

Blame every pop culture depiction of school as something that is the closest analogue to torture a child will endure and that people that enjoy learning are dweebs that deserved to be stuffed in a toliet.

wow.
http://gifninja.com/animatedgifs/304980/mind-blown.gif

I disagree. I think it has a lot to do with a lot of different things. The way we train and assign/hire teachers. Also, think we need to tailor schools to different learning styles(visual, audible, reading, hands on) and put kids who learn a certain way, in a environment more suitable for learning.

Also, especially today, kids need stimulation. More interactive learning. Classroom lessons on ipads(tablets) or interactive surface desks etc.

Or.. You know... Some tool that's been around since the establishment of civilization.. such as discipline.

Odd Mars 'Flower' & Snakelike Formation Spied By NASA's Curiosity Rover (PHOTOS)

Posted: 01/06/2013 10:06 am EST | Updated: 01/07/2013 3:02 pm EST


By: Tariq Malik
Published: 01/05/2013 11:30 AM EST on SPACE.com

New photos of Mars from NASA's Curiosity rover have sparked a buzz of discussion over an odd formation that some have dubbed a "flower" embedded in a Martian rock. The rover has also found a snake-like rock formation winding across the Red Planet's surface.

The so-called Mars "flower" photo was snapped on Dec. 19 by the microscope-like Mars Hand Lens Imager at the end of Curiosity's robotic arm. At the lower left of the image is a strange, apparently transparent formation that some Internet forum users on the website claimed looked much like a flower, according to NBCNews.com's photoblog.

NASA posted a raw, unprocessed version of the photo online on the Curiosity rover’s mission website overseen by the agency's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. Internet forum readers on the website Above Top Secret christened the object a flower, according to NBCNews.com's Alan Boyle.

Curiosity has seen bits of clear plastic (pieces of the rover itself) on the surface of Mars before, but NASA officials said that doesn’t appear to be the case this time.

JPL spokesman Guy Webster told NBCNews.com that the object "appears to be part of the rock, not debris from the spacecraft." [Face on Mars & More Martian Illusions (Photos)]

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This image shows the full photo from Mars rover Curiosity of a strange transparent feature on a rock, which some have nicknamed a "flower." It appears at lower left. Image taken Dec. 19, 2012.

On Friday (Jan. 4), NASA also unveiled a new panorama of Curiosity’s current location on Mars, a shallow depression called YellowknifeBayinside the vast Gale Crater. The image is a mosaic of photos that is dominated by a sinewy, snake-like rock winding across its center.

NASA scientists have dubbed the rock "Snake River." It is a thin curving line of dark rock that rises above the flatter rocks of its surroundings, making it an intriguing target for Curiosity's instruments, JPL officials said.

"It's one piece of the puzzle," rover mission project scientist John Grotzinger, of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, said in a statement. "It has a crosscutting relationship to the surrounding rock and appears to have formed after the deposition of the layer that it transects."

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The sinuous rock feature in the lower center of this mosaic of images recorded by the NASA Mars rover Curiosity is called "Snake River." Image taken Dec. 20, 2012.

The $2.5 billion Mars rover Curiosity landed on Aug. 5 to begin a two-year primary mission of determining whether the planet could have once been habitable for primitive microbial life. It is currently driving toward a 3-mile-high (5 kilometers) mountain rising up from the center of its Gale Crater landing site.

Curiosity is destined for a point called Glenelg at the base of the Martian peak, which scientists have named MountSharp. But first, mission scientists are looking over Curiosity's images of YellowknifeBay in order to pick a rock target for the rover to use as its first drill site. That drill test is expected soon, JPL officials said.

“The area the rover is in looks good for our first drilling target," rover project manager Richard Cook said.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/0...#slide=1212378

Happy Birthday to Stephen Hawking! Party it up you brilliant son of a bitch!

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NASA Eyes Wild Plan to Drag Asteroid Near the Moon

http://news.yahoo.com/nasa-eyes-wild...133639284.html

Capturing a near-Earth asteroid and dragging it into orbit around the moon could help humanity put boots on Mars someday, proponents of the idea say.
NASA is considering a $2.6 billion asteroid-retrieval mission that could deliver a space rock to high lunar orbit by 2025 or so, New Scientist reported last week. The plan could help jump-start manned exploration of deep space, carving out a path to the Red Planet and perhaps even more far-flung destinations, its developers maintain.
"Experience gained via human expeditions to the small returned NEA would transfer directly to follow-on international expeditions beyond the Earth-moon system: to other near-Earth asteroids, [the Mars moons] Phobos and Deimos, Mars and potentially someday to the main asteroid belt," the mission concept team, which is based at the Keck Institute for Space Studies in California, wrote in a feasibility study of the plan last year.
Space agency officials confirm that NASA is indeed looking at the Keck proposal as a way to help extend humanity's footprint out into the solar system. But the assessment is still in its early stages, with nothing decided yet.
"There are many options — and many routes — being discussed on our way to the Red Planet," Bob Jacobs, deputy associate administrator for the Office of Communications at NASA Headquarters in Washington, D.C., told SPACE.com via email. "NASA and the agency's Jet Propulsion Laboratory are giving the study further review to determine its feasibility." [NASA's Spacecraft for Asteroid Missions Revealed (Photos)]
Enabling manned exploration of deep space
In the Keck plan, an unmanned probe would snag a 25-foot-wide (7 meters) near-Earth asteroid, then haul it back to lunar orbit for future study and exploration.
Its developers see the mission as a way for humanity to get a toehold beyond low-Earth orbit, allowing our species to hone techniques and acquire skills that manned missions to more distant destinations will require.
For example, the robotic mission would help develop the precision flying techniques demanded by a manned mission to a near-Earth asteroid. Further, study of the captured space rock could teach researchers how to efficiently extract water from asteroids — a resource that could be an off-Earth source of radiation shielding and rocket fuel for journeying spacecraft.
"Extraction of propellants, bulk shielding and life support fluids from this first captured asteroid could jump-start an entire space-based industry," the Keck team writes. "Our space capabilities would finally have caught up with the speculative attractions of using space resources in situ."
Up-close examination of a captured asteroid would also yield insights into the economic value of space rock resources and shed light on the best ways to deflect potentially dangerous asteroids away from Earth.
Overall, the potential benefits of the mission are huge, the Keck team says.
"Placing a NEA in lunar orbit would provide a new capability for human exploration not seen since Apollo," the report reads. "Such an achievement has the potential to inspire a nation. It would be mankind’s first attempt at modifying the heavens to enable the permanent settlement of humans in space."
NASA's new spaceships
Human exploration of deep space beyond the moon is a NASA priority. In 2010, President Barack Obama directed the agency to get astronauts to a near-Earth asteroid by 2025, then on to the vicinity of the Red Planet by the mid-2030s.
To make all of this happen, NASA is developing a crew capsule called Orion and a huge rocket known as the Space Launch System. The Orion-SLS combo is slated to begin flying crews by 2021. The first unmanned Orion test flight is expected in 2017.
The space agency is also developing a new Space Exploration Vehicle for astronauts bound to explore a near-Earth asteroid. A prototype of the new vehicle, which could feature a rocket sled and "pogo stick" device for docking with an asteroid, coul dbe tested at the International Space Station in 2017, project officials have said.