AUG 04
NanoTech reality check
Nanotech is everywhere. Everywhere in the media that is. Venture Capital (VC) firms have been falling over themselves in the last decade to pour money into new companies which will ( one day ) provide us with everything from cancer-cures to non-clog house drains.
But, looking at ‘progress so far’ there’s a very large gap between what you might call nanotech ‘products’ – and nano ‘machines’ ( as first proposed by Richard Feynman over 40 years ago )
There are plenty of nanotech ‘products’ - such as micromachined powders used in suncreams, car-tyres and even even toner for photocopiers. But these are really just powders which have been ground-up a lot finer than was possible 20 years back.
( Then there are the carbon-based ‘buckyballs’ and ‘buckytubes’ – which occur naturally in soot. Theoretically, they do hold great hopes for the future, and may even spawn a new branch of chemistry. But at the moment, real world products which use them are few and far between. )
But as for the second group, realising useful nano-machines – there’s not much real-world progress as yet. Thousands of amazing prototypes have been made, and the technology to do this is very well developed. But how do you power the machines ? How do you control them ? Feynman wasn’t too explicit on that bit.
Not far in the future, it may be possible to mass produce a zillion ultra high tech ( read expensive ) ‘drain cleaning nanobots’ which you can pour down your sink to unblock it. But we already have an atomic-scale self-powered grease-shifter – it’s called caustic soda. Yes, it’s a bit toxic – but who’s to say the new nanobots won’t be ?
And, as always, when the new tech oneday finally arrives in a high street shop, or hospital, near you – it will bring a new set of problems too. As professor Ken Donaldson of the University of Edinburgh has recently pointed out – there will need to be a complimentary new branch of medicine – which he’s called ‘nanotoxicology'. In other words, medical damage caused by inadvertent ingestion of the 'mites'.
As he’s explained, particles that small can easily migrate around the body in the same way viruses do, and the effects, needless to say, are completely unknown.
Really Magazine suspects that all the VC firms are probably pouring at least 50% of their capital into insurance funds, so that they can hedge their bets against future claims for health-related damages – at least they should be.
Don’t hold your breath though.
For an ( official ) overview of the current state of the art, see:
http://www.nano.gov/
for daily nanonews see:
http://www.nanotech-now.com/
Editor's comment: Not sure we want to encourage it, but if any readers wish to experiment in a hands-on way, there are a number of companies producing relatively low-cost nanoparticle generators. They come in packets of 20 at tobacconists.
A smoking chip ?
Everyone knows how slow and ponderous [ oops !, tautological Ed. ] legal systems are. But, like dozing alligators, it’s amazing how quick they can move when they want to. Usually when there’s corporate money to be made – or, more importantly lost . . .
An AP story over the weekend has drawn attention to this by highlighting the fact that no fewer than twelve US states have managed to pass so-called ’Cheeseburger Bills’ in the last nine months alone. See:
http://news.findlaw.com/ap_stories
The bills give legal immunity to 'fast-food' restaurants and manufacturers so that they can’t become victims of ‘frivolous’ court cases. Cases along the lines of - “I got ill ‘cos I ate too many cheesburgers – you sold ‘em to me, so it’s your fault and I want some money”
The new laws are perhaps just a touch reminiscent of legislation which was devised to protect the tobacco companies against suits from people who were made ill by smoking ?
As we know though, the tobacco companies’ government-loan legal armour was eventually pierced when it became clear, thanks to whistleblowers, that they had been hiding research results about nicotine addiction and the carcinogenic effects of smoke.
In other words, the important factor wasn’t - ‘is regular use of cigarettes dangerous or harmless ?’ – it was that Joe Smith couldn’t possibly come to a rational decision about whether to harm himself or not – because the facts were being deliberately withheld from him.
Perhaps we could hazard a guess that in the last thirty years or so, there may possibly perhaps have been some industry-funded university studies which involved feeding rodents a diet of nothing but ’fast food’ their entire lives . . .
Well ? Where’s the results ?
If they so desired, legislators could force companies to publish any findings. Then we could come to ‘informed decisions‘ about whether to eat nothing but cheeseburgers - or not.
Let’s see how fast that happens . . .
Would you like a carbonated coloured flavoured sugar water with that ?
For further info see:
http://www.foodproductdesign.com/
and, of course,
Hand over the money
Fujitsu have been working on a vein recognition system for some years now. According to an article in Computerworld , they have just signed a deal to supply a large Japanese bank with the world’s first hand-vein-recognition ATM ‘s.
Users will simply hold their hand over an infra-red imaging system to get their cash from a ‘hole-in-the-wall machine’. No more numbers to remember.
The patterns of veins in individual’s palms are evidently singular enough to allow them to be uniquely identified. And the new machines get around a perceived ‘hygiene problem’ with fingerprint recognition devices which involve touching a glass panel.
We can’t help wondering though, how well the machines will work when the weather is very cold ? Veins in the extremities can change size very markedly according to temperature . . . but perhaps the machines can compensate. If not, you might have to rub your hands together for a while before you can get at your money.
Is it just us, or does that mental picture seem like a scene from some futuristic Woody
Allen film ?
‘Terahertz’ industry gets a £2Million boost.
Terahertz radiation lies in the gap between high frequency microwaves and low infra-red. Until now, there hasn’t been much commercial development with terrahertz tech – simply because it’s been very difficult to devise methods for producing it. In the 1980’s it was discovered that the radiation could be generated by bombarding some exotic semiconductor crystals with the right flavour laser. But it’s taken until now for commercial systems to start appearing.
The ‘new’ waveband presents all sorts of opportunity for applications, from medical ( spotting tumors ) to military ( spotting things inside buildings ) to security ( spotting things inside people's clothes ). And it’s the last one that’s currently causing some controversy . . .
Pick the right frequency terawaves, and it’s possible to build a scanner which can peer straight through a person’s clothing. As it happens, animal tissues reflect the waves fairly strongly, whereas most fabrics don’t. The waves can also pick out metals and ceramics - and many other substances also produce tell-tale reflections.
Needless to say, some human rights groups and privacy campaigners are none too happy about the developments. So, companies developing the tech have been struggling to make computer controlled scanners which don’t show the operator an image – just an indicator which says – good / bad.
Of course, it’s been possible to peer through clothing for many decades now using x-rays – but they’re far too dangerous to use on a routine basis everytime someone goes through an airport check-in.
Which brings to mind another possible problem-ette looming on the horizon . . . Bearing in mind the current controversy about the possible dangers posed by mobile phone transmissions ( which are of course less energetic than the THz band ) – is this new tech 100% safe ? We’ve probably missed it – but there doesn’t seem to be a huge amount of publicly available info on how much research has been done into the possible biological hazards of the new waveband.
The UK government is sufficiently enthusiastic about the idea though, and last week pumped in more than £2M as a non-refundable grant. Hand-held ‘wand’ style scanners are scheduled to be rolled-out at an airport near you within two years.
For a good overview of the tech so far, see http://www.teraview.co.uk/terahertz.asp
You can see a somewhat unsettling animation of a ( clothed ) person’s
silvery terahertz reflection on this page : http://www.startiger.org/thz.htm
comments ?
Call for, errr, - sorry – errr - what was I talking about ? Oh yeah . . .
The University of Queensland is currently looking for volunteers for an up-coming study. You must be male, over 18 , and live within 20Kms of the CBD ( central business district ). People with, and without, psychiatric problems are especially welcome to join in. But the main requirement is that you should be an enthusiast of weed, smoke, sess, ganja, zeese, or mary-jane.
Their webpage doesn’t give away much detail about any possible compensation you might receive for participating – but there might be a clue in the 20Kms requirement. Travel expenses only perhaps ?
The participation will just consist of an interview. There won’t be any ‘hands on’ activity apparently - but if you want to do your bit to further the knowledge of Bob Hope and its effects, here’s the url :
http://www.uq.edu.au/news/index.phtml?article=5843
Terror travel tourist torment
Some new research by the University of Warwick ( pron. wôrik ) has come up with some striking findings which may help in the ‘fat ginst terrism’ . Although the study isn’t complete yet, it’s already unveiled some remarkable similarities between two previously unlinked groups : ‘terrists’ and - ‘tourists’.
You can’t read the full report yet because there’s still much much more work to do - it’s not due to be finished until 2006 - but a press release gives us some tantalising pointers to the likely revelations it may contain.
Such as :
Both groups ( terrists and tourists ) tend to travel either alone, or in clusters ( i.e. not alone ).
They tend to change their plans at short notice.
They may carry baggage – although sometimes they don’t.
They both tend to visit important locations such as hotels and shopping centres.
These new insights will clearly be of great importance to airlines and security organisations – unfortunately though, the implication is that every tourist must now be even more carefully scrutinised.
We can all do our bit by keeping a very close eye on any tourists we spot.
http://www.newsandevents.warwick.ac.uk
Deep fat mystery.
As regular readers will know, we often mention fuel research – especially with regard to Hydrogen. In fact we had an item on the subject just a few days back ( see H2 in Wonderland , below ).
It’s not that we’re fixated on the subject, it’s just that, on a very regular basis, H2 stories surface which, frankly, we don’t understand.
And today was no exception.
The BBC is carrying a piece entitled ‘Sunflower oil boost to car
future’ http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/
Which highlights some current research by the University of Leeds.
They are working on a system which produces H2 from vegetable oils – with the idea that the gas can power a car. The research, which was undertaken by Dr. Andrew B Ross ( not Moss as the BBC has it ) and his colleagues can be seen here :
But despite our best efforts – we just don’t get it . . . The process is fairly complex, uses steam and some expensive catalysts – and it’s a two-step reaction – so you need two converters per vehicle. They get hot, and produce carbon and CO2 as waste products ( although, as the BBC points out – next time you grow some sunflowers, the new plants will theoretically absorb the same amount CO2 )
The usual question : why not just use the oil to drive the engine in the first place ?
There are already fleets of vehicles across the world running on vegetable oils – and you can even buy conversion kits to strap onto any old diesel engine so that it will run it on secondhand chip-oil if you so wish. See http://www.vegburner.co.uk/links.html
Of course, running a conventional engine on any vegetable oil also produces waste CO2 - but exactly the same re-absorption argument applies – when new oil-producing plants are grown, they absorb it back again.
Well ? does anyone out there understand it ? Let
us know.
p.s. The Beeb's observation that a tank full of ( unpressurised ) hydrogen would be '3,000 times bigger than its conventional cousin' ( oil ) is entirely correct. That's why no-one has ever suggested it. What are they running on ?
The Daily Whitewash.
Bearing in mind that there will be some important political elections coming up in the next few months – it might be a good time to brush up on the ‘art of polling’.
The National Council on Public Polls has an excellent info page, with some solid – though fairly obvious – questions which journos and editors should ask themselves before they cut’n’paste results of ‘sciuntifically conducted’ polls.
Questions like - ‘exactly how were the questions phrased ?’ ‘how was the public sample chosen ?’ and, of course, ‘who paid for the poll ?’
P.R. organisations, working on behalf of big business or political groups, are very well aware that by carefully tweaking various factors in the poll, it’s more than possible to nudge the numbers in the direction you wish. The tricks have to be pretty subtle – and legal – but for example, results can be very significantly altered just by carefully selecting the order in which questions are asked . . .
Unfortunately for the public, the media editors whose job it is to see that skewed polls are not given the ‘oxygen of publicity’, often have a more pressing problem on their mind - meeting their copy deadline . . .
If all the following questions were routinely analysed every time a poll result landed on a newsdesk – it’s just possible that we might not see quite so much . . . errrrrrm . . . ' whitewash ' . . . sticking to the wall . . .
See:
http://www.ncpp.org/qajsa.htm
No more bananas experiments !
Don’t get us wrong - we have nothing against mice. We like mice. But it does seem a little unfair to other creatures - the way that Mus musculus has been hogging the limelight of late. Every day there seems to be a new headline about them.
Today’s claim is that :
“Mice may hold key to restoring human hearing loss” ( * see note )
In the last few weeks we’ve had :
“Marathon mouse keeps on running”
“Mouse model offers clues to rapid aging disease”
“Modified mice ease the strain”
“World’s Oldest Mouse Reaches 136th Birthday”
The mouse-centric news releases seem to be multiplying at an alarming rate – what’s going on ?
We can’t help wondering too, whether some researchers may be falling into the trap of assuming that whatever applies to mice also applies to us humans. . .
Sometimes it does – sometimes it doesn’t.
Although we share more than 90% of our genetic makeup with a mouse – we also share around 50% with a banana ( as Prof. Steve Jones is fond of reminding us ).
Comment from our genetics correspondent:
'Mice are cheap. They breed quick. End of discussion.'
*Note: Notice how we bravely resisted the temptation of posting the 'obvious photo'
'Ethics' on hold.
Go to most Japanese corporate sites and you’ll find a ‘Philosophy’ page. We even have one ourselves. We like the idea of ‘setting out the stall’ in a clear and unambiguous way right from the start. But we have recently realised that we might be lagging behind somewhat - in that, the time may have come to expand the ‘Philosophy’ menu to include an ‘Ethics’ section as well . . .
We’ve found several major organisations which already have ‘Ethics’ pages implemented – It’s very rousing to find sites which go to the trouble of explaining how their products, strategies and attitudes might contribute to the general wellbeing of mankind.
Here’s an example :
and here's what they make :
http://www.missilesandfirecontrol.com
We’re working on a page of our own – but there are some logical paradoxes which we need to get straightened out before we launch.
Keep not taking the tablets. *
The Really Magazine house-dictionary defines ‘Placebo’ as : ‘An inert prescription intended to humor or satisfy’. As we know, placebos work. They ‘cure’ people.
The Big Pharmaceutical companies have a similar word - ‘Nocebo’ - which they reserve for descriptions of drugs trials where ‘no treatment’ works better than the drug they are testing.
But perhaps there should be another word to describe a curative factor in the form of an inert person ?
On Monday, a ‘doctor’ was arrested at a clinic in Belém, Brazil, after a neighbour turned him in to the authorities following an argument. He had a faked ID card, and was using a cloned registration number. ( source :http://www.oliberal.com.br/ )
He had been ‘practicing’ for ten years.
It’s not hard to imagine the damage and hardship he might have caused during this time : crimes for which a 2 to 6 year jail sentence is on the cards. But the case does beg the question ‘Why wasn’t he unmasked before ?‘ Surely, during the ten years of his ‘practice’ it would have become obvious, somewhere along the line, that he was a fraud ? Apparently not.
As a way of explaining the enigma, let’s assume, purely for the sake of discussion, that he had a genuinely benevolent, though amateur, approach to his ‘patients’. We’d like to know whether, during that time, he actually managed to help people too ? It would be very interesting to go back over the records and see how his performance compared to a regular qualified medic.
In other words, could there be a ‘doctor-cebo’ effect, equivalent to the ‘placebo’ effect ?
It’s not a new idea we know, but a case like this does give researchers the opportunity to prove things one way or the other . . .
* Alternative title : "Fake doctor ‘practicing’ for ten years, and no-one had any complaints"
Across the Un1V3Rse
Prof. Paul Davies is one of a new(ish) breed of scientists called ‘astrobiologists’. He recently published a thought-provoking piece in the UK’s New Scientist magazine – entitled “Do we have to spell it out ?” ( subscribers to NS can view the text here )
For non-subscribers, the gist of the idea is that if extraterrestrial civilizations exist – and want to communicate – why not do it the easy way ? Instead of constantly transmitting electronic messages across the universe and hoping for the best, why not encode a message into DNA and ‘seed’ a planet with the code ? Once you’ve done that, the DNA will happily reproduce itself at zero cost, and all you have to do is wait for the life-forms of the planet to evolve sufficiently to be able to decode the message.
Neat eh ?
He points out that it wouldn’t be wise to insert the code into crucial parts of a genome – as that could interfere with essential data which the lifeforms need to reproduce – but luckily – an astonishing 95% or so of the average animal’s DNA appears to have no function ! This so called ‘Junk DNA’ is currently mystifying biologists – ‘astro’ and otherwise.
There have been numerous studies to try to solve the mystery – but as yet there are no sure-fire explanations. But Really Magazine would like to suggest one.
We’d like to combine the two ideas. Our conjecture is that the surplus DNA could well contain messages from other worlds – and can be ‘Junk’ at the same time !
We speculate that one-day - when the ‘Junk’ is finally decoded - the message will read along the lines . . . “Inv3stment 0pp0R7unity Growth Enl4rgm3nt %%% ! “ etc etc etc
Resistance is futile.
Gas is the new oil
As many commentators have indicated, the idea that the Earth’s oil reserves will one day be exhausted is incontrovertible. But, as Really Magazine has pointed out a few times recently – that’s not about to happen any time soon.
To give an idea of how worried the oil companies are about 'dwindling hydrocarbon reserves', we need only look to the flame-stacks visible at most refineries and oilfields. They burn off ‘waste’ gas by the millions of tons per year. In Nigeria, Iran and Russia for example, the amount of ‘excess’ gas, disposed of by burning, is so huge that the light which it produces shows up like a large towns in night-time satellite images.
Around 80% of gas fields are currently untapped. That’s roughly equivalent to 10.5 trillion gallons of refined oil. And that’s just the known reserves.
Surely it would be worth the oil companies’ effort to tap into the reserves and ship it out by pipeline ? Apparently not. The cost of building and maintaining the pipeline wouldn’t leave them with the profit margins to which they have become accustomed.
But now there’s a new hot topic which might provide the motivation to start using the reserves. GTL i.e. Gas To Liquid.
All the big oil companies, and quite a few giant industrial firms, are suddenly showing a marked interest in ways to convert the gas into liquid on-site. Using some new exotic catalysts, the gas can be modified into liquid fuels which are very much like conventional diesel fuel – but cleaner.
As the article in the Houston Chronicle puts it ( see link ) that’s like “discovering another Saudi Arabia”
http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/
Military PR machine goes into intensive care.
We should be able to define a medical worker – at any level – as someone who wants to improve human health and save lives – no questions asked . . .
So today’s issue of The Lancet is going to stick in the throat of a great many people in the medical profession.
By the time you read this humble link, the story will be all over the media. And so it should be.
Unfortunately, the scenario is all too familiar, but very many thanks to The
Lancet for being brave enough to print this stuff.
http://www.thelancet.com/journal/vol364
You’ll need to register to read it.
For once, we recommend that you do - registration is free, and there’s none of the password e-mailing and faffing about which a lot of sites insist on nowadays.
Read it and feel sick.
Well, we got it wrong again. We thought that the news would be all over the front pages - but it evidently couldn't compete with 'free CD inside' frenzy . . . And there was us thinking that training to be a medic so that you can show soldiers how to torture people efficiently was a Bad Thing. Shows how much we know.
You can’t judge a book by its cover.
But can you judge a company by its website ?
The answer, we believe, is increasingly veering towards ‘Yes, you can’. OK, here’s the reasons . .
Recently, the magazine’s transport dept has been involved in booking some car hire for our chief international correspondent , who is shortly about to undertake a ( half ) world tour, scouring the ( half ) globe for stories on our be(half).
So we checked the websites of three major car hire companies to get details of locations, charges, availability, etc etc.
When we say ‘three major’ – we mean MAJOR. All household names. They have a combined turnover of more than nine billion dollars per year. These aren’t fly-by-night startups, they’re global players with offices in more than sixty different countries.
Now to the websites: Did they give us the info we needed ? Nope. They didn’t . . .
In fact, not one of them worked properly. Broken links, non-functioning Javascript, windows which wouldn’t close, lock-ups, missing phone numbers, unreadable fonts, etc etc. In short, the highest scoring site might get three out of ten for functionality.
How can that happen ? How can it be that the men who own and run these companies ( and yes, we checked – they’re all men ) allow such pathetic offerings to remain as the main high-tech interface between themselves and their customers – the public. Here’s few possible explanations, which we’ll examine one by one . . .
1) They don’t give a monkeys one way or the other.
Probably not all that likely an explanation. They can see, after all, a very accurate overview of the revenue which the sites generate. Logs of sales etc etc. If the money starts rolling in from website-initiated sales, or not, they’ll notice p.d.q.
2) They’re too tech-dumb to understand that the sites are a joke.
While it’s perfectly possible that dumb greyhaired technophobes might own and run all three companies, it’s a bit of a stretch of the imagination that they wouldn’t have hired and deputised some competent people below them – ones who know what a webpage is. After all, the owners succeeded perfectly well in hiring managers to deal with the highly technical logistical problems associated with administering a global car-hire concern.
3) They’ve been duped.
When they ask the people responsible for implementing the site :
“So, is the core internet portal system 100% operational yet ?”
The managers reply :
“Yes of course, it’s all running smoothly. The revenue streams indicate a pro-active upwardly orientated bottom-line scenario, with key strategic fiscal indicators showing positive directives at all strata – Sir “. Code for “ Errr. . . Dunno – Think so “
4) there is no number four
Just
the three foregoing then . . . Hmmmmm . . . perhaps the most likely scenario
is a combination of all three factors, throw in a bit of corporate myopia,
rip-offs by hardware and software suppliers, virtually non-existent customer
respect , and errrrr . . high electricity prices - and there we have it.
Sites which are as attractive and co-operative as a delinquent baboon with lipstick.
But none of these three abominable efforts created themselves. They’ve all been approved, at the highest levels, within the companies concerned - and are in daily use : aggravating customers all over the world. And we believe that they are a fairly accurate reflection of the ‘corporate personalities’ of their owners . . .
P.S. We did find a fourth site from a smaller company ( turnover in the mere millions ) which worked very well, and gave the info we needed straight away. They’ll be getting our order.
P.P.S. Really Magazine is pleased to announce that if
any of the global car-hire players would like to cont4ct us, we will happily
generate a webportal evaluation report for you* - come on, if you think you’re ‘ard
enough !
* in return for a commensurate fiscal consideration.
You’re not comin’ in ‘ere dressed like that !
Imagine the following scenario. A world games. Where men and women of every nationality could compete in world-class sports. An event so huge that the host country would have to come up with several billion dollars just to provide the infrastructure required.
Somehow, they are going to have to get their money back.
But imagine that the games have now grown so popular that the organisers can more than cover their costs just by selling the TV coverage rights – and by allowing ‘Official Sponsors’ to advertise within the stadia. The sponsors will have to pay a gargantuan sum for the exclusive rights to have their logos seen by several billion TV viewers across the world. But the companies concerned reckon it’s worth it, just to keep ahead of their competition, brand-awareness wise.
But now a possible problem surfaces. What if, at a crucial moment, a TV camera happens to zoom-in on a crowd shot – and, horror of horrors – right there – centre screen – is a spectator, seen by billions of viewers – drinking the wrong brand of cola !
That will not, must not, can not, be permitted. Not for that kind of money *
There’s only one solution. The spectators must be monitored as they enter the stadium, and told that they will have to leave their ‘Wrong Brand’ drink at the entrance gate, or they won’t get in.
But, hang on, what about their clothes ? What if they happen to be wearing a T-shirt with the logo for ‘Wrong-Brand’ trainers on it ? Aaaagh ! There’s only one thing for it. They will have to be told to turn it inside-out – or stay outside and watch the games on TV.
What a ridiculous flight of fancy. Sounds like a long-lost script for a ‘Father Ted’ episode. ( if you don’t know about ‘Father Ted’ click here ). Couldn’t happen. Especially not bearing in mind that the ethical keywords for the games are likely to be ‘Sportsmanship’ ‘Fair Play’ ‘Equality’ etc etc.
Thing is though, this week’s PR Week reckon something very similar has already happened – in fact, they say, it is happening right now. Surely not ?
Anyway, here’s their story. ( subscribers only at the moment unfortunately)
http://prweek.com/news/news_story.cfm?
Note: By way of example, the level of sponsorship at this year's Olympics is esitmated at 16 Billion Euros. (source: DW TV )
H2 in Wonderland
Yesterday, journalists were able to take advantage of a slightly bemusing photo-op ; which involved Germany’s chancellor, Mr. Schröder, driving round and round a carpark in a hydrogen powered car.
http://www.dw-world.de/english
This particular variety of hydrogen powered vehicle uses a fuel cell to generate electrical power from the H2 rather than directly burning it in a normal engine. ( no, we don’t understand that bit either )
It’s ‘pollution free’ - if you ignore any pollution caused by generating the hydrogen in the first place . . . As pointed out a few times by Really Magazine, the current favourite way to generate hydrogen is by separating it from natural gas. Which begs the question why not run the car on gas in the first place ?
Of course, if, instead, you generate the H2 by using electricity to spit it from water, then you’ve got a perfectly ‘green’ power source – if, and only if, the electricity which you're utilising is generated by some ‘green’ method such as windpower – rather than the much more likely gas / oil / coal / nuclear options.
Which begs another question – why not just use the electricity to drive the car – and cut out that highly dangerous middle step – a large tank full of highly explosive H2 ?
Whichever way we look at it, the whole ‘H2 economy’ idea seems to us to encompass about as many logical paradoxes as a Mad Hatter's Teaparty on April the first.
But there’s more to come . . .
Now a team from Vermont’s Green Mountain College in the US have proposed another twist to the tortured dialectic of H2.
Their suggestion is that while your H2 powered electric vehicle is sitting at home in your garage, why not leave the fuel-cell running, and sell the power back to the electricity grid ? see :
http://cleanedge.com/story.php?nID=3145
The authors of the report reckon that the owners of such a vehicle could sell around $2K‘s worth of power per year ! . . .
So, let’s see if we’ve got this right.
Step 1) The power station produces it’s electrical power to split H2 from water.
Step 2) The H2 is used in a car’s fuel cell to generate electrical power.
Step 3) The car’s power is sold back to the power grid.
Step 4) back to step 1
It’s obviously one of those days today. To round your dose of surrealism, why not listen to Green Mountain College’s anthem – sung, naturally enough, in Welsh.
http://www.greenmtn.edu/about/anthem.asp
Readers comment: Rolly Noel points us in the direction of this v interesting .pdf from The Institute for Local Self Reliance (ILSR). If you're wondering whether to allow yourself to be convinced by the current H2 hype - read this document.
News of rail travels.
Every other day, there seems to be a fresh story in the media about a new species of fish which has just been discovered. Perhaps not all that surprising, given the number of remote controlled ultra-deepwater probes which are now scuttling about on the seabed. No human has ever seen these creatures before – because no-one can go down there to have a look without a few hundreds of thousands of dollars-worth of high-tech gear.
But when it comes to dry land, it’s not every day that a new species of bird is found.
A ‘new’ bird, which has just been ‘discovered’ has been dubbed the ‘Calayan Rail’ – named after the small island in the Philippines where it lives. Here’s a link to the article on Birdlife.net where you can read the story, titled " Remarkable rail discovered 'just in time' "
http://www.birdlife.net/news/news/2004/08/
and here’s a pic of the rather funky-looking avian itself . . .
http://www.birdlife.net/images/raw/
Really Magazine is delighted that the bird’s been found, and that it may now get some protection if that’s deemed necessary. But we just have to be a little pecky picky over the language used to describe its ‘discovery’. . .
It wasn’t discovered.
Unlike the deep sea fish, this bird had, in fact, been clocked on countless previous occasions – by the people who live on the islands and nearby. They call them ‘Pidings’. ( And, this is pure guesswork - but most flightless birds which happen to be unfortunate enough to live nearby human settlements - might just might just find their names are commonly followed by the word ‘pie’. )
Anyway, perhaps it might be fairer to say – ‘Another bird species catalogued by Western scientists ’ because the locals – as very often happens - are well ahead when it comes to knowing about the nature which surrounds them.
Hmmmm. Thinking about it, maybe their headline is better . . .
Comment: The BBC have now picked up the story, and
their report puts a figure on the probable number of Rails as around 200
pairs at most. They mention that the scientists 'had to kill' a bird, 'in
order to register it' . So perhaps the latest headline should read "Endangered
Rail species - number of breeding pairs drops by 0.5% overnight"
see: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/
Cold comfort
For the past twenty seven years, the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research in Auckland, New Zealand, has been monitoring the height of glaciers in the Southern Alps.
Today’s press release from the organisation reveals some unexpected statistics. The glaciers are growing.
http://www.niwa.co.nz/pubs/mr/archive/
Not by an enormous amount ; but enough to be considered significant. Much more interesting, however, is the graph which NIWA provides ( see bottom of their page ) . It shows a determined and unmistakable trend. Contrary to current meteorological outlooks, the glaciers are evidently alive and well, and getting more substantial as the decades pass.
Not all that far away, however, in Antarctica, the glaciers are receding at an alarming rate. So what’s going on ?
No one has any idea. Even with the help of Japan’s Earth Simulator, currently the fastest ( public ) computer on the planet, predicting long term weather trends is about as accurate as predicting the shape of a cloud. We might get the overall form about right in a ballpark-kind-of-way, maybe, on a good day - but the details ? Forget it.
Hot oil prices.
As we are told every day, the price of oil is rising. The reasons for the increases are given as :
1) The threat of ‘Terrism’
2) Speculation on the futures market
3) Overstretched refinery capabilities in the US
4) Huge increase in demand from China
( let us know if we’ve missed one *)
Of course, the oil companies are not exactly bending over backwards to help out. Prices are going through the roof – and so are profits.
But it’s number four which Really Magazine is currently having difficulty with . . .
Here’s an ‘opinion’ piece from today’s ‘Newsday.com’
http://www.newsday.com/news/opinion/
According to the article, oil imports to China have risen 21% in the last quarter alone ! If our maths is correct, that means the amount of oil being imported is more than doubling every year. Old stories about grains of rice and chessboards spring to mind.
The same article tells us that China is now the second largest importer of oil on the planet ( having overtaken Japan )
Here’s the bit we don’t understand. China doesn’t get special prices for oil. They have to pay the same as everyone else – the market price – and the market price is set in Dollars - not Yuan. Unless we’ve thoroughly misunderstood global economics, the Yuan isn’t usually thought-of as being in the ‘top ten’ of hard currencies.
In other words, China is paying through the nose for its oil - in hard currency. Cash must be flowing out of the country like water flows out of the Yangtze delta. To say the least, it must be somewhat of a burden on the Chinese economy.
But, as always, we like to understand ‘who benefits ?’ . . . Where’s all the money going ? Who’s on the receiving end of this uber-tsunami of over-inflated lucre ? Because whoever-it-is, is doing very very very well at present.
Can someone let us know please ?
comments: * One, at least, was missed. The
large '?' hanging over Yukos.
comments ?
Playing your debts.
Bankruptcies have been rising at an astronomical rate in the UK and US, and personal debt levels are now at the highest they have ever been.
In the UK, the total level of personal debt is now around £1000Billion. ( source: Guardian / Observer )
It might not be correct to say that the level of personal bankruptcies is being directly caused by the over-easy access to loans via credit cards - but the card companies are obviously in the business of cajoling their clients into debt.
From the companies point of view, the optimum money-making strategy is to coax the punters to get into their absolute maximum sustainable level of debt - but without toppling them over into bankruptcy. This is a tricky game, playing with fire in a sense, and it seems they might just be pushing their luck a little far.
If you know all the rules though, and you’re careful with your spending, of course you can use the cards to your advantage – if you know all the rules . . .
Here’s a site where you can take a simple test which will show who's
wised-up - you, or your card company . . .
http://www.creditcardnation.com/
Today, Wired News has a hot item on ferrets and software piracy :
see:
http://www.wired.com/news/digiwood
We don’t really want to get involved with naming ferrets, but, to assist in a small way with the crusade against piracy, Really Magazine has a few tentative ideas for major software manufactures which may, possibly, help to cut down the, er . . . , growing menace.
1) Keep the price absolutely as low as possible - and sell to more customers. A high price doesn’t necessarily mean that you’ll make more money – because the customer base will be smaller. Duh! The higher the price, the more tempting it might be for someone to clone the product.
2) Make sure the product works properly. If your company fails to get it right time after time – issuing patches every few weeks – and then patches for patches for patches – the customers might just think ‘why are we paying for this bunch of half-baked junk ? ‘
3) Give responsible and efficient product support. If customers have to spend 50 minutes listening to copyright-free musical dross down their telephone and then get through to a rep whose answer to every query is ‘Have you tried re-installing it ?’ – they might get the idea that it’s not worth paying ‘just to get tech support’
4) Abandon lopsided ‘shrink-wrap’ agreements and the endless small print, which, when distilled down, say ‘ If it doesn’t do what you want – tough – we’ve got your money ’. Give a proper money back guarantee, as is mandatory for almost all other products. The product should be of ‘merchantable quality’ and ‘suitable for the use for which it’s advertised’. If it’s not – don’t try to sell it.
5) Give away outdated previous versions of the software for free via the internet. You can’t sell them anyway – but you can expand your user base and brand awareness dramatically – at zero cost.
Errr. How about Flippin ? errr, Floppy, errr. . . Zorilla , errr . .
Weighty knowledge.
A new ( Californian ) study has ‘found a link’ between the weight of schoolchildren’s backpacks – and back pain.
The study monitored over 3000 schoolchildren and found that over 60% of them suffered back problems – most likely induced by carrying their heavy school books ( combined weight on average 4.8 Kg ).
The study also revealed that walking to school with the books was more likely to cause back damage than if the child got a lift to school in an SUV a car.
In fact, the authors recommend a tip to alleviate the problems :
‘Get a lift to school whenever possible.’
Really Magazine knows next to nothing about the subject, but wouldn’t that possibly perhaps maybe exacerbate some other problems ? Such as turning into a mini tub’o’lard ?
p.s.
Curiously, the report doesn’t mention Japan, where, for many years, this is has been a big subject for debate. Schoolchildren traditionally drag half a library to school and back every day – perhaps it’s some kind of evolutionary test.
Ideas from The Controller.
A lot of less than squeaky-clean web directories attach the acronym ‘NSFW’ to their hyperlinks. Meaning, of course, ‘Not Safe For Work’.
Really Magazine would like to add our own NSFW contribution :
http://www.nature.com/news/2004/040809/
Not safe if you’re a worker, that is. Don’t let your boss see it if you know what’s good for you.
It’s a shame that Aldous Huxley isn’t still around,
as it would undoubtedly provided him with more than enough inspiration for
an entire new chapter in his ‘Brave New World ’.
comments ?
Quiet please : we're evolving.
Frank Drake, a pioneer of the SETI project has recently made the point that any extraterrestrial civilisations who are looking for other life-forms in the universe may soon have trouble finding us. His idea is that the old-style huge TV transmitters are quickly being replaced by low-power satellites which beam the progs downwards onto the Earth’s surface – and also by cable and fibre-optic ( non leaky ) systems.
See : http://www.newscientist.com/news
That much is true. And, as pointed out by Really Magazine on previous occasions, any sufficiently teched-up beings around 50 light years away from us now, will be able to pick up the old black and white analogue TV transmissions. Which will no doubt amuse ( and alarm ) them greatly.
In our opinion though, Mr Drake has got it wrong. The Earth is not “ . . . going to disappear “ soon with regard to man-made electromagnetic radiation. OK, the power of the individual sources of transmission may have gone down – but the quantity ( and frequency variation ) has gone through the roof !
The entire mobile phone network for example, vast numbers of military and civilian satellites ( including the GPS network ), microwave data links, high power extra-low-frequency links to submarines, TV, radio ( analogue and digital LW, MW, SW, VHF etc), WiFi data links – the list goes on and on.
Along with that lot there are countless kilometers of ultra high power electricity transmission cables on pylons all over the planet constantly pumping out ( and losing ) 50 or 60 Hz radiation by the megawatt.
No, we are absolutely saturated from every direction by just about every currently achievable form of electromagnetic noise. And it’s not going to get any quieter any time soon. As soon as any available bandwidth goes off-line, as will happen when the old analogue TV transmitters are one-day shut down, the governments of the world will licence it p.d.q. for some other use.
From the point of view of a high-tech alien, our planet will continue to be as hard to spot as a chimpanzee with a megaphone at a convention of Carthusian monks.
Things that need to be invented ( badly ).
Last year, the Really Magazine office had a severe problem with solar overheating. Our smug technical resources manager thought he’d found a solution when he discovered suppliers of so-called low-E glass.
The glass has a special coating which almost entirely blocks infra-red (IR) radiation, thereby allowing light to enter a building – but stopping the heat ! Case solved !
Errr. Not quite.
At the last minute, shortly before ordering a considerable quantity of the exotically priced uber-glass – a discovery was made. The coated glass blocks the IR allright – by absorbing it ! In doing so, the glass itself heats up very substantially, and then re-radiates its excess heat straight into the room. Duh !*
Obviously, what is needed is a glass coating which reflects the IR – not absorbs it ! And, such a coating may – just may – have been found by researchers at University College London. Not only that, but the coating helpfully ‘switches’ from transmitting the IR ( good for cool days ) to reflecting it at around 29C.
The coating, which is based around vanadium dioxide, is deposited on the glass using a novel Atmospheric Pressure Chemical Vapour Deposition (APCVD) process. The only drawback at present appears to be the film's somewhat unappealing yellowy / greeny colour – but the UCL team are on the case. Let’s hope they crack it.
Subscribers to the Royal Society of Chemistry mag. can read the research paper here for free, or non-subscribers can download it for £13 + tax.
But Really Magazine has found another helpful on-line resource
here, though you may need to squint a bit.
http://www.grad.ucl.ac.uk/comp/2004
*comment : The low-e glass is intetnded to be used in the outer panel of double-glazed window. If used on its own, it can make the room hotter instead of cooler !
It might be going a bit far
to say that the global tobacco industry is in trouble. It still earns a nasty few $Billions annually. But let’s just say it’s experiencing some 'stimulating downward pressure' from certain world governments – selective constraints which are causing it to evolve ever more creative ideas - as P.R. countermeasures.
Take for instance JTI. Never heard of them ? They are the third largest tobacco company on the planet. Last year they sold 423 billion cigarettes. Their head office is in Switzerland. That might seem odd, bearing in mind that the ‘JT’ stands for ‘Japan Tobacco’ – but hey ! that’s the nature of transnational corporations in the new millennium ! . . .
The
roots of the company, however, are very much Japanese, and their JT brand
is very much alive. But Japan has recently introduced some strict laws regarding
smoking in public places, even outdoor smoking is banned in some city districts – and
JT have come up with a novel idea – mobile smoking booths,
called, naturally enough, Smocars . .
They have built two now, one based on ‘50’s American style',
and the other '60’s French style' ( for some reason ). You can find
all the info you need about them here, on JT’s site, charmingly entitled ‘JT
Delight World.‘
http://www.jti.co.jp/JTI/tobacco/smocar/
Unhelpfully, none of Really Magazine staff is fluent in Japanese, so we can’t translate the pages for you. But here’s one person’s quirky take on the subject, Captain Japan’s revealing overview from BigEmpire.com http://www.bigempire.com/sake/smokers_style.html
Now things get a bit hazy. For, according to BigEmpire, by far the largest controlling shareholder in JT is – the Japanese Government itself ! The very same authority which has overall responsibility for tobacco control legislation. That can’t be right surely ?
So, where are those Smocars taking us to ? Who's driving ? Frankly, we haven’t the foggiest idea . . .
p.s. Don’t miss JT Delight World’s online art gallery
which has a comprehensive display of artworks from the 17th century onwards,
from masters such as Vincent van Gogh, Henri Rousseau, Paul Cézanne etc
etc, – all of which depict people smoking something . . . Classic.
http://www.jti.com/english/tobacco_corner/
A philanthropist wrapped in an enigma.
Ted Turner, the man who built CNN ( remember the “ Gulf War One Show “ ? ) has written an interesting article for the Washington Monthly – entitled “My Beef with Big Business” Here’s the link :
Ted reckons its time to “ – bust up the big [media] conglomerates “. A pretty radical idea, to say the least !
If Really Magazine has understood the four and a half thousand word article correctly, Ted feels that the few companies who now dominate Global Media have grown so powerful that they are stifling creativity and democratic debate – concentrating solely on boosting their quarterly fiscal results by almost any means necessary.
You don’t often hear this kind of idea coming from someone who was vice-chairman one of the largest media conglomerates on the planet , viz. Time Warner. ( they own AOL, Netscape, HBO, Cinemax, New Line Cinema, Time Inc, Time Warner Cable, CNN, Cartoon Network, Warner Bros Pictures, and more than hundred magazines including Wallpaper*, Marie Claire, Mad, and For the Love of Cross Stitch ).
Even more odd for someone who is one of the senior board members. See* : http://www.timewarner.com/senior_management/
Now Really Magazine is confused again. Is he or isn’t he? Can someone please let us know.
* The page was listing Ted as of Aug 07 2004.
No Gurning !
The BBC website has an item today on guidelines for passport photos in the UK. Here’s the link http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/
Let’s take a closer look.
There have always been rules on the clarity of passport pics, but now things are being tightened up a bit. The reason ? The software can’t cope otherwise . . .
Universities and commercial companies have been carrying out research on facial recognition techniques for decades : and now the technology has ( just about ) matured enough to be implemented by government agencies – specifically with regard to ID cards and MRTDs ( Machine Readable Travel Documents )
Human beings have had a few million years of experience in ultra-rapid facial recognition – but the technology which we have developed to do the job – or, to be specific – the software – isn’t quite as good at it as we are. The machines, it seems, get confused if the photos aren't standardised. Well I never.
So, the passport agencies are having to issue guidelines which will make it easy for the computers – otherwise the system can’t cope.
The UK Passport Office guidelines for photos is here: http://www.ukpa.gov.uk/downloads/
Have a look at it, it’s quite eye-opening. ( not too wide open though please ). In case you can’t be bothered to download the .pdf file, here’s some tips :
You can smile ( if you insist ), but only with a closed mouth – an open mouth is strictly a no-no.
No sunglasses or heavily tinted glasses.
If you really must wear glasses, they should have non-reflective lenses and lightweight frames.
No hats.
No ( top of the head ) hair dangling across your face.
Oh, and your photo must not incorporate toys or dummies. Doh!
A much more enlightening file on the same subject can be found here : http://www.icao.int/mrtd/download/documents/
An International Standards Organization pdf. ( provided here by the International Civil Aviation Organization ) goes into a lot more detail about the state of the art, and reveals that a great deal of effort has gone into the research. The machines can cope, for instance, with 'pink eyes', 'gender unknown', 'blue hair', and 'eye patches' ( acceptable for medical reasons only ). They do recommend however, that frowning and raised eyebrows can be problematic.
Curiously, neither the UK passport office or the ISO have much to say about beards, moustaches, mutton-chop sideburns or over-enthusiastic eyebrows. You might think that implies that hirsuteness doesn’t give the computers any problems - which is odd considering that a full-on sea-captain’s beard / moustache / eyebrow combo can cover up just about all of their face.
Really Magazine suspects that such voluminous facial hair would definitely confuse the machines – but that the authorities haven’t the bottle to demand that people shave.
Yet.
comment : There is, however, a competing theory as to why the Home Office would deem a capacious beard acceptable. Consider the mugshot on this link. Ed.
‘Flashes of Darkness’
“A broad, reticulate ‘main route’ and a global ramification weave the whole globe in a world-wide web of darkness and light.”
Eh?
Well, that’s the idea of Dr. Max Lippitsch of the Institut für Experimentalphysik, University of Graz. He want’s ( us ) to mark the 50th anniversary of Einstein’s death ( April 18/19 2005 ) with a ‘light relay’ - across the entire planet. The relay can include contributions from torches, fireworks, lasers, jars of bioluminescent algae etc - and participation is open to “every individual or organization in any country of the world” – [ that’s, er . . everyone, isn’t it ? Ed. ]
The idea isn’t going across all that well with many astronomers, who feel that it may encourage people to exacerbate the already weighty problem of ‘light pollution’.
Max is one step ahead though, and says that the event could also feature ‘flashes of darkness’ to compensate.
All clear ?
If not see :
http://www.wyp2005.at/glob1-light.htm
Registration for participants is open from Sept 2004
.........................
Breaking News Aug 3rd, Big Sister in space ?
Get paid £10K* to stay in bed. And no, this is not a wind-up. It’s real. The European Space Agency ( ESA ) is looking for volunteers to undergo tests, starting Jan 2005, which will go some way towards simulating the low gravity conditions of space.
There are, needless to say, one or two restrictions. Firstly, you must be in good health ( no smokers, addicts, or heavy wine lovers ), and secondly – and this is the important bit – monsieurs need not apply. There have been plenty of studies with male volunteers merci beaucoup.
Should you be chanceux enough to be accepted, you’ll have to stay in a bed, tilted head-downwards at 6 degrees, for a couple of months. You won’t be able to stand up – even for eating or washing – or anything else. Hmmm . . . not so facil, hein?
The full study will take 101 days, including all the tests, during which time you must stay in the 'research facility' . . .
Bonne Chance Astronautes des Lits !
You can check out the project, and download an application form here : http://www.medes.fr/Clinic/Experiments/
* total to be confirmed
It’s not all that often that
Really Magazine gives an out-and-out plug to another website. That means less mouse-clicks for us dammit ! But sometimes one comes along which can not be ignored.
Credit where credit’s due. Go here . . http://www.clubbo.com
“For more than 40 years Clubbo Records has epitomized (sic) the maverick spirit of the old-school independent record labels.” and now, at last, they have a website ! There's only one appropriate word - Poptastic !
Showcasing their roster of artists like ‘Clipper Cowbridge’, ‘Suthrn Cuzn’, and, we can’t fail to mention, ‘Action Plus’ with their single “Lucky Pink” - a perfectly classic example of American Eurotrash if ever there was one.
Really Magazine's personal fav groove is the 'Theme from the Spooky Bunch' - we got hooked on it the first time round in 1978 - so that sums us up doesn't it !
Honestly, don’t miss it. It’s worth a visit for the banner ads alone !
It wasn’t me mate . . . it was the ******* computer !
George Monbiot has provided a lucid ( as always ) account of a new idea to stop speeding, by using gps linked to a computerised look-up of local speed restrictions. It would work. Kind of. We’d have to wait, of course, for all vehicles to be gps equipped, but it looks like that might happen anyway, in order for the UK government to implement its ‘cyber snoop road toll’ scheme.
As G.M. points out though, the car manufacturers aren’t exactly over keen on the idea. They know perfectly well that a large majority of their customers just want to get as much grunt under the bonnet as they can get their wellies on.
But, providing the government don’t see it as a vote loser, they might just go ahead with it. It would, after all, save them a gargantuan fortune on NHS bills. To give an idea of the scale of things, on a normal day, around 50% of the incumbents in any urban hospital casualty ward across the UK will be motorcycle riders. The other half will contain a good few car drivers, and some pedestrians and cyclists.
As we’ve discovered though, technological fixes for problems often introduce even more unforeseen troubles. One can imagine, for example, that drivers might well get into the habit of driving their cars in ‘dogems’ mode. In other words with the accelerator pressed to the floor the whole time. The computer will take care of things – won’t it . Won't it ?
Hmmmm . . . let’s see who wants to take responsibility for programming that lot. Really Magazine fears it might give a new twist to the term ‘crashed’.
http://www.monbiot.com/archives/2004/07/27
Update Aug 04 : Stranded on the political hard shoulder at night during a thunderstorm, the UK Conservnaive party have annouced today that they would raise speed limits if elected . . . Doh! http://politics.guardian.co.uk
Kiteships
A German company called ‘Skysails’ is pioneering a new system to give wind-assistance to large ships. They say that the “ hitherto unused potential of wind energy “[errr . . not quite sure about that. Ed.] can be used to pull the ships along using what is, in effect, a very large computer-controlled parasail.
What’s
wrong with conventional sails, just like the ‘old days’ ? There
are, it seems, a couple of big advantages with the new system. Firstly, the
ship isn’t tilted ( a.k.a. 'heeling' ) as it would be with a traditional
mast/sail structure. Secondly, you don’t need a large crew to manage
the new device. It’s almost entirely remote–controlled by computer.
The makers claim that a full-sized version will be able to cut the fuel consumption of a large ship by up to 50%. [ errr . why not use two and cut it by 100% ? Ed. ] Given that fuel-oil prices are probably going to rise considerably, and that the new device can obviate half of the air pollution which the ships produce – it seems like it's an idea which might just fly..
( The Skysails site says that a Nature magazine article claims that the global shipping fleet produces 'toxic emissions volumes' equal to that produced by the entire US, although Really Magazine has not been able to trace the reference as yet )
Here’s their site.
http://www.skysails.info/index.php?id=11
Begging to differ
Every dog-owner knows that dogs can understand English ( or any other language ). They don’t take all that long to learn specific words , especially if there’s ‘something in it for them’ – like ‘walkies’, or ‘choccies’. Experienced dogs which are specially trained, say, for stage work, can readily learn hundreds of different words.
On the other hand, we have great difficulty understanding what dogs are trying to ‘say’ . The traditional explanation for the mismatch is that they simply don’t have any kind of language aside from the very obvious “I’m here” or “I’m hurt” etc etc. This is compounded by the assumption that they don’t have full control over the vocal cords – as we do.
That’s one way of seeing things. But what if – just if – dogs happen to be much more skilled at deciphering the ‘language’ of another species than we are ?
Here’s a letter from New Scientist 10th July, which explains how the Maku of South America have figured out how to interpret the barks of the hunting dogs which they use. It seems that the dogs have many different subtle bark variations depending on the animal they happen to be chasing. That’s to say, they have ‘words’ for the different animals . . .
If dogs have different ‘words’ for their prey, perhaps they also have ‘words’ for a host of other things ? Perhaps we’re just not clued up enough to notice ? Or perhaps anthropic arrogance has prevented us from even considering the possibility ? ( The Maku excepted of course )
http://www.newscientist.com/opinion/
Why do people look like their dogs ? ( or vice versa )
(note, this report should have been in the May issue, but got lost in the hugely sophisticated Really Magazine priority newsfeed filing system. It’s too riveting to leave out, so here it is. )
It was just a conjecture, but some people insisted that there was a connection. Now all is made clear in a document from the Dept of Psychology at the University of California ( where else ? ). Entitled “Do dogs resemble their owners” the research report, which looked at 45 dogs and their owners, found that, yes, there is a correlation, but that it’s categorically not due to ‘convergence’ ( i.e. owners growing to look like their dogs over time ).
The
study had the judges ( some students ) rate the features of the owner / dog
pairs using sophisticated 6-point Lickert-type scales and principal component
extraction with varimax rotation. The results showed unequivocally that the
effect ( which is, interestingly, only relevant with regard to ‘purebreds’ )
was due to the fact that
“ . . when people pick a pet, they seek one that, at some level, resembles them . . . “
At last, the mystery is solved - now we can rest easy in our baskets at night.
http://ucsdnews.ucsd.edu/newsrel/soc/Dogs.asp
40 years searching for the 'Higgs Boson' ( so far )
In 2007, a hugely expensive particle accelerator, the LHC ( Large Hadron Collider ), will go live at CERN. One of its chief tasks will be to pin down the elusive Higgs boson ( the so–called God Particle ).
Current theory favours the idea that all other particles somehow get their mass by interacting with the Higgs. Believe it or don’t, but modern physics, to date, has no tried and tested explanation as to how anything ‘gets its mass’. You have just as much an idea why a bag of sugar has a mass of around 2Kg as do the best physics brains on the planet.
But
if the Higgs is found, it may give some clues as to the existence of the
counter-intuitive ‘Higgs field’ – which is alleged to exert
some kind of 'drag' on other particles – thus providing them with their
mass.
The reason why it hasn’t as yet been found is that it's predicted to be very heavy for a particle – the current estimate is around 115 GeV – and, the heavier the particles are, the more energy has to be put into an accelerator to find them. Hence the well chunky LHC.
Spot a tiny flaw in the theory ?
If the Higgs is responsible for giving other particles – and hence the entire universe – its mass – where exactly does it get its own mass from ?
Doh !
In the opinion of Really Magazine magazine, the Higgs may well be found in 2007, but it will be eventually be filed under ‘just another exotic particle’ – and ‘how things get their mass’ will remain as mysterious as ever ( for the time being )
The magazine is so confident on this point that it would be willing to stake its professorship on the matter. ( errr . . if it had one )
A good round-up of the current thoughts can be found here :
http://www.phy.uct.ac.za/courses/phy400w/
with Peter Higgs info ( and much more ) here:
http://physicsweb.org/article/world/17/7/6
comments ?
Continuing that warm glow . . .
Nasa have just published the results of a study entitled ‘Urban Heat Islands Make Cities Greener’. ( link ) The analysis, which is backed up by images from ultra-specialised space-based thermal imaging devices, comes to the conclusion that big cities, are, in general, a couple of degrees hotter than the surrounding countryside. This, in turn, makes the plants grow quicker and flower earlier . . .
Oh really ?
They should have sent in a query to ‘Gardener's Question Time’ and saved a fortune . . .
There is however, a spectacular zoom-out mpeg on the same page. It starts in Central Park N.Y., and zooms out to the entire globe. Perhaps it’s a little deja-vu for sci-fi film-goers and hollywood FX buffs – but this is the real thing. Seamlessly compiled from a thousand or so mega-hi-res satellite shots. You might want to hold on to your chair while you watch it. ( Note , it’s a fairly heavy 4.3Mb mpeg file )
http://www.gsfc.nasa.gov/gsfc/earth/pictures
comments ?
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