SEPT 04
Can’t think straight today - Grrrrr ! Out of my way . . .
Caffeine is a stimulant. Everybody knows that. A great number of scientific studies into its effects have been undertaken over the last 170 years or so.
But now there’s a new study – a study of the previous studies – which has, as its conclusion, the alarming suggestion that caffeine ‘addiction’ should be viewed, in effect, as an illness.
The
new research ( results published on-line this week, from the Johns Hopkins
University ) says that caffeine is the world’s most commonly used
behaviorally active drug, ( we would have guessed alcohol – but what
do we know ? ) and that its withdrawal symptoms include headache, fatigue,
and foggy-headedness amongst others.
You can become addicted, say the authors, on just one small cup a day, and the withdrawal symptoms can last 2 – 9 days.
No big surprises there perhaps. But what is surprising is that researchers say that there is now sufficient evidence that ‘caffeine withdrawal ‘ should be formally classified as a ‘disorder’ – and included as such in the DSM ( Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders - the bible of mental disorders ).
Ooops . . . That’s going to go down well with the world’s coffee producers. Even more disturbing perhaps for the soft drinks industry - several produce world famous ‘household-name’ fizzy drinks which use caffeine as an added ingredient ( for some reason ).
p.s. It also raises this interesting possibility.
“Dear ( insert name of employer ). I shall be unable to come in to work for a few days as my medical practitioner says that I temporarily have a registered mental disorder. He informs me that if I spend a few days relaxing and recuperating in some of my local cafés, I should make a full recovery. Yours, ( insert your name ).”
Cosmic Man Consequences.
Well, the UK’s Independent Newspaper decided to talk about it today – so we will as well.
Bas van Geel, a biologist from the University of Amsterdam, has been using a neat method to track ‘solar activity' ( i.e. sunspots, solar flares etc ) back through history. He’s been looking at the levels of Carbon 14 (see note 1) over the centuries by examining its abundance in layers of peat. It seems that the levels of C14 vary in a cyclic way, peaking every 2.300 years or so. These peaks are thought to have been caused by increased solar activity – which would raise the levels of ‘Cosmic Rays ( Note 2)’ hitting the Earth – thus ionising more carbon.
But his team has decided to make some more inferences from the data with regard to climate change. They postulate that the large changes in cosmic ray levels could well affect the weather. Making it much colder. We won’t go into the various theories here, but you can check them out on the links below. They are, of course, just theories at this stage, but it seems entirely reasonable to imagine that solar activity would affect the weather here on Earth. And, of course, suggestions along those lines have been around for many decades.
But the Univ Amsterdam team decided to go further still – by tying-in the C14 levels with archaeological data – and they have found, sure enough, there appear to have been mass human migrations during the very same periods. The Scythians, for example, stated to migrate, so did the Dutch Farmers.
Convinced ? Well, we would be, if it weren’t for the fact that the migrations were all apparently to the East and West – instead of to the South - where it would have been warmer of course.
There’s little doubt that something big was happening though. Next event 3950.
See:
http://news.independent.co.uk/world
more details ; from May 2004
http://www.phys.uu.nl/~spada/bbos/
Note 1 : The levels of Carbon 14 are routinely used in the science of ‘carbon dating’ for archaeological remains etc. We confess that we had no idea, until today, that the levels of C14 varied on a cyclic basis – but we feel confident that the ‘carbon daters’ will have been taking these variations into account . . . Otherwise it would make a mockery of the highly accurate archaeological dating which we've come to expect.
Note 2 : Cosmic Rays are very high energy protons and other nucleic particles which hurtle though space with alarming velocities. Although it’s known that many originate from nuclear reactions within the sun, space is positively teaming with the ‘rays’ - some with energies 50 million times greater than we’ve achieved here on Earth inside particle accelerators. Origins ? There are theories that they may be generated by black holes etc etc. We’d like to ask though, if the cyclic level variations seen here on Earth have necessarily come from the Sun – why not from deep space ?
The following scenario couldn’t possibly happen. Pure fantasy.
Yesterday the price of a barrel of crude oil broke the ‘psychologically important’ $50 mark. Nothing altogether surprising about that really. It’s what we, in the journo trade, call a ‘dog bites man story’. We couldn’t help noticing though, that the ‘bad news’ actually provoked the entire stock market to rise a few points*.
Let’s be honest about it - the reason is perfectly clear - the oil companies, who make up a hugely significant proportion of the portfolio, are likely to make more profit.
Now to the interesting bit. The price rise, as explained in the mainstream media anyway, was largely down to - ‘rebel groups in Nigeria threatening to interrupt oil supplies’.
So what ? So this . . .
We’ve just conjured-up the bizarre fantasy that the possibility exists that ‘terrists’ could be playing the stock market.
As history shows, one announcement, perhaps originating from some dodgy offshore-based webserver, purporting to come from a ‘rogue group’ claiming to have nefarious intents focused, say, on disrupting oil supplies anywhere in the world, can send prices and shares spiraling upwards – ( temporarily only of course. ) If that same ‘rouge group’ was also keen on a dabble with stocks and shares – and had a suitable large wedge of liquid cash available to gamble with ( via the same dodgy offshore setup probably ) – they could make quite a bit in a couple of days.
Is anyone checking large cash-flows / threat-announcements for scientifically significant correlation we wonder ? Just a thought.
Couldn’t happen anyway. Too many checks and balances. We expect.
Note* The Dax, Tech Dax, DJ Euro Stoxx, Dow
Jones, and Nasdaq – all up - between 0.20% and 0.88
%.
0.88% doesn't seem much - but it's just one day's change - more or less equivalent to a yearly rate of interest of around 300%.
With $10M on the Dow Jones you could have made $88,000 yesterday.
Aging is preprogrammed and altruistic ( questionmark )
Brewers love yeast. Bakers love yeast. And geneticists love yeast - it’s cheap and it reproduces alarmingly quickly. Now, a new study from the University of Southern California, has used yeast to examine a possible theory regarding the aging of cells – and thus perhaps, by implication, the aging of animals.
The results, just published in the current issue of the Journal of Cell Biology ( see: http://www.jcb.org ) may ( or may not, depending on your viewpoint ) have shown that cells have a pre-progammed lifespan which is set to maximise the survival potential of an entire group of cells – rather than individuals. In other words, cells might be ‘dying early’ to help the species as a whole survive better.
The experiments clearly showed that a small percentage of the yeast cells, living under adverse conditions, were able to survive longer because they could utilise the materials released by their already dead cousins. So far so good. As far as we know, similar phenomena are seen with bacterial colonies.
Unfortunately though, Really Magazine has been completely unable to fathom what possible implication that could have with regard to animal or human populations. We can’t ( or don’t want to ) imagine any similar macabre scenario involving animals – let alone humans. We’re probably missing the point somewhere.
A second wing of the study was carried out by mathematical modeling ( a computer prog ). It found that when the virtual cells were ‘programmed’ to die-off sooner, and when there was a high degree of built-in mutation, then the ‘species’ survived better under quickly-changing adverse conditions.
Again, we’re probably missing the underlying subtlety here, but isn’t that exactly what you’d expect ? If the organisms live a very long time, then, by definition, the rate of reproduction will have to be lower if there are finite resources. If they reproduce more slowly, then ‘lucky’ chance mutations can’t creep into the genes so often – and so they won’t be able to adapt so well to the changing conditions.
Whatever your viewpoint, there’s no doubt though that science is now a tiny bit further down the road with regard to the understanding of how yeasts behave.
As for being a proof that " - aging is preprogrammed and altruistic" – errrr
. . . anyone fancy a beer ?
See our inteview page for more on aging research.
Big brother goes slightly deaf in one ear.
The University of Surrey has today announced a new method of encrypting mobile phone calls. See:
http://portal.surrey.ac.uk:7778/
It uses a patented technique to encode the speech into “speech-like waveforms” which can be transmitted and received over the normal mobile-phone networks without significant errors. The press release says that- “The system is the first and only one of its kind in the world” – which we’re more than happy to believe. (our italics)
There
are a couple of points, however, we haven't quite fully digested as yet.
Firstly, the press release doesn’t explain why encrypted signals can’t
simply be sent over the phone’s data channel just like any other data,
such as jpgs or video. It would obviously work – although, maybe, with
a delay. Protocol tweak required perhaps ?
Secondly, we don’t want to disappoint anyone, but encrypted mobile tech has been on sale for quite a while now – see, for example,
http://www.rohde-schwarz.com/it-security/topsec_gsm/
or
http://windowsfordevices.com/news/NS6799022989.html
If fact, if we remember correctly, ‘vocoder’- style voice encryptors have been around for a couple of decades now – they can work with any phone, mobile or not.
We also stumbled across this helpful pdf. , which references the university’s work. It’s from the UK government’s Communications Electronics Security Group (CESG) based - ahem - fairly near Cheltenham.
http://www.cesg.gov.uk/site/crypto/media/Vox.pdf
It does mention that the devices which they describe will “ - need to be periodically returned to a cryptocustodian to fit a new encryption key ”
Who, we wonder, is the ‘cryptocustodian’ ? No idea, but we could take a wild guess that he/she might have an office in the vicinity of – ahem – Cheltenham ? For more info, why not ring CESG ?
Please note though, that:
“ The department’s communications systems may be monitored or recorded in order to secure the effectiveness of the systems and for other lawful purposes “
gwerbl gwerbl tocanch oonarb ogn ch ch
For more of the university’s work see :
http://www.ee.surrey.ac.uk/CCSR
Consumer driven design ?
A new(ish) UK government-funded project has been launched which is giving the general public a chance to comment on how a new car should be designed. The project, called SPRINTCar, ( we won’t go in for any Laboured Acronym Dissection – LAD, this time ) is a collaboration overseen by Oxford University’s Begbroke Science Park ( not overly concerned with the science of website design apparently )
The public can complete a substantial on-line questionnaire . . .
http://www.sprintcar.org.uk with
plenty of opportunity to input their own ideas rather than just picking
from drop-down lists. The organisers are particularly keen to hear from
women.
The aim of the project is to design and produce a car which will showcase ‘best-of-British’ innovation. It will be a low-carb* ( hey ! have we just invented a new industry buzzword ? ), recyclable, upgradable, and safety-conscious.
Disappointingly, rumour has it that the most popular requests so far have been for ‘hatchbacks’ and ‘MPV’s’. Doh! Where are all the public-driven cutting-edge innovative design concepts ? Like drive-by-wire, or 90 degree steering ?
The proof-of-concept vehicle will eventually get built in 2006 by GM, but as we understand it – won’t be available for sale - but any innovations it comes up with may find their way into production by 2010.
Let’s hope that the public consultation process doesn’t cause the project to suffer from the ‘committee effect’ – otherwise we might end up with a 'Consumer Assisted Motor Engineering Lemon'.
*The UK’s government-set target is that by
2012, 10% of all new cars sold should emit less than 100g of CO2 per Km.
In other words, they’ll have to somehow burn less fuel.
comments ?
Flipping cold stones.
This week’s Nature magazine reports an amazing discovery. Plants can grow under rocks in the Arctic and Antarctic ( and also on top of rocks*). Over 1000 randomly selected rocks were sampled in the semi-frozen North and the semi-frozen South.
The random selection process was achieved by ‘throwing a flagged marker stone blindly over the shoulder’. Wherever it landed, the nearest rock was turned over, and, astonishing as it may seem, most of the rocks, when examined, had large colonies of hypoliths growing underneath . . .
( The word hypo-lith, is a generic term applied to micro-organisms which grow ‘under-stones ’. These particular ones were green, photosynthesising microplants, or perhaps cyanobacteria .)
Even more extraordinary, perhaps, is that since the areas searched have been explored, even occupied, by humans for decades ( the ‘refuelling base’ Alexander Island, one of the test sites in the Antarctic, is ‘claimed’ by UK, Chile and Argentina ) you might have thought that someone would, before now, have kicked over a stone and realised that is was green underneath. Apparently not.
* Similar organisms also covered about 10% of the ‘above ground ’ – these ones are, of course, called ‘epi-liths ’.
We won't even mention the 'endo-liths '.
Blue sky science.
On the 28th of Sep ( or the 29th – depending where you look ) the new gamma ray telescope – built by a 10 country international consortium – will be inaugurated in Namibia, 100 km south of Windhoek.
The project, named with a somewhat strained pun/acronym HESS, is a synchronised interconnected array of four dishes which look for gamma radiation from deep space.
The ‘scope is an increasingly rare example of pure blue-sky ( absolutely literally in this case ) scientific research – in other words, research for the sake of knowledge rather than for commercial gain.
The dishes pick up the blue Cherenkov glow ( the same seen in photos of power station reactor cores ) a side effect caused as the ultra high energy gamma rays ( photons ) smash into the Earth’s upper atmosphere.
They have actually been running in test mode for some ten months now, and have already been able to pinpoint, with unprecedented accuracy, a furiously intense gamma-ray source more or less in the estimated ‘centre’ of our galaxy, the ‘Milky Way’.
It’s exact structure and origin is entirely unknown, and is likely to stay that way for quite some time - bearing in mind its distance from us and the fact that anything coming within hundreds of light-years of it will be utterly fried by the radiation.
The consortium has produced an excellent .pdf brochurette http://www.mpi-hd.mpg.de/ which explains how the array works, what it’s looking for, and why it’s in Namibia . . .
Also see : http://www.mpi-hd.mpg.de/hfm/HESS/
P.S. The HESS array will be having an open-day for visitors on Sat
2nd Oct . Their advice is "Please bring hats, suncream, and sunglasses" Just
for protection from sunlight, we hope . . . Details at the URL above.
Let’s have a heated debate !
An interesting debate is taking place via the time-honoured method of a ‘public exchange of letters’. The subject of the discussion is "Windpower- good, or not good?" and the two formidable adversaries are Prof. George Monbiot (good) and Prof. David Bellamy (not good).
The most recent letter has just been published on George M’s site http://www.monbiot.com/archives/
Interesting as it is, we’d like to point out, with the greatest of respect to both protagonists, that it’s beginning to look as though the debate lacks a traditional, and crucial, ingredient. Vitriol.
150 years ago exchanges of this type regularly took place in the columns of the largest and most respectable* newspapers and magazines. Debates about evolution, medicine, or astronomy regularly featured the most grotesque of personal insults. It’s a tradition which, we feel, has been sadly neglected in recent times.
The kind of thing we have in mind could go something like this ( paraphrased, for brevity, from an exchange in 1860 between Thomas Huxley and Bishop Wilberforce – subject : Evolution )
Bishop “Could you tell us whether it is on your grandmother’s side or your grandfather’s that you are related to an ape ? “
Huxley “ If I had to chose between a miserable ape for a grandfather, or a man who thought like you do – I’d prefer the ape. “
That’s more like it.
Note* The editors would often go out of their way to wind–up both parties
and pour petrol on the flames – well naturally, sells more papers doesn’t
it . . .
Too hot ! – Too cold ! – Hmmm , just right
The prestigious ‘Baker Institute ’ ( an integral part of Rice University, Houston ) is ‘dedicated to the highest standards of intellectual excellence and integrity’ – self evident really when you consider that it lists amongst its advisors people like Baron Douglas Hurd, His Excellency Shimon Peres, and Rt. Hon. John Major.
They’ve recently finished a year-long thoroughgoing study into the question of how heavily Japan should rely on nuclear power for electricity generation. You can access the new 61 page report here, (.pdf file )
http://www.rice.edu/energy/publications
It goes into a huge amount of detail, and tries to quantify the cost / benefits of nuclear- some thirty years into the future. Not an easy task, bearing in mind that it’s not known what will happen to oil / gas / coal / bio-renewables /hydro / solar / wave / geo-thermal or wind generation prices during that period.
The report does mention that there have been some serious accidents at Japanese nuclear plants ( it was published too early to catch the latest lethal one though ) – and also touches on the ‘falsified data’ which revolved around some safety inspections.
The authors also point out that the projections don’t take into account costs of storage of nuclear waste, or the costs of any future accidents. Unfortunate perhaps, because you might imagine that those figures could well be fairly relevant to the extensively sophisticated mathematical calculations which have been made.
We’ve probably missed it in the wealth of info – but, try as we might, we couldn’t find any mention either of the enormous de-commissioning costs for the plants – or the yearly price of insurance against nuclear accidents - or the ultra-high-level security costs / implications. Maybe they'll be included in the next exhaustive in-depth study ?
The main conclusion ? ( as we understand it anyway ) Too few nuclear plants will increase the cost of electricity – and too many nuclear plants will . . . errrr . . . . also increase the cost.
If you’d like to know more about the Baker Institute their site
has a very enlightening speech given by the late Ronald Reagan outlining
their oeuvre. Be sure to watch it all the way through if you can. ( Realplayer format
)
http://realaudio.rice.edu/BakerInst/RonaldReagan
Are we there yet ?
Practically all today’s UK papers carry stories about the new ‘tilting’ Virgin trains
which will now be running between London and Manchester.
See for example :
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news
And all, or at least all the ones we checked – missed the interesting bit of the story. They duly mentioned the band which played , the Branson photo op., the red carpet, the Prime Minister’s visit , and of course the high-tech computer controlled rolling stock. They didn’t mention why this one will probably work and the previous one didn’t.
It’s about twenty years since the UK’s last effort to introduce tilting trains was cancelled. It was called the 'Advanced Passenger Train ' (APT).
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/1695589.stm
The government-backed project was plagued with problems from the start, and reached its terminus after a disastrous PR demo in 1981, when a train full of invited journalists were treated to a show of how the tech systems didn’t work properly.
But the project wasn’t axed because a few journos had claimed the tilting had made them feel sick, or because Thatcher ‘didn’t like trains’ – if we remember correctly, it was cancelled because the trains were too wide.
Many years – and many tens of £Millions into the project, some insightful person pointed out that although the trains had been built to the standard width – there was an absolutely fundamental problem. That person probably saved a considerable number of lives. He or she ( anyone know who it was ? ) realised that if two trains were passing on a bend, and one of the tilting mechanisms was to malfunction – then the trains could hit each other. Doh !
The new Italian-built Pendolino trains are narrower at the top - narrow enough to miss each other even if the tilt goes wrong on a bend.
So now the UK has trains to rival the Japanese Bullet Trains !
http://www.geocities.com/Tokyo/Island/
errrrr . . well, not quite. They still haven’t implemented the final design tweak.
This last problem centres again on the ancient UK infrastructure. The fact that the old tracks are rather too close for comfort has been obviated by making the trains narrower – but there’s still the ‘tunnel problem ‘ . . .
Many of the old tunnels take two-way traffic, and again are really too narrow. That means that, when two trains pass each other at over 100mph inside a tunnel, there is an almighty thump caused by the opposing air-pressure waves being pushed along in front of the trains. At 120mph its just about acceptable – but go much faster ( the Japanese Bullets reach 190 mph ) and the air-pressure whack is unbearably and frighteningly loud. It makes people’s ears ‘pop’ too.
The solution ? As the Japanese designers discovered many years back, the trains have to be ‘sealed’ just like an airplane body. That gets round the problem.
Are the new trains air-sealed ? errrr . . . nope . . . don’t think so.
p.s. Note to all the journos, from various publications we checked, who duly cut’n’pasted the indentical ‘factoid’, ( presumably originating from the Virgin press release - just a wild guess ) informing us that Pendolino means ‘she who leans ’ . . .
errrr . . . we don’t know much Italian, but that’s not strictly quite right is it ?
Cor!, wot a shame .
‘News’paper to clobber its own website shocker. According to e-consultancy.com the UK’s ‘Sun ’ newspaper is about to pull some of its online content. The article says that The Sun is ‘losing’ 90,000 ‘readers’ a day to its website. It also informs us that the owners aren’t too happy about that - and have decided to win back ‘readers’ to the print version by removing most of the editorial content - and ‘page three’ .
Allegedly.
If the story is correct, the effects are yet to be seen – because, as of today, 'page free' is still going strong.
But Really Magazine isn’t quite sure about mathematical logic of such a decision anyway – but it’s easily tested . . . Why not close the site entirely and see if sales of the paper version shoots up by 90,000 ?
No, the paper shouldn’t worry unduly. After all, you can’t pin
a webpage to the back of a toilet-cubicle door can you ?
http://www.e-consultancy.com/newsfeatures/
Lottery to end misery ?
The United Nations has set itself some ambitious goals. Specifically, the so-called Millenium Development Goals. (MDG’s)
Here they are :
Goal 1
Eradicate extreme poverty and hunger.
Halve, between 1990 and 2015, the proportion of people whose income is less
than US$1 a day.
Halve, between 1990 and 2015, the proportion of people who suffer from hunger.
Goal 2
Achieve universal primary education.
Ensure that by 2015 all children will be able to complete a full course of
primary schooling.
Goal 3
Promote gender equality and empower women.
Eliminate gender disparity in all levels of education by 2015.
Goal 4
Reduce child mortality.
Reduce by two-thirds, between 1990 and 2015, the under-5 mortality rate.
Goal 5
Improve maternal health.
Reduce by three-quarters, between 1990 and 2015, the maternal mortality ratio.
Goal 6
Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases.
Have halted by 2015 and begun to reverse the spread of HIV/AIDS.
Have halted by 2015 and begun to reverse the spread of malaria and other major
diseases.
Goal 7
Ensure environmental sustainability.
Integrate principles of sustainable development into country policies and reverse
the loss of environmental resources.
Halve, by 2015, the proportion of people without sustainable access to safe
drinking water.
Have achieved, by 2020, a significant improvement in the lives of at least
100 million slum dwellers.
Goal 8
Develop a global partnership for development.
Develop the world trading and financial system.
Address the special needs of the least developed and landlocked and small island
countries.
Deal comprehensively with the debt problems of developing countries.
An admirable, and astonishingly ambitious set. But how much will it all cost
? A new analysis by a set of global economics experts has put the current ‘ballpark’ estimate
at about £28Billion per year. So up to year 2015 they’ll need £308B.
Where on earth are they going to get that kind of money ?
Well, amazingly enough, if the ‘high income countries’ of the world were to levy a tax of just 1p per litre on petrol – that would raise almost double the amount the UN needs . . .
So, we can rely on our visionary ‘leaders’ to implement the new tax first thing Monday morning - can’t we ?
Civilisation: nice idea – wrong species.
For full details see:http://www.wider.unu.edu/publications/
p.s. They do have some other ideas for raising the cash though – like a ‘global’ lottery and ‘global’ Premium Bonds . . .
any ideas for names for
the lottery ?
Some rights reserved
Pretty obvious stuff really - It’s illegal to take someone else’s money without their permission – but if they fancy to give it all away no-one can stop them.
As we’re fond of pointing out – downloading and sharing music and other media files is not always necessarily illegal. Under normal circumstances, the owners of the copyright are automatically protected by law - but if they decide to waive their rights and ‘give it away’, then, of course, they can.
Now a bunch of high profile recording artists – including David Byrne, The Beastie Boys, and Brazil’s Minister of Culture ( also known as Gilberto Gil ) – are doing just that. In a project organised by Wired Magazine, they’ve contributed to a CD under the so-called Creative Commons License.
The CD will given away free with the Nov. issue of the magazine – and comes with instructions which will apparently allow - positively encourage it seems – ripping, sampling, sharing and mashing-up. ( some rights still reserved though . . . )
It must have been a nightmare rather hard work for Wired to put the CD together. It took months ; and only about a quarter of the acts/labels which they approached could finally give the green light.
Here’s a good overview of the story from the Wall St. Journal :
Note*
Before any artists decide to give away any of their hard-crafted works, they should carefully check any paperwork they’ve signed. It often happens that contractual clauses claim ‘ownership’ of any works which an artist produces – even ones which haven’t been written yet – so they might not be at liberty to ‘give away’ their works – even if they wrote, produced, performed and recorded them entirely themselves . . .
Never mind the Kulturstiftung !
It’s taken nearly thirty years, but the Punk movement has finally been welcomed by the establishment. The ‘bundes’ in fact.
Starting on the 22nd of Sept, there will be a three day taxpayer-funded punkfest at Kassel in Germany. Gigs, exhibitions, seminars ( like, for instance, ‘The influence the situationist ideas had on the punk movement’ ) and films.
The funding comes via the Kulturstiftung des bundes, a governmental culture-promotion agency which normally concentrates on slightly less risqué projects like inner city degeneration, tackling unemployment, and building skateboard parks – so this foray into the punk world is a brave move.
The Punk Kongress , as it’s called, has it’s own website
which has an admirable disregard for English, with sentences like “ It where primarily US-bands who cultivated a raw and ruff version of rock and roll “ (sic.sic.sic.) – but there’s a wealth of info about the kongress. Schedule / bookings / venues / the whole f ( oh, hang on, there's the phone ) ing works.
The sign-off line is “Be there or get lost “
Bezaubern !
p.s. The kongress will be opened and closed with live performances by a D.J.
called ‘Bomber Harris’ – see? they do have
a sense of humour !
p.p.s.
The Kulturstiftung des Bundes will also be backing the celebrations
for Einstein’s
100th (posthumous) birthday in 2005.
The Dutch quest for bloomlessness.
The expression ‘Using a sledgehammer to crack a nut cluster’ springs to mind with this press release from the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility ( ESRF ), Grenoble, France.
Scientists have been using the most powerful synchrotron radiation source in Europe to bombard 1,3-Distearoyl-2-oleoylglycerol with X-rays in order to determine its crystalline structure .
Why ? To see why chocolate goes white of course.
The peculiar white ‘fat-bloom’ which sometimes forms on chocolate doesn’t degrade the product in any way – except visually. Customers, understandably though, don’t like the look of it – and won’t buy ( or return ) the chocolate, thinking that the bloom might perhaps be a mould of some kind. But it’s just an artifact of the different crystalline forms of cocoa butter. Apparently.
Researchers from the University of Amsterdam (UvA) have been using the ESRF to probe the bloom – and have managed, for the first time, to identify the structure of one of the components (SOS) – which may make it possible to minimise blooming in future chocolate production facilities. ( CPF’s )
See report and picture at :
http://www.esrf.fr/News/FrontNews/chocolate/
comments ?
“. . . and that’s really quite extraordinary – there . . .”
In an ideal world learning would always be fun. And there’s no doubt that there is an overabundance of stuffiness on in the field of high academia. So perhaps it’s refreshing to see a lighthearted touch, now and again, when it comes to handing out honorary degrees.
But, as far as we know, this is the first time that a Doctor of Civil Law degree has been bestowed – on a football club.
Tomorrow (Sept 19th) , at half time, Norwich City will receive the degree from the University of East Anglia.
So now, the team will presumably be known as Dr. Canaries.
We’d like to push the logic a little further, and suggest that in
a reciprocal goodwill gesture, the dean of the university should be declared
winner of this year’s F.A. cup.
comments ?
Claim your next virtual coffee ?
Really Magazine was in a coffeeshop / bookshop recently. One which ran a highly eccentric but interesting scheme called ‘next coffee’.
The idea – if we’ve understood it correctly, is that anyone who bought a coffee in the store, could, if they wished, pay for two cups – but they only receive one. The second ‘phantom’ cup is placed in cyberspace ( in the form of a notice on a blackboard ). Should a bookshop customer be unlucky enough to find themselves in the store – desperate for a caffeine hit – but without any ready cash – they can then claim the ‘next coffee’ without having to pay for it. The next time they visit the shop – they buy two ( one phantom again ) and so the cycle continues.
Something oddly similar seems to be happening at Mozzila.org. They recently implemented an excellent scheme whereby anyone – yes anyone – who finds a serious vulnerability ( bug ) in one of their products, can claim a ‘bounty’ – at $500 a shot.
The strategy has already borne fruit, and two days ago the organisation issued new versions of their excellent open-source ‘Firefox’ browser and ‘Thunderbird’ e-mail prog. ( we’ve downloaded and updated both with no problems ).
The similarity with the ‘next coffee’ scenario is that one of the recipients, a Mr. Palmgren, generously donated his $0.5Grand straight back to the developers - in order to bolster their ‘bounty’ fund ! – currently running at around $10,000.
What a nice gesture !
Of course, software ‘auditors’ - who, in essence, make their money by finding bugs in other people’s code - have been around since the invention of computers, but because this scheme is open to anyone, it could spawn a whole new group of professional self-employed bug hunters. Vaguely reminiscent of those people who make a living by doing magazine puzzles and crosswords.
Just a touch more difficult ( and useful ) though.
See:
http://www.mozilla.org/press/mozilla
What we’re about . . .
Since it’s our 1 year birthday issue today, maybe it’s a good time to dissect our raison-dêtre, to lay out the shop window , to put the cards on the table, to run the flag up the - - - etc
If you have the time, listen to this recent BBC Radio 4 broadcast – it’s a bit long, but it kind of hits the nail on the head. ( See ? It’s not just us then ! )
The commentators pin the blame for the pitifully low standards in science / tech reporting on commercial pressures and naiveté – both of which are true - but we’d like to go add a further ingredient to the mix - because there’s a large helping of highly misleading source material out there too.
There are a few reasons for that. Firstly, scientists have to go to a great deal of trouble to exclude the ‘experimenter effect’ from any research – in other words, the tendency to find the result you are looking for – even if it’s wrong. Being generous, let’s say that sometimes they don’t manage to entirely eliminate it.
Then there are those who deliberately falsify the results. In the academic world, that might be a rare event ( although historically, there’s no shortage of very high-profile examples ), but in the commercial world . . . a very different story.
It’s so common it’s almost routine. The larger the outfit concerned, the more money they can throw at a high-powered PR firm to push the dope for them. Budgets for this kind of operation often run into million$. ( and, as we've learned over the past year, government departments sometimes employ the very same monster PR firms too – presumably for the same reasons.)
Take, as an indicator of the current state of affairs, so-called ‘Astroturf’ websites. The nickname has stuck because the sites are ‘fake grass-roots organisations’ – which purport to be, say, not-for-profit consumer groups campaigning for ‘fair and balanced viewpoints’ – but which in reality are solidly financed by big-business - to push false info to consumers – sadly, the mainstream media often fall for it hook line and sinker . . .
Bearing all the following in mind, there’s rarely any shortage of material for us to get stuck into. If we find a silly story we like to have a bit of fun with it - and if we occasionally find a Astroturf job we’ll unhesitatingly chew it up for you.
Don’t get the idea that we’re 100% negative though – far from it - when something which seems to be truly novel, interesting, and spin-free turns up we’ll try our best to be the first to plug it !
To be honest though, sometimes it feels like we’re sailing against the wind – the words ‘science’ and ‘humour’ don’t exactly dovetail together all that well ( all the more reason perhaps, to keep campaigning ). There seems to be a widespread assumption that serious science and technology must be treated - errr . . . seriously. Gravely worshipped, without question, at the high altar of respect.
Sorry, but Really Magazine reserves the right to remain agnostic.
In the end, all we’re trying to do is to stumble, blindly, as best we can, in the opposite general direction to what we perceive as ‘un-reality’ – and have a bit of fun doing it . . .
Anyway, hope you like the results ! If you do ( or if you don’t ) let us know.
In the meantime thanks for your time !
Martin G. Editor
Don't even mention Sheffield's ' Pop Museum '
In this cynical age, people often assume that elected politicians will always
be prone to ‘economy with the truth’, and sometimes even the
occasional brush with outright lies. We would be the first to admit that
it’s often difficult to tell the wood from the trees – but we’d
like to point out that senior politicians do – actually – sometimes
tell the whole truth and nothing but. Take for example Michael
Meacher.
In 1999 Mr. Meacher said : " The Earth Centre is going to be every bit as exciting and attract as many people as the Millennium Dome “. (from http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/300844.stm )
See ? He was absolutely right.
Doncaster’s Earth Centre has now been closed ( for the second time ) , and this time it’s final. It cost £43Million. Now the local council is in the process of considering alternative uses. ( If anyone has any ideas, cont4ct us and we’ll forward them to the council ).
By contrast, the Eden Project in Cornwall, which traces its roots back to private enterprise rather than government ' vision ', is doing extremely well . . .
According to The Independent, the government’s Millenium Commissioner’s chief exec concludes, that’s because : “ - it has plants to show off ”.
see: http://news.independent.co.uk
p.s.
Sheffield's £15Million Millenium effort, the 'National Centre for Popular Music' scored 'Nil Points' - and is now a student's union building.
The ‘ axis-of-good show ’ ( and anyone else with the wonga ).
We thought we’d better remind readers that there’s only one year left to book your exhibition space at DSEI 2005. That’s the largest ‘defence’ industry expo on the planet. Last year’s event was especially well attended, and the organisers are predicting that the 2005 version will be 30% bigger !
As an exhibitor, you’ll obviously get access to the event – something which is not all that easy to come by. Even journalists from the national and international broadcast media and newspapers are only allowed in ‘at the discretion of the organisers’.
Needless to say, members of the ordinary public will not be admitted. In fact, if last year was anything to go by, they won’t even get near the building. Last time, the police, backed up by over two thousand privately hired security guards, saw to that.
It should be said though, that access does not come cheap. In fact, you’ll have to part with a fairly substantial amount of ‘wonga’ ( that’s an industry term for cash ). Space goes for around £85 per square metre per day ( plus registration fee, compulsory insurance & VAT ), rather more, on a daily basis, than the most up-market office space in Manhattan, Hong Kong, or Tokyo.
( Of course, should you happen to be a high ranking government rep of some kind, you’ll be able to get in free, no problem – because it goes without saying that you’ll automatically have the requisite wonga-factor-backup from whichever country you represent. Tax dollars, petrodollars or family fortunes all perfectly acceptable. )
Now, you’ll need a ‘product’ of some sort. Don’t worry though, it doesn’t necessarily have to explode to comply. You might make, for instance, zips, or batteries – anything as long as the military of some country somewhere need to buy it at some point. Our favourite from last year, for instance, was the clearly indispensable Imperial Sword Company http://www.imperialsword.com
( Please note though, that if you make leg-irons, electric shock belts, or shackles having a minimum internal circumference when fully locked of more than 165mm – then it might be a good idea to show some of your other products instead )
Despite general gloom in the manufacturing sector, last year, more than 500 companies from the UK alone managed to buy a presence at the show. Take a look at the list. Curiously, a lot of them are awfully shy, and many we checked don’t even have websites for some reason. Others, though, are household names. see:
http://www.dsei.co.uk/review/exhibitor-list.htm
Overall, the obvious success of the expo is perhaps not so surprising when you consider that the UK is the second largest supplier of ‘defence equipment ’ on the planet.
Oh, one last thing, don’t worry about selling your gear to some dodgy backwater country who might never actually pay the bill – the UK government will automatically cover any financial defaults for you, courtesy of the taxpayers.
Jolly good ! Carry on !
Compare and contrast :
Love it or hate it, Chris Morris’s “The
Day Today” certainly had something of a visionary outlook. Here
are a couple of Morrisesque offerings from this morning’s
news :
Klingon ‘culture’ alive and well on planet Earth.
and:
Klingon ‘culture’ alive and well on planet Earth.
Sd it ive crshd agn
Who was it who coined the phrase ‘ - couldn’t chew gum and walk in a straight line at the same time ‘ ? It was a good few years ago now, but it’s modern equivalent has just been set in concrete. With regard to mobile phone use.
The Swedish National Road and Transport Institute has recently finished an extensive study using their new(ish) ‘Simulator III’ virtual reality kit - which confirmed what many had previously suspected – in general, people can’t make a mobile phone call and drive in a straight line. Doh !
http://www.vti.se/info/fonyhet/
Not only that, but there wasn’t any significant difference in the lack of concentration whether the phone was the ‘hands-free’ type or not ! That’s going to go down well with motoring lobby groups.
In the UK, making an ‘ordinary’ mobile call whilst driving has been illegal since last December. But the RAC is currently reckoning that at least 10 million motorists routinely ignore the law.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/3624714.stm
The more we look at it, the more it seems that 'mobiles and driving' go
together like 'bulls and chinashops'. In the end, there might have to be
a tech solution to the problem. But it’s not so easy to see how this
could be done – well, we haven’t been able to think of a way
of doing it yet. Any ideas ?
A tiny problem magnified out of all proportion.
As regular readers will know , we often complain about websites which insist on using acres of pure white background. Naturally, we intend to carry on in that direction - but today we’ll make a exception, because we do understand that there may be a small, but significant number of the population who enjoy staring at a fluorescent tube for a few hours on end. It may even have medical benefits – helping to alleviate Seasonal Affective Disorder for example.
So we’ll switch the 'gripe de jour' towards another syndrome which helps to make the use of the www a much less than pleasant experience. Font sizes. Ok, it’s not the world’s most pressing problem at the moment, but even the tiniest splinter can get supremely irritating over a long enough period.
Really Magazine uses the excellent ‘Firefox’ open-source browser which has a handy facility for changing the font size on most websites - but the Ctrl and + keys are almost worn out pumping the text size up and down to allow us to read . . . The variation is extraordinary. There are hundreds of ‘respected’ websites which use text which is so small as to be totally unreadable on a largish monitor.
There is some research which suggest that users tend to take ‘small text’ as a cue for ‘important’ and therefore worthy of attention : we can ( just about ) believe that – but there must be a far larger number who immediately close the site and flip to another where they can read without effort.
What to do ? Set a ‘standard’ size for text and cajole webdesigners to adhere to it ? Hopeless.
Build an auto-sizing function into browsers which sets the font according to a formula derived from monitor resolution and website design strategy? Forget it.
No, we have a much better idea. Web-designers purleese at least have a think about it. It’s (almost) effortless. Just set the text to be more or less the same size as Google uses.
Case solved. Next !
Attractive ideas
This week, the European Space Agency will may
decide the future of a possible mission to find out if there’s something
wrong with gravity.
Six years ago, John Anderson of the California Institute of Technology pointed out some anomalies in the trajectories of three space probes – Pioneer 10 , Pioneer 11 , and Ulysses. All three, it seems, had been drifting off their predicted paths by a very small – but consistently measurable amount.
Since then, every new measurement has backed up the findings.
Back calculations show that the craft had experienced a deceleration - in a direction which points directly at the sun.
There are three possible explanations ( that we know of ) so far :
Firstly, all three probes may have developed some mechanical problem – say, a gas leak, that’s slowing them down. But all three ? all slowing by the same amount – in the same direction ? Hmmmm.
The second theory is that they may be interacting with the mysterious ‘Dark Matter’ which some cosmologists propose pervades the entire universe. They propose the ‘Dark Matter’ and ‘Dark Energy’ because otherwise the maths doesn’t work. In fact it’s out by a factor of about 19 times. The entire universe would have to be 95% unseen ‘Dark Matter’ to compensate. Our bit, the stuff we know about, making up the other 5%. Hmmmmm.
Third theory. Gravitational pull might not drop-off over distance in a strictly 'Newtonian' way - pulling just a tiny bit harder than expected at very large distances. If so, it could explain the spacecraft's anomalies – and get rid of all that annoying Dark Matter Theory at the same time.
The new ESA project , called Cosmic Visions, may, if it goes ahead, discover that cosmology is due for one of its largest overhauls since Einstein.
See The Observer :
http://www.guardian.co.uk/life/science/
Will they, won’t they, join the dance ?
First they were, then they weren’t, then they were again, then they weren’t again – and now they are again ! Russia and the Kyoto Protocol !
See: http://story.news.yahoo.com/news
What are they playing at ? Is it just a case of the left hand not letting the right hand know what it’s doing ? - or monumental incompetence ? – or perhaps they are just playing an awfully amusing game with all the other countries who’ve signed up and are ready to go ?
Whatever the reason, the current state of affairs - with conflicting statements coming from ‘ trusted sources ’ on an almost weekly basis – is a long way short of responsible. And it’s getting boring too.
It’s time to either sign up or rip it up.
Yes, we know it’s a highly complex equation, and, environmental issues aside, we know that there are fortunes to be made or lost depending on the outcome. But twelve years to figure out the consequences is surely long enough.
Resources and overviews see:
http://unfccc.int/resource/convkp.html
Look ! no wires ! well, not many anyway . . .
AP are running a story at the moment about a new development in ‘microrobotics’ . Scientists at Carnegie Mellon have developed a small robot which can ‘walk on water’ – pondskater style. See:
Assistant professor Metin Sitti says that “I think it is the final challenge of microrobotics if you can make this thing,"
The final challenge ? Surely you’re joking, Mr Sitti ?
We’d like to suggest a couple of further challenges for the team :
Firstly, how about making one with an on-board power supply ? The picture of the mite, (click here) for some reason, omits to show the cables which are attached to the device to supply power and directional commands.
Doh !
But the second challenge is perhaps the most difficult – find a use for it.
Sorry, but the “ . . .with a net or a boom, it could skim contaminants
off the top of water ” Purleese !
Editor’s comment:
The real challenge, with all these ‘microbots’ like pondskaters and micro-helicopters etc etc, is to come up with a viable lightweight power source . . . batteries are too heavy and don’t last long enough . . . fuel-burning engine/generator combos are too big.
When it happens, we promise to report it enthusiastically.
Bright future for the black stuff ?
Oil may, or may not, be running short, but one thing is certain – there’s still an awful lot of coal around. As we’re fond of pointing out, globally, there are hundreds of years-worth of known reserves. But it has two big disadvantages, which discourage commercial enterprises and governments from exploiting the reserves.
Firstly, it’s hard to pump coal down a pipeline. Secondly, it’s filthy stuff – even worse than oil. It has much higher levels of highly persistent and toxic heavy metals, much higher sulphur content, and, like oil, of course it produces CO2 when burned.
But serious research has been going on across the world to try to make a ‘near zero-emission’ coal-fired power station a reality. It hasn’t quite happened yet – but there are prototypes. Such as the one formally announced today by the Australian Coal Association : see:
http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/ ( caution : hideous ‘flashy’ site )
The new tech, which the consortium says may be retrofit-able to existing stations, was developed in partnership with the Center for Coal Utilization in Japan. It uses a novel approach. The new system pumps oxygen through the burning coal-bed – in order to produce more CO2 . . . yes , more CO2. But the increased levels of the gas make it much easier ( and more economical ) to isolate from the flue gases. Another way of putting it would be to say - add oxygen and the carbon burns more efficiently.
Of course there are still problems : like how is this gigantic requirement for oxygen going to be provided ? : how is the ‘locked-up CO2 going to be disposed of ? : what happens to all those heavy metals which will still be present in the plant’s waste products ?
Even so, we're convinced that all those old half-worked closed-up coal mines across the world will soon start looking like good business again. That’s our coal tip.
( Caution regarding forward
looking statements )
Good fat / Bad fat
Despite claims to the contrary, it seems that eating nothing but ‘fast food’ for thirty days is not really bad for you after all ! Not at least according to Dr. Ruth Kava , who has written an extensive review of two ( other ) people who did just that.
See: http://www.techcentralstation.com/
TechCentralStation is an interesting site, where you can find other enlightening pieces such as “Obesity: a Sign We're Doing Things Right” .
If you can’t be bothered to follow the link – and who could blame you – we can tell you that the conclusion is “Overall, a fat society is healthier than a poor one”
Hmmm, we might need a while to thoroughly digest the implications of that one.
Oh by the way, Techcentralstation has an impressive list of heavyweight sponsors - like, for instance, McDonalds . . .
If you’d like to find out a bit more about TCS - and we thoroughly
recommend it - do a Google for “DCI group” - their (
recently revealed) ‘publishers’ . . .
link of the day :
Foing’s ark
The BBC has an exclusive story this morning – an interview with Dr. Bernard Foing, Chief Scientist for the European Space Agency. – he wants to set up a DNA bank on the moon. See http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/
Briefly summarised – he thinks it would be a good idea if we were to store DNA samples of as many species as possible ( including us of course ) on the moon. Then, if the Earth were to be devastated in some catastrophe – say an asteroid hit, or an atomic war – we would be able to re-seed life again, and eventually get things back to normal.
Seems like a good, though astronomically expensive idea. But it does raise one or two logistical problems . . .
If the Earth had been scourged to such an extent that life had all but been obliterated, it could be incredibly important and useful to have a kind of DNA Noah’s Ark stashed somewhere. The problem is though, who would go to (or from ) the moon, fetch the DNA and get things going again ? Without any tech backup ?
With all due respect to ESA’s lunar chief, we think we have a better idea.
Why not store the DNA here on Earth ? Scientists inform us, almost daily, that they think it’s possible to safely store nuclear waste by burying it kilometers deep in some mountain range somewhere. Let’s store the DNA in the same place. Well, not exactly the same place obviously, but a similar place.
We can safely assume that any Earthly disaster which was devastating enough to eradicate an entire mountain range will also have sent the moon off into some deep-space trajectory anyway.
Editor’s note: Inspired by the old Mel Brooks joke :
“ Hey, Mr. Pilot – whereabouts in the plane d’you keep the ‘Black Box’ ? ”
“Well Mr. Brooks, it’s up near the cockpit, level 2”
“OK, that’s where I’m sitting .
. . “
An imaginary transcript of a farcical scenario which couldn’t possibly happen.
Hello, is that tech support ?
Yes sir, how may we be of assistance today ?
Oh, well, I hope you can, because we’ve got a bit of a problem – a hell of a problem actually . . .
Yes sir, how may we be of assistance today ?
Well, look, we use the operating system in what you might call a ‘mission critical’ environment . . .
Ahhh . . .
We’re a , ahem , a government department . . . OK, in fact we use it to oversee a missile launch system. We’ve launched a test, and now we need to send an abort command – but we’ve got a blue-screen – page access error &FF-203AE1 / 99E.
I see sir – did you read the EULA sir ?
The what ?
The ‘End User License Agreement’ sir.
Well, er , yes , I think so – look, er, we haven’t much time actually – er . . . what do we need to do ?
The EULA clearly states, sir, that the operating system should not be used in ‘environments requiring fail-safe performance’, sir.
Look, it too late for that – what the hell do we do dammit !
There’s no need to raise your voice sir, - did you try switching the power off and on again sir ?
You blithering idiot ! We’ve a bloody full-on Trident up there ! We have to sen_
End of transcript.
Link of the day:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/09/06/
ElectroPoly.
The I.Q. of parrots, birds in general in fact, has recently been upgraded. Biologists now estimate that an average parrot has an intelligence rating approximately equivalent to a five year old human. As we all know, they love to talk – and as parrot owners have appreciated for many years – they’re often very aware of just what they’re saying.
One special case, Alex, the African Grey, dramatically furthered research at the University of Arizona, by proving he could readily communicate with his experimenters, and even spontaneously put together simple sentences. He’s now so famous, he’s even got his own website. http://www.alexfoundation.org/
But how do they actually produce the uncannily accurate mimicked sounds ? You could might assume that it’s pretty much the same way we do. And you’d be right.
The sound originates in their ‘voicebox’ ( except theirs is called a Syrinx , and ours is a Larynx ). The sound then travels up the windpipe, and is modulated by the shape of the throat and the tongue. Just like us in fact.
Self evident perhaps ? Not to researchers at Indiana University. They wanted to prove that parrot’s tongues help to shape the sound. See
http://newsinfo.iu.edu/news/page/
We’ve had a good look at the page – and , try as we might, we can’t find any mention of exactly how the experiment was actually done. It quantifies the results pretty well - “ the tongue position could significantly affect the qualities of the emerging sound “. Right, very enlightening – but how was it actually done ?
Luckily, this page is also available on the Current Biology site (or you can read the full aricle in the Sep. 7th print edition. ) It goes into a little more detail. Here, we find that the five helpful parrots used in the experiments actually had their voiceboxes removed and replaced with a small loudspeaker. Then their tongues were moved about – and guess what ? the sound coming out of their beaks actually changed !
( If anyone would like to hear what a parrot with a loudspeaker embedded in its throat sounds like, the experimenters have thoughtfully provided a .wav file you can listen to. )
So now we know for sure. Parrots use their tongues when they speak.
It might have saved a lot of time, trouble and unpleasantness if someone had just thought to ask Alex the African Grey . . .
Editor’s note - According to New Scientist magazine, the parrots had already shuffled off this mortal coil and gone to join the choir invisible before the tests were carried out. They were casualties of a Florida pest control programme.
" I never forget a face,
- but in your case I'll be glad to make an exception." ...
Groucho Marx
‘The man who mistook his wife for a hat’ became a bestseller for author Oliver Sacks. But we can safely say that the number of people in the world who can’t tell the difference between their wife and a hat – whilst leading perfectly normal lives in every other respect – is vanishingly small. So it might come as a surprise, as it did to us, that a relatively high proportion of people might be suffering from prosopagnosia – an inherited disorder which prevents them from recognising faces. Any faces. Even their own children.
Sufferers usually identify other people very easily though – but by using other criteria – such as the way they move, their clothes, smell, voice etc etc. They are often so good at it that it’s not uncommon for a person to reach adulthood before they realise that they are prosopagnosial.
Perhaps this helps to explain the fact that estimates as to the number of people suffering from the inherited version of the disorder, ( rather than the type caused by injury or stroke ) varies wildly – from ‘extremely rare’ – up to an astonishing estimate of ‘1% of the population’ .
Bearing in mind what a phenomenally subtle and complex process it must be - to recognise one person, with 100% accuracy, from say, a million others – just by a quick glance at their face – perhaps it’s not surprising that sometimes the algorithm, or neuronal wiring - or whatever it is - can’t always perform perfectly.
Computer scientists across the planet – now bolstered with government-backed uber-budgets, are still struggling to come up with machine-based face-recognition systems which work even reasonably well in ideal circumstances.
See:
http://www.choisser.com/faceblind/
and
http://www.faceblind.org/research/
An exclusive interview
The second of our exclusive interviews. This one is with Dr. Aubrey de Grey, a biogerontologist and bioinformaticist working at the UK's University of Cambridge. The main goal of his biogerontology work is to expedite the development of a true cure for human aging.
Lopsided body study.
Here’s a tip. If you meet someone who has one ear higher than the other – don’t mess with them. A new study by the psychology and anthropology depts of Ohio State University, has determined that, if people have pronounced bodily asymmetry ( e.g. one foot broader than the other ) – they are more likely to be aggressive. . .
The study looked at 100 people ( average age 20.1 years – (code for students )) and provoked them by means of a cunning plan involving some wind-up phone calls. The researchers then measured how aggressive the students became. How ? By measuring how hard they slammed the phone down . . .
Previously, the scientists had charted each of the students for bodily asymmetry. This took into account wrist size, foot broadness, finger length etc etc.
The findings ? “ . . . the more asymmetry the participants showed in their body parts, the more force they used when hanging up the phone . . . “
And now to a possible explanation. The researchers reckon that, perhaps, bodily asymmetry might be a measure of stress during pregnancy. They reason that, the more perfectly a pregnancy progresses , the more likely the child will be perfectly symmetrical. The same stresses might also impact on the development of the central nervous system – and ‘impulse control’.
We wondered what Steve Jones, Professor of Genetics at University College London, would make of the work ?
Comment from Prof. Steve Jones :
In fact there is a mountain of this sort of stuff - particularly for facial asymmetry (my own, you may have noted, is pretty asymmetric). Search Google for that; and you might search Anders Moller, who seems to think that everything in the animal world has to do with what is technically called "fluctuating asymmetry".
You can read an abstract of the OSU study here, and subscribers to Interscience can read the whole lot :
http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/
________________
Continuing with the subject of bodily (im)perfection, we’re reminded
of those old composite photos which were all the rage in the early part of
the last century. Enthusiasts of human morphology would, for instance, go to
a prison and take 100 photos of the inmate’s faces. Then by some laborious ‘pre-Photoshop’ techniques,
they would overlay the shots to produce what they called ‘The Criminal
Face’ or ‘The Insane Face’ etc etc.
They reasoned that the photos showed that you could tell whether someone
was ‘dangerous’, or not, just by looking at them. Although thoroughly
unfashionable nowadays, those early studies are still having repercussions.
For instance with regard to ‘identity parades’ etc. - where observers
routinely pick out people ‘who just don’t look right’
see: http://eyewitnessconsortium.utep.edu/ (.pdf
file )
A pioneer of the early work was Francis Galton, who also published many letters and papers on the subject of Eugenics etc. It’s worth noting, that if he were publishing the same material today, he would without doubt be prosecuted under race-relations law – perhaps he should have included his own self-portrait in his composite-mugshot work ?
See: http://www.mugu.com/galton/index.html
SUV’s are slightly amusing.
If you’d like to be amused by a clown, follow this audio-link from the Sports Utility Vehicle Owners of America site. They’ve just launched a series of radio ads featuring ‘The Climate Clown’. The clown will be making jokes about legislation aimed at curbing SUV power ( and thus CO2 outputs ) It’s, well . . . real kooky ain’t it !
But who exactly are the SUVOA ? Well, according to their website
They are “a non-profit consumer organization dedicated to supporting the rights and serving the interests of SUV owners.”
Right . . .
Now it’s time for a game. It’s called ‘Follow The Trail’ . . .
For a head start, begin here :
with Strat@comm, a very $ubstantial Public Relations company. Would you believe it, but, when we tried to find out who their clients are, via this ‘portfolio’ page, the info was decidedly sparse – as in non existent. Nowadays, they seem a touch shy about revealing their clients for some reason.
Luckily though, those helpful people at Google have cached some old pages for us ! ( follow OurWork / Clients. Don’t hang about though, because those pages may well disappear p.d.q.)
The pages reveal that Stratacomm works ( or worked ) on behalf of Daimler Chrysler, Ford Motor Company, General Motors - and quite a few other high-profile motor-related outfits . . .
What are we driving at ?
The SUVOA website is registered to Stratacomm's office address in Washington DC. . . ooooops !
According to Associated Press, Stratacomm 'purchased' them two years ago . . .
That’s known as an Aha ! moment.
Game’s up ! Doh !
see:http://msnbc.msn.com/id/5839461/
Confusion on the increase.
Yesterday’s Guardian newspaper carried an interesting story about ‘population increase’ in the UK see:
http://society.guardian.co.uk/environment/
According to the piece, the UK’s population is set to rise , ( increase estimated at 4 Million in the next 20 years ) , which appears, from our point of view anyway, odd.
Mathematics has never been the magazine’s strong point, but it seems to us that the figures have all the solidity and credibility of one of those old Enron balance sheets. Here’s a few problems :
After a few hundred words explaining how the population is going up, we
come across the following sentence from a University College researcher
:
“ . . . given the below-replacement average family size chosen by women
in this country . . . “ Errrr . . . isn’t that a way of saying
that the population is decreasing ?
Perhaps it would be better to turn to the UK government’s own website where the some figures are laid out for all to see.
http://www.statistics.gov.uk/cci/nugget.asp?id=761
This page shows the graphs of births and deaths in the UK up to 2002. Curiously, the ‘birth’s’ graph (light blue) , which clearly shows a determinedly downward trend over the last 100 years, is mysteriously deflected from its course in the future projections, and levels off . . . Errrr, why’s that ?
Instead, have a look at this extrapolation which we've prepared from the offical figures . . .
Which would you put your money on ?
Now have a look at this page :
http://www.statistics.gov.uk/cci/nugget.asp?id=760
This graph, confusingly labeled ‘natural increase’ shows the variation (light blue) in population in the last ten years ( i.e. births v. deaths ). As we can see , the ‘increase’ is, in fact, decreasing - again, there’s absolutely no mistaking the way the graph is headed.
Of course there is another factor affecting a country’s population – how many come in and how many go out.
But these figures are always heavily ‘managed’ depending on the viewpoint of the body presenting the data. Politicians know that it’s a very highly emotionally charged subject – and so can be used to their advantage. Look in one direction and the figures are rising – ask someone else, and they’re going down.
Add into this the notorious and volatile ‘grey market’ for ‘illegal’ workers to which the Home Office traditionally turns a blind eye . . .
See: George Monbiot “Immigrants the rich love” http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/
And then there are the tens of thousands of UK citizens who ‘leave the country’ every year on a quasi-permanent basis. As soon as they get the chance. Where do these people show up in the graphs ?
Bearing all this in mind, how far can we trust the ‘official’ figures on ‘migration’ ?
All in all, the government’s public information sites might benefit
from one of those disclaimers so often found in corporate publications. Traditionally,
they are titled ‘Caution with Regard to Forward Looking Statements’ .
. . .
Don’t throw away your paper just yet.
New research from the University of Washington has come up with an interesting, though disturbing, finding . . .
The study focused on information storage – specifically on whether
it’s easier to keep track of info when stored on computer or paper.
Amazingly, or not, depending on your viewpoint, the research showed that
people trust computer-based info storage twice as much as paper. Trust in
the sense that they feel it’s easier to keep track of things. See:
http://www.uwnews.org/article.asp
There’s absolutely no doubt that it’s far quicker to find information on a computer-based system. But, unless we’ve missed it, the study didn’t take into account that day when you try to access your files and get a ‘disk error’ message.
A paper filing system is large, slow, cumbersome and prone to errors – but
it has a lifetime of at least 100 years - more if it’s looked after
properly. Odd bits go missing here and there, but the whole library doesn’t
just disappear one day without warning .
Ok, it can disappear if it burns down,
but the same applies to an office where a computer archive resides.
Whereas, in our experience, the lifetime of an average hard-drive is a couple of years or so. It works every single day, without the slightest hesitation or error – until it doesn’t.
And, on that day, there's a good chance you will permanently lose access to all your data.
There’s also a perception that CD and DVD backups are totally reliable. They’re not. Here’s a familiar story :
http://www.detnews.com/2004/techcolumns
Anyway, the university is determined to continue its studies. They have created a special department called “Keeping Found Things Found” , and they are constantly gleaning new details from sufferers computer users. You can even take part in an on-line survey if you wish, the current one is about Personal Information Management : See :
https://catalyst.washington.edu/webtools/
Oh, by the way, the following message appeared when we tried to access the Keeping
Found Things Found website . . . http://kftf.ischool.washington.edu/
Microsoft VBScript runtime error '800a0046' Permission denied /index.asp, line 71
Hard disk error maybe ?
NanoTech reality check
Nanotech is the next big thing, and it's 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,
advertising
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Editor's picksThe territoriality of park benches re-appraised using ANT
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