Science and the National Science Foundation announced the winners of the fourth annual Science and Engineering Visualization Challenge.

The winning illustration displays five well-known mathematical surfaces that exist only in the abstract. It was created using a 3D-rendering program.

Posted by Cynosarges at 9:41 AM | Permalink | Backtalk

Apparently beauty basically depends on what you've been exposed to and what is therefore easy on your mind, or so says Piotr Winkielman, of the University of California, San Diego.

What a grand statement. And how did the esteemed doctor arrive at the dramatic conclusions? Random-dot and geometric pattern experiments. Wonderful. While his conclusions seem reasonable, the "experiment" relies heavily on the participant's subjective rating of "attractiveness" of an object - which could easily be skewed based on the images shown. "As predicted," the researchers write, "participants categorized patterns more quickly and judged them as more attractive when the patterns were closer to their respective prototypes."

Jump three suppositions ahead and you get "This ...," he said, "accounts for cultural differences in beauty -- and historical differences in beauty as well -- because beauty basically depends on what you've been exposed to and what is therefore easy on your mind."

Huh?

I think the only conclusion that can be reached from this social experiment is that the brain finds recognizable patterns more appealing (I don't think I've ever used the word "attractive" to describe random dot patterns). To leap ahead and make irresponsible assertations without direct proof is asinine.

For example - we've all heard of or experienced the "fact" that many men marry a woman that either looks like, or displays qualities possessed by the man's mother. Couple that with the fact that most men are exposed to their mothers (sorry, no orphans in this study) more than anyone else in their lives - remember the doctor said "beauty basically depends on what you've been exposed to and what is therefore easy on your mind".

The conclusion?

Freud was right! Most men have an oedipal complex.

Me thinks the good doctor is trying to validate Freudian analysis (because he studied it in PSY102) because he is trying desperately to find the reason why he got a boner in the shower once while thinking about his mother.

Posted by Cynosarges at 6:57 AM | Permalink | Backtalk

Is it just me, or are doctors and scientists getting a little too specialized ?

Maybe some conscilience between disciplines would be he'pful.

Posted by Cynosarges at 6:50 AM | Permalink | Backtalk

Injured dolphin may get prosthetic tail

A team of more than 150 volunteers and veterinarians spent months nursing Winter (the dolphin's "name") back to health.

Estimated cost for the prosthetic tail? Well over $100,000.

Morons.

Volunteer to help people or save the planet. Give the money to feed some hungry kids. Better yet, feed the dolphin to the hungry kids and give me the money.

Posted by Cynosarges at 9:16 AM | Permalink | Backtalk

'Natural Male Enhancement' Company Owner Indicted on Fraud.

CINCINNATI — The maker of dietary supplements that claim to improve everything from sexuality to memory defrauded thousands of customers and banks of at least $100 million, federal authorities say.

Warshak, who has 107 counts against him, denies the accusations and will continue to operate the company, his attorney said Thursday.

The company, which recently said it has 5 million customers worldwide, is known for its "Smiling Bob" ads that depict a man whose life gets better after he uses the company's Enzyte for "natural male enhancement." The company markets nationally a variety of other products claiming to help everything from night vision to memory to female libido.

Surprise surprise surprise - penis enhancement drugs (PEDs) don't work (unfortunately is not a muscle so daily exercise doesn't work either). There always seems to be a large group of people always willing - if not eager - to set aside reason on the hope of some 'miracle cure' result. Mix in some good (and admittedly funny) advertising and watch the profits grow. One needs only to look at the multi-billion $$ vitamin and dietary supplement industry to see this.

Unfortunately this company didn't just sell PEDs, he also sold other 'drugs' claiming to reduce the risks of prostate cancer and heart attack (oddly the same 'drug' does both). Obviously dangerous to someone that may gain a false sense of security about their health and forego more traditional means of staying healthy- like diet and exercise. And this company is only one of many. These types of products have been around forever - we called them snake oil last century.

We seem to have developed an overconfidence in our collective medical abilities - constantly believing in "cure-all" claims or the "just take this pill and you'll be alright" mode of thinking. Our doctors don't help by over-prescribing antibiotics and painkillers everytime a child sniffles or a back aches, or by labeling every high-strung person with Attention Deficit Disorder - maybe its just Restless Leg Syndrome - and then proceeding to alter their brain chemistry with drugs like Strattera, etc. There must be some anthropological root for this behavior, this meme.

Granted there are many significantly helpful drugs out there (remember good ole aspirin?), but people need to realize there is no "cure all" for every malady. I find it particularly appalling that doctors wantonly prescribe brain-chemistry altering drugs and yet have little or no knowledge as to what these things really do to a human brain. To me it is the equivalent to "leeching" a patient to get rid of "bad blood". (When I need to get some major plumbing done to my house, I usually call an experienced plumber - someone with lots of experience and knowledge - to do the job. They don't need to have a degree in fluid mechanics, but they certainly need to know what the wrench is for).

How can I make the claim that doctors don't know anything about the brain? They are our most educated group of individuals in our society, right? Well ask one - or many - how the brain works. You'll receive a different answer from each doctor. Sure they can vaguely name off some brain regions and what they "do", but no one has any real idea how neural processes in the brain actually produce the effects we experience. They can't even agree on a standardized definition of these neural processes. They can, however, tell you what the direct effect of taking their drugs is - after all, they have clinical studies to prove it. Thanks, but no thanks. They don't know nearly enough yet for me to have any confidence in their pharmaceutical recommendations.

There are some great (and not-so-great) theories on the brain and the mind (sorry for the horrible segway). Over the coming months I will share some of them as well as my own theories on the matter - which is so deceptively simple, it may just be true.

Posted by Cynosarges at 6:54 AM | Permalink | Backtalk

A recent article on CNN claims "Last cavemen were survivors"

I know this is a semantic issue, but please please PLEASE try to make sense with your headlines (at least the ones not on the Entertainment pages) .

The last cavemen died.

They were not survivors.

Otherwise the headline would read "Last Homo sapiens were survivors"

Posted by Cynosarges at 7:37 AM | Permalink | Backtalk

Congrats crew of Atlantis!

Am I the only person that still thinks going into and returning from space is still amazing?

In other Shuttle news, looks like NASA is sending a Nigerian teenager onto a zero-gravity flight. Kudos to NASA ! But if the money you spend on this were instead spent on a school for the kids in her village, wouldn't that be better in the long run? The PR just isn't as sexy I guess.

And why haven't I seen any offers to send up my kid? Guess I'll have to move to a third world country and apply.

Posted by Cynosarges at 7:26 AM | Permalink | Backtalk

CAMBRIDGE, Mass., Sept. 20 (UPI) -- U.S. scientists at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology are starting a project to better understand how to best tackle the world's looming energy crisis.

All I can say is... Its about time. Apparantly the energy crisis is a new topic, otherwise MIT may have wanted to look at it, I don't know, back in the 70's. But, better late than never.

Lets hope the energy solutions the eggheads come up with can be used outside the annual MIT robot competition .

Posted by Cynosarges at 7:13 AM | Permalink | Backtalk

Found this nugget tucked away on Foxnews.com.

Most of the federal scientists who improperly accepted personal money from drug or biotechnology companies walked away with reprimands or were allowed to retire unscathed.

NIH workers are goverment workers (I am friends with several) and cannot recieve money from private firms. They also recieve goverment salaries, which I am sure, is no where near the rate-of-pay they would receive in the private sector.

Its a double-edged sword. Without impartial government research, which tends to be more purely scientific in nature (i.e. science for the sake of science) , all of us suffer. Much of the research done at NIH may not have any immediate intrinsic value (e.g. drug sales) but it is still vital and necessary research.

While private research is equally important, private firms are in it for results : results = money (nothing wrong with a bit of capitalism). But the lure of big money from private or commercial firms surely takes its toll on the scientists and their desire to increase their standard of living.

But it still makes me wonder about the impartiality of the science - especially when BIG money is on the line.

Posted by Cynosarges at 12:17 PM | Permalink | Backtalk

We'll start off with an easy one today to illustrate the total disregard for the scientific method that is so prevalent in today's "science".

This one comes from ScienceDaily . Apparently we shouldn't wear our helmets when riding a bicycle - nevermind the $50 ticket - it may be hazardous to our health! How, do you ask, was this conclusion drawn? Let's take a look at the "research"...

Dr Ian Walker, a traffic psychologist (traffic psychologist ??) from the University of Bath, used a bicycle fitted with a computer and an ultrasonic distance sensor to record data from over 2,500 overtaking motorists in Salisbury and Bristol.

He found that drivers were as much as twice as likely to get particularly close to the bicycle when he was wearing the helmet.

Across the board, drivers passed an average of 8.5 cm (3 1/3 inches) closer with the helmet than without.

And the conclusions drawn from this rigorous experimentation?

"This study suggests wearing a helmet might make a collision more likely in the first place.

It shows that when drivers overtake a cyclist, the margin for error they leave is affected by the cyclist’s appearance.

By leaving the cyclist less room, drivers reduce the safety margin that cyclists need to deal with obstacles in the road... as well as the margin for error in their judgments."

What?? Supposition + Supposition + Supposition = Fact ??

Dr Walker suggests the reason drivers give less room to cyclists wearing helmets is down to how cyclists are perceived as a group. “We know from research that many drivers see cyclists as a separate subculture, to which they don’t belong.”

Dr. Walker's degree in a fringe, pseudo field come into play...

“As a result they hold stereotyped ideas about cyclists, often judging all riders by the yardstick of the lycra-clad street-warrior.

“This may lead drivers to believe cyclists with helmets are more serious, experienced and predictable than those without.

“The idea that helmeted cyclists are more experienced and less likely to do something unexpected would explain why drivers leave less space when passing.

“In reality, there is no real reason to believe someone with a helmet is any more experienced than someone without.

He suggests communication is the answer...

“The best answer is for different types of road user to understand each other better. Most adult cyclists know what it is like to drive a car, but relatively few motorists ride bicycles in traffic, and so don’t know the issues cyclists face.

“There should definitely be more information on the needs of other road users when people learn to drive, and practical experience would be even better.

“When people try cycling, they nearly always say it changes the way they treat other road users when they get back in their cars.”

Yet even more conclusions can be drawn...

The study also found that large vehicles, such as buses and trucks, passed considerably closer when overtaking cyclists than cars. The average car passed 1.33 metres (4.4 feet) away from the bicycle, whereas the average truck got 19 centimetres (7.5 inches) closer and the average bus 23 centimetres (9 inches) closer. However, there was no evidence of 4x4s (SUVs) getting any closer than ordinary cars.

Previously reported research from the project showed that drivers of white vans overtake cyclists an average 10 centimetres (4 inches) closer than car drivers.

Leading to yet another "experiment"...

To test another theory, Dr Walker donned a long wig to see whether there was any difference in passing distance when drivers thought they were overtaking what appeared to be a female cyclist. Whilst wearing the wig, drivers gave him an average of 14 centimetres (5.5 inches) more space when passing.

Maybe they just thought is was a strange guy in a wig... Maybe the drivers wanted to avoid explaining an accident with a transvestite hooker...

In future research, Dr Walker hopes to discover whether this was because female riders are seen as less predictable than male riders, or because women are not seen riding bicycles as often as men on the UK’s roads.

Even to me that seems a bit chauvinistic...

It seems Dr. Walker is more interested in job security than science. He has more "experiments" planned and will no doubt author the government pamphlets to communicate to car drivers the need to be mindful of the psychology of a bicyclist.

The Doctor claims drivers not only behave differently around bicyclists, but differently to bicyclists wearing helmets and those without. Where does this "hard data" come from. Thin air. Even in a court of law a witness cannot testify to what someone was thinking. I would hope scientific research is a bit more rigorous than our justice system in determining facts.

If we look at the scientific method we see it was not followed - he must have the "Cliff Notes" version. I won't get into all the details of the scientific method but the highlights are Observation, Description, Prediction. Control, and Falsifiability (or the elimination of plausible alternatives). Did the Doctor monitor the driving habits of people in the same location when no bicyclist was around? Or if a pedestrian was around?

What the good Doctor did was a Field Experiment - which are notoriously subjective and in the field of social sciences, nearly impossible to corroberate. There was no control in this experiment, and too many variables were involved. It is therefore a quasi-experiment and not subject to empirical methodology. The conclusions drawn from such quasi-experiments cannot be verified and are totally subjective, effectively rendering them useless.

Let's see some more science in your method doctor before you publish such an outlandish claim. And ScienceDaily - shame on you for putting this on your site.

Doctor Walker's research has been accepted for publication in the journal Accident Analysis & Prevention which is available to you at the low annual rate of $1,485.26.

Posted by Cynosarges at 8:05 AM | Permalink | Backtalk

Dark matter, human consciousness, the human brain, global warming, religion, evolution and creationism. What do these topics have in common? All have a prescribed set of current theories or beliefs. All are derived from insufficient data - they are incomplete. Many are lacking any empirical data at all while some are just widely held beliefs, myths and superstitions.

We have been told ad nauseum that these topics are "theories" or "laws" or "truths". These assertations have become memes and are now unquestioned. They are also inaccurate. A few definitions are in order to clarify the scientific terminology.

Idea - any conception existing in the mind as a result of mental understanding, awareness, or activity.

Concept - an idea of something formed by mentally combining all its characteristics or particulars; a construct.

Belief - confidence in the truth or existence of something not immediately susceptible to rigorous proof

Scientific Theory - a coherent explanation for a large number of facts and observations about the natural world. A theory is Internally consistent and compatible with the evidence, firmly grounded in and based upon evidence, tested against a wide range of phenomena, and demonstrably effective in problem-solving

Scientific Hypothesis - an idea or proposition that can be tested by observations or experiments, about the natural world. In order to be considered scientific, hypotheses are subject to scientific evaluation and must be falsifiable, which means that they are worded in such a way that they can be proven to be incorrect.

Scientific Law - a description of a natural phenomenon or principle that invariably holds true under specific conditions and will occur under certain circumstances.

Some of the afformentioned "theories" are more complete than others, while some are non-scientific in nature, the end result in the media is the same - exaggerated claims as to the validity of the "theories". The media continually spouts headline after headline claiming some miraculous scientific "discovery" has been "verified" thus "proving" Theory A to be "correct". Many of these claims are derived from a "house-of-cards" mindset in which the deductions derived from the new data come from other equally precarious deductions - one stacked on top of the other requiring only a modest breeze of truth to topple them. Sometimes the new "discoveries" are derived from flimsy, even shoddy, experimental data that has little, if any, relation to the topic at hand. Some "discoveries" are biased by the scientists or the scientific publishers themselves, whether it be for capitalistic, political, or theological reasons. Whatever the reason, a lot of misleading (if not totally false) information is being spoon fed to the masses (read "to me and you"), while at the same time other, more legitimate "discoveries" are overlooked or ignored out of fear or ignorance.

Equally disturbing are religious claims. I find it difficult to accept any current prescribed doctrine religious dogma although I consider myself a spiritual person. I have my own beliefs on the afterlife and a supreme being. Books written thousands of years ago, by men more intellectually primitive than now, hold no sway over my current thinking.

To that point, many mathematical and scientific books were also written over the centuries. Most, if not all have been updated, ammended, or replaced with better, more accurate information and ideas as our collective knowledge grows. It seems a bit presumptuous and arrogant to think that ancient man got religion 100% correct the very first time it was conceived. Sadly, I do not have that much faith in my ancestors or their beliefs.

Hence the creation of Altar of Stone - A forum to openly discuss new ideas and current scientific, religious, philosophical theories and claims. Hopefully without the venom from people who are either too afraid or are just unable to think beyond themselves.

Posted by Cynosarges at 10:20 AM | Permalink | Backtalk