Rants, Raves, and Rhetoric v4 » Science

TED: When ideas have sex

Ezra S F — Thu, 15 Jul 2010 11:41:54 +0000

I don’t think I of myself as very intelligent. I think I’ve managed to have great conversations chock full of fantastic ideas with very intelligent people and discussed those ideas with others who refined them.

It hadn’t occurred to me it was the exchange of objects leads to specialization which leads to improvement of both objects and ideas as individuals attain expertise. It also means we as a society are all working for each other. We all depend on each other as we have reached the point where no one knows how to make everything in every day items we use.

The fewer people in the social network, the less exchange, the less specialization so isolation leads to regressions. So as we get better at communicating world wide and having global conversations, technology will increase at an even faster pace.

How well we communicate is more important than our individual intelligence.

Matt Ridley, author of The Rational Optimist.

Science of Motivation Animated

Ezra S F — Tue, 01 Jun 2010 21:52:29 +0000

Last year I posted a TED video by Daniel Pink on the science of motivation. This is the same talk but animated. I’d love to see more of these!

TED Talk: The Danger of Science Denial

Ezra S F — Fri, 16 Apr 2010 04:33:50 +0000

TED Talk: Every pollen grain has a story

Ezra S F — Thu, 08 Apr 2010 22:21:55 +0000

Given the local record pollen count level, I found this one interesting.

World Autism Awareness Day

Ezra S F — Fri, 02 Apr 2010 01:50:04 +0000

On December 18, 2007, the United Nations General Assembly adopted resolution 62/139… which declares April 2 as World Autism Awareness Day (WAAD) in perpetuity.

News last month about oxytocin helping autism patients’ socialization was quite intriguing. I hope research continues and helps as many as possible. Something so basic as a naturally produced hormone makes me wonder if early intervention could perhaps help? Oxytocin normally is produced through social contact. There are many reasons why someone might not produce enough.

Apparently the big thing this year is to wear blue? Okay. I’ll wear blue.

TED Talks: Epic Wins

Ezra S F — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 23:33:37 +0000

While I like video games and found Everything Bad Is Good for You: How Today’s Popular Culture Is Actually Making Us Smarter an entertaining ride, I am skeptical when people describe video games in all glowing terms. Like everything, they improve specific skills. Also people are attracted to games in which they have specific skills.

For instance, girls are said to be attracted to games which tell stories and can create their own story. This explains the female attraction to Final Fantasy series with its hours of video between minutes of play. As the stories got longer, my interest waned.

Using a game to solve the world’s problems reminds me of the Last Starfighter. If you need me to go blow up a space ship, then I’m your guy. Solving global warming is far, far down my list of interests.

Dunbar on Facebook

Ezra S F — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 02:17:11 +0000

You’ve read my previous posts on Dunbar‘s Number, right?

Go on…. I’ll wait.

Remember the one on Scoble and Facebook? Good. For a while, I fastidiously ensured my number of friends stayed below 150 because I took the idea of Dunbar’s number as a life strategy. Then I let it slip to 200 which I pared back down to 150. My laziness let it hit 500.

It appears Robin Dunbar is now studying Facebook users to see ‘if the “Facebook effect” has stretched the size of social groupings.’ He says despite the large number of friends people only interact with about 150 of them. Maybe like most of psychology, the subjects are college students who supposedly are almost all on Facebook. In the real world, most of the people with which I have regular interaction, exactly those Dunbar’s number covers, are not my Facebook friends.

My Facebook friends instead are my information buffet. Social networks are how we keep in touch with what is happening in the world. My information technology friends provide me what is happening in my career field. My photography friends provide me with useful tips for a big hobby. Also, the bigger our social network, the more opportunities for help from or being consequential strangers. Social networks are a strategy not a replication of the brain.

The term “friends” used by Facebook, I think, is a brilliant marketing ploy. People would much rather show up as my friend than my contact.

Ashley Merryman: On Parenting

Ezra S F — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 05:45:03 +0000

Cannot believe I have yet to read NurtureShock: New Thinking About Children! It looks to have all the things I love: scientific studies debunking common assumptions, policy, school programs, etc. At least it is already on the wishlist. Also, I follow NutureShock on Twitter. A list of articles on the topic.

The first part on praise is something I passed around to several people. My parents were pretty good about making me work hard on things I’d given up on doing because I didn’t succeed easily at first. Seems like it would difficult for a parent to be disciplined not to ever praise innate qualities, so maybe it is okay once in a while?

The latter part of this on kids and sleep deprivation is interesting. I knew sleep really helped the brain. More than just the capability of male fruit flies to breed. For example, very tired people have worse trouble driving than those who are intoxicated on alcohol. It hadn’t occurred to me sleep deprivation would have consequences to learning.

Ashley Merryman: On Parenting from PopTech on Vimeo.

Self-Reporting

Ezra S F — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 11:05:49 +0000

When I read something like this, I start to question the validity of the method.

Psychologist Sam Gosling analyzed the Facebook profiles of 236 college-aged people, who were also asked to fill out personality questionnaires… surveys that were designed to assess not only how study participants viewed themselves in reality, but also what their personalities would be like if they had all of their ideal traits.
The Psychology of Facebook Profiles | TIME

The better experiment here is to have half the participants maintain a normal Facebook profile. The other half would create a profile demonstrating their ideal self. Then compare those against the Big Five questionnaire looking at both. The list of personality traits in the article “openness, agreeableness, conscientiousness, extraversion and neuroticism” gives away the test used despite not explicitly named. Of course, I’m no fan of the Big Five.

Should the results match you can say Facebook reveals whatever the Big Five measures. However, I’d be uncomfortable saying any instrument measuring self-reported information accurately reflected anything about a person’s real personality.

Passing the Sniff Test

Ezra S F — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 04:01:43 +0000

I found a discussion over brunch entertaining.

Apparently women sniffed teeshirts worn 2 days by males. Women preferred the shirts belonging to genetically dissimilar men. These are the good men because they ensure better MHCs in offspring. Unfortunately, the women on oral contraceptives preferred genetically similar men. Yeah. The latter women would prefer their brother, son, or father (all sharing 1/2 her genes) to any other men. The feared scenario is women marry men satisfying their preference for genetically similar men and in preparing to have children suddenly find their husbands revolting.

Our mothers were on to something when told us to always smell nice. Preventing women on birth control from smelling who we really keeps us from getting judged down inappropriately. Well, really the game we play is not letting the other side have too much information.

P.S. The same study almost found significance to single women preferring genetically similar men. That really would make news.

TED: Stroke of Insight

Ezra S F — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 05:00:40 +0000

The first couple TED videos I watched didn’t impress me. A few weeks later, I saw this post from Sam about the top 10 TED videos. Sam is one of those people who reserves good for the truly special so I made sure to watch them. This video was the first on that list and occupied me as I watched it about once a day for a week. (Admittedly I didn’t get around to it until a few months later.)

B&N suckered me into buying the book My Stroke of Insight by setting up a table for interesting topics. Smart because I nearly dropped a couple hundred dollars that day. Anyway, I gave it as gift to Mom. Family conversations and book gifts about random miscellaneous topics is why I blabber so much about random miscellaneous information. No, I had not read it before I gifted it. So… Now I am reading it. I do like the book.

Alexis told me she knows someone else who is reading it. She has exams so I recommended she at least watch this video. I figure the invitation should be more global.

I’m kind of hoping to have a stroke now.

TED Talks: Is Play More Than Fun?

Ezra S F — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 23:02:59 +0000

In the Q&A, Stuart Brown, co-author of Play: How It Shapes the Brain, Opens the
Imagination, and Invigorates the Soul, rejects the idea play is a rehersal for adulthood. Stopping an animal from playing doesn’t prevent the animal from being a successful predator. REM sleep provides the rehearsal needed for learning. Play is the next evolutionary step. The video is a little too heavy on repeating the same generic idea over an over with different examples. However, they are amusing examples.

The types of play Brown references usually involves multiple individuals in a social interaction. This play teaches survival skills like socialization, adaptation, flexibility (our selfish genes at work).

The origin of this play research was in identifying the next Charles Whitmore, the University of Texas Tower sniper. In studying mass murderers, he found Charles and others like him consistently grew up in environments where play was not allowed. By not playing these children developed into dysfunctional adults.

I found a particular claim quite interesting. “The opposite of play is not work… It is depression.” That is almost word for word out of his book on page 126, which Google Books has a copy. Later he better explains the part about play and work are not in opposition:

The quality that work and play have in common is creativity. In both we are building our world, creating new relationships, neural connections, objects…. At their best, play and work, when integrated, make sense of our workd and ourselves. (Play, p.127)

This agrees with Adam and Jamie from the Mythbusters to Moira Gunn for the Commonwealth Cluf of California about their work. Just look at Adam’s face before triggering a test on any episode. The complete and total joy is a testament to the power of dopamine.

I think the opposition to depression involves movement which is exercise. Exercise produces serotonin which is crucial to fighting off depression. So my work, sitting in a cube all day long problem solving is good for dopamine but not a producer of serotonin. However, a good game of tag would produce both dopamine in anticipating tagging a playmate and serotonin from the movement. (Why can’t work be more like tag?)

If Dr. Brown is right, then suppressing the rough and tumble playing children enjoy is the best way to place in society malfunctioning adults who are more likely to be violent. Things like recess (just half an hour) during the day will keep our prisons less full 20 years later. Maybe the No Child Left Behind meant all the children will end up in prison? More likely children will fit their play in less supervised situations and get their fill.

TED Talks: Dan Pink on the surprising science of motivation

Ezra S F — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 07:05:34 +0000

I was attracted to this video because a while ago I read Daniel’s book: A Whole New Mind. Take the concept that simple, clearly defined jobs will move to overseas. So to succeed in the United States, children need to be learning conceptual skills and become the people inventing the work doled out to overseas workers. Let’s ignore that overseas workers are more than capable of conceptual work like our kids.

The pervasiveness of functional fixedness perhaps explains why I have a job. (That and I’m not a gestault pscychologist.) The web comic xkcd recently posted a flowchart on how to become a computer expert where the pick one at random is overcoming functional fixedness. Much of what I do is figuring out non-intuitive issues and document a way to make it work aka a workaround.

I like his list of what economists say are good motivators to replace monetary incentives. The opportunity to get incentives like these drew me to this project. Of course, we don’t have the levels of autonomy Pink describes. Baby steps! Can you see your employer allowing the employees to spend one day a year working on whatever the employees wish to deliver a new product? Some autonomy in a group I work with here resulted in Yaketystats.

Autonomy
Mastery
Purpose

My favorite quote:

Traditional notions of management work great when you want compliance. If you want engagement, self-direction works better.

So this video is why this week I’ve been talking about how compliance sucks. :)

LMS in a Pandemic

Ezra S F — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 22:36:48 +0000

As we head into the new school year across the United States, medical officals are warning about higher than normal numbers of young people with the flu. The Center for Disease Control (CDC) says this about H1N1, “Current visits to doctors for influenza-like illness are down from April, but are higher than what is expected in the summer.” Yesterday the CDC released Guidance for Responses to Influenza for Institutions of Higher Education during the 2009-2010 Academic Year.

Review and revise, as needed, policies, such as student absenteeism policies and sick leave policies for faculty and staff, that make it difficult for students, faculty, and staff to stay home when they are ill or to care for an ill family member. Do not require a doctor’s note to confirm illness or recovery.

Some faculty use online learning systems to provide notes to students so students can concentrate on the lecture or discussion rather than furious copy the blackboard or projection. The minority place all the information from lectures and slides online so students don’t get too far behind if they miss a class. If entire faculties did this for all the lectures, then students with the flu could stay home in isolation withouth much ill effect this flu season.

Of course, working to place all this material online is a ton of work to place on the shoulders of the faculty.

Also it would be an enormous weight on the shoulders of my colleagues who manage our storage. I would find it unlikely we host more than 1/5 of their classes.

Photo: My mother demonstrating how she spends time outside during fire season. Nothing to do with the flu except some people cover their mouth and nose to protect themselves.

TED Talks: Social Bacteria

Ezra S F — Sun, 23 Aug 2009 14:06:58 +0000

We have 10x bacteria cells on or in our bodies as human cells. By far most of those protect us. Soap which kills 99% of bacteria kills both the good and the bad. This video by far gives an idea as to how cool bacteria can be.

Bonnie Bassler here says bacteria use produce chemicals which attach to receptors to communicate with each other to know when they have enough presence to do their joint action called quorum sensing. The human brain acts similarly. Vasopressin, oxytocin, dopamine, adrenaline, cortisol, etc. all influence brain cells with the right receptors. Really most if not all human cells are operate in unison by chemicals attaching to receptors. Of course, our cells are super-specialized descendants of bacteria, so why not use a known efficient communication method?

It seems like bacteria intending to attack a human would have been selected for two contradictory points:

Large enough numbers to overwhelm the body.
Small enough numbers to prevent white blood adapting and increasing their own numbers to fight off the infection.

Interrupting the quorum sensing used by bacteria to delay the attacks ought to violate that second selection point. If so, then this might create selection pressure for bacteria which launch their attacks with smaller numbers. This might be even better for us?

I also like how she gave credit to her team of people who did the real work.

Dangers of Serotonin

Ezra S F — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 02:16:28 +0000

He’s associated damage to the temporal lobe with psychopathic killers. The epigenetic effects, brain damage, and environments appears to be an MAOA variant on the X chromosome with experiencing violence around 3 years old.

Males only get the X from their mother. Men are much more likely. Girls get one X from mother and one from father which dilutes. Bathing the brain in serotonin too early makes the brain insensitive to the calming serotonin later.

Interesting.

TED Jim Fallon: Exploring the mind of a killer

Cosmological Constants

Ezra S F — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 02:16:46 +0000

Guess I am pretty dense. As many books and TV shows as I have read or seen about Einstein, physics, and cosmology, I just understood something for the first time since it was extremely plainly laid out for me. An ever expanding universe requires one or more forces to push matter further apart: cosmological constant. Forces attract or repel. Gravity attracts matter. Yet there is something, still unknown, repelling matter.

TED Talks: Robert Full: Learning from the gecko’s tail

Ezra S F — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 11:02:53 +0000

I enjoyed the slow motion action shots of the geckos.

Little Changes

Ezra S F — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 01:48:39 +0000

Flipping channels, I ran across Deep Impact during a speech given by the president (played by Morgan Freeman).

The black president didn’t amaze me. Hollywood figured out how to portray them a decade before the US figured out how to elect one.

What amazed me is that with all the really cool forward looking technology for the time, instructions for how to communicate the evacuation was sent by fax to news agencies. Yeah, it wasn’t emailed. The White House didn’t post it on a web site. No mention of Facebook.

Is NASA powering landing craft with nuclear drives?

At least since this movie aired we have implemented programs to discover both the large and medium objects capable of regional to global catastrophes.

We still need a plan to do something about the ones we anticipate will hit us. Or how about a plan to save our legacies? (The children, art, history)

TED Talk: Pandemics

Ezra S F — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 18:58:29 +0000

TED Prize wish: Help stop the next pandemic by Larry Brilliant

What can we learn from the 1918 flu? by Laurie Garrett

My favorite part is that only 20% of Tamiflu is used by human bodies. The rest goes back into the ecosystem where waterfowl who can spread flu end up breeding resistant strains. Ouch.

Rants, Raves, and Rhetoric v4 » Science

TED: When ideas have sex

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