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NeuroLogica Blog
Using AI for Neuroforecasting I’ve been following AI (artificial intelligence) news very closely, including all the controversies...
a year ago
34
a year ago
I’ve been following AI (artificial intelligence) news very closely, including all the controversies and concerns. I tend to fall on the side of – AI is a powerful tool, we should continue to develop it and use it responsibly. We don’t need to panic, and highly restrictive laws...
Quantum Frontiers
Finding Ed Jaynes’s ghost You might have heard of the conundrum “What do you give the man who has everything?” I discovered a...
2 months ago
50
2 months ago
You might have heard of the conundrum “What do you give the man who has everything?” I discovered a variation on it last October: how do you celebrate the man who studied (nearly) everything? Physicist Edwin Thompson Jaynes impacted disciplines from quantum information theory to...
NeuroLogica Blog
Tandem Perovskite Silicon Solar Panels Are Coming It’s pretty clear that we are at an inflection point with adoption of solar power. For the last 18...
a year ago
14
a year ago
It’s pretty clear that we are at an inflection point with adoption of solar power. For the last 18 years in a row, solar PV electricity capacity has increased more (as a percentage increase) than any power source. Solar now accounts for 4.5% of global power generation. Wind...
nanoscale views
Recent papers to distract.... Time for blogging has continued to be scarce, but here are a few papers to distract (and for readers...
4 months ago
3
4 months ago
Time for blogging has continued to be scarce, but here are a few papers to distract (and for readers who are US citizens:  vote if you have not already done so!). Reaching back, this preprint by Aharonov, Collins, Popescu talks about a thought experiment in which angular...
Willem Pennings
Home Assistant-compatible air quality sensor I recently moved and our new home is equipped with a ventilation system that distributes fresh...
over a year ago
16
over a year ago
I recently moved and our new home is equipped with a ventilation system that distributes fresh (outside) air through the house and recoups heat from the air that is exhausted. There is a problem with this system, though. Sometimes, for example when a neighbour lights their wood...
Math Is Still...
Physicists Observe ‘Unobservable’ Quantum Phase Transition Measurement and entanglement both have a “spooky” nonlocal flavor to them. Now physicists are...
a year ago
15
a year ago
Measurement and entanglement both have a “spooky” nonlocal flavor to them. Now physicists are harnessing that nonlocality to probe the spread of quantum information and control it. The post Physicists Observe ‘Unobservable’ Quantum Phase Transition first appeared on...
Eukaryote Writes...
A point of clarification on infohazard terminology “Infohazard” means any kind of information that could be harmful in some fashion. Let’s use “memetic...
over a year ago
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over a year ago
“Infohazard” means any kind of information that could be harmful in some fashion. Let’s use “memetic hazard” to describe information that could specifically harm the person who knows it.
Drew Ex Machina
Recollections of NASA’s Apollo 11 Mission Like a lot of kids who grew up during the ‘60s and ‘70s, I had a fascination with spaceflight. This...
7 months ago
65
7 months ago
Like a lot of kids who grew up during the ‘60s and ‘70s, I had a fascination with spaceflight. This interest started honestly enough back around […]
Blog - Practical...
Why are the Dutch So Famous for Waterworks? [Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] This is the Veluwemeer...
a month ago
34
a month ago
[Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] This is the Veluwemeer (velOOwemeer) Aqueduct in Harderwijk (HAR-der-vehk), Netherlands. It solves a pretty simple problem. If you put a bridge for vehicles over a navigable waterway, you often have to make it...
The Roots of...
Quote quiz: “drifting into dependence” Quote quiz: who said this? (No fair looking it up). I have modified the original quotation slightly,...
a year ago
71
a year ago
Quote quiz: who said this? (No fair looking it up). I have modified the original quotation slightly, by making a handful of word substitutions to bring it up to date: It might be argued that the human race would never be foolish enough to hand over all power to AI. But we are...
NeuroLogica Blog
3D Printed Rocket Launches This is one of those technology news stories where the implications of the technology is greater...
a year ago
37
a year ago
This is one of those technology news stories where the implications of the technology is greater than the thing itself. Relativity Space, a rocket company based in California, launched their first Terran-1 rocket. The launch ultimately failed when the second stage failed to...
Willem Pennings
ClockSquared improvements My ClockSquared project has a long history – it goes all the way back to 2015, when it was simply...
over a year ago
19
over a year ago
My ClockSquared project has a long history – it goes all the way back to 2015, when it was simply called the “Birthday word clock”. I haven’t spent much time on the project in recent years, but I’ve upgraded the internals a while ago and finally felt like writing a post about it....
Many Worlds
Webb Telescope Finds No Signs of a Thick Atmosphere Around a Second TRAPPIST-1 Planet Among the most eagerly awaited results from the early observations of the James Webb Space Telescope...
a year ago
16
a year ago
Among the most eagerly awaited results from the early observations of the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) is whether or not the seven rocky planets of the TRAPPIST-1 system have atmospheres. The TRAPPIST-1 planets are close to us (40 light-years away), are all solid rather than...
Math Is Still...
In a ‘Dark Dimension,’ Physicists Search for the Universe’s Missing Matter An idea derived from string theory suggests that dark matter is hiding in a (relatively) large extra...
a year ago
49
a year ago
An idea derived from string theory suggests that dark matter is hiding in a (relatively) large extra dimension. The theory makes testable predictions that physicists are investigating now. The post In a ‘Dark Dimension,’ Physicists Search for the Universe’s Missing...
Math Is Still...
Merging Fields, Mathematicians Go the Distance On Old Problem Mathematicians have illuminated what sets of points can look like if the distances between them are...
11 months ago
75
11 months ago
Mathematicians have illuminated what sets of points can look like if the distances between them are all whole numbers. The post Merging Fields, Mathematicians Go the Distance On Old Problem first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Math Is Still...
The Mathematician Who Sculpted the Shape of Space Eugenio Calabi, who died on September 25, conceived of novel geometric objects that later became...
a year ago
33
a year ago
Eugenio Calabi, who died on September 25, conceived of novel geometric objects that later became fundamental to string theory. The post The Mathematician Who Sculpted the Shape of Space first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Math Is Still...
‘A-Team’ of Math Proves a Critical Link Between Addition and Sets A team of four prominent mathematicians, including two Fields medalists, proved a conjecture...
a year ago
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a year ago
A team of four prominent mathematicians, including two Fields medalists, proved a conjecture described as a “holy grail of additive combinatorics.” The post ‘A-Team’ of Math Proves a Critical Link Between Addition and Sets first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Math Is Still...
New Proof Finds the ‘Ultimate Instability’ in a Solar System Model For the first time, mathematicians have proved that planetary orbits in a solar system will always...
a year ago
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a year ago
For the first time, mathematicians have proved that planetary orbits in a solar system will always be unstable. The post New Proof Finds the ‘Ultimate Instability’ in a Solar System Model first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Math Is Still...
Big Advance on Simple-Sounding Math Problem Was a Century in the Making A new proof about prime numbers illuminates the subtle relationship between addition and...
4 months ago
58
4 months ago
A new proof about prime numbers illuminates the subtle relationship between addition and multiplication — and raises hopes for progress on the famous abc conjecture. The post Big Advance on Simple-Sounding Math Problem Was a Century in the Making first appeared on...
Probably...
Smoking Causes Cancer In the preface of Probably Overthinking It, I wrote: Sometimes interpreting data is easy. For...
a year ago
39
a year ago
In the preface of Probably Overthinking It, I wrote: Sometimes interpreting data is easy. For example, one of the reasons we know that smoking causes lung cancer is that when only 20% of the population smoked, 80% of people with lung cancer were smokers. If you are a doctor who...
Melting Asphalt
2015 Meta Time for my annual blogging review. And only 11 days late! I'll keep it brief. Blog stats I...
over a year ago
18
over a year ago
Time for my annual blogging review. And only 11 days late! I'll keep it brief. Blog stats I published a paltry six full essays this year. Don't get me wrong: I'm proud of them. But still, six. It would be… Read more ›
Willem Pennings
Balancing cube This cube manages to balance itself on a corner, and can simultaneously rotate around its axis in a...
a year ago
26
a year ago
This cube manages to balance itself on a corner, and can simultaneously rotate around its axis in a controlled manner. It does so using clever controls and a set of three reaction wheels. The original idea for this device comes from researchers at ETH Zürich, who demonstrate...
brr
The Beer Can Connecting old and new.
a year ago
Cremieux Recueil
The Value of Foreign Diplomas Is that immigrant high-skilled or do they just have a fancy degree?
a month ago
NeuroLogica Blog
Clickbait and Misinformation Which is worse – clickbaity headlines for news articles that are factually correct, but may be...
9 months ago
68
9 months ago
Which is worse – clickbaity headlines for news articles that are factually correct, but may be playing up a sensational angle, or straight-up misinformation? It depends on what you mean by “worse”. A new study tries to address this information, with some interesting findings....
Math Is Still...
If the Universe Is a Hologram, This Long-Forgotten Math Could Decode It A 1930s-era breakthrough is helping physicists understand how quantum threads could weave together...
5 months ago
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5 months ago
A 1930s-era breakthrough is helping physicists understand how quantum threads could weave together into a holographic space-time fabric. The post If the Universe Is a Hologram, This Long-Forgotten Math Could Decode It first appeared on Quanta Magazine
The Works in...
How to start an advance market commitment A practical guide from the founders of Frontier
9 months ago
Quantum Frontiers
My experimental adventures in quantum thermodynamics Imagine a billiard ball bouncing around on a pool table. High-school level physics enables us to...
11 months ago
87
11 months ago
Imagine a billiard ball bouncing around on a pool table. High-school level physics enables us to predict its motion until the end of time using simple equations for energy and momentum conservation, as long as you know the initial conditions … Continue reading →
Blog - Practical...
How Railroad Crossings Work [Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] If you’ve ever ridden a bike,...
a year ago
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a year ago
[Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] If you’ve ever ridden a bike, driven a car, or operated pretty much any other vehicle on earth, there’s a fact you’ve probably taken for granted: you can see farther than it takes to stop. Within the span...
nanoscale views
Some updates on the NSF and related issues Non-blog life has been very busy, and events have been changing rapidly, but I thought it would be a...
a week ago
7
a week ago
Non-blog life has been very busy, and events have been changing rapidly, but I thought it would be a good idea to give a brief bulleted list of updates regarding the NSF and associated issues: A court decision regarding who has the authority to fire probationary federal workers...
Quantum Frontiers
Quantum Frontiers salutes an English teacher If I ever mention a crazy high-school English teacher to you, I might be referring to Mr. Lukacs....
9 months ago
69
9 months ago
If I ever mention a crazy high-school English teacher to you, I might be referring to Mr. Lukacs. One morning, before the first bell rang, I found him wandering among the lockers, wearing a white beard and a mischievous grin. … Continue reading →
Sean Carroll
The Biggest Ideas in the Universe: Space, Time, and Motion Just in case there are any blog readers out there who haven’t heard from other channels: I have a...
over a year ago
27
over a year ago
Just in case there are any blog readers out there who haven’t heard from other channels: I have a new book out! The Biggest Ideas in the Universe: Space, Time, and Motion is Volume One of a planned three-volume series. It grew out of the videos that I did in 2020, trying to offer...
Articles - Chris...
Moved to tears 20 years ago, on January 15 2004, a little before 2 AM Pacific time, was the payoff. It was...
a year ago
74
a year ago
20 years ago, on January 15 2004, a little before 2 AM Pacific time, was the payoff. It was cause for celebration. But first, I wept.
Math Is Still...
The Year in Math Landmark results in geometry and number theory marked an exciting year for mathematics, at a time...
2 months ago
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2 months ago
Landmark results in geometry and number theory marked an exciting year for mathematics, at a time when advances in artificial intelligence are starting to transform the subject’s future. The post The Year in Math first appeared on Quanta Magazine
The Works in...
Getting people to donate their organs Too few people donate their organs, dead or alive. How can we make it easier?
11 months ago
Math Is Still...
A Mutation Turned Ants Into Parasites in One Generation A new genetics study of ant “social parasites” shows how complex sets of features can emerge rapidly...
a year ago
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a year ago
A new genetics study of ant “social parasites” shows how complex sets of features can emerge rapidly and potentially split species. The post A Mutation Turned Ants Into Parasites in One Generation first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Blog - Practical...
The Wild Story of the Taum Sauk Dam Failure [Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] Early in the morning of...
4 months ago
60
4 months ago
[Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] Early in the morning of December 14, 2005, pumps were nearly finished filling the upper reservoir at the Taum Sauk power station, marking the end of the daily cycle. Water rose to the top of the rockfill...
NeuroLogica Blog
Reconductoring our Electrical Grid Over the weekend when I was in Dallas for the eclipse, I ran into a local businessman who works in...
11 months ago
64
11 months ago
Over the weekend when I was in Dallas for the eclipse, I ran into a local businessman who works in the energy sector, mainly involved in new solar projects. This is not surprising as Texas is second only to California in solar installation. I asked him if he is experiencing a...
Explorations of an...
2024 (Part 1 of 2) Another year has come and gone. As is tradition, I have written a couple of blog posts documenting...
2 months ago
2
2 months ago
Another year has come and gone. As is tradition, I have written a couple of blog posts documenting some of my natural history highlights throughout the year.  January Pre-dawn on January 1, 2024 saw me heading south towards Yarmouth County, Nova Scotia in search of a Gray Heron,...
Out-of-Pocket Blog
Healthcare should NOT be local | Out-Of-Pocket Let's think bigger
a year ago
Math Is Still...
Scientists Find a Fast Way to Describe Quantum Systems After years of false starts, a team of computer scientists has found a way to efficiently deduce the...
10 months ago
51
10 months ago
After years of false starts, a team of computer scientists has found a way to efficiently deduce the Hamiltonian of a physical system at any constant temperature. The post Scientists Find a Fast Way to Describe Quantum Systems first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Tikalon Blog by Dev...
US Independence Day Tikalon is on a short holiday in celebration of US Independence Day, July 4, 2024. Our next article...
8 months ago
7
8 months ago
Tikalon is on a short holiday in celebration of US Independence Day, July 4, 2024. Our next article will be posted on Monday, July 15, 2024. View my version of the iconic image of George Washington's crossing of the Delaware River in which he encounters some unusually large...
Math Is Still...
The Lawlessness of Large Numbers Mathematicians can often figure out what happens as quantities grow infinitely large. What about...
a year ago
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a year ago
Mathematicians can often figure out what happens as quantities grow infinitely large. What about when they are just a little big? The post The Lawlessness of Large Numbers first appeared on Quanta Magazine
NeuroLogica Blog
Ripples in Spacetime It’s always exciting when a scientific institution announces that they are going to make an...
a year ago
43
a year ago
It’s always exciting when a scientific institution announces that they are going to make an announcement. Earlier this week we were told that there was going to be a major announcement today (June 29th) regarding a gravitational wave discovery. The goal of the pre-announcement is...
Out-of-Pocket Blog
2024 Healthcare Predictions, Out-Of-Pocket Style | Out-Of-Pocket I'm not a fortune teller, I'm a fortune, teller
a year ago
Math Is Still...
How Simple Math Moves the Needle The spatial intuition behind a three-point turn offers an on-ramp to a century-old geometry problem....
a year ago
17
a year ago
The spatial intuition behind a three-point turn offers an on-ramp to a century-old geometry problem. The post How Simple Math Moves the Needle first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Math Is Still...
How to Build an Origami Computer Two mathematicians have shown that origami can, in principle, be used to perform any possible...
a year ago
31
a year ago
Two mathematicians have shown that origami can, in principle, be used to perform any possible computation. The post How to Build an Origami Computer first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Out-of-Pocket Blog
The Reality of Real-World Evidence | Out-Of-Pocket Real recognize real...sort of
a year ago
Math Is Still...
New Proofs Probe the Limits of Mathematical Truth By proving a broader version of Hilbert’s famous 10th problem, two groups of mathematicians have...
a month ago
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a month ago
By proving a broader version of Hilbert’s famous 10th problem, two groups of mathematicians have expanded the realm of mathematical unknowability. The post New Proofs Probe the Limits of Mathematical Truth first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Damn Interesting
A Blight on Soviet Science On a hazy afternoon in March 1927, a Russian scientist was walking through the dense forests of...
over a year ago
11
over a year ago
On a hazy afternoon in March 1927, a Russian scientist was walking through the dense forests of Abyssinia, ducking under low-hanging branches and stopping to inspect the wild coffee trees lining his path. Accompanied by a group of local guides, the young traveller had been hiking...
NeuroLogica Blog
A Climate Rebuttal The climate change discussion would benefit most from good-faith evidence and science-based...
a year ago
34
a year ago
The climate change discussion would benefit most from good-faith evidence and science-based discussion. Unfortunately, humans tend to prefer emotion, ideology, motivated reasoning, and confirmation bias. As an example, I was sent an excerpt from a climate change podcast as a...
NeuroLogica Blog
Is Mars the New Frontier? In the excellent sci fi show, The Expanse, which takes place a couple hundred years in the future,...
a year ago
27
a year ago
In the excellent sci fi show, The Expanse, which takes place a couple hundred years in the future, Mars has been settled and is an independent self-sustaining society. In fact, Mars is presented as the most scientifically and technologically advanced society of humans in the...
Math Is Still...
Mathematicians Solve Long-Standing Coloring Problem A new result shows how much of the plane can be colored by points that are never exactly one unit...
a year ago
14
a year ago
A new result shows how much of the plane can be colored by points that are never exactly one unit apart. The post Mathematicians Solve Long-Standing Coloring Problem first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Math Is Still...
When Data Is Missing, Scientists Guess. Then Guess Again. Across the social and biological sciences, statisticians use a technique that leverages randomness...
5 months ago
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5 months ago
Across the social and biological sciences, statisticians use a technique that leverages randomness to deal with the unknown. The post When Data Is Missing, Scientists Guess. Then Guess Again. first appeared on Quanta Magazine
IEEE Spectrum
Why the Art of Invention Is Always Being Reinvented Every invention begins with a problem—and the creative act of seeing a problem where others might...
4 months ago
47
4 months ago
Every invention begins with a problem—and the creative act of seeing a problem where others might just see unchangeable reality. For one 5-year-old, the problem was simple: She liked to have her tummy rubbed as she fell asleep. But her mom, exhausted from working two jobs, often...
NeuroLogica Blog
A Galaxy Without Dark Matter Dark matter is one of the greatest current scientific mysteries. It’s a fascinating story playing...
a year ago
16
a year ago
Dark matter is one of the greatest current scientific mysteries. It’s a fascinating story playing out in real time, although over years, so you have to be patient. Future generations might be able to binge the dark matter show, but not us. We have to wait for each episode to...
Math Is Still...
What Has the Pandemic Taught Us About Vaccines? Should Covid-19 vaccines be judged by how well they prevent disease or how well they prevent death?...
a year ago
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a year ago
Should Covid-19 vaccines be judged by how well they prevent disease or how well they prevent death? Anna Durbin, a public health expert and vaccine researcher, talks with Steven Strogatz about the science behind vaccines. The post What Has the Pandemic Taught Us About...
Stephen Wolfram...
Five Most Productive Years: What Happened and What’s Next So… What Happened? Today is my birthday—for the 65th time. Five years ago, on my 60th birthday, I...
6 months ago
93
6 months ago
So… What Happened? Today is my birthday—for the 65th time. Five years ago, on my 60th birthday, I did a livestream where I talked about some of my plans. So… what happened? Well, what happened was great. And in fact I’ve just had the most productive five years of my life. Nine...
IEEE Spectrum
The First Virtual Meeting Was in 1916 At 8:30 p.m. on 16 May 1916, John J. Carty banged his gavel at the Engineering Societies Building in...
3 months ago
48
3 months ago
At 8:30 p.m. on 16 May 1916, John J. Carty banged his gavel at the Engineering Societies Building in New York City to call to order a meeting of the American Institute of Electrical Engineers. This was no ordinary gathering. The AIEE had decided to conduct a live national meeting...
symmetry magazine
What is neutral naturalness? Indirectly testing this theory, motivated by the mysterious mass of the Higgs boson, could be within...
a year ago
34
a year ago
Indirectly testing this theory, motivated by the mysterious mass of the Higgs boson, could be within reach for experiments at the Large Hadron Collider.
Math Is Still...
‘Entropy Bagels’ and Other Complex Structures Emerge From Simple Rules Simple rules in simple settings continue to puzzle mathematicians, even as they devise intricate...
a year ago
27
a year ago
Simple rules in simple settings continue to puzzle mathematicians, even as they devise intricate tools to analyze them. The post ‘Entropy Bagels’ and Other Complex Structures Emerge From Simple Rules first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Casey Handmer's blog
California’s path to redemption California is by far the richest and most powerful polity led by Progressive ideals, and it has...
a week ago
10
a week ago
California is by far the richest and most powerful polity led by Progressive ideals, and it has taken a beating of late. In this post, I discuss a practical roadmap by which California must reclaim its mantle as the shining city on the hill, an embodiment of the positive...
Math Is Still...
Never-Repeating Tiles Can Safeguard Quantum Information Two researchers have proved that Penrose tilings, famous patterns that never repeat, are...
a year ago
40
a year ago
Two researchers have proved that Penrose tilings, famous patterns that never repeat, are mathematically equivalent to a kind of quantum error correction. The post Never-Repeating Tiles Can Safeguard Quantum Information first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Quantum Frontiers
Caltech’s Ginsburg Center Editor’s Note: On 10 August 2023, Caltech celebrated the groundbreaking for the Dr. Allen and...
a year ago
32
a year ago
Editor’s Note: On 10 August 2023, Caltech celebrated the groundbreaking for the Dr. Allen and Charlotte Ginsburg Center for Quantum Precision Measurement, which will open in 2025. At a lunch following the ceremony, John Preskill made these remarks. Hello everyone. … Continue...
Beautiful Public...
The United States Frequency Allocation Chart This crazy, beautiful chart illustrates the incredible complexity of managing one of our nation’s...
over a year ago
32
over a year ago
This crazy, beautiful chart illustrates the incredible complexity of managing one of our nation’s most crucial – and invisible – national assets: the radio spectrum.
NeuroLogica Blog
Update on Self-Driving Cars The story has become a classic of failed futurism – driverless or self-driving cars were supposed...
a year ago
10
a year ago
The story has become a classic of failed futurism – driverless or self-driving cars were supposed start taking over the roads as early as 2020. But that didn’t happen – it turned that the last 5% of capability was about as difficult to develop as the first 95%. Around 2015 I...
Probably...
Logarithms and Heteroskedasticity Here’s another installment in Data Q&A: Answering the real questions with Python. Previous...
9 months ago
81
9 months ago
Here’s another installment in Data Q&A: Answering the real questions with Python. Previous installments are available from the Data Q&A landing page. log_heterosked Logarithms and heteroskedasticity¶ Here’s a question from the Reddit statistics forum. Is it correct to use...
IEEE Spectrum
How This Record Company Engineer Invented the CT Scanner The inspiration for computed tomography (CT) came from a chance conversation that research engineer...
over a year ago
8
over a year ago
The inspiration for computed tomography (CT) came from a chance conversation that research engineer Godfrey Hounsfield had with a doctor while on vacation in the 1960s. The physician complained that X-ray images of the brain were too grainy and only two-dimensional. Hounsfield...
IEEE Spectrum
5 Questions for Robotics Legend Ruzena Bajcsy Ruzena Bajcsy is one of the founders of the modern field of robotics. With an education in...
3 months ago
58
3 months ago
Ruzena Bajcsy is one of the founders of the modern field of robotics. With an education in electrical engineering in Slovakia, followed by a Ph.D. at Stanford, Bajcsy was the first woman to join the engineering faculty at the University of Pennsylvania. She was the first, she...
Math Is Still...
Physicists Puzzle Over Emergence of Strange Electron Aggregates Electrons have been seen uniting into entities with fractions of electric charge, this time without...
9 months ago
93
9 months ago
Electrons have been seen uniting into entities with fractions of electric charge, this time without a magnetic field coaxing them into it. The post Physicists Puzzle Over Emergence of Strange Electron Aggregates first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Explorations of an...
Borneo: Quest For The Bulwer's Pheasant The Bulwer's Pheasant was one of the first birds to grab hold of my attention when I first flipped...
3 months ago
3
3 months ago
The Bulwer's Pheasant was one of the first birds to grab hold of my attention when I first flipped through the pages of my Borneo field guide many years ago. This pheasant of Bornean hill forest is nearly unbelievable-looking (the male, that is). He has a deep maroon chest and a...
Math Is Still...
How ‘Idle’ Egg Cells Defend Their DNA From Damage How do immature egg cells maintain genetic quality for decades before they mature? Scientists find...
10 months ago
97
10 months ago
How do immature egg cells maintain genetic quality for decades before they mature? Scientists find unusual safeguards in this quiescent cell that may inform research into fertility. The post How ‘Idle’ Egg Cells Defend Their DNA From Damage first appeared on Quanta...
Uncharted...
10 Other Places Where Geniuses Hide Groups, networks, the Internet, IQ, state sponsorship, and many more
2 months ago
Quantum Frontiers
Discoveries at the Dibner This past summer, our quantum thermodynamics research group had the wonderful opportunity to visit...
a year ago
41
a year ago
This past summer, our quantum thermodynamics research group had the wonderful opportunity to visit the Dibner Rare Book Library in D.C. Located in a small corner of the Smithsonian National Museum of American History, tucked away behind flashier exhibits, the Dibner is … Continue...
IEEE Spectrum
How Engineers at Digital Equipment Corp. Saved Ethernet I’ve enjoyed reading magazine articles about Ethernet’s 50th anniversary, including one in the The...
11 months ago
82
11 months ago
I’ve enjoyed reading magazine articles about Ethernet’s 50th anniversary, including one in the The Institute. Invented by computer scientists Robert Metcalfe and David Boggs, Ethernet has been extraordinarily impactful. Metcalfe, an IEEE Fellow, received the 1996 IEEE Medal of...
Math Is Still...
A Century Later, New Math Smooths Out General Relativity Mathematicians prove a theorem that illuminates the geometry of universes with tiny amounts of mass....
a year ago
27
a year ago
Mathematicians prove a theorem that illuminates the geometry of universes with tiny amounts of mass. The post A Century Later, New Math Smooths Out General Relativity first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Math Is Still...
Risky Giant Steps Can Solve Optimization Problems Faster New results break with decades of conventional wisdom for the gradient descent algorithm. ...
a year ago
17
a year ago
New results break with decades of conventional wisdom for the gradient descent algorithm. The post Risky Giant Steps Can Solve Optimization Problems Faster first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Beautiful Public...
A Rover's First 590 Days* on Mars I downloaded 60,000 images to experience what NASA's Perseverance rover has been seeing since...
over a year ago
54
over a year ago
I downloaded 60,000 images to experience what NASA's Perseverance rover has been seeing since landing there in Feb. 2021.
Out-of-Pocket Blog
Dental Insurance, Value-Based Dental, and Beam Benefits | Out-Of-Pocket Why doesn’t dental have value-based care?
a year ago
Math Is Still...
Vacuum of Space to Decay Sooner Than Expected (but Still Not Soon) One of the quantum fields that fills the universe is special because its default value seems poised...
7 months ago
75
7 months ago
One of the quantum fields that fills the universe is special because its default value seems poised to eventually change, changing everything. The post Vacuum of Space to Decay Sooner Than Expected (but Still Not Soon) first appeared on Quanta Magazine
pcloadletter
Coding interviews are effective Coding interviews are controversial. It can be unpleasant to code in front of someone else, knowing...
a year ago
32
a year ago
Coding interviews are controversial. It can be unpleasant to code in front of someone else, knowing you're being judged. And who likes failing? Especially when it feels like you failed intellectually. But, coding interviews are effective. One big criticism of coding interviews is...
Quantum Frontiers
Ten lessons I learned from John Preskill Last August, Toronto’s Centre for Quantum Information and Quantum Control (CQIQC) gave me 35 minutes...
a month ago
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a month ago
Last August, Toronto’s Centre for Quantum Information and Quantum Control (CQIQC) gave me 35 minutes to make fun of John Preskill in public. CQIQC was hosting its biannual conference, also called CQIQC, in Toronto. The conference features the awarding of … Continue reading →
Out-of-Pocket Blog
Big Changes Coming | Out-Of-Pocket What's temporary vs. permanent?
a year ago
NeuroLogica Blog
Using Genetic Engineering To Fight Malaria Despite robust efforts to fight it, malaria remains one of the most significant infectious diseases...
a year ago
17
a year ago
Despite robust efforts to fight it, malaria remains one of the most significant infectious diseases affecting humans. According to UNICEF – ” In 2021, there were 247 million malaria cases globally that led to 619,000 deaths in total. Of these deaths, 77 per cent were children...
NeuroLogica Blog
What Is a Grand Conspiracy? Ah, the categorization question again. This is an endless, but much needed, endeavor within human...
12 months ago
46
12 months ago
Ah, the categorization question again. This is an endless, but much needed, endeavor within human intellectual activity. We have the need to categorize things, if for no other reason than we need to communicate with each other about them. Often skeptics, like myself, talk about...
Cremieux Recueil
Woke Madness Why do more left-wing individuals tend to be more mentally ill?
6 months ago
Out-of-Pocket Blog
Some cool AI healthcare projects | Out-Of-Pocket What was built at the OOP hackathon?
7 months ago
Wanderingspace
Hope for Mars Nothing really. Just a gorgeous image of Mars from the UAE Hope mission.
over a year ago
IEEE Spectrum
The Meeting of the Minds That Launched AI The Dartmouth Summer Research Project on Artificial Intelligence, held from 18 June through 17...
a year ago
18
a year ago
The Dartmouth Summer Research Project on Artificial Intelligence, held from 18 June through 17 August of 1956, is widely considered the event that kicked off AI as a research discipline. Organized by John McCarthy, Marvin Minsky, Claude Shannon, and Nathaniel Rochester, it...
NeuroLogica Blog
How To Prove Prevention Works Homer: Not a bear in sight. The Bear Patrol must be working like a charm. Lisa: That’s specious...
a year ago
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a year ago
Homer: Not a bear in sight. The Bear Patrol must be working like a charm. Lisa: That’s specious reasoning, Dad. Homer: Thank you, dear. Lisa: By your logic I could claim that this rock keeps tigers away. Homer: Oh, how does it work? Lisa: It doesn’t work. Homer: Uh-huh. Lisa:...
SubAnima
How would Alien evolution work? A deep-dive into the biology of the colonial aliens from Edge of Tomorrow.
over a year ago
Wanderingspace
Eclipse 2024 from Space https://twitter.com/ThePlanetaryGuy
11 months ago
IEEE Spectrum
The Do-or-Die Moments That Determined the Fate of the Internet CES) and the Game Developers Conference have become regular features of the digital world. ARPANET...
a year ago
10
a year ago
CES) and the Game Developers Conference have become regular features of the digital world. ARPANET in 1972, or the mid-1980s conferences now known as Interop, alerted experts to new technologies, and, in some cases, altered the balance between competing approaches. Packet...
Asterisk
Culture Studies Montessori classrooms don’t have much in common with the Jesuit colleges of early modern Europe. But...
7 months ago
10
7 months ago
Montessori classrooms don’t have much in common with the Jesuit colleges of early modern Europe. But students in both settings learn more than a core curriculum — instead they’re taught a distinctive culture. And then they pass it on.
Out-of-Pocket Blog
Physicians and Pharma Marketing | Out-Of-Pocket oh we getting that drug money
a year ago
Math Is Still...
A Plan to Address the World’s Challenges With Math Minhyong Kim is leading a new initiative called Mathematics for Humanity that encourages...
a year ago
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a year ago
Minhyong Kim is leading a new initiative called Mathematics for Humanity that encourages mathematicians to apply their skills to solving social problems. The post A Plan to Address the World’s Challenges With Math first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Blog - Practical...
Do Droughts Make Floods Worse? [Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] Do you remember the summer of...
a year ago
105
a year ago
[Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] Do you remember the summer of 2022 when a record drought had gripped not only a large part of the United States, but most of Europe too? Reservoirs were empty, wildfires spread, crop yields dropped, and rivers...
Probably...
The Center Moves Faster Than You In May 2022, Elon Musk tweeted this cartoon: The creator of the cartoon, Colin Wright, explained it...
a year ago
22
a year ago
In May 2022, Elon Musk tweeted this cartoon: The creator of the cartoon, Colin Wright, explained it like this: At the outset, I stand happily beside ‘my fellow liberal,’ who is slightly to my left. In 2012 he sprints to the left, dragging out the left end of the political...
Asterisk
The Biggest Community Development Program You’ve Never Heard Of The pilot of the Indian Community Development Program — among the first holistic development...
4 months ago
12
4 months ago
The pilot of the Indian Community Development Program — among the first holistic development interventions to elicit widespread community participation — was a resounding success. Why did it fail to scale? And what can that tell us about development programs today?
NeuroLogica Blog
Using Plants as Biofactories When you think about it, plants are self-reproducing solar-powered biological factories. They are...
a year ago
37
a year ago
When you think about it, plants are self-reproducing solar-powered biological factories. They are powered by the sun, extract raw material from the air and soil, and make all sorts of useful molecules. Mostly we use them to make edible molecules (food), but also to make textiles,...
Math Is Still...
Hopes of Big Bang Discoveries Ride on a Future Spacecraft Physicists and cosmologists will have a new probe of primordial processes when Europe launches the...
10 months ago
86
10 months ago
Physicists and cosmologists will have a new probe of primordial processes when Europe launches the Laser Interferometer Space Antenna (LISA) next decade. The post Hopes of Big Bang Discoveries Ride on a Future Spacecraft first appeared on Quanta Magazine
IEEE Spectrum
Designing the First Apple Macintosh: The Engineers’ Story In 1979 the Macintosh personal computer existed only as the pet idea of Jef Raskin, a veteran of the...
a year ago
16
a year ago
In 1979 the Macintosh personal computer existed only as the pet idea of Jef Raskin, a veteran of the Apple II team, who had proposed that Apple Computer Inc. make a low-cost “appliance”-type computer that would be as easy to use as a toaster. Mr. Raskin believed the computer he...
Asterisk
Why You’ve Never Been In A Plane Crash The United States leads the world in airline safety. That’s because of the way we assign blame when...
a year ago
11
a year ago
The United States leads the world in airline safety. That’s because of the way we assign blame when accidents do happen.
Andrew Fraknoi –...
Coming Up: Einstein without Tears; Religion and Extraterrestrial Life Two upcoming events that may be of interest to you (please pass on to others who may like them): The...
5 months ago
49
5 months ago
Two upcoming events that may be of interest to you (please pass on to others who may like them): The Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at San Francisco State Presents: A non-technical, 6-week class with Professor Andrew Fraknoi Einstein without Tears Tuesdays from 12:30 to 2:30...
Inverted Passion
Usefulness grounds truth Are LLMs intelligent? Debates on this question often, but not always, devolve into debates on what...
8 months ago
90
8 months ago
Are LLMs intelligent? Debates on this question often, but not always, devolve into debates on what LLMs can or cannot do. To a limited extent, the original question is useful because it creates an opening for people to go into specific. But, beyond that initial use, the question...
Quantum Frontiers
A peek inside Northrop Grumman’s subatomic endeavors As the weather turns colder and we trade outdoor pools for pumpkin spice and then Christmas carols,...
over a year ago
35
over a year ago
As the weather turns colder and we trade outdoor pools for pumpkin spice and then Christmas carols, perhaps you’re longing for summer’s warmth. For me, it is not just warmth I yearn for: This past summer, I worked as a … Continue reading →
Math Is Still...
Why Mathematical Proof Is a Social Compact Number theorist Andrew Granville on what mathematics really is — and why objectivity is never quite...
a year ago
88
a year ago
Number theorist Andrew Granville on what mathematics really is — and why objectivity is never quite within reach. The post Why Mathematical Proof Is a Social Compact first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Math Is Still...
After 20 Years, Math Couple Solves Major Group Theory Problem Britta Späth has dedicated her career to proving a single, central conjecture. She’s finally...
3 weeks ago
20
3 weeks ago
Britta Späth has dedicated her career to proving a single, central conjecture. She’s finally succeeded, alongside her partner, Marc Cabanes. The post After 20 Years, Math Couple Solves Major Group Theory Problem first appeared on Quanta Magazine
pcloadletter
Quality is a hard sell in big tech I have noticed a trend in a handful of products I've worked on at big tech companies. I have friends...
a year ago
28
a year ago
I have noticed a trend in a handful of products I've worked on at big tech companies. I have friends at other big tech companies that have noticed a similar trend: The products are kind of crummy. Here are some experiences that I have often encountered: the UI is flakey and/or...
IEEE Spectrum
The Battle for Better, Broader, More Inclusive AI AI’s inclusivity problem is no secret. According to the ACLU, AI systems can perpetuate housing...
a year ago
75
a year ago
AI’s inclusivity problem is no secret. According to the ACLU, AI systems can perpetuate housing discrimination and bias in the justice system, among other harms. Bias in the data an AI model relies on is reproduced in its results. Large Language Models (LLMs) share this problem;...
Confessions of a...
Cottesloe Fish Habitat Protection Area Today I am teaching my first tutorial in the second year unit ‘Marine Systems‘, which will introduce...
over a year ago
75
over a year ago
Today I am teaching my first tutorial in the second year unit ‘Marine Systems‘, which will introduce students to their major project, which is centred around a field trip to the Cottelsoe Fish Habitat Protection Area (CFHPA).  I’m pretty excited to introduce a few of my new ideas...
Math Is Still...
What Can Jellyfish Teach Us About Fluid Dynamics? Jellyfish and other aquatic creatures embody solutions to diverse problems in engineering, medicine...
a year ago
30
a year ago
Jellyfish and other aquatic creatures embody solutions to diverse problems in engineering, medicine and mathematics. John Dabiri, a fluid dynamics expert, talks with Steven Strogatz about what jellyfish can teach us about going with the flow. The post What Can...
The Works in...
How Poor Maintenance Loses Wars - 2022, Ukraine Maintains A new section from Stewart Brand's Maintenance on Books in Progress
a year ago
NeuroLogica Blog
How Were the Pyramids Built? The Egyptian pyramids, and especially the Pyramids at Giza, have fascinated people probably since...
9 months ago
60
9 months ago
The Egyptian pyramids, and especially the Pyramids at Giza, have fascinated people probably since their construction between 4700 and 3700 years ago. They are massive structures, and it boggles the mind that an ancient culture, without the benefit of any industrial technology,...
Chris Grossack's...
Preprint -- The RAAG Functor as a Categorical Embedding After almost a year of sitting on my hard drive, I finally had time in August to finish revising my...
a year ago
13
a year ago
After almost a year of sitting on my hard drive, I finally had time in August to finish revising my new preprint on Right Angled Artin Groups (Raags). And in September I had time to put it on the arxiv for people to see! Within 24 hours I had an email from somebody who had...
Math Is Still...
How Math Achieved Transcendence Transcendental numbers include famous examples like e and π, but it took mathematicians centuries to...
a year ago
30
a year ago
Transcendental numbers include famous examples like e and π, but it took mathematicians centuries to understand them. The post How Math Achieved Transcendence first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Asterisk
Where the Wild Things Aren't We tell our children that weirdness is a blessing in disguise. That’s our fantasy, not theirs.
2 months ago
NeuroLogica Blog
Reading The Mind with fMRI and AI This is pretty exciting neuroscience news – Semantic reconstruction of continuous language from...
a year ago
54
a year ago
This is pretty exciting neuroscience news – Semantic reconstruction of continuous language from non-invasive brain recordings. What this means is that researchers have been able to, sort of, decode the words that subjects were thinking of simply by reading their fMRI scan. They...
IEEE Spectrum
The Lisa Was Apple’s Best Failure Happy 40th Birthday to Lisa! The Apple Lisa computer, that is. In celebration of this milestone, the...
over a year ago
22
over a year ago
Happy 40th Birthday to Lisa! The Apple Lisa computer, that is. In celebration of this milestone, the Computer History Museum has received permission from Apple to release the source code to the Lisa, including its system and applications software. You can access the Lisa source...
Inverted Passion
What bootstraps intelligence? A musing on how intelligence comes to be. The bedrock of intelligence is abstractions – the thing we...
6 months ago
85
6 months ago
A musing on how intelligence comes to be. The bedrock of intelligence is abstractions – the thing we do when we throw away a lot of information and just emphasise on a subset of it (e.g. calling that thing an apple instead of describing all its atoms and their x, y, z positions)....
NeuroLogica Blog
Fossil Fuels – Reduce Demand or Supply? This is a bit of a false choice – we can do both, or neither – but it is an important question and a...
a year ago
16
a year ago
This is a bit of a false choice – we can do both, or neither – but it is an important question and a somewhat of a dilemma. Is the optimal path to reductions and eventual elimination of fossil fuel burning through reduced demand or supply? There are some interesting tradeoffs...
Out-of-Pocket Blog
More Thoughts On Amazon and One Medical | Out-Of-Pocket Is this the start of Amazon's business offering? A recession hedge?
11 months ago
SubAnima
Could There Be Laws Of Biology? Physics has such nice equations and universal laws. Could we ever expect to find similar principles...
over a year ago
4
over a year ago
Physics has such nice equations and universal laws. Could we ever expect to find similar principles or axioms for biology?
The Roots of...
Levels of safety for AI and other technologies What does it mean for AI to be “safe”? Right now there is a lot of debate about AI safety. But...
a year ago
34
a year ago
What does it mean for AI to be “safe”? Right now there is a lot of debate about AI safety. But people often end up talking past each other because they’re not using the same definitions or standards. For the sake of productive debates, let me propose some distinctions to add...
NeuroLogica Blog
New Type of Black Hole Discovered ESA’s Gaia orbital telescope has recently discovered two new black holes. This, in itself, is not...
a year ago
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a year ago
ESA’s Gaia orbital telescope has recently discovered two new black holes. This, in itself, is not surprising, as that is Gaia’s mission – to precisely map the three-dimensional position of two billion objects in our galaxy, using three separate instruments. The process is called...
IEEE Spectrum
The Forgotten Story of How IBM Invented the Automated Fab In 1970, Bill Harding envisioned a fully automated wafer-fabrication line that would produce...
3 months ago
49
3 months ago
In 1970, Bill Harding envisioned a fully automated wafer-fabrication line that would produce integrated circuits in less than one day. Not only was such a goal gutsy 54 years ago, it would be bold even in today’s billion-dollar fabs, where the fabrication time of an advanced IC...
NeuroLogica Blog
Mach Effect Thrusters Fail When thinking about potential future technology, one way to divide possible future tech is into...
a year ago
40
a year ago
When thinking about potential future technology, one way to divide possible future tech is into probable and speculative. Probable future technology involves extrapolating existing technology into the future, such as imaging what advanced computers might be like. This category...
Cremieux Recueil
Preregistration Is No Panacea Stopping scientific cheaters requires setting up systems that can't be gamed
3 months ago
NeuroLogica Blog
New Asteroid Probably Won’t Hit Earth NASA recently discovered a 50 meter wide asteroid whose orbit will come close to Earth. They...
over a year ago
35
over a year ago
NASA recently discovered a 50 meter wide asteroid whose orbit will come close to Earth. They estimate a close approach in 2046, which will likely bring the asteroid within 1.1 million miles of the Earth, about four times the distance of the moon. However, there is always...
wadertales
WaderTales blogs in 2022 Here are brief summaries of the sixteen WaderTales blogs that were published in 2022. I have grouped...
over a year ago
33
over a year ago
Here are brief summaries of the sixteen WaderTales blogs that were published in 2022. I have grouped the blogs into sections; problems with trees, more research from Iceland, Curlews, news from the East Asian-Australasian Flyway, tracking and updates. As ever, I am grateful to...
Math Is Still...
Data Compression Drives the Internet. Here’s How It Works. One student’s desire to get out of a final exam led to the ubiquitous algorithm that shrinks data...
a year ago
42
a year ago
One student’s desire to get out of a final exam led to the ubiquitous algorithm that shrinks data without sacrificing information. The post Data Compression Drives the Internet. Here’s How It Works. first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Inverted Passion
Why time seems to pass faster as we age 1/ I’ve been mega-obsessed with this feeling. A year as a 36-year-old seems so much shorter as...
a year ago
92
a year ago
1/ I’ve been mega-obsessed with this feeling. A year as a 36-year-old seems so much shorter as compared to when I was a kid or even as a teen. It seems cosmically unfair – we have fewer years to live, and each year flies by faster. 2/ But, why is that happening? My tentative...
Math Is Still...
How Scientists Are Tackling the Tricky Task of Solar Cycle Prediction Scientists have struggled to accurately forecast the strength of the sun’s 11-year cycle — even...
a year ago
28
a year ago
Scientists have struggled to accurately forecast the strength of the sun’s 11-year cycle — even after centuries of solar observations. The post How Scientists Are Tackling the Tricky Task of Solar Cycle Prediction first appeared on Quanta Magazine
brr
South Pole Topography The relentless accumulation (and management) of snow.
over a year ago
Out-of-Pocket Blog
Transforming Healthcare Data with Tuva Health | Out-Of-Pocket The nitty, gritty, and shitty of working with health data
a year ago
NeuroLogica Blog
The Speed of Gravity I recently received an e-mail question from an SGU listener about the speed of gravity. They were...
over a year ago
48
over a year ago
I recently received an e-mail question from an SGU listener about the speed of gravity. They were questioning a statement they heard by Neil DeGrasse Tyson that if the sun were magically plucked from existence, the Earth would not feel the effects for 8 minutes and 20 seconds –...
Math Is Still...
The Year in Math Landmark results in Ramsey theory and a remarkably simple aperiodic tile capped a year of...
a year ago
37
a year ago
Landmark results in Ramsey theory and a remarkably simple aperiodic tile capped a year of mathematical delight and discovery. The post The Year in Math first appeared on Quanta Magazine
The Works in...
Issue 15: To change a norm Plus: bland buildings can't be blamed on labor costs, reasons to be sceptical about prediction...
9 months ago
90
9 months ago
Plus: bland buildings can't be blamed on labor costs, reasons to be sceptical about prediction markets, and gentrification policies that actually help.
Math Is Still...
Why Computer Scientists Consult Oracles Hypothetical devices that can quickly and accurately answer questions have become a powerful tool in...
2 months ago
39
2 months ago
Hypothetical devices that can quickly and accurately answer questions have become a powerful tool in computational complexity theory. The post Why Computer Scientists Consult Oracles first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Sean Carroll
The Biggest Ideas in the Universe | 24. Science For the triumphant final video in the Biggest Ideas series, we look at a big idea indeed: Science....
over a year ago
30
over a year ago
For the triumphant final video in the Biggest Ideas series, we look at a big idea indeed: Science. What is science, and why is it so great? And I also take the opportunity to dip a toe into the current state of fundamental physics — are predictions that unobservable universes...
NeuroLogica Blog
Scammers on the Rise Good rule of thumb – assume it’s a scam. Anyone who contacts you, or any unusual encounter, assume...
a year ago
63
a year ago
Good rule of thumb – assume it’s a scam. Anyone who contacts you, or any unusual encounter, assume it’s a scam and you will probably be right. Recently I was called on my cell phone by someone claiming to be from Venmo. They asked me to confirm if I had just made two fund...
Math Is Still...
AI Needs Enormous Computing Power. Could Light-Based Chips Help? Optical neural networks, which use photons instead of electrons, have advantages over traditional...
9 months ago
83
9 months ago
Optical neural networks, which use photons instead of electrons, have advantages over traditional systems. They also face major obstacles. The post AI Needs Enormous Computing Power. Could Light-Based Chips Help? first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Explorations of an...
Borneo: Quest for the Bornean Peacock-Pheasant October 19, 2024 Laura and I were up dark and early from our accommodations in Ranau. I filled my...
2 months ago
3
2 months ago
October 19, 2024 Laura and I were up dark and early from our accommodations in Ranau. I filled my thermos with coffee, we quickly packed (though not quietly, as every dog in the neighbourhood began barking), and we headed eastwards to the town of Telupid where we had a very...
IEEE Spectrum
Taking the Measure of the Earthquake That Destroyed Tokyo At 11:58 am on Saturday, 1 September 1923, the Kanto region of Japan started to shake. The...
a year ago
15
a year ago
At 11:58 am on Saturday, 1 September 1923, the Kanto region of Japan started to shake. The earthquake began with a violent horizontal back-and-forth motion, followed by two vertical jolts, and then another horizontal shock even stronger than the first. The intensity of the tremor...
Math Is Still...
How Base 3 Computing Beats Binary Long explored but infrequently embraced, base 3 computing may yet find a home in cybersecurity. ...
7 months ago
54
7 months ago
Long explored but infrequently embraced, base 3 computing may yet find a home in cybersecurity. The post How Base 3 Computing Beats Binary first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Out-of-Pocket Blog
How Much Info Should A Patient Get? | Out-Of-Pocket A discussion question
a year ago
nanoscale views
Annual Nobel speculation thread Not that prizes are the be-all and end-all, but this has become an annual tradition.  Who are your...
5 months ago
2
5 months ago
Not that prizes are the be-all and end-all, but this has become an annual tradition.  Who are your speculative laureates this year for physics and chemistry?  As I did last year and for several years before, I will put forward my usual thought that the physics prize could...
Math Is Still...
Dogged Dark Matter Hunters Find New Hiding Places to Check Perhaps dark matter is made of an entirely different kind of particle than the ones physicists have...
10 months ago
56
10 months ago
Perhaps dark matter is made of an entirely different kind of particle than the ones physicists have been searching for. New experiments are springing up to look for these ultra-lightweight phantoms. The post Dogged Dark Matter Hunters Find New Hiding Places to Check...
Out-of-Pocket Blog
The Engineering Behind Healthcare LLMs with Abridge | Out-Of-Pocket What kinds of challenges come up with creating a speech-to-text gen AI product?
6 months ago
pcloadletter
Agile is a tainted term Oh no, not another agile article. But at least this one isn't attempting to teach or reconcile. I'm...
a year ago
29
a year ago
Oh no, not another agile article. But at least this one isn't attempting to teach or reconcile. I'm not going to talk about the difference between agile and Agile™ nor will I try to convince you of my favorite flavor of Agile™. Instead, I'm here to assert that agile is a tainted...
The Works in...
Notes on Progress: Selective breeding and chicken welfare We've bred larger and larger chickens. Now can we breed happier ones?
over a year ago
Math Is Still...
The Jagged, Monstrous Function That Broke Calculus In the late 19th century, Karl Weierstrass invented a fractal-like function that was decried as...
a month ago
35
a month ago
In the late 19th century, Karl Weierstrass invented a fractal-like function that was decried as nothing less than a “deplorable evil.” In time, it would transform the foundations of mathematics. The post The Jagged, Monstrous Function That Broke Calculus first...
Math Is Still...
The Physics of Cold Water May Have Jump-Started Complex Life When seawater gets cold, it gets viscous. This fact could explain how single-celled ocean creatures...
7 months ago
57
7 months ago
When seawater gets cold, it gets viscous. This fact could explain how single-celled ocean creatures became multicellular when the planet was frozen during “Snowball Earth,” according to experiments. The post The Physics of Cold Water May Have Jump-Started Complex Life...
Out-of-Pocket Blog
What Do Hospitals Care About? | Out-Of-Pocket Let’s look at three big priorities and a real hospital
4 weeks ago
Probably...
Hazard and Survival Here’s a question from the Reddit statistics forum. If I have a tumor that I’ve been told has a...
3 months ago
45
3 months ago
Here’s a question from the Reddit statistics forum. If I have a tumor that I’ve been told has a malignancy rate of 2% per year, does that compound? So after 5 years there’s a 10% chance it will turn malignant? This turns out to be an interesting question, because the answer...
NeuroLogica Blog
New Material for Nanoconductors One of the things I have come to understand from following technology news for decades is that...
2 months ago
32
2 months ago
One of the things I have come to understand from following technology news for decades is that perhaps the most important breakthroughs, and often the least appreciated, are those in material science. We can get better at engineering and making stuff out of the materials we have,...
Interaction Magic -...
Plastic archeology The history, science and engineering of Lego bricks, on the cusp between trash and treasure.
a year ago
IEEE Spectrum
Fakes: Not an Internet Thing, a Human Thing Every day, as the Internet becomes more indispensable to modern life, the drawbacks of deep...
a year ago
18
a year ago
Every day, as the Internet becomes more indispensable to modern life, the drawbacks of deep engagement with the virtual realm capture as much attention as the wide-ranging benefits. On the Internet, of course, anyone can in all too many forums pretty much say anything—regardless...
NeuroLogica Blog
The Science of Gift Giving There is a lot of social psychology out there providing information that can inform our everyday...
a year ago
13
a year ago
There is a lot of social psychology out there providing information that can inform our everyday lives, and most people are completely unaware of the research. Richard Wiseman makes this point in his book, 59 Seconds – we actually have useful scientific information, and yet we...
Math Is Still...
In the ‘Wild West’ of Geometry, Mathematicians Redefine the Sphere High-dimensional spheres can have a much wider variety of structures than mathematicians thought...
a year ago
15
a year ago
High-dimensional spheres can have a much wider variety of structures than mathematicians thought possible. The post In the ‘Wild West’ of Geometry, Mathematicians Redefine the Sphere first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Casey Handmer's blog
It Is Time To Build The Monster Scope A shorter version of this post was published in Palladium on 10/18/24. This version incorporates...
3 months ago
28
3 months ago
A shorter version of this post was published in Palladium on 10/18/24. This version incorporates helpful feedback from a number of knowledgeable readers.  With the recent SpaceX Starship orbital flight tests, it is time to commit to building the largest physically possible space...
Math Is Still...
A New Agenda for Low-Dimensional Topology This past October, dozens of mathematicians gathered in Pasadena to create the third version of...
a year ago
73
a year ago
This past October, dozens of mathematicians gathered in Pasadena to create the third version of “Kirby’s list” — a compendium of the most important unsolved problems in the field. The post A New Agenda for Low-Dimensional Topology first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Out-of-Pocket Blog
Maternity Care and Payer Contracting with Marta Bralic Kerns | Out-Of-Pocket and some good tips for consultants working at startups
a year ago
The Works in...
Britain’s interwar apartment boom A decade of Art Deco densification
a year ago
Math Is Still...
The Physicist Decoding the Nonbinary Nature of the Subatomic World Inside the proton, quarks and gluons shift and morph their properties in ways that physicists are...
2 months ago
36
2 months ago
Inside the proton, quarks and gluons shift and morph their properties in ways that physicists are still struggling to understand. Rithya Kunnawalkam Elayavalli brings to the problem a perspective unlike many of their peers. The post The Physicist Decoding the...
Math Is Still...
Pierre de Fermat’s Link to a High School Student’s Prime Math Proof How Fermat’s less famous ‘little theorem’ got mathematicians young and old to play with prime-like...
a year ago
33
a year ago
How Fermat’s less famous ‘little theorem’ got mathematicians young and old to play with prime-like Carmichael numbers. The post Pierre de Fermat’s Link to a High School Student’s Prime Math Proof first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Math Is Still...
It Might Be Possible to Detect Gravitons After All A new experimental proposal suggests detecting a particle of gravity is far easier than anyone...
4 months ago
39
4 months ago
A new experimental proposal suggests detecting a particle of gravity is far easier than anyone imagined. Now physicists are debating what it would really prove. The post It Might Be Possible to Detect Gravitons After All first appeared on Quanta Magazine
NeuroLogica Blog
Localizing Hidden Consciousness What’s going on in the minds of people who appear to be comatose? This has been an enduring...
a year ago
25
a year ago
What’s going on in the minds of people who appear to be comatose? This has been an enduring neurological question from the beginning of neurology as a discipline. Recent technological advances have completely changed the game in terms of evaluating comatose patients, and now a...
Math Is Still...
New Kind of Magnetism Spotted in an Engineered Material In an atomically thin stack of semiconductors, a mechanism unseen in any natural substance causes...
a year ago
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a year ago
In an atomically thin stack of semiconductors, a mechanism unseen in any natural substance causes electrons’ spins to align. The post New Kind of Magnetism Spotted in an Engineered Material first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Drew Ex Machina
Tropical Weather Analytics and Phantom Space Partner on Hurricane Hunter Satellite Constellation Tropical Weather Analytics, Inc. (TWA), with a revolutionary 3D measurement capability for improved...
a year ago
41
a year ago
Tropical Weather Analytics, Inc. (TWA), with a revolutionary 3D measurement capability for improved hurricane forecasting and weather intelligence, is announcing a strategic partnership with Phantom Space […]
Probably...
Have the Nones Leveled Off? Last month Ryan Burge published “The Nones Have Hit a Ceiling“, using data from the 2023 Cooperative...
8 months ago
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8 months ago
Last month Ryan Burge published “The Nones Have Hit a Ceiling“, using data from the 2023 Cooperative Election Study to show that the increase in the number of Americans with no religious affiliation has hit a plateau. Comparing the number of Atheists, Agnostics, and “Nothing in...
NeuroLogica Blog
Coal vs Natural Gas In the last 18 years, since 2005, the US has decreased our CO2 emissions due to electricity...
a year ago
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a year ago
In the last 18 years, since 2005, the US has decreased our CO2 emissions due to electricity generation by 32%, 819 million metric tons of CO2 per year. Thirty percent of this decline can be attributed to renewable energy generation. But 65% is attributed to essentially replacing...
NeuroLogica Blog
Understanding Jumbo Phage Viruses Bacteriophages, viruses that infect bacteria, are the most abundant form of life on Earth. And yet...
10 months ago
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10 months ago
Bacteriophages, viruses that infect bacteria, are the most abundant form of life on Earth. And yet we know comparatively little about them. But in recent years phage research has taken off with renewed interest. This is partly driven by the availability of CRISPR-based tools for...
Math Is Still...
How ‘Event Scripts’ Structure Our Personal Memories By screening films in a brain scanner, neuroscientists discovered a rich library of neural scripts —...
2 weeks ago
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2 weeks ago
By screening films in a brain scanner, neuroscientists discovered a rich library of neural scripts — from a trip through an airport to a marriage proposal — that form scaffolds for memories of our experiences. The post How ‘Event Scripts’ Structure Our Personal...
Out-of-Pocket Blog
Some Thoughts On Startups Overpromising | Out-Of-Pocket the role RFPs play, how it's difficult to define patient harm, and more
11 months ago
Probably...
Why are you so slow? Recently a shoe store in France ran a promotion called “Rob It to Get It”, which invited customers...
a year ago
14
a year ago
Recently a shoe store in France ran a promotion called “Rob It to Get It”, which invited customers to try to steal something by grabbing it and running out of the store. But there was a catch — the “security guard” was a professional sprinter, Méba Mickael Zeze. As you would...
Blog - Practical...
How French Drains Work [Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] In February of 2017, one of...
7 months ago
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7 months ago
[Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] In February of 2017, one of the largest spillways in the world, the one at Oroville Dam in northern California, was severely damaged during releases from heavy rain. You might remember this. I made a video...
Out-of-Pocket Blog
Random Uncontrolled Trials/Tweets | Out-Of-Pocket I need to deactivate my Twitter smh
a year ago
Blog - Practical...
East Palestine Train Derailment Explained [Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] On the evening of Friday,...
a year ago
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a year ago
[Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] On the evening of Friday, February 3, 2023, 38 of 149 cars of a Norfolk Southern Railway freight train derailed in East Palestine, Ohio. Five of the derailed cars were carrying vinyl chloride, a hazardous...
Probably...
Confidence In the Press This is the fifth in a series of excerpts from Elements of Data Science, now available from Lulu.com...
2 months ago
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2 months ago
This is the fifth in a series of excerpts from Elements of Data Science, now available from Lulu.com and online booksellers. It’s based on Chapter 16, which is part of the political alignment case study. You can read the complete example here, or run the Jupyter notebook on...
Asterisk
A User’s Guide to Building a Subculture First, you’re going to need something to care about.
4 months ago
Blog - Practical...
How Do Fish Ladders Work? [Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] Building a dam imparts a...
11 months ago
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11 months ago
[Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] Building a dam imparts a stupendous change to the environment, and as with any change, there are winners and losers. The winners are usually us, people, through hydropower generation, protection from flooding,...
wadertales
Learning lessons from Slender-billed Curlews The 2024 Ibis paper, recommending that the Slender-billed Curlew should be classified as Extinct,...
3 months ago
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3 months ago
The 2024 Ibis paper, recommending that the Slender-billed Curlew should be classified as Extinct, tells a sad tale. We now know that, by the time that the Slender-billed Curlew Action Plan was published in 1996, it was already too late to save the species. Resources expended...
Probably...
We Have a Book! My copy of Probably Overthinking It has arrived! If you want a copy for yourself, you can get a 30%...
a year ago
19
a year ago
My copy of Probably Overthinking It has arrived! If you want a copy for yourself, you can get a 30% discount if you order from the publisher and use the code UCPNEW. You can also order from Amazon or, if you want to support independent bookstores, from Bookshop.org. The official...
The Roots of...
Why you, personally, should want a larger human population What is the ideal size of the human population? One common answer is “much smaller.” Paul Ehrlich,...
a year ago
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a year ago
What is the ideal size of the human population? One common answer is “much smaller.” Paul Ehrlich, co-author of The Population Bomb (1968), has as recently as 2018 promoted the idea that “the world’s optimum population is less than two billion people,” a reduction of the current...
Uncharted...
Why Could Lebanon Be Rich, but Is so Chaotic? Mountains, seas, and a shitty region
5 months ago
NeuroLogica Blog
Regret After Transitioning In my last post I noted that even mentioning general vague support for the LGBTQ community was...
a year ago
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a year ago
In my last post I noted that even mentioning general vague support for the LGBTQ community was enough to trigger very specific feedback, often making erroneous scientific claims. Each claim requires a deep dive and article-length discussion. Even though the discussion that...
NeuroLogica Blog
Categorization and What’s In a Name Categorization is critical in science, but it is also very tricky, often deceptively so. We need to...
a year ago
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a year ago
Categorization is critical in science, but it is also very tricky, often deceptively so. We need to categorize things to help us organize our knowledge, to understand how things work and relate to each other, and to communicate efficiently and precisely. But categorization can...
IEEE Spectrum
Franklin’s Franklins Were Freakishly Un-Fakeable To make something hard to fake, you can use exotic materials or clever tricks. Benjamin Franklin, a...
a year ago
17
a year ago
To make something hard to fake, you can use exotic materials or clever tricks. Benjamin Franklin, a printer by vocation, a scientist by avocation, leaned on cleverness, developing measures that are still in use. Those black arts have now yielded to the latest analytical...
Interaction Magic -...
Designing bikes or bike lanes? Which impacts the cycling experience more: the design of the bike or the bike lanes? Interview and...
over a year ago
10
over a year ago
Which impacts the cycling experience more: the design of the bike or the bike lanes? Interview and podcast with city transport planners Catherine Osborn and David Wills.
Asterisk
Why Worry?
a year ago
Out-of-Pocket Blog
Patient Messaging Conundrum pt. 2 | Out-Of-Pocket Some thoughts from an academic, a behavioral scientist, a patient, and more
a year ago
Math Is Still...
How Is AI Changing the Science of Prediction? With lots of data, a strong model and statistical thinking, scientists can make predictions about...
4 months ago
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4 months ago
With lots of data, a strong model and statistical thinking, scientists can make predictions about all sorts of complex phenomena. Today, this practice is evolving to harness the power of machine learning and massive datasets. In this episode, co-host Steven Strogatz speaks with...
Uncharted...
What Is Happening in Syria? Assad’s regime has fallen, leaving a power vacuum. Why? Who are the winners and losers? What will...
3 months ago
25
3 months ago
Assad’s regime has fallen, leaving a power vacuum. Why? Who are the winners and losers? What will happen next?
Out-of-Pocket Blog
Weird health insurance concepts | Out-Of-Pocket Intercompany eliminations, copay shenanigans, and reference-based pricing
4 months ago
Math Is Still...
Chatbots Don’t Know What Stuff Isn’t Today’s language models are more sophisticated than ever, but they still struggle with the concept...
a year ago
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a year ago
Today’s language models are more sophisticated than ever, but they still struggle with the concept of negation. That’s unlikely to change anytime soon. The post Chatbots Don’t Know What Stuff Isn’t first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Blog - Practical...
How Would a Nuclear EMP Affect the Power Grid? [Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] Late in the morning of April...
over a year ago
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over a year ago
[Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] Late in the morning of April 28, 1958, the USS Boxer aircraft carrier ship was about 70 miles off the coast of the Bikini Atoll in the Pacific Ocean. The crew of the Boxer was preparing to launch a...
Blog - Practical...
Why Are Rails Shaped Like That? [Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] Maybe more than any other type...
a year ago
32
a year ago
[Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] Maybe more than any other type of infrastructure, railways have a contingent of devoted enthusiasts. “Railfans” as they call themselves; Or should say “ourselves”? Maybe it's the nostalgia of an earlier era or...
NeuroLogica Blog
Ghosts Are Not Real It’s Halloween, so there are a lot of fluff pieces about ghosts and similar phenomena circulating in...
a year ago
13
a year ago
It’s Halloween, so there are a lot of fluff pieces about ghosts and similar phenomena circulating in the media. There are some good skeptical pieces as well, which is always nice to see. For this piece I did not want to frame the headline as a question, which I think is...
Asterisk
Development Finance Done Right A veteran diplomat explains how to navigate the U.S. development ecosystem, master the interagency...
8 months ago
7
8 months ago
A veteran diplomat explains how to navigate the U.S. development ecosystem, master the interagency process, and bring electricity to 200 million people.
The Works in...
Anemia and Malaria In malaria endemic regions, being anemic could be keeping children safe
4 months ago
Quantum Frontiers
Memories of things past My best friend—who’s held the title of best friend since kindergarten—calls me the keeper of her...
over a year ago
32
over a year ago
My best friend—who’s held the title of best friend since kindergarten—calls me the keeper of her childhood memories. I recall which toys we played with, the first time I visited her house,1 and which beverages our classmates drank during snack … Continue reading →
Out-of-Pocket Blog
Machine Vision, Robots, and Endoscopes with Matt Schwartz | Out-Of-Pocket When GI met AI
a year ago
NeuroLogica Blog
About Those Lab Leak Documents It was recently revealed that the House subcommittee probing the origins of COVID-19 accidentally...
a year ago
24
a year ago
It was recently revealed that the House subcommittee probing the origins of COVID-19 accidentally released a “trove” of documents related to their investigations. The documents include e-mails and internal communications among the scientists and experts who put together the first...
IEEE Spectrum
What Is an Electronic Sackbut? If you, like me, think of musical synthesizers as an artifact of 1970s rock and disco, then you,...
a year ago
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a year ago
If you, like me, think of musical synthesizers as an artifact of 1970s rock and disco, then you, like me, will be surprised to learn that the first electronic synthesizer predates those genres by several decades In 1945, Hugh Le Caine, a physicist at Canada’s National Research...
Stephen Wolfram...
Computing the Eclipse: Astronomy in the Wolfram Language Basic Eclipse Computation It’s taken millennia to get to the point where it’s possible to accurately...
11 months ago
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11 months ago
Basic Eclipse Computation It’s taken millennia to get to the point where it’s possible to accurately compute eclipses. But now—as a tiny part of making “everything in the world” computable—computation about eclipses is just a built-in feature of the Wolfram Language. The core...
Asterisk
Golden States
11 months ago
Math Is Still...
How Quantum Physicists Explained Earth’s Oscillating Weather Patterns By treating Earth as a topological insulator — a state of quantum matter — physicists found a...
a year ago
13
a year ago
By treating Earth as a topological insulator — a state of quantum matter — physicists found a powerful explanation for the movements of the planet’s air and seas. The post How Quantum Physicists Explained Earth’s Oscillating Weather Patterns first appeared on Quanta...
Math Is Still...
Is Perpetual Motion Possible at the Quantum Level? A new phase of matter called a “time crystal” plays with our expectations of thermodynamics. The...
a year ago
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a year ago
A new phase of matter called a “time crystal” plays with our expectations of thermodynamics. The physicist Vedika Khemani talks with Steven Strogatz about its surprising quantum behavior. The post Is Perpetual Motion Possible at the Quantum Level? first appeared on...
Math Is Still...
Across a Continent, Trees Sync Their Fruiting to the Sun European beech trees more than 1,500 kilometers apart all drop their fruit at the same time in a...
8 months ago
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8 months ago
European beech trees more than 1,500 kilometers apart all drop their fruit at the same time in a grand synchronization event now linked to the summer solstice. The post Across a Continent, Trees Sync Their Fruiting to the Sun first appeared on Quanta Magazine
NeuroLogica Blog
The Future of (Unpaid) Work If we think of the top inventions that had a positive impact on human society and our quality of...
over a year ago
32
over a year ago
If we think of the top inventions that had a positive impact on human society and our quality of life most lists would contain things like the printing press, the wheel, or the computer. One invention that should be on everyone’s list but is easy to overlook is – the washing...
Math Is Still...
Memories Help Brains Recognize New Events Worth Remembering Memories may affect how well the brain will learn about future events by shifting our perceptions of...
a year ago
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a year ago
Memories may affect how well the brain will learn about future events by shifting our perceptions of the world. The post Memories Help Brains Recognize New Events Worth Remembering first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Probably...
The Gender Gap in Political Beliefs Is Small In previous articles (here, here, and here) I’ve looked at evidence of a gender gap in political...
a year ago
47
a year ago
In previous articles (here, here, and here) I’ve looked at evidence of a gender gap in political alignment (liberal or conservative), party affiliation (Democrat or Republican), and policy preferences. Using data from the GSS, I found that women are more likely to say they are...
Uncharted...
Ten New US Cities: 1. Guantanamo City Why we should turn Guantanamo Bay into Guantanamo City
a month ago
Math Is Still...
Biophysicists Uncover Powerful Symmetries in Living Tissue After identifying interlocking symmetries in mammalian cells, scientists can describe some tissues...
a year ago
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a year ago
After identifying interlocking symmetries in mammalian cells, scientists can describe some tissues as liquid crystals — an observation that lays the groundwork for a fluid-dynamic theory of how tissues move. The post Biophysicists Uncover Powerful Symmetries in Living...
brr
South Pole Signage Please close doors quietly!
a year ago
Blog - Practical...
Connecting Solar to the Grid is Harder Than You Think [Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] On June 4, 2022, a small piece...
11 months ago
83
11 months ago
[Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] On June 4, 2022, a small piece of equipment (called a lightning arrestor) at a power plant in Odessa, Texas failed, causing part of the plant to trip offline. It was a fairly typical fault that happens from...
NeuroLogica Blog
AI and User Manuals About half of Americans, when asked, report that they don’t read the user manual for new technical...
7 months ago
58
7 months ago
About half of Americans, when asked, report that they don’t read the user manual for new technical devices they acquire. Although I suspect that many people are like me – I read them sometimes, and then only partly. If there is a “quick user guide” I will often look at that....
Interaction Magic -...
Podcast: Designed for life A deep dive into my career and the future of experience prototyping with Tony Ryan, CEO of Design &...
over a year ago
8
over a year ago
A deep dive into my career and the future of experience prototyping with Tony Ryan, CEO of Design & Technology Association.
symmetry magazine
Imagining the future of gravitational-wave research To understand why scientists are excited about detecting a new background, just look to the history...
a year ago
46
a year ago
To understand why scientists are excited about detecting a new background, just look to the history of studies of the CMB.
ToughSF
Nuclear Conversion for Starship There has been much discussion about converting the SpaceX Starship to use nuclear propulsion. It...
over a year ago
3
over a year ago
There has been much discussion about converting the SpaceX Starship to use nuclear propulsion. It would allow for a great increase in specific impulse and a massive extension of mission capabilities. But is it actually worthwhile? The image above is modified from...
Math Is Still...
Pleasure or Pain? He Maps the Neural Circuits That Decide. The work of the neuroscientist Ishmail Abdus-Saboor has opened up a world of insights into precisely...
11 months ago
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11 months ago
The work of the neuroscientist Ishmail Abdus-Saboor has opened up a world of insights into precisely how much pleasure and pain animals experience during different forms of touch. The post Pleasure or Pain? He Maps the Neural Circuits That Decide. first appeared on...
The Roots of...
A plea for solutionism on AI safety Will AI kill us all? This question has rapidly gone mainstream. A few months ago, it wasn’t...
a year ago
41
a year ago
Will AI kill us all? This question has rapidly gone mainstream. A few months ago, it wasn’t seriously debated very far outside the rationalist community of LessWrong; now it’s reported in major media outlets including the NY Times, The Guardian, the Times of London, BBC, WIRED,...
Asterisk
The Myth of the Loneliness Epidemic Are we really living through a uniquely lonely moment in American history? When it comes to...
4 months ago
20
4 months ago
Are we really living through a uniquely lonely moment in American history? When it comes to friendship, this isn’t the first time that authorities have cried wolf.
Out-of-Pocket Blog
What's The Deal With Telemedicine? | Out-Of-Pocket we're in the weird in-between stage of adoption
a year ago
Out-of-Pocket Blog
Personalized Health Insurance and the Payer Stack | Out-Of-Pocket Stacks on stacks on stacks
a year ago
Math Is Still...
Quanta Relaunches Hyperjumps Math Game Explore a universe of numbers and arithmetic in our new and improved interactive math game,...
a year ago
32
a year ago
Explore a universe of numbers and arithmetic in our new and improved interactive math game, Hyperjumps! The post Quanta Relaunches Hyperjumps Math Game first appeared on Quanta Magazine
IEEE Spectrum
Quantum Technology’s Unsung Heroes In a world where quantum technologies are on the rise in computing, cryptography, materials,...
a year ago
14
a year ago
In a world where quantum technologies are on the rise in computing, cryptography, materials, sensors, telecom, biomed, and AI, it’s easy to forget that not so long ago the words “quantum” and “technology” rarely fit comfortably into a sentence together. A range of trailblazers...
Drew Ex Machina
The Promise of MIDAS: The First Experimental Early Warning Satellites Today in the United States we almost take for granted the military’s ability to detect missile...
a year ago
36
a year ago
Today in the United States we almost take for granted the military’s ability to detect missile launches anywhere on the planet and quickly determine whether it […]
Math Is Still...
Math Is Still Catching Up to the Mysterious Genius of Srinivasa Ramanujan Born poor in colonial India and dead at 32, Ramanujan had fantastical, out-of-nowhere visions that...
4 months ago
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4 months ago
Born poor in colonial India and dead at 32, Ramanujan had fantastical, out-of-nowhere visions that continue to shape the field today. The post Math Is Still Catching Up to the Mysterious Genius of Srinivasa Ramanujan first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Math Is Still...
Cellular Self-Destruction May Be Ancient. But Why? How did cells evolve a process to end their own lives? Recent research suggests that apoptosis, a...
a year ago
41
a year ago
How did cells evolve a process to end their own lives? Recent research suggests that apoptosis, a form of programmed cell death, first arose billions of years ago in bacteria with a primitive sociality. The post Cellular Self-Destruction May Be Ancient. But Why? first...
Asterisk
Silicon Valley’s Gold Rush Roots Silicon Valley, purveyor of disruptive technologies, likes to think of itself as sui generis. But...
11 months ago
7
11 months ago
Silicon Valley, purveyor of disruptive technologies, likes to think of itself as sui generis. But there’s a clear line from tech’s knowledge economy to the Bay Area’s first economy: gold mining.
Quantum Frontiers
What is the logical gate speed of a photonic quantum computer? Terry Rudolph, PsiQuantum & Imperial College London During a recent visit to the wild western town...
a year ago
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a year ago
Terry Rudolph, PsiQuantum & Imperial College London During a recent visit to the wild western town of Pasadena I got into a shootout at high-noon trying to explain the nuances of this question to a colleague. Here is a more … Continue reading →
Probably...
Combining Risks Here’s another installment in Data Q&A: Answering the real questions with Python. Previous...
9 months ago
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9 months ago
Here’s another installment in Data Q&A: Answering the real questions with Python. Previous installments are available from the Data Q&A landing page. combine_risk Combining Risks¶ Here’s a question from the Reddit statistics forum. Bit of a weird one but I’m hoping you’re the...
NeuroLogica Blog
Eating Methane Methane is the forgotten greenhouse gas (sort of). Often, when discussing how best to reduce...
a year ago
11
a year ago
Methane is the forgotten greenhouse gas (sort of). Often, when discussing how best to reduce anthropogenic climate change, we talk about decarbonizing our electrical and transport sectors, and carbon removal. But methane is also a greenhouse gas, contributing to global warming,...
The Works in...
History is in the making It's technology and ideas, not politics, that change our lives the most. History should reflect...
3 months ago
Casey Handmer's blog
Why do we need a Department of Government Efficiency? President Trump’s recent sweeping electoral victory is a clear mandate for change. There is some...
3 months ago
26
3 months ago
President Trump’s recent sweeping electoral victory is a clear mandate for change. There is some urgency, and Trump has assembled the early stages of a team and coalition that can deliver it. It’s not exactly a mystery what Elon and Vivek plan for The Department of Government...
Beautiful Public...
14,000 Photos of Army Uniforms and Rations from the 70s and 80s An incredible archive of 14,000 photos of Army uniforms, military gear and rations from the 70s and...
3 months ago
Math Is Still...
Evolution: Fast or Slow? Lizards Help Resolve a Paradox. Why does natural selection appear to happen slowly on long timescales and quickly on short ones? A...
a year ago
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a year ago
Why does natural selection appear to happen slowly on long timescales and quickly on short ones? A multigenerational study of four lizard species addresses biology’s “paradox of stasis.” The post Evolution: Fast or Slow? Lizards Help Resolve a Paradox. first appeared...
Out-of-Pocket Blog
Out-Of-Pocket 2021 Predictions | Out-Of-Pocket the future is easy to predict right
a year ago
NeuroLogica Blog
What Kind of Social Media Do We Want? Recently Meta decided to end their fact-checkers on Facebook and Instagram. The move has been both...
2 months ago
37
2 months ago
Recently Meta decided to end their fact-checkers on Facebook and Instagram. The move has been both hailed and criticized. They are replacing the fact-checkers with an X-style “community notes”. Mark Zuckerberg summed up the move this way: “It means we’re going to catch less bad...
Math Is Still...
Are There Reasons to Believe in a Multiverse? Several areas of physics suggest reasons to think that unobservable universes with different natural...
a year ago
102
a year ago
Several areas of physics suggest reasons to think that unobservable universes with different natural laws could lie beyond ours. The theoretical physicist David Kaplan talks with Steven Strogatz about the mysteries that a multiverse would solve. The post Are There...
Math Is Still...
Why Insect Memories May Not Survive Metamorphosis The reshuffling of neurons during fruit fly metamorphosis suggests that larval memories don’t...
a year ago
13
a year ago
The reshuffling of neurons during fruit fly metamorphosis suggests that larval memories don’t persist in adults. The post Why Insect Memories May Not Survive Metamorphosis first appeared on Quanta Magazine
The Roots of...
What I’ve been reading, September 2023 A quasi-monthly feature. Recent blog posts and news stories are generally omitted; you can find them...
a year ago
284
a year ago
A quasi-monthly feature. Recent blog posts and news stories are generally omitted; you can find them in my links digests. I’ve been busy helping to choose the first cohort of our blogging fellowship, so my reading has been relatively light. All emphasis in bold in the quotes...
NeuroLogica Blog
A Climate Debate Regarding Health Effects – Part II Yesterday’s post was the first in an exchange about the effects of climate change on public health....
over a year ago
35
over a year ago
Yesterday’s post was the first in an exchange about the effects of climate change on public health. Today’s post is my response. Part II Climate change is a critically important topic for society today, and it’s important that the public have a working knowledge of the facts,...
wadertales
Inland feeding by coastal godwits Species such as Dunlin and Knot are well-served by conservation measures that aim to protect...
over a year ago
30
over a year ago
Species such as Dunlin and Knot are well-served by conservation measures that aim to protect estuaries but the same is not necessarily true for Black-tailed Godwits. In a 2022 paper in the journal Wader Study, Clément Jourdan and colleagues describe the movements of ten tagged...
Explorations of an...
2024 (Part 2 of 2) June and July I always sound like a broken record each year when discussing June and July. I was...
2 months ago
3
2 months ago
June and July I always sound like a broken record each year when discussing June and July. I was fortunate to have a lot of field work in 2024 which kept me occupied for most of these two months. But it's one of the best jobs in the world as I spend each and every day outside,...
NeuroLogica Blog
RFK Jr., Joe Rogan, and Vaccines RFK Jr., who is now running for the Democratic presidential nomination, is anti-vaccine. He will...
a year ago
31
a year ago
RFK Jr., who is now running for the Democratic presidential nomination, is anti-vaccine. He will vehemently deny this, but I don’t buy it for a second. He is simply playing the, “I’m not anti-vaccine, I am pro-safe vaccine” gambit, which is disingenuous and always has been. We...
Math Is Still...
Can AI Models Show Us How People Learn? Impossible Languages Point a Way. Certain grammatical rules never appear in any known language. By constructing artificial languages...
a month ago
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a month ago
Certain grammatical rules never appear in any known language. By constructing artificial languages that have these rules, linguists can use neural networks to explore how people learn. The post Can AI Models Show Us How People Learn? Impossible Languages Point a Way....
Math Is Still...
The Cosmos Teems with Complex Organic Molecules Wherever astronomers look, they see life’s raw materials. The post The Cosmos Teems with...
3 months ago
Math Is Still...
Mollusk Eyes Reveal How Future Evolution Depends on the Past The visual systems of an obscure group of mollusks provide a rare natural example of path-dependent...
a year ago
43
a year ago
The visual systems of an obscure group of mollusks provide a rare natural example of path-dependent evolution, in which a critical fork in the creatures’ past determined their evolutionary futures. The post Mollusk Eyes Reveal How Future Evolution Depends on the Past...
Math Is Still...
Why the Brain’s Connections to the Body Are Crisscrossed In all bilaterally symmetrical animals, from humans down to simple worms, nerves cross from one side...
a year ago
34
a year ago
In all bilaterally symmetrical animals, from humans down to simple worms, nerves cross from one side of the body to the opposite side of the brain. Geometry may explain why. The post Why the Brain’s Connections to the Body Are Crisscrossed first appeared on Quanta...
Math Is Still...
Brain’s ‘Background Noise’ May Explain Value of Shock Therapy Electroconvulsive therapy is highly effective in treating major depressive disorder, but no one...
11 months ago
37
11 months ago
Electroconvulsive therapy is highly effective in treating major depressive disorder, but no one knows why it works. New research suggests it may restore balance between excitation and inhibition in the brain. The post Brain’s ‘Background Noise’ May Explain Value of...
Wanderingspace
Goodbye Ingenuity Mission completed. Ingenuity is left alone on Mars after damage to one of its blades renders it...
a year ago
55
a year ago
Mission completed. Ingenuity is left alone on Mars after damage to one of its blades renders it inoperable..
NeuroLogica Blog
Roleplaying Games May Help Autistic People Gotta love the title of this paper: “A critical hit: Dungeons and Dragons as a buff for autistic...
6 months ago
48
6 months ago
Gotta love the title of this paper: “A critical hit: Dungeons and Dragons as a buff for autistic people“. Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) is a tabletop roleplaying game where a small group of people each play characters adventuring in an imaginary world run by the dungeon master (DM)....
Sean Carroll
The Zombie Argument for Physicalism (Contra Panpsychism) The nature of consciousness remains a contentious subject out there. I’m a physicalist myself — as I...
over a year ago
24
over a year ago
The nature of consciousness remains a contentious subject out there. I’m a physicalist myself — as I explain in The Big Picture and elsewhere, I think consciousness is best understood as weakly-emergent from the ordinary physical behavior of matter, without requiring any special...
Asterisk
AI Isn’t Coming for Tech Jobs—Yet LLMs can make a developer’s job easier and faster. When might they make them obsolete?
a year ago
Beautiful Public...
US Government UFO (UAP) Footage For decades, the public suspected that the US Government was hiding secret intelligence about UFOs —...
a month ago
21
a month ago
For decades, the public suspected that the US Government was hiding secret intelligence about UFOs — (now known as UAPs). Turns out…it kind of was.
Drew Ex Machina
NASA’s Explorer 18: The First Interplanetary Monitoring Platform Among the greatest scientific achievements of the opening years of the Space Age was the...
a year ago
30
a year ago
Among the greatest scientific achievements of the opening years of the Space Age was the characterization of Earth’s magnetic field and the discovery of what became […]
Uncharted...
Interesting News & Game Theory of Sex | Q3 2024 Trans & bathrooms, the end of nation states, woke pendulum, trigger warnings, is breastfeeding...
4 months ago
24
4 months ago
Trans & bathrooms, the end of nation states, woke pendulum, trigger warnings, is breastfeeding actually good for IQ, are differences in household work justified, and more
The Works in...
Growing Forests As countries develop, deforestation drops
a year ago
NeuroLogica Blog
Biofrequency Gadgets are a Total Scam I was recently asked what I thought about the Solex AO Scan. The website for the product includes...
a year ago
43
a year ago
I was recently asked what I thought about the Solex AO Scan. The website for the product includes this claim: AO Scan Technology by Solex is an elegant, yet simple-to-use frequency technology based on Tesla, Einstein, and other prominent scientists’ discoveries. It uses delicate...
NeuroLogica Blog
Titan Disaster and Risk vs Benefit There has been a lot of discussion regarding the recent disaster of the Titan submersible. Was the...
a year ago
30
a year ago
There has been a lot of discussion regarding the recent disaster of the Titan submersible. Was the risk justified? Who should be responsible for the safety issues? Who should be on the hook for the millions of dollars the rescue effort took? And why did this tragedy garner more...
Uncharted...
Ten New US Cities: 2. Starbase A city of dreams
a month ago
Light from Space
The Fossil Footprint Nebula A rarely imaged target as it is very dim. This image took me over 50h of total exposure time. Total...
a year ago
41
a year ago
A rarely imaged target as it is very dim. This image took me over 50h of total exposure time. Total exposure time: 52h 40' Image resolution: 4,490 × 4,552px (0.96″/px) Shot from my driveway near Tucson, AZ in late 2023 Telescope: William Optics RedCat
Math Is Still...
The ‘Elegant’ Math Model That Could Help Rescue Coral Reefs Physicists and marine biologists built a quantitative framework that predicts how coral polyps...
2 weeks ago
10
2 weeks ago
Physicists and marine biologists built a quantitative framework that predicts how coral polyps collectively construct a variety of coral shapes. The post The ‘Elegant’ Math Model That Could Help Rescue Coral Reefs first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Math Is Still...
The Computer Scientist Who Builds Big Pictures From Small Details To better understand machine learning algorithms, Lenka Zdeborová treats them like physical...
5 months ago
52
5 months ago
To better understand machine learning algorithms, Lenka Zdeborová treats them like physical materials. The post The Computer Scientist Who Builds Big Pictures From Small Details first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Math Is Still...
An Easy-Sounding Problem Yields Numbers Too Big for Our Universe Researchers prove that navigating certain systems of vectors is among the most complex computational...
a year ago
16
a year ago
Researchers prove that navigating certain systems of vectors is among the most complex computational problems. The post An Easy-Sounding Problem Yields Numbers Too Big for Our Universe first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Out-of-Pocket Blog
The New (Experimental) Ways To Tackle The Mental Health Crisis | Out-Of-Pocket let's try some new stuff to scale mental health care
a year ago
nanoscale views
Seeing through your head - diffuse imaging From the medical diagnostic perspective (and for many other applications), you can understand why it...
3 months ago
3
3 months ago
From the medical diagnostic perspective (and for many other applications), you can understand why it might be very convenient to be able to perform some kind of optical imaging of the interior of what you'd ordinarily consider opaque objects.  Even when a wavelength range is...
Math Is Still...
How Is Cell Death Essential to Life? Cells in our bodies are constantly dying — and these countless tiny deaths are essential to human...
3 months ago
47
3 months ago
Cells in our bodies are constantly dying — and these countless tiny deaths are essential to human health and multicellular life itself. In this episode, co-host Steven Strogatz speaks with cellular biologist Shai Shaham about what makes a cell “alive” and the latest developments...
Drew Ex Machina
GOES Video of Solar Eclipse – October 14, 2023 Solar eclipses have fascinated humanity since ancient times and the annular eclipse of October 14,...
a year ago
53
a year ago
Solar eclipses have fascinated humanity since ancient times and the annular eclipse of October 14, 2023 was no different. Unlike a total solar eclipse where the […]
Cremieux Recueil
Did Unions End Long Work Hours? Is it growth or organized labor that's more responsible for giving us shorter workdays?
6 months ago
Asterisk
You’re Invited to a Colonoscopy! Colonoscopies are the first-line method for preventing colorectal cancer in America —and almost...
a year ago
8
a year ago
Colonoscopies are the first-line method for preventing colorectal cancer in America —and almost nowhere else. But do they work? We finally have a comprehensive trial, but it’s left gastroenterologists with more questions than answers.
Eukaryote Writes...
Defending against hypothetical moon life during Apollo 11 This is how a completely abstract argument about alien germs was taken seriously and mitigated at...
a year ago
71
a year ago
This is how a completely abstract argument about alien germs was taken seriously and mitigated at great effort and expense during the 1969 Apollo landing.
NeuroLogica Blog
Confidently Wrong How certain are you of anything that you believe? Do you even think about your confidence level, and...
5 months ago
45
5 months ago
How certain are you of anything that you believe? Do you even think about your confidence level, and do you have a process for determining what your confidence level should be or do you just follow your gut feelings? Thinking about confidence is a form of metacognition – thinking...
NeuroLogica Blog
Light and Distance in an Expanding Universe Commenter Lal asks in the topic suggestions: “Media reports that light has been travelling from that...
9 months ago
73
9 months ago
Commenter Lal asks in the topic suggestions: “Media reports that light has been travelling from that distant galaxy for 13 and a half billion years, which I assume is true, but this neither represents the original nor the current distance to that galaxy in terms of light years. I...
Stephen Wolfram...
Yet More New Ideas and New Functions: Launching Version 14.1 of Wolfram Language & Mathematica For the 36th Time… the Latest from Our R&D Pipeline There’s Now a Unified Wolfram App Vector...
7 months ago
61
7 months ago
For the 36th Time… the Latest from Our R&D Pipeline There’s Now a Unified Wolfram App Vector Databases and Semantic Search RAGs and Dynamic Prompting for LLMs Connect to Your Favorite LLM Symbolic Arrays and Their Calculus Binomials and Pitchforks: Navigating Mathematical...
Asterisk
The Wrong Kind of City? How much can the way cities grow tell us about the economic trajectory of their countries? According...
6 months ago
15
6 months ago
How much can the way cities grow tell us about the economic trajectory of their countries? According to the father of modern sociology, quite a lot.
The Works in...
What did Henry George think about cities? Solving the terrible urban conditions of the 1800s by abolishing cities
10 months ago
symmetry magazine
CERN opens Science Gateway About 1,400 people attended the grand opening of CERN’s new science education center.
a year ago
symmetry magazine
Kétévi Assamagan pays it forward Kétévi Assamagan's contributions to physics go beyond his research at the Large Hadron...
over a year ago
27
over a year ago
Kétévi Assamagan's contributions to physics go beyond his research at the Large Hadron Collider. Kétévi Assamagan first became interested in physics in high school—because he had to be. His school in Togo, in West Africa, required students to declare a major....
NeuroLogica Blog
Fake Fossils In 1931 a fossil lizard was recovered from the Italian Alps, believed to be a 280 million year old...
a year ago
34
a year ago
In 1931 a fossil lizard was recovered from the Italian Alps, believed to be a 280 million year old specimen. The fossil was also rare in that it appeared to have some preserved soft tissue. It was given the species designation Tridentinosaurus antiquus and was thought to be part...
IEEE Spectrum
The Marimba Virtuoso’s Desktop Planetarium The United States was at the time approaching “peak space.” The previous year, cosmonaut Yuri...
a year ago
13
a year ago
The United States was at the time approaching “peak space.” The previous year, cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin had become the first human to reach outer space, and on 12 September 1962 President Kennedy would announce the United States’ intention to put a man on the moon before the...
Math Is Still...
Secret Messages Can Hide in AI-Generated Media In steganography, an ordinary message masks the presence of a secret communication. Humans can never...
a year ago
115
a year ago
In steganography, an ordinary message masks the presence of a secret communication. Humans can never do it perfectly, but a new study shows it’s possible for machines. The post Secret Messages Can Hide in AI-Generated Media first appeared on Quanta Magazine
Stephen Wolfram...
Foundations of Biological Evolution: More Results & More Surprises This is a follow-on to Why Does Biological Evolution Work? A Minimal Model for Biological Evolution...
3 months ago
72
3 months ago
This is a follow-on to Why Does Biological Evolution Work? A Minimal Model for Biological Evolution and Other Adaptive Processes [May 3, 2024]. Even More from an Extremely Simple Model A few months ago I introduced an extremely simple “adaptive cellular automaton” model that...
NeuroLogica Blog
The Gender Boxing Hubub Both Lin Yu-ting of Taiwan and Imane Khelif of Algeria earned medals in female boxing competition at...
7 months ago
48
7 months ago
Both Lin Yu-ting of Taiwan and Imane Khelif of Algeria earned medals in female boxing competition at the 2024 Olympics. This has caused a controversy because both boxers, according to reports, have some form of DSD – difference of sex development. This means they have been caught...
Casey Handmer's blog
We can Terraform the American West Why is there almost nothing on the left hand side of the USA? Water scarcity! We’re missing 300...
4 months ago
23
4 months ago
Why is there almost nothing on the left hand side of the USA? Water scarcity! We’re missing 300 million Americans. We’re missing  30 global cities west of 100 degrees longitude. We should do something about it! The western US is a parched opportunity to create millions of acres...
Inverted Passion
Review of 2023 Time is strange – 2023 simultaneously felt too long and too short. It was short because I remember...
a year ago
37
a year ago
Time is strange – 2023 simultaneously felt too long and too short. It was short because I remember recently writing my 2022 review, and it was long because I ended up packing a lot of stuff into it. ✅ Train 5 days a week (including Mixed Martial Arts) I did manage to train 5...
Casey Handmer's blog
Salton Sea statistics I wanted to gain better insights into the Salton Sea level, evaporation, inflows and outflows. Step...
2 months ago
37
2 months ago
I wanted to gain better insights into the Salton Sea level, evaporation, inflows and outflows. Step one was to gather publicly available data about its level, and collate it into a single graph. Here we see that despite the continual formation of Salton Sea advisory committees,...
Quantum Frontiers
A (quantum) complex legacy Early in the fourth year of my PhD, I received a most John-ish email from John Preskill, my PhD...
over a year ago
34
over a year ago
Early in the fourth year of my PhD, I received a most John-ish email from John Preskill, my PhD advisor. The title read, “thermodynamics of complexity,” and the message was concise the way that the Amazon River is damp: “Might … Continue reading →
NeuroLogica Blog
Using CRISPR To Treat HIV CRISPR has been big scientific news since it was introduced in 2012. The science actually goes back...
11 months ago
39
11 months ago
CRISPR has been big scientific news since it was introduced in 2012. The science actually goes back to 1987, but the CRISPR/Cas9 system was patented in 2012, and the developers won the Noble Prize in Chemistry in 2020. The system gives researchers the ability to quickly and...
Math Is Still...
The Brainstem Fine-Tunes Inflammation Throughout the Body The evolutionarily ancient part of the brain that controls breathing and heart rate also regulates...
9 months ago
55
9 months ago
The evolutionarily ancient part of the brain that controls breathing and heart rate also regulates the immune system — a discovery about the brain-body axis made by experts on taste. The post The Brainstem Fine-Tunes Inflammation Throughout the Body first appeared on...
Blog - Practical...
Why Railroads Don't Need Expansion Joints [Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] One of the most common...
a year ago
34
a year ago
[Note that this article is a transcript of the video embedded above.] One of the most common attributes folks imagine when they think of trains is the clickety-clack sound they make as they roll down the tracks. The thing is, most trains don’t make that sound anymore. Or really,...
Asterisk
From Warp Speed to 100 Days During the COVID pandemic, we learned to design vaccines within weeks. Now, the bottleneck is...
a year ago
11
a year ago
During the COVID pandemic, we learned to design vaccines within weeks. Now, the bottleneck is testing that they work. To get even faster, we need innovations in clinical trial design.
IEEE Spectrum
James Wimshurst’s Electrostatic Immortality James Wimshurst did not invent the machine that bears his name. But thanks to his many refinements...
a year ago
28
a year ago
James Wimshurst did not invent the machine that bears his name. But thanks to his many refinements to a distinctive type of electrostatic generator, we now have the Wimshurst influence machine. What does a Wimshurst machine do? Influence machines date back to the 18th century....
Math Is Still...
Concept Cells Help Your Brain Abstract Information and Build Memories Individual cells in the brain light up for specific ideas. These concept neurons, once known as...
a month ago
34
a month ago
Individual cells in the brain light up for specific ideas. These concept neurons, once known as “Jennifer Aniston cells,” help us think, imagine and remember episodes from our lives. The post Concept Cells Help Your Brain Abstract Information and Build Memories first...
Asterisk
Oops
a year ago
symmetry magazine
Rap with an undercurrent of particle physics UK musician Consensus spins the big ideas of physics into rap and hip-hop tracks.
a year ago
Sean Carroll
The Biggest Ideas in the Universe | 23. Criticality and Complexity Spherical cows are important because they let us abstract away all the complications of the real...
over a year ago
52
over a year ago
Spherical cows are important because they let us abstract away all the complications of the real world and think about underlying principles. But what about when the complications are the point? Then we enter the realm of complex systems — which, interestingly, has its own...