New process could revolutionize electron microscopy

Researchers at the University of Sheffield have created what sounds impossible - even nonsensical: An experimental electron microscope without lenses that not only works, but is orders of magnitude more powerful than current models. By means of a new form of mathematical analysis, scientists can take the meaningless patterns of dots and circles created by the lens-less microscope and create images that are of high resolution and contrast and, potentially, up to 100 times greater magnification... Continue Reading New process could revolutionize electron microscopy

"Interface scaffolds" could wire prosthetics directly into amputees' nervous systems

Scientists at Sandia National Laboratories have announced a breakthrough in prosthetics that may one day allow artificial limbs to be controlled by their wearers as naturally as organic ones, as well as providing sensations of touch and feeling. The scientists have developed a new interface consisting of a porous, flexible, conductive, biocompatible material through which nerve fibers can grow and act as a sort of junction through which nerve impulses can pass to the prosthesis and data from the prosthesis back to the nerve. If this new interface is successful, it has the potential to one day allow nerves to be connected directly to artificial limbs... Continue Reading "Interface scaffolds" could wire prosthetics directly into amputees' nervous systems

The Day of the Campions

This won't end well

Russian scientist cultivate seeds from plants frozen in Siberia for 30,000 years.

Why is I feel like I've just walked into the first chapter of a John Wyndham novel?

Han shot first

The sociopolitical importance of setting the record straight.

R J MacReady, call your service

This will not end well

Russian scientists breach an Antarctic lake that has been sealed for 14 million years.  So far, that makes for a passingly interesting story until these sort of bits show up in the Popular Science story (emphasis added):

The team is apparently alive and well despite a week of suspicious radio silence,.

And,

Last week we thought that might happen again–if anyone could even hail the scientists–because conditions are getting worse, but no one heard from the team in several days. Then on Monday, the Russian news agency announced the team's success.

Then,

But scientists want to reach it because it could hold weird forms of life that survive in deep cold and with no sun.

Sealed for 14 million years? Weird life forms? Base cut off by bad weather? Lost radio contact? Then the team calmly says that everything's fine?

Send in the flame throwers!

Duck mating is an arms race

A duck pond may seem like the ideal place to spend a peaceful spring afternoon, but during mating season it can look like the scene of a gang attack. Though ducks as a species are famously monogamous, unattached drakes can be extremely aggressive. They attack any female in sight in a mating frenzy that often ends in the injury or death of the victim. This has resulted in the ducks developing ways to prevent unwanted matings and the drakes ways to overcome their defenses. Researchers in North America are developing a novel way to study this "evolutionary arms race" that uses high-speed cameras, force transducers and model duck oviducts made of glass... Continue Reading Duck mating is an arms race

Plasma-filled bags could replace the Petri dish

The humble Petri dish may soon be a thing of the past. A team of researchers in Germany have developed a new technique for treating plastic bags with plasmas to turn them sealed, sterile containers suitable for microbiology work with much less chance of contamination than traditional containers. This holds the promise of not only decreasing the possibility of contamination in stem cell and live-cell therapy techniques, but also the potential for cultivating whole human organs for transplant surgery... Continue Reading Plasma-filled bags could replace the Petri dish

Meanwhile, back at the lab

Swiss scientists create "cyborg" yeast.

When asked why they did it, they got a bit sulky and started mumbling that they were just "cocking about".

The Big Germ

Scientists discover a giant virus.  Much larger than any previous virus, this is the first germ capable of inflicting physical violence. Instead of causing fever or nausea, it knees the victim in the groin.

Doctors recommend that the public take a refresher course in hand to hand combat in the event of an outbreak.

Anatomy of the Centaur

I've often wondered about this.  Do centaurs have an extra pelvis or does the spine just curve?  If the latter, how are the vertebrae arranged?

I know, I know; I need a hobby.

Next up: Thark arms.  How the heck do you fit the lower pair on the rib cage?

Caffeine fiends

Popular Science headline:

Newly Found Species of Bacteria Lives On Pure Caffeine

Big deal; I know undergraduates who do that all the time before exams.

This in from the Satellite of Love

Scientists grow a brain in a bowl.

They don't know where the guy in the cloak and hood came from.

Joke science

An American professor tries to uncover the secrets of humour.

This is one avenue of research that we dare not go down.  The impact of such discoveries could be devastating.

I was wondering

Scientists discover how hummingbird tongues work.

Why do I get the impression that most science these days is actually a series of thinly disguised barroom bets?

Plastic feathers

The American Chemical Society suggests manufacturing plastic out of chicken feathers.

Now they're just making it up.

Journey to a Bit of the Way in the Earth

Scientists plan to take up where Project Mohole left off and drill their way to the Earth mantle.

It'll all end in tears, I know it.

Professor Frost, call your service

The New York Times looks at free will and presents this jaw dropper (emphasis added):

Now for questions from experimental philosophers:


1) In this deterministic universe, is it possible for a person to be fully morally responsible for his actions?


2) This year, as he has often done in the past, Mark arranges to cheat on his taxes. Is he is fully morally responsible for his actions?


3) Bill falls in love with his secretary, and he decides that the only way to be with her is to murder his wife and three children. Before leaving on a trip, he arranges for them to be killed while he is away. Is Bill fully morally responsible for his actions?
...
Is Bill being judged illogically? In one way, yes. The chain of reasoning may seem flawed to some philosophers, and the belief in free will may seem naïve to the psychologists and neuroscientists who argue that we’re driven by forces beyond our conscious control — an argument that Bill’s lawyer might end up borrowing in court.

Then there's this, which sums up the attitude of these nihilists:

In one experiment, some people read a passage from Francis Crick, the molecular biologist, asserting that free will is a quaint old notion no longer taken seriously by intellectuals, especially not psychologists and neuroscientists.

"Quaint old notion"? Just how much crack are these people smoking. It's obvious that they are; it's a question of how much. "The belief in free will may seem naïve"? If this is truly how psychologists and neurologists think, then I intend to give them a very wide berth in future. I thought I put this sort of woolly thinking behind me when I stopped teaching undergraduates first year history of science. I don't know what's worse, their idea that there is no such thing as free will or that they explain the belief in it as some evolutionary trick to maintain social order. The first one is bad logic while the second is flat-out wishful thinking wrapped in a Just So story.

Aside from more detailed refutation, which I shall fore go to prevent fits or narcolepsy, this sort of idea is nonsense because it refutes itself. Any argument that attempts to demonstrate the non-existence of reason or to reduce it to a purely mechanistic operation is inherently self-contradictory and therefore invalid because it negates a priori the foundations of any epistemological system upon which it bases itself. That is, if you can reason that there is no such thing as reason, then you cannot regard the conclusion as true because it is the result of unreason. QED. To negate free will is to negate reason because reason cannot exist without it. Therefore, if you can argue that free will does not exist, your argument is invalid because you could make it

It is even more obvious that no one who espouses the claim that free will does not exist cannot believe this because if he did, he wouldn't bother to tell anyone.  Why should one automaton argue with another automaton?  It's pointless.

The other problem I have is that in the experimental example they have got the question wrong. This comparison of tax evasion and murder isn't a question of free will; it's a question of morality.  The tax problem has a grey area because taxes are coercive and collected without individual consent. They may even be punitive, unjust, or  flat-out persecution.  On the other hand, the husband is quite baldly guilty of adultery and premeditated murder.  Regardless, how anyone can claim that free will is not operating or operates differently in either case is beyond me.

Finally, there is the fact that this whole idea is based on three hidden assumptions:  One, that man is not possessed of a soul that is transcendent, hence subject to inherent nature rather than physical forces, and is therefore capable of exercising free will.  Two, that the universe is purely mechanistic (and crudely so) and three, that God does not exist.

God, you see is where all of this truly falls down.  Let us grant for a moment all that these nihilists argue.  Let us agree that man is a mere puppet of impersonal, mechanical forces that make him dance to their blind, mindless tune.  Let us grant that man's every thought, decision, and emotion is also a product of these forces.  Let us concede all of this.  It does the nihilists no good.  If God is in the equation, then He is the Prime Mover from which all these forces emanate.  But God is not mindless nor is He without will.  Far from it.  He is the source and archetype of all will and reason.  Our reason is merely a pale imitation of His created in His image.  These forces exist and operate in accordance with His will and are unable to do otherwise because all action is dependent on Him.  If God, as He has made plain to us, wishes man to have free will, then it is logical to conclude that these forces that the nihilists invoke must conform to God's will, which is to grant man free will.  Short version:  The universe is determinate, but the goal of this determination is to make man free.

I really do wish some of these nihilists worked for me.  I'd cut their pay immediately by 50 percent and when they squawked, I'd blame it on impersonal forces.  I think that their determinism would go South pretty fast after that.

Project Tic Toc

Could the Large Hadron Collider be turned into a time machine?

Well, it looks about right.

Worlds in Collision: Immanuel Velikovsky

An example of a truly dedicated loony.

Why the other queue goes faster