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Are You Observant?

Posted by Andrew at 4:12 PM on July 13, 2010

Do you consider yourself to be an observant kind of person?  Someone who really pays attention to detail?  If you are, then you’ll be interested in watching and participating in a couple of video tests by researchers Christopher Chabris and Daniel Simons.  These are genuine experiments – there’s no skull or shriek going to pop out half way through.

The first is a over ten years old and is considered to be a classic – just follow the instructions. It’s best if you can run it full-screen.

Now, if you’ve seen that one before, or if you want to try it for a second time, you can watch this newer version. Again just follow the instructions and also best viewed full-screen.

If you’ve been totally fascinated by what you’ve just seen, then head on over to the source site here or the YouTube Channel for more videos.

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Alan Turing

Posted by Andrew at 4:09 PM on June 23, 2010

Today is the 98th anniversary of the birth Alan Turing, one of most brilliant minds of the 20th Century.  Born on was born on 23rd June 1912 in London, England, he is known as one of the fathers of modern computing, though his ideas for programmable computers were ahead of their time.

He is widely know for the test which bears his name – the Turing Test – which Alan Turing designed to test for machine intelligence. In the test, a person communicates in natural language via keyboard and screen with two hidden respondents, one human, one computer.  If the person cannot tell which of the respondents is the machine, the computer is said to have passed the Turing test.  So far no computer has consistently passed the test.

Turing is also famous for his work during the Second World War at Bletchley Park and the breaking of the German naval Enigma code.  In collaboration with Gordon Welchman, he designed an electromechanical machine called a “bombe” that eliminated unworkable Enigma settings, leaving only a few to be investigated by analysts.  He went on to make a several further contributions to the war effort in different areas.

Regrettably, in 1952, Turing was arrested, tried and convicted for homosexuality which at that time was a criminal offence.  As result, and despite his wartime record, his security clearance to work for the government was revoked.  Sadly, in 7 June 1954, he committed suicide, eating an apple laced with cyanide.

Happy Birthday, Alan.

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Posted in People, Science

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Happy 50th Birthday Mr Laser

Posted by Andrew at 5:24 AM on June 8, 2010

On the 16th May 1960, Theodore Maiman at the Hughes Research Lab in California fired up the first confirmed demonstration of a laser using a synthetic ruby.   A few months later on 12th December and persuing a different line of research, Ali Javan at Bell Labs, showed the first helium-neon gas-discharge laser.

One of the key differences between the two versions, was that the latter could operate continuously and within 3 months Bell demonstrated a phone call between two handsets using a laser to transmit the modulated voice signal.  One of the underlying building blocks for the telecommunications era had arrived (the other being the semi-conductor).

Einstein had originally theorised back in 1917 that it would be possible to excite atoms such that when electrons change state, light (photons) would be emitted with a predictable wavelength.  However, it wasn’t until 1954 when Charles Townes and two colleagues James Gordon and Herbert Zeiger at Columbia University produced a similar effect for the first time using ammonia molecules and microwaves.  Townes later shared the Nobel Prize for Physics with two Russian scientists, Aleksandr Prokhorov and Nicolay Basov who produced similar results in the same year.

However, this was a MASER which used microwaves rather than light and there were significant difficulties in getting the technique to work for the shorter wavelengths involved.  Townes developed ideas for an “optical maser” but it was Gordon Gould, a student at Columbia who came up with name LASER – light amplification by stimulated emission of radiation.

2010 marks the 50th anniversary of the creation of the first lasers and there’s a little bit of celebration going on.  The UK’s Institute of Engineering and Technology (IET) has a selection of articles in its monthly magazine.  The first two, “The Laser Reaches 50” and “Ten Unexpected Uses for Lasers” are the most accessible (and formed the basis for this post).   Over in North America, LaserFest celebrates all things laser.

Now, where’s my lightsaber…

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Renaissance Geek

Posted by Andrew at 6:55 AM on June 1, 2010

If, like me, you have always believed that you never stop learning, and that the pursuit of knowledge and understanding is part of the human condition, then I think you will love this.  “In Our Time” , one of the BBC‘s flagship radio programmes, now has its archive online, going back to 1998.

“In Our Time” is a weekly radio programme about 40 minutes long, with Melvyn Bragg, the presenter, and usually three experts from the field.  The programme discusses topics from art to science to history to literature: it’s the history of ideas, as they term it, and it exposes you to the whole gamut of life and human development.  Recent episodes included the Cool Universe, the Rise and Fall of the Zulu Nation, Munch and The Scream and the Infant Brain.  As you can see, it covers some pretty wide ground.

For sure, there’s the odd programme which will be of no interest whatsoever, but I’m constantly fascinated by what I don’t know so every programme is surprise.  Even if I don’t think I’ll be interested, I’ll listen just for the context.

The archive is in a couple of different formats, some RealPlayer and some iPlayer, and you don’t seem to be able to download the programmes for listening on portable devices.  However, if you are hooked, there’s an podcast (in a variety of formats) for current programmes and you can download the audio for listening in the car / gym / wherever.

If you add one podcast to your playlist this year, this should be it (after GNC, of course!)

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Oxygen-Free Animals Discovered

Posted by Andrew at 9:43 AM on April 8, 2010

The BBC reports that the a team of scientists from Marche Polytechnic University in Ancona, Italy have found three new species of tiny creatures living over 2 miles down in the Mediterranean Sea.  It’s so deep and dark there’s almost no oxygen whatsoever and although only 1mm in size, this is the first time that anything other than bacteria have been found in such places.

Although it wasn’t possible to bring the creatures to the surface alive, eggs from them have been successfully hatched in an oxygen-free environment.  The leader of the team admits that it’s a complete mystery as to how these creatures survive and more research will be needed.  It’s likely that there’s some kind of animal-microbe relationship but it’s otherwise unclear.

I find this story interesting on two levels.  The first is that we’re still making discoveries about the world around us simply by looking.  For sure this was far down in the ocean but it’s not really far down – the Marianas trench is about 7 miles deep.  Secondly, the implications for different forms of life on both this planet and others is significant, given that multi-cellular life without oxygen now appears to be possible.

Every day’s a new adventure…

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Posted in Science, space

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Stock Up on Winter Coats

Posted by susabelle at 7:44 AM on March 26, 2010

I think I’d better learn to knit and get a few sweaters and scarves under way. Just in case we step into a global cooling period, thanks to an Icelandic volcano with a hot temper. If you think it can’t happen, it’s only because your human memory is rather short.

I’m reading a really interesting book called “Cold,” by Bill Streever, in which he outlines several smaller global environmental crises over the last several hundred years that have plunged the earth into a mini ice age, or at least into a year “without summer.” One of those incidents was the eruption of Indonesia’s Mount Tambora on April 5th, 1815. The largest eruption in modern history, it plunged the earth into a darkened state for more than a year, leading to the “Year Without a Summer” in 1816. Tambora’s sulfur-laden gasses spewed 28 miles through the atmosphere and into the stratosphere, bringing a darkened haze to the entire northern Hemisphere, resulting in freezing temperatures well into August of 1816. Crops failed, livestock starved to death, and the world’s population reduced by an estimated 3.4 million people due to starvation or direct consequence of the eruption itself.

Iceland’s Katla volcano, currently covered with a thick glacier of ice, is often disturbed by the eruptions of its neighbor, the volcano Eyjafjallajokull. And right now, Eyjafjallajokull is burping lava day after day, greatly increasing the likelihood that Katla will erupt itself. The last time it had a major eruption, in the 1700′s, the north American continent experienced a very cold summer. Scientists in Iceland are continuing to monitor seismic activity in the area, and will likely be able to predict if an eruption is imminent.

Let me know if you’ll be needing that extra hand-knit scarf for next year. I’m taking orders now.

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Change the Future

Posted by Andrew at 6:44 AM on November 5, 2009

The Science Museum, London, is celebrating a century of science and as part of the festivities, it asked visitors to vote for the scientific discovery or invention that most “changed the future”.  The ten objects it put forward were:

1. Apollo 10 Capsule
2. DNA Double Helix
3. Electric Telegraph
4. Model T Ford
5. Penicillin
6. Pilot ACE Computer
7. Steam Engine
8. Stephenson’s Rocket
9. V2 Rocket Engine
10. X-ray Machine

And the winner was……the X-ray Machine, beating penicillin and the DNA double helix into 2nd and 3rd place respectively.  The discovery of X-rays in 1895 by Wilhelm Roentgen started a new era of medical diagnosis allowing medics to see inside living people without relying on surgery.  Today, the descendants of these first X-ray machines can almost measure what we think.

Amazingly, the particular X-ray machine shown was developed at home in under a year by Russell Reynolds while he was still at school.  He was assisted by his father, a general practitioner, and another inventor William Crookes.

Although some doctors were quick to pick up on the new invention it wasn’t until the 1920s that X-ray machines were widely used in medicine.

Making The Modern World is a complementary web site containing over a hundred scientific discoveries which helped shape civilisation.  Worth a browse.

What inventions today will have such an impact when we look back from 2109?

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Posted in Information, Science, space, tech

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How many times has Todd’s water been wee?

Posted by Matthew Greensmith at 3:36 PM on May 26, 2009

In #479 Todd mentioned about how much happier he was to be drinking tap water than the re-cycled urine the ISS occupants were looking forward to.  Now I was taught a long time ago about the water cycle of ocean, to rain, to river to ocean.  During this process animals drink it, or eat it in their food, then dispose of it in urine.  It got me thinking on a strange tangent about what the chances that Todd was actually drinking re-cycled without knowing.

So armed with Google and some very liberal over-simplification I have made a quick back of the envelope calculation.  There is no point in making any claim of accuracy in the amount of urine produced per day over all of time.  Taking today’s population of humans, cows, pigs and sheep we get roughly 87 Billion liters per day which will be substantially less than the actual total.  It needs to be because I am going to assume that this same volume is produced every day stretching back to when large animals are first recorded as being present 230 million years ago.

There’s a lot of water in the world, approximately 1.4 trillion cubic kilometers.  At 87 Billion liters a day it would take 16 Billion days to convert it all to urine.  Since the recorded beginning of large animals though, there has been 84 Billion days.  That would mean an average of 5 re-cycles for any given amount of water.

In reality there are lots of complications with these sums even outside the extremely inaccurate (but lowball) daily volume.  A lot of the water we drink leaves in sweat and our breath, and a lot of the water in urine comes from breaking down sugars fats.  The water gets into these through plants and then the animals in the food chain.  I think the numbers are good enough to make a solid claim that at least 10% of any volume of water has previously passed through a urinary tract.  The ISS is just increasing the percentage.

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Twitter With Your Brain!

Posted by susabelle at 9:13 AM on April 23, 2009

GO BADGERS

That was the post Adam Wilson made to Twitter by using only his brain.  Wearing a special red cap fitted with electrodes that connected to a computer flashing letters, by concentrating on the letters he wanted, Wilson was able to Twit the small message on the screen in front of him.

What this means for the rest of the world is almost beyond comprehension for those of us that regularly type, text, and click to send messages, visit websites, write emails, etc.  What this means for persons with physical disabilities, who have perfectly functioning brains but ill-functioning bodies, is that they may be able to communicate as easily someday as the rest of us do.  And all it takes is a silly red cap with electrodes.  No cumbersome pointing devices held by the teeth or strapped to the head, or custom keyboards that will take the pounding of a fist because the fingers can’t move.

What is even more surprising and exciting about this breakthrough is that it uses two existing products to do its job.  Twitter, of course, already exists and functions well for many people.  The electrode “brain cap” already exists as well, and is still being fine-tuned for work with computers.  Previous work had been focused on using brain implants to communicate, but this work is 10 years or more from any type of fruition.  Using existing products, Wilson, and his supervisor Justin Williams (both work for the University of Wisconsin) made the link that had not been made before.

This is exciting news for those suffering from debilitating, paralyzing injuries, whose brains are able to function normally in all ways except in the ability to communicate.  Hundreds of thousands of people in the United States alone suffer from such disabilities.  These types of breaks in technology can really leapfrog researchers ahead in their efforts to bring accessibility to all.

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What Hubble Brings Us or, Patience is a Virtue

Posted by Matthew Greensmith at 9:05 AM on April 7, 2009

The Hubble space telescope, now active for nearly 20 years, continues to send back images that amaze and astound scientists. And it’s not only the newest pictures being sent that are providing all of the “ooh” moments these days.

Scientists studying land-based telescope views discovered a gassy planet orbiting a nearby star (HR 8799), and then went back to images from Hubble that are at least ten years old to see if they could get a closer look. By using computer technology to “clean” the image, they were able to get a closer look at the gassy planet, which may not be as gassy as once thought. It might actually be water and land-filled, refueling the speculation that other planets can hold life as well. As in, “we are not alone.”

I’ve always been fascinated by Hubble’s images, and when images can be used to further develop scientific theories and expand on unkowns in our astronomical world, that is all that much better. It still bothers me to think that Hubble will be retired some day, as it is providing so much right now for scientists studying “other worlds.”

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