When he was two years old, Ben stopped seeing out of his left eye. His mother took him to the doctor and soon discovered he had retinal cancer in both eyes. After chemotherapy and radiation failed, surgeons removed both his eyes. For Ben, vision was gone forever.

But by the time he was seven years old, he had devised a technique for decoding the world around him: he clicked with his mouth and listened for the returning echoes. This method enabled Ben to determine the locations of open doorways, people, parked cars, garbage cans, and so on. He was echolocating: bouncing his sound waves off objects in the environment and catching the reflections to build a mental model of his surroundings.

Echolocation may sound like an improbable feat for a human, but thousands of blind people have perfected this skill, just like Ben did. The phenomenon has been written about since at least the 1940s, when the word “echolocation” was first coined in a Science article titled “Echolocation by Blind Men, Bats, and Radar.” […]

Neuroscience used to think that different parts of the brain were predetermined to perform specific functions. But more recent discoveries have upended the old paradigm. One part of the brain may initially be assigned a specific task; for instance, the back of our brain is called the “visual cortex” because it usually handles sight. But that territory can be reassigned to a different task. There is nothing special about neurons in the visual cortex: they are simply neurons that happen to be involved in processing shapes or colors in people who have functioning eyes. But in the sightless, these same neurons can rewire themselves to process other types of information. […]

we refer to the brain’s plasticity as “livewiring” to spotlight how this vast system of 86 billion neurons and 0.2 quadrillion connections rewires itself every moment of your life. […]

In Ben’s case, his brain’s flexible wiring repurposed his visual cortex for processing sound. As a result, Ben had more neurons available to deal with auditory information, and this increased processing power allowed Ben to interpret soundwaves in shocking detail. Ben’s super-hearing demonstrates a more general rule: the more brain territory a particular sense has, the better it performs. […]

Recent decades have yielded several revelations about livewiring, but perhaps the biggest surprise is its rapidity. Brain circuits reorganize not only in the newly blind, but also in the sighted who have temporary blindness. In one study, sighted participants intensively learned how to read Braille. Half the participants were blindfolded throughout the experience. At the end of the five days, the participants who wore blindfolds could distinguish subtle differences between Braille characters much better than the participants who didn’t wear blindfolds. Even more remarkably, the blindfolded participants showed activation in visual brain regions in response to touch and sound. When activity in the visual cortex was temporarily disrupted, the Braille-reading advantage of the blindfolded participants went away. In other words, the blindfolded participants performed better on the touch- related task because their visual cortex had been recruited to help. After the blindfold was removed, the visual cortex returned to normal within a day, no longer responding to touch and sound.

But such changes don’t have to take five days; that just happened to be when the measurement took place. When blindfolded participants are continuously measured, touch-related activity shows up in the visual cortex in about an hour. […]

In the ceaseless competition for brain territory, the visual system has a unique problem: due to the planet’s rotation, all animals are cast into darkness for an average of 12 out of every 24 hours. (Of course, this refers to the vast majority of evolutionary time, not to our present electrified world.) Our ancestors effectively were unwitting participants in the blindfold experiment, every night of their entire lives.

So how did the visual cortex of our ancestors’ brains defend its territory, in the absence of input from the eyes?

We suggest that the brain preserves the territory of the visual cortex by keeping it active at night. In our “defensive activation theory,” dream sleep exists to keep neurons in the visual cortex active, thereby combating a takeover by the neighboring senses. […]

In humans, sleep is punctuated by rapid eye movement (REM) sleep every 90 minutes. This is when most dreaming occurs. (Although some forms of dreaming can occur during non-REM sleep, such dreams are abstract and lack the visual vividness of REM dreams.)

REM sleep is triggered by a specialized set of neurons that pump activity straight into the brain’s visual cortex, causing us to experience vision even though our eyes are closed.

{ Time | Continue reading }

image { Michael Mann, Manhunter, 1986 }

quote { Does the popular quote, “No artist tolerates reality,” belong to Nietzsche? }

Contrary to wide‐held beliefs, religiosity decreases with greater expected proximity to death

Our study cannot answer whether some men adopt a feminist identity to increase their access to sexual partners.

Questions from 1920 Still Haunt Neuroscience — A 100-year-old paper anticipated key issues in modern neuroscience

For a while, the Union’s top general in the Civil War was a perfectionist. George Meade kept looking for the perfect opportunity to engage the forces of the Confederacy in battle. He accomplished little. Ulysses Grant and William Tecumseh Sherman got the job done by their willingness to use imperfect methods. How Perfectionism Has Made the Pandemic Worse

Viruses mutate all the time, often with no impact, but this one appears to be more transmissible than other variants—meaning it spreads more easily. Barely one day after officials announced that America’s first case of the variant had been found in the United States, in a Colorado man with no history of travel, an additional case was found in California. There are still many unknowns, but much concern has focused on whether this new variant would throw off vaccine efficacy or cause more severe disease —- with some degree of relief after an initial study indicated that it did not do either. […] Bedford notes that this new variant seems to have a higher secondary-attack rate —- meaning the number of people subsequently infected by a known case — compared with “regular” COVID-19. Finally, the new variant seems to result in higher viral loads (though this is harder to be sure about as viral loads can be affected by sampling bias and timing). […] This variant, now called B.1.1.7, has “an unusually large number of genetic changes, particularly in the spike protein,” which is how the virus gains entry into our cells. The new variant may be better at eluding our immune response and replicating, or be able to better bind to locations in our body more conducive to infecting others, but that is all speculative for the moment. […] we may need to be stricter — less time indoors, better masks, better ventilation, more disinfection of high-touch surfaces. […] We don’t know. We won’t know for a while. [The Atlantic]

Decline in Marriage Associated with the COVID-19 Pandemic in the United States

New study following 12,541 healthcare workers for #COVID19 re-infection over 31 weeks published in NEJM. Natural immunisation held up well over the 6 months of the study, with only two cases of asymptomatic reinfections observed.

Scientists turn carbon dioxide into jet fuel

Google Maps’ Moat is Evaporating

You can now gain entry to any station of the New York City Subway with the tap of a phone, instead of the swipe of a MetroCard.

The largest single bank heist of all time was committed the day before the Coalition invaded Iraq in 2003, when Saddam Hussein sent his son, Qusay, to the Central Bank of Iraq with a handwritten note to withdraw all the cash in the bank. Qusay then removed about $1 billion (£810 million) in $100 dollar notes in strongboxes, requiring three lorries to carry it all. Approximately $650 million (£525 million) was found later by US troops hidden in the walls of one of Saddam’s palaces. Although both of Saddam’s sons were killed, and Saddam was captured and executed, more than one third of the money was never recovered. — Seven Greatest Real-Life Heists

How Did Madagascar Become the World’s Biggest Producer of Vanilla?

Maneki-neko (beckoning cat)

Alex’s intelligence was on a level similar to dolphins and great apes. She also reported that Alex seemed to show the intelligence of a five-year-old human, in some respects, and he had not even reached his full potential by the time he died. She believed that he possessed the emotional level of a two-year-old human at the time of his death. Looking at a mirror, he said “what color”, and learned “grey” after being told “grey” six times. This made him the first and only non-human animal to have ever asked a question.

Human chess match, Leningrad, 1924

When a shark bit or killed a swimmer, people within the past century might take out hundreds of the marine predators to quell the panic, like executing everyone in a police lineup in order to ensure justice was dispensed on the guilty party.

Eric Clua, a professor of marine biology at the École Pratique des Hautes Études in Paris, said the rationale behind shark culls in the past was simple: fewer sharks, fewer attacks. That reasoning also drives methods such as shark nets and baited hooks, which are currently in use at a number of Australian and South African beaches that are frequently visited by sharks. […]

Dr. Clua said he has found a way to make precision strikes on sharks that have attacked people through a form of DNA profiling he calls “biteprinting.” He believes it’s usually just solo “problem sharks” that attack humans repeatedly, analogizing them to terrestrial predators that have been documented behaving the same way. […]

This summer, Dr. Clua and several colleagues published their latest paper on collecting DNA from the biteprints of large numbers of sharks. Once a database is built, DNA could be collected from the wounds of people who were bitten by sharks, and matched to a known shark. The offending fish would then need to be found and killed.

Critics have taken issue with every facet of this plan. […]

the “rogue shark” theory, popularized by Steven Spielberg’s “Jaws,” has been debunked. […] the existence of problem sharks has never been proven. […] removing these guilty sharks “would be near impossible” […] Dr. Clua’s proposal would cost billions of dollars to implement on a meaningful scale in Australia, South Africa or the United States […]

However people react when shark attacks do occur, Dr. Shiffman offered the reminder that such incidents are rare. According to the International Shark Attack File at the University of Florida, there were 64 unprovoked attacks on humans last year and 41 provoked attacks, meaning that a person “initiates interaction with a shark in some way.”

Five of the attacks were fatal. More people are killed by falling trees in the U.S. every year.

{ NY Times | Continue reading }

Fette Sans: I want to cut you open and pour out all your insides, chew on your liver and your heart, and then sew you back together using your intestine and maybe I will pack you better than you were and there will be some left to crochet myself a necklace.

{ Forty-one reflections on 2020 | Continue reading }

A woman posted a photo of a Starbucks barista who asked her to wear a mask. Then, $100,000 was donated to that barista. Now, the woman wants half of that money.

Using Hot Coffee to Dislodge Meat in the Throat

A US judge in Michigan has ruled that a 42-year-old man can seek compensation from his parents for destroying his pornography collection.

How much is an hour of your free time worth? $19.

Tears were found to be a magnet for visual attention.

Studies show, for instance, that volunteering correlates with a 24% lower risk of early death . What’s more, volunteers have a lower risk of high blood glucose, and a lower risk of the inflammation levels connected to heart disease. They also spend 38% fewer nights in hospitals than people who shy from involvement in charities.

Diet Modifications, Including More Wine and Cheese, May Help Reduce Cognitive Decline — Cheese, by far, was shown to be the most protective food against age-related cognitive problems, even late into life; The daily consumption of alchohol, particularly red wine, was related to improvements in cognitive function; Weekly consumption of lamb, but not other red meats, was shown to improve long-term cognitive prowess.

A comprehensive study from Uppsala University, involving more than 250,000 women, shows that oral contraceptive use protects against ovarian and endometrial cancer. The protective effect remains for several decades after discontinuing the use.

An article reporting an increased risk of death when surgery is carried out on the surgeon’s birthday has caused a Christmas controversy

Simple processes can make wood stronger than steel, impact-resistant — or even transparent

Apple targets car production by 2024 and eyes “next level” battery technology

Deepfakes didn’t disrupt the US election as many predicted. But cheapfakes had a banner year.

Compology uses cameras and artificial intelligence to monitor what’s thrown into dumpsters and trash containers at businesses such as McDonald’s restaurants. The point is to make sure dumpsters are actually full before they’re emptied and to stop recyclable materials like cardboard from being contaminated by other junk.

The Full(est Possible) Story of the Four Seasons Total Landscaping Press Conference

Biometric Bribery — Inside Semlex, the Brussels-based company that supplies biometric documents such as passports and driving licenses to governments and international bodies.

The U.S. Army spent almost a year making face masks — no different from commercial masks designed and brought to market within days of the pandemic.

Remembering Beethoven the astute businessman

Larry Heard is an American DJ, record producer and musician. He is widely known as a pioneering figure in 1980s Chicago house music, and was leader of the influential group Fingers Inc., whose 1988 album Another Side was the first long-form house LP. [listen to Never No More Lonely, Can You Feel It, full album] — About “Can You Feel It” (1986): “I had two cassette decks—there were no digital recorders or even multi-track recorders—and I did one take, one pass, on one tape, then ran it back to the other one, played some other parts by hand that I wanted to add, and that was pretty much the recording process.”

It’s -43C in Yakutsk, Republic of Sakha; time to get some fish at the local outdoor market

I always awkwardly struggle to get to the end call button on video calls. So I made this

Previous studies on aesthetic chills (i.e., psychogenic shivers) demonstrate their positive effects on stress, pleasure, and social cognition. We tested whether we could artificially enhance this emotion and its downstream effects by intervening on its somatic markers using wearable technology.

{ Scientific Reports | Continue reading }

At a time when digital media is deepening social divides in Western democracies, China is manipulating online discourse to enforce the Communist Party’s consensus. To stage-manage what appeared on the Chinese internet early this year, the authorities issued strict commands on the content and tone of news coverage, directed paid trolls to inundate social media with party-line blather and deployed security forces to muzzle unsanctioned voices. […]

Researchers have estimated that hundreds of thousands of people in China work part-time to post comments and share content that reinforces state ideology. Many of them are low-level employees at government departments and party organizations. Universities have recruited students and teachers for the task. Local governments have held training sessions for them. […]

Local officials turned to informants and trolls to control opinion […] “Mobilized the force of more than 1,500 cybersoldiers across the district to promptly report information about public opinion in WeChat groups and other semiprivate chat circles.”

{ NY Times | Continue reading }

related/audio { The Chinese Surveillance State | Part 1, Part 2 }

In the middle of September 1952, Charlie Chaplin came to Richard Avedon’s photo studio. Avedon, then 29, had been chasing him for years, but Chaplin never answered his letters. And then the phone rang. Avedon thought it was a joke and hung up, but Chaplin called back and said he was coming right over. Avedon sent his assistants out of the studio so that there would be no distractions.

At first, Avedon shot a few pictures straight on, “almost as though I was doing a passport picture.” When Avedon thought he had his shot, Chaplin asked, “Now, I could do something for you.” He lowered his head, and came up grinning in extreme closeup, with his fingers forming horns on the side of his head—the great god Pan. […]

It seems that Avedon had a Hi-how-are-you friendship with the man who ran the shoeshine stand in the building that housed Avedon’s studio. One day he asked what Avedon did for a living, and Avedon told him he was a photographer. A year or so later, the shoeshine man told Avedon his daughter was getting married. “I will let you be the photographer,” he told Avedon, undoubtedly thinking he was doing him a favor.

Avedon took his Rolleiflex to Long Island and shot the wedding.


{ Wall Street Journal | Continue reading }

related { Texas Wedding Photographers Have Seen Some $#!+ }

photo { Richard Avedon, Chalrie Chaplin, 1952 }

Just a few doses of an experimental drug can reverse age-related declines in memory and mental flexibility in mice

What Explains the Decline of Serial Killers?

Walmart will use fully autonomous box trucks to make deliveries in Arkansas starting in 2021

A trip of 500 km on one charge. A recharge from zero to full in 10 minutes. All with minimal safety concerns. The solid-state battery being introduced by Toyota promises to be a game changer not just for electric vehicles but for an entire industry.

LED lights found to kill coronavirus — technology can be installed in air conditioning, vacuum, and water systems

Researchers who studied the DNA of 2,700 COVID-19 patients in 208 intensive care units across Britain found that five genes were central to many severe cases. The genes partially explain why some people become desperately sick with COVID-19, while others are not affected, Baillie said.

A new study of almost 40,000 adults has found that the brains of lonely people differ from those of people who are not lonely, in significant and detectable ways. This loneliness “signature” consists of variations in the volume of different brain regions, and the way those brain regions communicate.

Can Dropping a Little Data Change Conclusions?

Zodiac killer code cracked — The cipher, sent in a letter to The Chronicle in November 1969, has been puzzling authorities and amateur sleuths since it arrived 51 years ago.

Israeli Phone-hacking Firm Claims It Can Now Break Into Encrypted Signal App

How Russian hackers infiltrated the US government for months without being spotted

High-Frequency Traders Push Closer to Light Speed With Cutting-Edge Cables

DeepL Translator “Try out the world’s best machine translation.”

8 Giraffes are stuck on a flooding island. But the rescues have begun.

James Verdesoto, the movie poster artist behind iconic posters such as Pulp Fiction, Ocean’s Eleven, Girl, Interrupted, and Training Day, explains how color schemes are used in movie posters via OpenCulture

By mid-December, the Northern Hemisphere is usually well into the start of its annual cold and flu season — but so far this year, even as the COVID-19 pandemic surges in dozens of countries, the levels of many common seasonal infections remain extremely low. […] In the Southern Hemisphere — now past its winter — seasonal influenza hardly struck at all. That looks as though it might happen in the north, too.

Conversely, some common-cold viruses have thrived, and tantalizing evidence suggests that they might, in some cases, protect against COVID-19. One study of more than 800,000 people, for example, showed that adults who had had cold symptoms within the previous year were less likely to test positive for SARS-CoV-2 — although why this is so remains a mystery. […] One possible explanation is that previous infection with a coronavirus (another cause of the common cold) could confer some immunity to SARS-CoV-2. […] Previous coronavirus infections do seem to generate T cells and B cells — immune-system cells that help to attack and remember pathogens — that can recognize SARS-CoV-2. These pre-existing cells might provide some partial cross-protection against the new coronavirus. A few studies have shown that, because of other coronavirus infections, about one-quarter of people have antibodies that can bind to the SARS-CoV-2 virus. […]

Another way that seasonal colds might be contributing to COVID-19 immunity is that a current rhinovirus infection might interfere directly with SARS-CoV-2 — perhaps by kicking off interferon responses, part of the immune system that inhibits viral reproduction. A study6 by Ware and his colleagues, for example, shows that someone with a rhinovirus infection is 70% less likely to also get a common coronavirus infection, compared with someone who doesn’t have the sniffles.

{ Nature | Continue reading }

MDMA-assisted couples therapy investigated in landmark pilot trial + My methodology for working wlthMDMA as an adjunct to psychotherapy is as follows

Why wild giant pandas frequently roll in horse manure, study

This study explored the definitions of sexual boredom in a large community sample of Portuguese individuals.

In the mid-1960s, Australian athlete Reg Spiers found himself stranded in London with no money to buy a plane ticket home. Desperate to get back to Australia in time for his daughter’s birthday, he decided to post himself in a wooden crate.

New Year’s resolutions: Participants with approach-oriented goals [starting new habits] were significantly more successful than those with avoidance-oriented goals [quitting habits]

Scientists say they have come up with a potential way to make oxygen on Mars — NASA wants to land astronauts on Mars in the 2030s. On Mars, oxygen is only 0.13% of the atmosphere, compared to 21% of the Earth’s atmosphere. Transporting enough oxygen on a spacecraft to sustain the mission isn’t currently viable.

These hardware and software tools collect forensic data from mobile phones: the texts, emails, and photos stored on the phone; data regarding when the texts and emails were sent and where the photos were taken; the locations—if location tracking tools are turned on—where the phone and, presumably, the user have been; and when they were there. According to the report, 2,000 of the United States’s 18,000 law enforcement agencies, including 50 of the nation’s largest police departments, either have purchased MDFTs (Mobile Device Forensic Tools) or have access to these tools.

Tesla Inc. is taking advantage of its surging shares by going back to the capital markets for the third time in ten months and raising as much as $5 billion of common stock. If you have a product for which the market is willing to pay virtually anything, you sell more of it. That’s true for electric cars and it’s just as true for stock, which is far easier to manufacture. Issuing $5 billion a year ago would have meant dilution of more than 8%; today, it’s less than 1%. [Bloomberg]

These studies consistently show that most rats prefer the nondrug reward over cocaine (and over heroin or methamphetamine. After I had reviewed these studies in my class, a student asked, ‘Does this mean that sugar is more addictive than cocaine?’.

You may be surprised to learn that of the trio of long-awaited coronavirus vaccines, the most promising, Moderna’s mRNA-1273, which reported a 94.5 percent efficacy rate on November 16, had been designed by January 13. This was just two days after the genetic sequence had been made public in an act of scientific and humanitarian generosity that resulted in China’s Yong-Zhen Zhang’s being temporarily forced out of his lab. In Massachusetts, the Moderna vaccine design took all of one weekend. It was completed before China had even acknowledged that the disease could be transmitted from human to human, more than a week before the first confirmed coronavirus case in the United States.By the time the first American death was announced a month later, the vaccine had already been manufactured and shipped to the National Institutes of Health for the beginning of its Phase I clinical trial.

A new report from One Fair Wage finds that more than 80% of workers are seeing a decline in tips and over 40% say they’re facing an increase in sexual harassment from customers.

these data show that distinctive eyebrows reveal narcissists’ personality to others

Viewers’ antisocial tendencies (Dark Triad traits, aggression, and moral disengagement) in conjunction with an affinity for antihero genres and favorite antihero characters (similarity, wishful identification, and parasocial interaction)

The success of horror films, popularity of true crime, and prevalence of violence in the news implies that morbid curiosity is a common psychological trait. However, research on morbid curiosity is largely absent from the psychological literature. In this paper, I present a novel psychometric tool for assessing morbid curiosity, defined as a motivation to seek out information about dangerous phenomena.

Impostor syndrome—the idea that you’ve only succeeded due to luck, and not because of your talent or qualifications—was first identified in 1978 by psychologists Pauline Rose Clance and Suzanne Imes. In their paper, they theorized that women were uniquely affected by impostor syndrome. Since then, research has shown that both men and women experience impostor feelings.

According to a new study, the mass of all our stuff—buildings, roads, cars, and everything else we manufacture—now exceeds the weight of all living things on the planet

Mount Everest, Earth’s tallest mountain, just got taller by about a meter

In America, Christmas trees are a multibillion-dollar business. But who’s making the money?

{ as coastal homeowners face rising sea levels brought on by climate change, the state is increasingly approving sandbags and other structures that are speeding the loss of its beaches | ProPublica | full story }

California Water Futures Begin Trading Amid Fear of Scarcity

Water is joining gold, oil and other commodities traded on Wall Street […] Farmers, hedge funds and municipalities alike are now able to hedge against — or bet on — future water availability in California, the biggest U.S. agriculture market and world’s fifth-largest economy. […]

The futures are tied to the Nasdaq Veles California Water Index, which was started two years ago and measures the volume-weighted average price of water.

{ Bloomberg | Continue reading }

{ Covid-19 death rates per 100,000 population by country | Wikipedia }

This Robot Can Rap

A case of 32-year-old man with frequent ejaculation as the initial symptom of rabies was first reported

Missing credit card payments may be an early sign of dementia, study says

Court Suspends ‘Copyright Troll’ Lawyer From Practicing Law

Palaeolithic voyage for invisible islands beyond the horizon

Google’s deep-learning program for determining the 3D shapes of proteins stands to transform biology, say scientists

Research shows married people enjoy better health. But why? Is it because marriage is good for your health and encourages healthier behavior, or because healthier individuals are more likely to get married?

I could use your help — not your support, not your approval, not your reassurance but your help as an open and thoughtful audience for these difficult questions. But you won’t help me, because you won’t listen to what I’m trying to say, because all you care about is how much victim status I deserve. You are really letting me down. [ Agnes Callard | NY Times]

How I Made a Self-Quoting Tweet

52 things I learned in 2020

Die Hard Christmas tree ornament

Cloud Zoo

So, your research argues that TV advertising is about 15 to 20 times less effective than the conventional wisdom says […]

There are, not surprisingly, objections to this research. Especially from the marketing industry. For instance, they’ll point to the brand-building aspect of advertising: “It’s not just about short-term sales,” they’ll say. Or the game-theory aspect — that is, if you don’t advertise your product and your rivals do, where does that leave you? […]

eBay believed that for every dollar they’re spending, they’re getting 50 cents of net profits. And what we showed is that on average, they’re losing more than 60 cents on every dollar. […]

Google actually did a fascinating study not too long ago, which concluded that close to 60 percent of ads on the internet are never, ever even seen.

{ Freakonomics | Continue reading }

fake drive-through coronavirus testing sites have been cropping up in recent weeks […] scammers are dressing up like medical professionals and conducting fake, unsanitary tests for money and identity theft, while possibly spreading the virus. […] Reports about such sites have emerged in Alabama, Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, New York, and Washington state.

{ two cents | Continue reading }

related { Amplification-free detection of SARS-CoV-2 with CRISPR-Cas13a and mobile phone microscopy }

Female 29 years of age, university student, from dysfunctional family. She began her suffering 11 years ago with personality dissociation, characterized by aversion to sacred objects and images, and psychomotor agitation with transient states of loss of consciousness with manifestations of spiritual possession that required psychiatric, and psychological treatment, and 5 exorcisms without improvement over a period of ten years. […]

With informed consent, a fMRI was accomplished before and in the beginning of a possession induced by exorcism performed by a Catholic priest. […] due to the involuntary motor activity and the patient’s loss of consciousness, it is not possible to perform the analysis completely in this case.

{ Trends in Medicine | Continue reading }

There were 16 people in total that participated in the project “Resting Stated-Tractography-fMRI in initial phase of spiritual possession.” 13 of them are health professionals: a surgeon, psychiatrist, psychologist, neurophysiologist, family medicine physician, neurosurgeon, 2 radiology technicians, a gynecologist, medical doctor, diagnostic radiology physician, exorcist and patient (Ex former medical student). The priest, mother and an aunt of the patient were not included. […]

8 out of 13 participants (61.53%) had accidents and sudden events that put their lives in danger […]

Eight days before the exorcism, the psychiatrist experienced malfunctioning of his computer […]

Seven days after the exorcism, the surgeon had a head trauma, chest trauma and multiple bruises in a forest accident with fall from a height of one meter; he also had a MVA (motor vehicle accident) 15 minutes before receiving the images of the patient’s tractografies […]

22 days after the exorcism the medical doctor presented sudden breakup of a ten years relationship with her boyfriend.

Eight days before and during the exorcism, the father of the patient (a family medicine physician) presented chest and back pain with a normal electrocardiogram; 37 days after the exorcism he is admitted to the Critical Care Unit “CCU” for massive acute myocardial infarction, with loss of myocardial function of 90%.

41 days after the exorcism, the gynecologist is involved in an offense she did not commit.

[…]

On the survey carried out, the 12 participants are much more afraid of organized crime in Mexico than of the devil.

{ Trends in Medicine | PDF }

Here’s a puzzle […] It’s called “Cain’s Jawbone,” in which people are challenged to put the shuffled pages of a murder mystery novel in their proper order. Since its creation in 1934, it has only been solved by two people — until now.

British comedian John Finnemore made it his quarantine project to crack “Cain’s Jawbone” — and he succeeded, making him just the third person to solve it in its nearly 90-year history. […]

The puzzle takes the form of 100 cards, each containing the page of a murder mystery novel. In order to solve the puzzle, participants must put all the cards in the proper order and determine who murders who in the story. There are 32 million possible combinations, which makes finding the correct result quite a feat. 

{ The World | Continue reading }

Given that everything in the universe reduces to particles, a question presents itself: What are particles?

The easy answer quickly shows itself to be unsatisfying. Namely, electrons, photons, quarks and other “fundamental” particles supposedly lack substructure or physical extent. “We basically think of a particle as a pointlike object,” said Mary Gaillard, a particle theorist at the University of California, Berkeley who predicted the masses of two types of quarks in the 1970s. And yet particles have distinct traits, such as charge and mass. How can a dimensionless point bear weight? […]

Quantum mechanics revealed to its discoverers in the 1920s that photons and other quantum objects are best described not as particles or waves but by abstract “wave functions” — evolving mathematical functions that indicate a particle’s probability of having various properties. The wave function representing an electron, say, is spatially spread out, so that the electron has possible locations rather than a definite one. But somehow, strangely, when you stick a detector in the scene and measure the electron’s location, its wave function suddenly “collapses” to a point, and the particle clicks at that position in the detector.

A particle is thus a collapsed wave function. But what in the world does that mean? Why does observation cause a distended mathematical function to collapse and a concrete particle to appear? And what decides the measurement’s outcome? Nearly a century later, physicists have no idea.

{ Quanta | Continue reading }

related { For the first time, a quantum computer made from photons—particles of light—has outperformed even the fastest classical supercomputers }