Loud Noises, Big Plans!

Some Jobs More than Others

2011-03-14T21:08:00.001-05:00

Let's face facts: Robots are the future. For real this time. Beyond automated assembly lines, we are going to see robots in more and more human-facing roles (and people are looking especially closely at Japan on this one, since they have an older population that vastly outnumbers the working-age population, and some~~one~~thing is going to have to care for them.)

So, the Georgia Institute of Technology did a study on how effective these robots are going to be in interacting with people. Sounds reasonable. After all, there's no point in blowing an entire R&D budget on Robot Guidance Counselors (that's robots doing the job of guidance counselors, not guidance counselors for robots, by the way) when it turns out that people would rather get life advice from a rolled-up newspaper.

It turns out that robots may have a future in the nursing industry. Grief counselors, not so much. Interestingly enough, subjects responded differently to the exact same robot contact depending on what they thought was happening. People who thought that the robot was cleaning their arm responded much more favorably than people who thought that the robot was trying to "comfort" them.

What does this mean for the sex robots of the future? too early to tell, but there may still be hope for them in certain specialized fetish niches.

(And I demand some recognition for the fact that I made it all the way through this post without changing their "Touched by a Robot" press release title into a "Touched by an Angel" joke!)

Who Knew The Wait Would Be Worth It?

2010-11-25T10:00:00.001-06:00

This is a Sponsored post written by me on behalf of LG. All opinions are 100% mine.

I still haven't gotten around to getting a new cell phone, but that may have turned out for the best.

LG has come out with a smartphone that runs on Windows, the LG Optimus 7. It's their first Windows Phone 7 device, but they have come out of the gate strong, cramming in a lot of features. I've been reading up on it, and I can see three reasons why I want one.

Voice-to-text feature that can be used for updating Facebook and Twitter statuses. You know how all those Favstar titans always tweet about texting and driving? I am going to join their ranks with a vengeance! I'll still be a terrible driver, but at least I won't have to take my eyes off the road.
A 3.8-inch display, which (in my opinion), is about as big as you can get if you still want to be able to put it in your pocket. Let's face it, anything much larger starts to resemble a mini laptop, and the WVGA LCD display's 800x480 pixels give great resolution without making you feel like you're missing out on anything.
Gaming and music through Zune and Xbox LIVE. I'm not much of a Zune user, but I'm an avid gamer. With that 3.8-inch display, I'm going to bring the thunder with me wherever I go!

ATTN: SANTA - I have found this year's Christmas gift. Please dispatch it from the north pole with all due haste. I'll forgive you if my gift comes early this year.

Forced Out?

2010-11-22T07:00:00.001-06:00

A study from the University of Haifa has asked whether early retirement is as optional as it appears. According to their data, most people take early retirement options because of workplace pressure. However, their data set was taken from men who had taken early retirement from government companies that became privatized, which makes me wonder how applicable it is across the entire workforce.

I'm not saying government employees are lazy and terrible at their jobs (because plenty of other people are saying it), I'm saying that I can see where a profit-motivated corporation would look to trim its workforce as much as possible. That's probably the source of the pressure cited in the study. Is this kind of thing really happening in companies that aren't making a dramatic shift in managment and objectives?

The ideal put forth by Sigal Naim, who carried out the study, is that "everyone would be able to continue working based on his or her abilities and desires." He goes on to suggest a removal of mandatory retirement ages. That's all well and good in theory, but what happens in reality, when elderly workers who are well past their prime insist on bitterly clinging to jobs that could be used to lower the nation's unemployment rate?

We All Have Hobbies

2010-11-11T11:16:00.002-06:00

And by "hobbies," I mean "things we do on the internet when we need a quick break to restore our sanity." When my job gets too rough, I take a minute to check in on one or two favorite sites and pull myself together. Lately I've been thinking about travel. I won't be able to get there myself anytime soon, but I like to look up what the weather is like in my dream travel destinations.

I've been looking at Rome, Paris, and some of the traditional European destinations, but I've also been looking west. I've always wanted to visit Australia. The Melbourne weather forecast doesn't look so great today (thunderstorms), but it's their springtime down there, which means it would be a great place to visit this winter. I've looked at Sydney, Cairns, and Perth, as well, but for some reason I keep going back to check the Melbourne weather. I've heard good things about Victoria, and their National Gallery is supposed to be worth seeing.

Is it weird that I'm going to check the weather in other countries? It's cheaper and easier than traveling, and it's nice to know that things are at least nice somewhere in the world when they suck here. What odd stuff do you look up on the internet?

Can't BEET it!

2010-11-07T19:00:00.000-06:00

Ha ha ha. Sorry for the pun, I just couldn't help myself. I'll try not to go too nuts with this story (~~because that would be BEET-ing a dead horse!~~)

Apparently, beet juice is kind of a big deal. They've been looking into it over at Wake Forest University, and it has some pretty beneficial health effects. It's all about the nitrates, which I thought were supposed to be harmful compounds found in processed meat like hot dogs, but then I'm not a university biologist so my knowledge is crap.

The body turns nitrates into nitrites, and nitrites improve blood flow. The Wake Forest researchers divided up their test subjects into a group that ate a lot of nitrates, provided by beet juice, and a group that didn't. Then they switched diets halfway through for the participants to make sure that it really was the food that was having the effect. And in all cases, the research supported the theory that increased nitrate consumption leads to improved blood flow.

From there, they are saying that this improves brain activity, and think it's going to be helpful for older adults.

What I want to know is how nasty it was to have to drink 16 ounces of straight beet juice. That's a full pint glass, and when dealing with glasses of that size, I'd rather have the beer. Does beer help increase the blood flow to the brain? If they're interested in studying that, I want to volunteer to be one of the test subjects!

Do they have oil in Iowa?

2010-10-10T15:09:00.002-05:00

Iowa's the corn state, right? I think it's the flat state where Napoleon Dynamite was set, but I'm not too strong on the geography in that region. I know Idaho is potatoes, but when I think of U.S. oil reserves, I know the big players are Texas and Alaska, and I don't think that Iowa contributes much.

It figures that the non-oil-rich states would be the ones working hardest on oil alternatives. After all, there's no incentive to come up with a scientific development that might undermine one of your state's big industries. Anyway, the point is that Iowa State University has come up with an organic asphalt that doesn't require petroleum to produce. They're testing it on one of their bike paths.

I'm happy about the idea, because even if I don't completely embrace all the "peak oil" hysteria, I still think it's important to use renewable resources. Non-renewable resources, by definition, have to run out sometime, after all. An Iowa bike path is a small start, but I'm keeping my fingers crossed that it catches on.

But what if you're allergic to mice?

2010-10-02T16:12:00.003-05:00

Remember a few years back when there was a news story about a lethal "peanut butter kiss"? A girl had died, and the rumor that was circulating was that her boyfriend had just eaten a peanut butter sandwich and kissed her, and she was so fatally allergic to peanuts that she had a reaction and died. It turned out to be a load of crap--the coroner released an official report after her autopsy stating that she did not have an allergic reaction to kissing her boyfriend--but the urban legend was just too juicy for people to let go. I still hear coworkers talking about it.

I haven't seen anyone die from a food allergy, but I have seen some pretty bad reactions. Allergies to things like wheat, peanuts, and milk can be serious business. I can only imagine how heartbreaking it must be for allergy sufferers since those items end up in so many of the food products available in stores and items on restaurant menus these days.

Given all that, I think it's kind of a big deal that Johns Hopkins prevented mice from having fatal allergic reactions. I think that's good news. Granted, it usually takes a long time for something to get from the "tested in mice" stage to the "making life better for everyone" stage, but I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

Motorcycles are racist?

2010-09-27T13:01:00.003-05:00

Sure, they're dangerous, but according to Johns Hopkins, motorcycles are more likely to be fatal for black people. Blacks and whites, with similar injuries from motorcycle accidents, have noticeably different mortality rates. Even when they both wear helmets, a white motorcyclist has a greater chance of surviving his injuries than a black one.

I'm not really sure how to interpret the results, although I give credit to the scientists for admitting that more research needs to be done. Although they tried to account for factors like the sex of the motorcyclist, the severity of the injuries, and their insurance status, it was 1.5 times more likely for black victims to die, with even white motorcyclists without helmets having a greater survival rate than blacks with helmets. I don't know if this is institutional bias on the part of the hospital, if black motorcyclists are more likely to have pre-existing conditions, or what.

Personally, I'm not a fan of motorcycles. I've never been comfortable on one. All of this reading about motorcycle-related fatalaties makes me more nervous than ever to even think about riding them.

Widgets

2010-09-23T23:04:00.001-05:00

Wow, so I've been blogging for over two years. I had no idea it had been that long. I guess time really does fly when you're having fun.

Looking at this blog now, I see some stuff that I've outgrown, and other stuff that I never really grew into. I'd feel better if I spent some time cleaning things up a bit. I have some ideas about what's working and what needs to go, but haven't made a final plan yet.

Does anyone have any suggestions? What widgets work for you? What has helped your blog, and what just takes up space?

I'm Switching to Boost Mobile!

2010-09-20T23:09:00.001-05:00

This is a Sponsored Post written by me on behalf of Boost Mobile. All opinions are 100% mine.

My brother's got a Blackberry, and for the longest time he hasn't been able to shut up about Boost mobile's Blackberry Monthly Unlimited Plan. He's got a lot more ladies lined up than I do (but let the record show that I do well enough for myself!), so he has really been getting a lot out of their unlimited text feature, although the unlimited e-mail option is pretty handy, as well. He hasn't come close to Boost's limit of 10 personal e-mail accounts, but he has an e-mail for his real estate business, a separate one for his delivery service, and his personal account, so he's happy that the plan doesn't limit him to just one account.

I've never been as much of a tech geek, so I hadn't paid much attention, but since my cell phone contract was due to expire recently, I checked out Boost Mobile for myself. It turns out that in addition to the Blackberry plan, they've got a bunch of prepaid, pay-as-you-go phone plans. After putting up with the hassle of complicated service agreements that lock me into extended-duration contracts, it was exactly what I was looking for.

By far, the best part of Boost Mobile is their Re-Boost payment option. It lets me kiss contracts goodbye (I know I just mentioned how much I really don't like them, but it bears repeating), but I can keep my phone connected by adding funds to my Boost account online, by phone, or in person. Right now I'm using my debit card to make payments, but I think that I'm going to sign up for the automatic payment option so that I don't have to worry about running out of funds at the wrong time.

I think the best part of switching to Boost Mobile (besides getting rid of contracts) is going to be the ability to check Facebook on the go. My current phone is a piece of junk, and I have become a total Facebook junkie. Boost mobile has a huge selection of phones, and for a flat monthly fee, they also offer unlimited connectivity to Facebook. It's going to be great, even if my productivity at work does take a hit. Maybe I can tell the boss that I'm networking, and developing my credentials as a social media expert?

Are Kids Worse Off, or Just More Honest?

2010-09-19T10:34:00.000-05:00

This press release from the American Psychological Association has me questioning what they're actually trying to say. I mean, the headline is that college students are "exhibiting" more severe mental illness these days. But does that mean that they're suffering from more severe illness?

What I'm getting at is that just because more college students are reporting (and seeking help for) mental illness now, isn't it possible that there were just as many students in the past who suffered in silence? Let's face it: there's a stigma attached to mental illness, and I think that the current prejudice against mental illness and the people who admit to suffering from it is not nearly as pronounced as it has been in years past. So it's all well and good to call it something like "a shift in the needs of students seeking counseling services," (as John Guthman, director of student counseling services at Hofstra University calls it) but isn't it possible that this is something that they have consistently needed but were afraid to ask for?

Maybe I'm getting wound up about nothing, but I have serious problems with the language used in large parts of the APA's press release. "More students are coming to college with pre-existing mental health difficulties"? Sounds to me like another way of saying "they were like that when they got here!"

KSU does NOT have a gambling problem.

2010-08-24T07:00:00.000-05:00

I repeat, KSU does NOT have a gambling problem. I cannot stress that enough. They're just really interested in sports odds.

In a study reminiscent of something from Guys and Dolls or any story that involves hustlers hanging around racetracks with "can't fail" systems, a Kansas State University professor says that there's a way to predict the outcome of some college football games. And it's not the heat, it's the humidity. Well, the contrast between humid and arid regions.

Apparently, this economics professor found that teams from humid regions end up getting their butts handed to them when they play in arid regions. Bookmakers take note. After all, the study was about ways to make the market for sports betting "more efficient," so I'm glad that someone gets to benefit from this state-funded research work, even if it's not starving orphans, cancer victims, or war amputees.

"All Hands on Deck!"

2010-08-19T07:00:00.000-05:00

"Screw that, I'm getting mine!"

At least, that's how the exchange goes in "disturbed ecosystems," according to Georgia Tech Researchers. They were looking into whether organisms all try to work together when their ecosystems are under assault, or if it's dog-eat-dog business as usual. It's probably an area of study that's going to be of relevance for quite a while (I'm looking at YOU, gulf coast!).

It was panic in the petri dish as biologists exposed microbes to acoustic disturbances. They looked at how many were killed off when they were in disturbed environments, how many were killed off when they were competing with other organisms for the same resources, and how many were killed off when competing for resources after their environment was disturbed. Rather than both populations of competing organisms declining equally in the third scenario, one group would wipe the floor with the other.

To rephrase that, creatures that are neck and neck in an environment where they have to fight each other to survive no longer remain neck and neck when their environment gets unusually dangerous. That's when the men are separated from the boys, and one group curb stomps their opponents while they're most vulnerable. This is bad news for species diversity, especially when you consider all the ecosystems that we're disturbing...

And this, boys and girls...

2010-08-17T07:00:00.000-05:00

Is why we don't get attached to any one particular ideal, mindset, organization, or whatever. I mean, when it gets right down to it, is there anything out there actually worth dying over? Okay, fine, possibly the allies in WWII ending the holocaust, but examples are few and far between.

The University of Texas at Austin has been looking into extremism, and what people are willing to die for. They describe people willing to die for other members of their group as "fused," which is an interesting way of looking at it. Personally, I think it's commendable to be willing to sacrifice yourself to save others regardless of who they are, but this study focused on what people would do for members of their "group" versus people outside of it.

The bottom line? Spainards want Americans dead. That's only a slight exaggeration, but the gist of it is that Spanish college students (who were studied for the project) were more willing to die for people inside of Europe than they were for people outside of it (specifically, America). There were also some interesting follow-up questions about who would be willing to die so that terrorists would get killed that raise some interesting ethical questions and insights into the nature of extremism.

Hopefully, I'll never be in a situation where I face a choice like that in real life.

Beating a Dead Horse: Binge Drinking and Crippled Teens

2010-08-03T07:00:00.002-05:00

I'm sure you remember my coverage of Loyola University's last study on binge drinking and long-term health effects. Guess what? They've built on that, and it turns out that binge drinking is (still) bad for you in the long term.

The latest news from Loyola University is that binge drinking messes with your genes. I'm not really clear how this is different from their last study, though. Maybe it's more specific? This time, they've managed to shoehorn teen binge drinking in there, possibly to garner more media attention.

It looks like the 2008 study proved that binge drinking makes for brittle bones. This new study proves that binge drinking messes up your genes. So their hypothesis from the original study, that binge drinking might be messing with your genes, appears to have been proven.

Being a Moose Must Suck

2010-07-29T07:00:00.000-05:00

Putting aside the problems of not being able to enjoy things like television and the internet, you'd have to spend cold winters outside and worry about getting killed by hunters or inattentive drivers. And then you'd have to be constantly eating to support yourself, considering that moose can weigh around 1,000 pounds. Now imagine what it would be like if you had arthritis. Ugly, right?

It looks like scientists at Michigan Tech are also thinking about what it would be like to be a moose. Unsurprisingly, they also think it would suck, but for different reasons. They're worrying about osteoarthritis.

I can see that. I can only imagine how bad joint pain is when you weigh ten times as much. That's a lot of stress to put on bones. According to them, malnutrition early in life leads to the bone and joint problems later, so I guess their next project should research how they can get moose to eat healthier.

Firewater? Really?

2010-07-27T07:00:00.001-05:00

It's always important to examine prejudices to see if there's any truth to them, or if it's just mean-spirited people spreading rumors. Like the idea of Indians and their firewater. Let's face it, that assertion in this day and age is just naked bigotry.

So the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services keeps records on this sort of thing. Actually, their subdivision, the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) tracks it, and then releases their data. According to a survey the released in June, American Indians and Alaska Natives had a lower rate of alcohol usage than the national average. Mind you, that's past month alcohol usage.

It's a mixed result. Although the past month usage is lower than the national average, the rate of binge alcohol and illicit drug use is higher than the national average, with one in eight American Indian or Alaska Native adults seeking treatment at a speciality facility for alcohol or drug use. Make of that what you will.

Surprise! Marketers will sell you out!

2010-07-20T07:00:00.001-05:00

You've got bigger problems than privacy violations if you needed to be told that marketers want as much of your personally identifying information as they can get their hands on. Strangely enough, the consumers providing that information would rather not give them carte blanche to track their myriad personal details. Who would have guessed?

A UMass Amherst study shows that marketers and consumers have differing expectations of "privacy." I'm not surprised. Most of the consumers would rather choose or control what information that marketers had access to. Most marketers didn't expect consumers to be bothered by the fact that they were harvesting as much data as they could get their hands on.

I don't understand why marketers don't get this, especially after the backlash generated by so many embarrassing incidents. Google took a hit by pre-emptively connecting people through Google Buzz. Blizzard provoked fan outrage by trying to get everyone in their forums to post using real names. I can respect the fact that they want to grab as much information as they can to increase their sales, but I wish they'd be honest about their motivations instead of lying to us (and possibly themselves) about how they just want to use this information to make our lives better.

ATTENTION WORKFORCE:

2010-07-15T08:00:00.001-05:00

You're screwed, for several reasons, according to the University of New Hampshire.

First, you've got to deal with a lot of punks joining the workforce. The recent crop of graduates is "entitlement minded," and I'm sure you can guess what that means. They think they deserve preferential treatement, are less likely to enjoy their job, and freely take credit for other people's successes while denying responsibility for any shortcomings. You know, kind of like the contributors to Brazen Careerist.

Once these entitlement-minded workers hit your workplace, they are going to be frustrated on the job and likely to abuse co-workers. That's right, if they don't have an objective view of their relative worth and their contributions, they end up feeling slighted on the job. Or, as Professor Paul Harvey puts it, they respond poorly to "perceived inequities in the rewards received by co-workers to whom psychologically entitled employees feel superior.” This surly attitude leads to lashing out, including workplace abuse like rumor mongering, ignoring promises, and slinging insults. So you've got that to look forward to.

The best part of all? When supervisors try to communicate with these entitled employees, the entitled workers end up feeling more frustrated, not less.

What I would like to see is how this study correlates with the one from University of Toronto that showed how women working for a female supervisor are more distressed. Does this have anything to do with the way that different genders view entitlement? I'm sure Penelope Trunk would have something to say about it.

Weed, but not Marijuana

2010-07-13T11:36:00.001-05:00

Weed science. Sorry, Snoop Dogg and Dr. Dre, Cornell University is only studying that unwanted crap that grows in your garden, but at least they're taking it to the next level. It's part of their horticulture department.

Cornell is so stoked about studying weeds that in two weeks, they're holding a contest. This "world series of weeds" is supposed to cater to those with "a special interest in weed science" (again: no stoners). The contest involves four categories: identifying weeds, identifying herbicides, calibrating sprayers, and solving farm problems. A whopping 105 students have already registered!

Does anyone else think that this level of specialization is funny? I bust on soil scientists a lot, but the whole field seems kind of nuts. Making your living by studying dirt?

Another Way to Screw Up Your Kids

2010-07-06T07:00:00.000-05:00

Look out, world! Another scientific study has been published to tell you something you already knew! That's right, the Cornell College of Human Ecology has announced that playing favorites with your children will make them depressed adults.

I will concede that the study had an interesting finding: even the favored children end up with problems. I'm not overflowing with sympathy for them, but they have to put up with the pressure of their parents' expectations, and they end up shouldering the resentment of their less-favored siblings. So even the winners end up losers when parents play favorites.

The sad thing is that some parents don't even realize that they're treating their children unequally. 30% of mothers surveyed said that they treated their children equally, while only 15% of children felt equally treated. That's right, you can cause lasting emotional damage without even trying! Hooray?

Profits or Predators Don't Matter, We're All Doomed

2010-07-01T07:00:00.001-05:00

I don't think this study will change much in the long run, but it turns out that we might not properly understand what drives the commercial fishing industry. The currently accepted theory is that fishermen use a "top down" approach, starting with predators at the top of the food chain (notably tuna and halibut). Once fishing reduces their population and catches dwindle, fishermen move further down the food chain pulling in the fish those predators used to eat until those numbers dwindle, and so on.

According to the University of Washington, it turns out that our motivations may be more economic than evolutionary. Commercial fisheries are (understandably) motivated to catch whatever fish is the most profitable. This means that governments can influence conservation efforts and maintain sustainable levels of fishing by setting price controls on seafood.

Will it work, though? I'm pessimistic. Governments are going to be motivated by what is politically popular, and I don't think it would be possible to arrange for the kind of national cooperation required to have a lasting effect on ocean populations. We should all cultivate a taste for jellyfish, since they're the only thing that has managed to thrive thanks to our efforts.

Are High Heels Really Worth It?

2010-06-29T07:00:00.000-05:00

I think we need to draw a line between cosmetic surgery and ridiculous nonsense that puts people in danger without any real benefits. It looks like The American Orthopaedic Food and Ankle Society agrees with me. They think that you should avoid cosmetic foot surgery.

I think it's worth noting, that of the three surgeries given as examples of unnecessary "foot facelifts," two of them had to do with wearing high heels (making feet narrower and changing the shape of the little toe, if you were curious). Is a fashion accessory really something worth risking permanent physical damage over?

Note that I said fashion accessory. This is about changing the look of your feet to fit into shoes. Getting a nip, tuck, or liposuction for a bathing suit is about an article of clothing, and the subject of a completely separate post. Still, when you are risking (and here we'll quote Dr. Michael Pinzur of Loyola University Health System) "infections, pain, scarring and nerve damage," you might want to ask yourself if the surgery is really necessary.

Pinheads Multitasking

2010-06-14T11:09:00.001-05:00

I hate mosquitoes. I don't know why, but I always have the worst reaction to their bites, and I never notice them landing on me. They always manage to dodge me at the last second when I try to swat them, too.

I just don't get how something so small can be so crafty. I mean, I've got fingernail trimmings that are bigger than their brains, and yet they still get the job done, sneaking in, drinking up, and getting away clear. (I wish I could pull that trick at bars!)

University of Adelaide is thinking about bug brains, too. Professor David O'Carroll has been looking at the way that insects are able to judge motion and speed. It turns out that some parts of their brain pull double duty--their vision center also takes into account different light patterns and uses that to judge speed. O'Carroll points out that insects can have as much as 30% of their brain devoted to the visual system, which is more than other animals, so it makes sense that they'd apply it to different tasks in order to get the most efficient usage of space.

Fear of Theft, or Fear of Commitment?

2010-06-08T15:38:00.004-05:00

I have scaled back my online presence because I was a victim of identity theft. It happened to me a few months ago, and I just haven't gotten the same enjoyment out of networking and sharing opinions with other people since then. I've noticed a chilling effect to the point of near-paranoia.

I've looked into some identity protection programs, figuring that if I had a good one in place I could get back out there and connect with people. Most of the time, though, I run into the same issue. I don't want to subscribe to a service or get locked in to a program for an extended period of time. How do I know whether the company is actually doing anything to protect my identity? Are they just raking in checks while they set the equivalent of a google, waiting to see if they need to send me an e-mail? I don't want to pay for that.

It's why I'm psyched to hear about IDCheck. The company that offers it, ID Watchdog, promises a solution that's quick, convenient, and low-cost. It's a one-time fee you pay to see if anyone has stolen your identity. They even go further, taking action to clear things up for you if you've been a victim. And they're announcing that they'll be rolling out prepaid cards for $10 that you can save or give out like iTunes gift cards. If it's half as good as they promise, I can't wait.

(This blog's compensation disclosure policy can be read here)

Beating Dead Horses and What People Want

2010-06-07T13:38:00.001-05:00

So I guess that Indiana University got the rights to some video clips of speed dating in Germany, and they are mining that data just as hard as they possibly can.

As previously reported, Indiana University combed through the footage trying to figure out if speed daters who appeared interested in their partner would indicate genuine interest when they filled out the card at the end of the date. The findings announced that women were tricky and men were easy to read, (but this may only apply in Germany). Building on that dramatic breakthrough, Indiana University looked at the footage again.

Their shocking new finding? You will look to the opinions of others to determine whether or not someone is hot. I'll give you a moment to collect yourself. After all, who would have thought that things are more attractive when it looks like someone else wants them?

To summarize: research subjects found people more attractive if they watched a video of someone else finding them attractive first. That, and Indiana University needs to do something besides watching old clips of German speed-dating sessions.

Oh, Missouri

2010-04-21T07:00:00.001-05:00

Why are your kids so filthy? And I ask because I care, not because I want to pass judgment on you or anything. Seriously, your school kids need serious help.

I'm talking about treatment-resistant ringworm. It's a fungus, not a worm, but the fact remains: 7% of your elementary school children are covered in drug-resistant fungus. That's just nasty.

Children's Mercy Hospitals and Clinics has issued a press release about it, and hopefully people will pay attention. Sharing hats, combs, anything that touches your head? Knock that crap off right away.

How come rich people get all the safety?

2010-04-19T21:08:00.000-05:00

It must be nice to be able to afford not to die in a car accident. Actual science from the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences shows that car safety features do a better job of protecting rich people. (And by "do a better job of," I actually mean "are present to.")

For their study, they went around and compared vehicle safety features like crash test ratings, air bags, etc. They cross-checked this information with ZIP codes, and compared how much money people were earning in that ZIP code (median income) to how safe their cars were. Care to guess the results?

That's right, the rich people had the safer cars. The researchers point out that usually the cutting-edge safety features are installed as optional (and pricey!) components on high-end cars. Later, as their effectiveness has been proven, it eventually "trickles down" and becomes standard features in all cars, regarless of their price point.

Still, it must be nice to be able to afford better protection against injuries from car accidents.

Your Love of Crabs Will Kill Us All

2009-11-02T07:00:00.000-06:00

Congratulations, University of Alabama at Birmingham. Your research into blue crabs is going to poison the environment and kill us all. Sorry, what I meant to say was that UAB has made an exciting new discovery about a potential food source, and I'm sure that nothing could possibly go wrong!

People eat blue crabs. People only eat blue crabs when they're molting. Molting season happens only the spring and early summer. UAB scientists want to make blue crabs molt on demand so that they can be eaten year round.

I see their point. You can start setting up blue crab operations all along the coast and it will create jobs and make more food available. But is it really a good idea to force those kinds of changes? Especially when you consider that factory farms raising salmon are little more than floating ocean pens; how do you keep this chemical you're giving to the blue crabs from getting into the ocean at large? And then what happens once it starts affecting organisms in the wild?

Oh, I'm sure it'll be nothing to worry about.

Hey, Doctors! Time to Feng Shui it Up!

2009-10-30T07:00:00.000-05:00

So, the Mayo Clinic conducted a study to see how patients were affected by the rooms where they met with their doctors. (Not the exam rooms where they run all the tests on you, the rooms where you actually sit and talk with your doctor about what's wrong with you and what might go wrong with you.)

It was an okay test, I suppose. It turns out that in "experimental" setups where patients sat next to their doctor and looked at the same computer screen during the consultation, patients were more engaged in their treatement and received a better quality of care. That seems like kind of a no-brainer; if you give patients a chance to get involved with their own treatment, they will. (I imagine that this new setup for doctors is a pain in the ass, though.)

I don't think that the study went far enough. Sure, patients and doctors do well when side by side facing a computer screen. What about on roller skates and facing a computer screen? Or when suspended over a shark tank and facing a computer screen? What if the computer screen is replaced with a medical textbook? An informational documentary on molluscs? An angry badger with a toothache? Inquiring minds want to know! For Science!

Insomnia for Cancer

2009-06-11T14:39:00.001-05:00

Staying up late slows the disease's progress.

I wish that was the case. It seems like the press release from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill is a bit of a tease in that respect. The title indicates that messing with your circadian clock can stop cancer growth.

It actually sounds kind of inconclusive to me. Original studies showed that nurses and flight attendants who messed up their circadian rhythm (the way their bodies tell night from day, usually because they were working through the night) ended up with higher rates of cancer. So scientists concluded that messing up your circadian clock by keeping odd hours gives you cancer.

Now it looks like actually messing with your genes, and restructuring the biological cells of your body to change the circadian clock can slow down cancer. They altered the genes of some mice and found that they lived longer. So staying up late is still a bad idea, cancer-wise, but they're trying to find better ways of altering the way your cells tell what time it is.

Granny Tipping

2009-06-09T13:02:00.002-05:00

Knocking old people around could provide a valuable service.

I was just looking at a paper in the Journal of Neurophysiology that presents new theories for preventing falls. Not that I read the Journal religiously or or anything. I guess I stumbled across it the same way you find anything out there on the internet.

Anyway, professors at the University of Illinois are experimenting with the way you keep your balance. They think that by exposing people to near-slips in laboratory conditions helps to train them to avoid actual slip-and-fall accidents in the real world. So the study was a lot of tipping people over on oil-lubricated vinyl, which probably wasn't nearly as erotic as it sounds.

That means that whenever you jostle old people in line and on the subway, you're being a good citizen, helping them develop a better sense of balance so they don't fall down on their own, right?

Bloggers of Interest: Da Old Man

2009-05-08T07:00:00.000-05:00

I'd like to introduce you to a little concept I call the "snowball of shame." It starts with something that you've been putting off doing for a while, and you're ashamed because you should have done it earlier. The "snowball" part comes in when you put it off just a little longer because you don't want to face the embarrassment of how overdue this task is, but then putting it off makes you even more ashamed to admit that you've been dragging your heels, which makes you put it off longer, etc.

For example: you're reluctant to call your mother because you don’t want a lecture about how you never call. So you put it off for a day, and then the next day you worry that you're going to hear even more about it, so you put off calling for another day, etc.

That's why it's taken so long to get to the latest entry in my Bloggers of Interest series. You don't want to know (well, actually, I just don't want to tell you) how long ago Da Old Man, the proprietor of the Crotchety Old Man World Wide Headquarters and Discount House of Worship and author of Crotchety Old Man Yells at Cars, was kind enough to answer my questions to be profiled as a Blogger of Interest. Let's just say that I'm finally sitting down to cope with a particularly big snowball of shame, and he's been incredibly patient.

Da Old Man's blog is interesting because of its aggressive outlook, no-holds-barred approach, and its regular photo caption contest. He covers a range of topics, including his courageous battle with hospital food and harrowing tales of embarrassing personal disfigurement. But he can tell you more about his blog in his own words.

What got you into blogging?

About 5 years ago I worked in a terrible job. We called my bosses the Incubus and the Succubus. Blogging gave me a way to tell off my bosses without losing my job. My co-workers could read the crap I was feeling, and usually would get a laugh or two.

Where did the names Incubus and Succubus come from? Were your bosses constantly trying to do it with their employees? Or was it a life-draining kind of thing? I always thought that while the Succubus... um, "drains it out," its male counterpart, the Incubus, is supposed to... er, "put it in."

Incubus and Succubus were chosen simply because they were perfect demonic terms, and we were sure we were working in the Social Services ring of hell.

How did you choose your blog's name?

I'm pretty crotchety, and I imagine if I live long enough, I'll be the insane old guy on the corner yelling at cars to slow down.

What were you like as a crotchety young man?
I just pretty much had a bad attitude every day. Lots of teen angst, mixed in with anger issues.

I'm going to assume that you count "crotchety" as having a good attitude these days, and skip on to the next question. When and why did you start the photo caption contest?

It almost gives me a day off. It is also a chance for the readers to get more involved. They really like it. Because my judges are my friends, it gets them involved in a fun way, too.

Why did you choose a Zucchini as a trophy?

There were so many glitzy awards being passed around, I wanted to give out something funny, and zucchini is the most humorous denizen of the vegetable kingdom.

Are you sure that the zucchini is the funniest vegetable? No love for the jicama, or the tomato, or the eggplant's snooty British cousin, the aubergine?

Zucchini is the perfect funny trophy worthy vegetable, no question. While kumquats, jicama, tomatoes, and aubergine are every bit as funny on their own, they lack the overall comedic stature that a zucchini projects.

Ah, the zucchini "projects," thrusting its mighty comedic stature forward to penetrate stodgy reserve of some of your readers. It's a dick joke, I get it. Next question: what does the blogosphere need more of?

It needs more originality, with more quality first person writing.

And more public service announcements on the dangers of buying secondhand truffles, I might add. What does it need less of?

Youtube videos, blogs about how adorable one's kids are, blogs written from the viewpoint of pets.

Where do you see yourself (and your blog) in three years?

I just hope to keep getting better and include more original photos, perhaps with frequent travelogue style posts. I'd also like to have tens of thousands of readers per day, so I can accept a bit of paid advertising and make a living.

I Love You, Man

2009-05-04T13:15:00.000-05:00

I'd also love it if you drank less. And I'd love some acronyms, too. Actually, I'd love a lot of acronyms. Can anyone make that happen?

The University of Texas can make all that happen, and more. Their School of Public Health conducted a research study that threw around more acronyms than a GAO rundown of NIST RFP audits, kicking around acronyms like SMART (Southern Methodist Alcohol Research Trial), MIF (motivational interviewing with feedback), NIAAA (National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism) and e-CHUG (don't ask). Their claim is that individualized feedback is effective at stopping alcohol abuse in college.

According to this study, people in college don't realize that their peers drink less than they appear to. Sure, the rumors abound that college campuses are packed with drunken yahoos, but this study claims that there's less drinking going on than people realize, and by educating students about the behavior of their peers, they'll realize that it's okay to drink less.

I suppose that way of thinking is fine, if you're content to follow the herd. Tonight, I'm going to raise a glass to the outliers of society, who not only drink more than their peers, but who are also proud of it.

Chicks Are Inscrutable

2009-05-01T07:00:00.001-05:00

And that's not just my opinion. It's backed up by science. Outside observers are better at reading the intentions of men than they are at figuring out what women are thinking.

Indiana University conducted a study where observers watched clips from speed-dating interactions and were asked whether or not the participants were interested in each other. Neither men nor women were particularly effective as observers when it came to figuring out which daters were interested. However, the speed-dating men were easier to "read," and both male and female observers were able to figure out whether the interest on their part was genuine. Speed-dating women were more deceptive, and misled observers as to whether or not they were interested more frequently.

There were some other interesting side notes to this study. For one thing, there was no difference in accuracy on the observers' part whether they viewed a full 30 seconds of interaction or only 10 seconds (Hi there, Malcolm Gladwell!).

The other point worth noting was that while the observations were conducted in Indiana, the actual speed-dating sessions were conducted in Germany. So as far as we know, it's only German men who are transparently easy to read.

OMG! DRAMA!

2009-04-29T07:00:00.001-05:00

Does talking about your problems with someone make them better, or worse? Actually, go back a step. How to you talk about your problems with people? Are you trying to find solutions, or do you just want people to pay attention to you while you complain?

Remember all the drama of high school? The endless discussion about who got in a fight/started dating/etc.? I can only imagine how much worse it is with crap like twitter and instant/text messaging. So, Stony Brook University started looking at what kind of effects it has on them (and went with the exciting study name "Clarifying co-rumination: Associations with internalizing symptoms and romantic involvement among adolescent girls").

Their studies show that frequent discussion of problems can lead to depression or anxiety. I'm not sure they aren't putting the cart before the horse, though. Isn't it equally possible that depressed or anxious people spend more time running to their friends to talk about how worried they are?

Sweeping Carbon Under the Rug

2009-04-27T07:00:00.000-05:00

If you can't see it, then it must not be there, right? I used to clean my room by throwing all of my junk in the closet and shutting the door. Now it looks like some scientists are recommending that we do the same thing to fix the environment.

There's a research paper put out by two scientists that thinks we can solve some of our carbon dioxide problems by burying it at sea. Specifically, they think we should start gathering up all of our "crop residue" (stalks of corn and wheat, the leftover bits of the plants that we don't use), tie it up in bundles, and then bury it in the ocean. Problem solved, right?

I think the challenge would be making sure that collecting, bailing, shipping, and burying the residue doesn't generate more carbon dioxide than the alternatives, but they're scientists and they're convinced that it's the way to go.

It's Okay to Sleep with Your Dog

2009-04-24T07:00:00.000-05:00

Not to, like, do it with your dog, because that's nasty, but it's okay to share a bed with your dog. The University of Kansas says that you can let your dog lick your face and sleep in your bed without worrying about germs. Apparently, more than half of all dog owners are into that kind of thing.

The press release gets a little muddled towards the end, though. The researchers tracked the spread of E. coli bacteria to determine whether or not it was "safe" to get overly affectionate with your dog. Then it gives all kinds of information about e-coli, how it is spread, and whether it can develop drug resistance.

Interestingly enough, it looks like more drug-resistant e-coli bacteria is spread from dog owners to their pets than the other way around.

Luckily, Bloggers Aren't Licensed

2009-04-23T07:00:00.001-05:00

It turns out that licensed doctors can stop practicing medicine for as long as they want, and then pick up the job again later without having their competency re-assessed. Fair enough, you can keep your driver's license valid and go without driving for years, bu no one will ask you to re-take your driver's test before you can get back behind the wheel. Of course, driving a car and performing brain surgery aren't exactly alike.

Researchers at the University of Michigan are concerned that states aren't checking up on the competency of inactive doctors who return to active practice. Of course, since the licensing board for the District of Columbia is the only one that requires a minimum number of patient visits to keep a license registered as "active," most of these boards wouldn't even know which ones were in danger of getting rusty.

Of course, since bloggers don't need a license to do their thing, I can pick back up where I left off without worrying too much.

Social Disease

2009-04-22T11:17:00.001-05:00

Yeah, so it's been a while since I posted. That's because a virus wiped out my computer, and I'm still kind of pissed about it.

I wasn't looking at porn sites, I wasn't visiting shady offshore gambling sites, and I wasn't trying to download pirated movies. I was just using a popular widget that lets people hop from blog to blog (I'm sure you know the one) when an error message came up and my computer crashed, never again able to restart successfully.

Yes, I have virus protection software. Yes, it is kept current with the latest definitions. Yes, I avoid opening attachments in e-mails, especially when they're from people I don't know. That's why I am convinced that some malicious code was passed onto me when I decided to "drop" in on someone else's blog.

What will this mean for the future of my participation in social networking sites? Now that I've got a new computer and restored access to the internet, I'm not sure. I'm certainly going to be much more suspicious of bloggers I don't know.

Born Leaders (Gossips/Flirts/Wallflowers, etc.)

2009-03-25T07:00:00.000-05:00

According to studies, your role in (and the size of) your social network is a function of your genetic code. Whether you're the central hub in a network of interconnected acquaintances or an outlier with a few friends who don't know each other, your position is apparently predicted by your genes.

To get these results, they studied fraternal and identical twins. The identical twins had the same number of people who knew them as friends, and those friends had an equal chance of knowing each other. Fraternal twins had social networks of differing "shapes," with different numbers of friends and a varying likelihood of whether or not those friends knew each other.

Almost as interesting as the unsung breakthrough itself is the ability of the professors involved to milk a concept for all the sweet, sweet grant money that they can get their hands on. That's right. Research into social networks should sound familiar for good reason--these same two professors from Harvard Medical School and UC San Diego were in the news previously for using grant money to research how social networks spread happiness.

I wish I had paid more attention in school. Then I'd be able to get people to pay me for spending all my time ~~on myspace~~ thoroughly researching social networks like these two professors.

Science Fiction? Media Hype? Both?

2009-03-23T07:00:00.001-05:00

The University of Maryland got me all excited the way they were casually throwing around words like teleportation, but it's not as cool as you'd think. For one thing, it's only occurring one atom at a time, which isn't very useful for Star Trek style transport. It also turns out that they're not moving atoms, they're moving information from one atom to another.

They think it will help with Quantum Computing, which is supposed to be the Next Big Thing in computers, all smaller, faster, and more sophisticated than the current systems that are limited by the physical properties of their construction. I remain nonplussed. After all, assuming that they do manage to construct a working quantum computer, I don't think I'll personally see the effects of one for decades. The first quantum computers aren't going to be cheap, and I've never been an early adopter of new technology.

Oh, and the information? Yeah, it's up to 90% accurate. That's right, even if they do find a way to apply this to teleporting people, you've got a 1 in 10 chance of winding up with your index finger where your big toe should be and your teeth trading places with your fingernails. Good times.

Silent Killers: Now with More Silence!

2009-03-20T07:00:00.001-05:00

That's right, flying robot killers from the future are going to be more silent than ever before! That's robots who fly and kill people, not flying people who kill robots, by the way.

Georgia Tech is working on making our unmanned aerial drones quieter, so that they will be tougher to spot. Short-term thinking says that's a good idea, because we'll be able to spy on today's enemies more effectively.

In the long term, we're already developing more efficient aerial predators based on the design of prehistoric killing machines. It's bad enough that they'll be harvesting our own organs to hunt us down and kill us more effectively, now they'll be able to do it without giving us any warning.

It's going to be a dark future, indeed.

Illusions of Value

2009-03-18T07:00:00.000-05:00

Ohio State University has determined that when we think about money, the numbers involved can be more important than the value. Some of the subjects were actually making different choices depending on whether they were asked to make decisions about one dollar or 100 cents. In fact, it seemed like they thought that it was better to receive 100 cents than it was to receive a dollar.

To conduct the study, they used that "prisoner's dilemma" game. Are you familiar with it? I'm kind of sick of hearing about it, since it seems like the stock scenario that someone brings up when they want to sound like they know something about psychology or human behavior, but the idea is that you can screw over other "players" in the "game" or not screw them over. The outcome is based on their reactions, but it's a safer bet to screw them over (you can gain more if you don't, but you'd have to trust the other players for that).

Is anyone surprised that participants were more impressed by numbers than they were by actual values? It's kind of like the way that products are advertised for $39.99 instead of $40. Our minds can play tricks on us, so it's always important to think twice before you spend your hard-earned money.

Good News for Gigolos

2009-03-16T07:00:00.000-05:00

Harvard Medical School has found a way to "wipe out" the Herpes virus. I guess it's good news for anyone with a cold sore, too.

This new cure messes with the RNA of the virus. It ends up unable to replicate, and unable to get picked up by the body. At least, that's how it has worked for the mice so far, and hopefully it will also work in people.

I hope it works for people. I don't have any plans to contract herpes in my future, but it's good to know that Harvard's got my back if I ever change my mind. Of course, there is a downside to this. That's right. More ads like those Valtrex commercials where attractive people tell you how great life is now that they've found a cure for their herpes.

Old drivers WILL kill you.

2009-02-28T07:00:00.001-06:00

You know all those stories about old people "confusing" the gas pedal with the brake and mowing down a huge crowd of people? Well, they're just going to get worse.

I used to be a big fan of mandatory, regular vision testing to retain your driver's license. Now it turns out that it's completely worthless. So, even if you make people take vision tests to prove that they can still drive, you're not keeping unsafe older drivers off the road.

It's an argument for buying more SUVs and driving everywhere. If some crazy 90-year-old driver is going to have a senior moment and ram me, I want to be as protected as possible.

It was nice knowing you, Frogs.

2009-02-26T07:00:00.001-06:00

They're doomed. Doomed because gluttons can't stop eating them. I mean, it's bad enough that their permeable skin puts them at risk of poisoning, but now they're just web-footed cattle.

Endangered web-footed cattle. But who the hell EATS frogs, anyway? The article I read blames school cafeterias (?!) in Europe and Asians in general, but I'm stunned that it's that bad.

Only one thing for it, and that's factory farming. We're doing it with salmon, right? I can't imagine it would be that much harder with frogs.

Deaf Mice = SCIENCE!

2009-02-24T07:00:00.001-06:00

Would you want to be deaf? I wouldn't. I mean, I'm watching the Amazing Race this season, and that deaf kid's doing a pretty good job (probably better than I'd do on the race--those hillbillies from Virginia were more my speed), but I'm pretty happy being able to hear things.

Now, what if someone wanted to trade a little bit of your hearing in exchange for more damage-resistant ears? You wouldn't be able to pick up small noises or soft whispers, but you'd be able to attend rock concert after rock concert without needing earplugs.

Researchers at Johns Hopkins Medicine have found that the ear has a mechanism that protects you against hearing loss. You don't need to go partially deaf to take advantage of it, either, it's just how they proved that it existed.

They messed around with this ear system that limits just how much sound mice could hear, and the ones that retained their full hearing were more susceptible to permanent hearing damage when exposed to loud noises. The ones that heard less also suffered less damage. In theory, by manipulating this system (or at least understanding more about how it works), we could figure out how to listen to loud music at clubs and still be able to hear properly the next day. Sign me up!

CEOs and Rockstars

2009-02-17T22:28:00.000-06:00

Neither should have any expectation of privacy, says a professor at Neeley TCU School of Business.

It's the collision of two values that are important to me: A person's right to privacy, and a company's need for full disclosure. I think that company information like CEO salaries and expense reports should be available to the public. I also think that a person has a right to privacy, and that they shouldn't be forced to release their medical records.

Should the SEC be able to force CEOs to disclose information about any potentially life-threatening illnesses that they have? Why stop there? What if the CEO has a wife or child who is in the terminal stage of some sort of disease, wouldn't that be distracting? Should we require them to disclose that information?

Even when you look at celebrities, who the paparazzi claim are entitled to "no expectations of privacy," their medical records are still protected--people who sell their medical records to tabloids can be prosecuted for breaking the law. Why should someone have their medical history placed on display for all to see just because they're running a company?

It's No Barry White

2009-02-04T07:00:00.001-06:00

I'm no scientist. If I was, then I would have known for "some time" that the irritating whine that mosquitoes make is "the sound of love," according to this press release. Hopefully, romantic love, but knowing those mosquitoes I wouldn't be surprised if it was the kind of love that $5 would buy you out by the dumpster behind a Denny's on a Saturday night.

Anyway, they've been studying mosquitoes and found out that they actually change pitch when they're ~~mating~~ "in love." I'm not sure how they measured that, exactly. Oh, sure, the article mentions tiny microphones attached to the mosquitoes, and tethered mosquitoes, but it's still kind of odd to me. I mean, how the hell do you tether a mosquito in the first place?

Oh, hey. Aren't you glad that this was part of a $19.7 million grant from the National Institutes of Health? I'm sure that's taxpayer money well spent, even before we get into all the money that the new stimulus package is slinging around.

Rumors Had It

2009-02-03T20:17:00.000-06:00

Right. So, today's post is late because my ISP and I have been having a bit of a disagreement. With crappy, on-again off-again internet access like this, it really makes me wonder why I kill myself trying to pay my bill ontime.

Now, on to the subject of the day: election rumors. Did you hear any? More importantly, did you hear any good ones? I know the election is a polarizing subject, but there were rumors on both sides of the spectrum (secret muslims vs. banning books).

So, they did a follow-up poll asking people if they heard the rumors about the candidates, and if they believed them. Most people reported that they didn't believe them, and that the rumors didn't affect how they voted. Keep in mind that these questions were asked after the election.

Now, do you think that they really weren't swayed by the rumors, or were they just lying so they didn't look stupid?

Bedbugs are BACK, Baby!

2009-02-02T07:00:00.001-06:00

That's right, we're living in a Charles Dickens novel. I mean honestly, when was the last time you heard about someone having an infestation of bedbugs in their house? Well, you might hear it more often, since bedbug populations are increasing and they've become resistant to pesticides.

It's actually kind of funny because the study shows that the insect kingdom has its own regional differences. Researchers compared bedbugs found in New York City with bedbugs from Florida. The tough, urban bugs from NYC were better at surviving the pesticide than the softer, weaker bedbugs from the more hospitable climate of Florida.

I actually had a coworker come back from a trip recently and he thought he had picked up some bedbugs at a shady hotel he was staying in. It turns out that they weren't bedbugs (the exterminator didn't know what the hell they were), but he had done a lot of reading about them in the meantime. Have you ever gone to a party where the host puts all the coats in a big pile on the bed? That's what my parents used to do when they had company, but it turns out that it's a terrible idea. My friend was telling me that bedbugs can get into your clothing, so they can either move from an infected mattress into the pile of coats to get taken to all the guests' houses, or from one guest's coat into the mattress and all of the other guests' coats. It makes me cringe just thinking about it!

Of Butterflies and Bootleggers

2009-02-01T16:18:00.001-06:00

First, do you call it a bootlegger turn or a handbrake turn? You know, that move where you yank on the emergency brake while turning the wheel, so that you can whip your car around 180 degrees (hopefully without flipping over)? It's a staple of a lot of racing video games.

I've heard it called a bootlegger turn because the mobsters running illegal liquor during prohibition would use it to escape police roadblocks. I don't know how effective it was, or how often they used it, but it's a fun mental image. Also, it was probably easier to do back then, given the low top speeds that cars used to have.

It turns out that butterflies and bootleggers may have more in common than you'd think. They both attempt erratic, high-speed maneuvers to evade capture. Butterflies may have developed their hind wings to make fast, tight turns in the air to keep from getting eaten. The wings help them move quickly and erratically. That's what they think at Cornell, although it's kind of a shame that they had to go around clipping wings off of butterflies to prove their theory.

They Won't Have To Hunt Us

2009-01-31T08:13:00.001-06:00

So, we're using robots to help stroke victims regain their mobility.

It makes sense. I wouldn't want to spend my day watching someone do boring, repetitive motions to rebuild their muscle strength. In fact, it's so boring and repetitive that the stroke victims don't like doing it. The breakthrough in this case is that by involving virtual reality environments (read: having patients use the robot as a controller in a video game), stroke victims will work at the rehab exercises longer and regain function faster.

Sure, it sounds helpful at first. Until you think about what's in it for the robots. Not only will we be providing them with massive amounts of valuable data about how we move, where our mobility weaknesses are, and how we can be stopped from moving, but we're also giving them the chance to harm us directly. It's all ~~fun and games~~ physical therapy until the patient has his legs ripped off. We won't need faster robots that hunt us like dogs, we're already walking right into their cold metallic hands!

Touching Costs Extra

2009-01-30T07:00:00.001-06:00

What's your favorite possession? Where did you get it? How much is it worth to you?

Now imagine I gave you something cheap, like a keychain. Would you value it as much? You might if you held it for a little while. At the very least, you'd think it was more valuable than a keychain that you hadn't held.

All it takes is 30 seconds. Test subjects that held a coffee mug for 30 seconds showed an attachment to it that was stronger than those who held it for ten seconds, or those who hadn't held it at all. How strong? Well, subjects who held their coffee mugs would aggressively bid for them in an auction setting. So aggressively that four out of seven times the test subjects would pay more than the retail price for the mug, even when they were told how much it was selling for in the nearby campus bookstore.

It's a good reason to figure out what you're going to buy and what you're willing to pay for it before you enter the store, since all it takes is a little physical contact to completely abandon common sense.

Your Potato Children Will Be Deformed

2009-01-29T07:00:00.003-06:00

Plants have reproductive organs. Who knew? Well, everyone who had to sit through high school biology, but who remembered? And/or who cared?

Soil scientists, that's who. Specifically, agronomists. And not just because they have some kind of sick plant fetish. They're not just daydreaming about the private parts of plants, they're trying to make the world a better place. And this time, someone finally thought of the (plant) children.

Concerned agronomists have determined that while herbicide tests consider whether the plant-killing substances will kill "good" plants (read: the ones that aren't weeds), the tests don't verify that the herbicides don't accidentally sterilize the good plants.

I'm all for improved testing to make sure that we can keep enjoying future generations of plants like potatoes, corn, and soybeans. However, I do think that the language in their press release is dry, densely scientific, and a little obsessed with reproductive organs.

What Makes Someone a Jerk?

2009-01-28T07:00:00.001-06:00

How do you define what a jerk is? When you get mad at someone for acting like a jerk, is it because they're actually doing awful things, or is it just because they're not being as nice as you would like? The University of Chicago has found out that not only is it better to be nice to people, but we tend to punish people if we feel slighted by them.

Let me explain the experiment. In part 1, you are participating with another guy. The other guy is given $100, and chooses to give you $50. If the roles were reversed afterwards, and you were given another $100 with the option to share some of it with the other guy, how much would you give him?

In part 2, pretend the study gives you $100, but lets the other guy take as much from you as he wants (and he takes $50). When it's your turn, and he gets $100, how much would you take from him?

It turns out that most people felt like they were getting ripped off in part 2, and took as much as they could from the other guy. In part 1, people generally felt grateful and shared their $100 evenly with the other guy to thank him for his earlier generosity.

It's strange because in both situations, the participant ends up with $50 more than he had before. But in the first part, they liked the other person in the study. In the second part, they thought that they were paired with a jerk. They acted accordingly.

Where did you learn that smile?

2009-01-27T07:00:00.000-06:00

Or did you know it all along? That grin of triumph, the pout of unhappiness, are you doing it because you've seen other people do it, or because it just feels natural to you? If you hadn't seen other people expressing their emotions, would you still use the same expressions yourself?

Yes, you would. It turns out that some emotional responses are hard-wired, and not something that you learn. A study of blind and sighted athletes showed similar expressions on the faces of both blind and sighted winners (and similar expressions of disappointment on blind and sighted losers). Even athletes who were blind from birth "knew" how to express happiness and disappointment on their faces without seeing other people do it.

I don't really have any jokes to make about it, it's just kind of interesting.

Walkin' Farther and Doin' It More

2009-01-26T07:00:00.001-06:00

In the title of this post, "doin' it" is not referring to walking, it's referring to... you know, doin' it.

It's an an interesting mix of theory and speculation put forward by Washington University in St. Louis. After studying a bunch of mammals (161 different species), researchers found that the animals that traveled the most had the most offspring.

I would have guessed that all the walking was done by bigamist mammals who were trying to make sure that their wives stayed far enough apart that they never bumped into each other, but the researchers had a simpler explanation: the animals that walk more find more food. They find more food, it gives them more energy, and so they get busy more often.

Does this translate to the human species? I kind of doubt it. We can drive places to get food. I think that walking as part of an exercise plan to keep up your appearance could lead to more romantic encounters, but I don't think that people would find a direct link in humans between daily distance walked and number of children.

Peeing In Your Food

2009-01-25T06:53:00.002-06:00

I suppose it's not news that no one in food service washes their hands after using the bathroom. But Kansas State wanted to find out why. Surprise! It's because they're lazy.

It's not just bathroom handwashing. It's not cleaning their work surfaces, and not paying attention to how long foods have been sitting out, which foods need to be refrigerated, and how hot food needs to get in order to kill germs. Restaurant workers don't know, and don't care. Luckily, they were willing to complete surveys that confirmed it.

Even after four hours of training, the food service workers participating in the survey still didn't follow proper procedures for kitchen hygeine, but they stopped citing ignorance and started blaming the managers for not monitoring them. I guess they think that if they're sloppy enough, they'll get their own Food Network TV Show.

Vampire Clothing

2009-01-24T07:43:00.001-06:00

Yarn that feeds on blood. That's certainly something the world needs more of. Luckily, the University of Michigan has invented bloody yarn that conducts electricity.

It's supposed to be exciting because it's (partly) an advance in nanotechnology. The yarn is coated in carbon nanotubes by soaking it in a special solution, and the nanotubes conduct electricity. By adding anti-albumin to the solution, the yarn conducts even more electricity when it comes into contact with blood.

Personally, I think this sounds about as useful as that clothing that changes color when your body temperature changes. The researchers have high hopes, though. They think that the clothes can be tied into a device like a cellphone or PDA so that when people start bleeding, the device calls for help (electronically, by calling an emergency service, not, like, by screaming loudly). We'll just have to wait and see how they do with that.

Is Your Pig Farm Too Gassy?

2009-01-23T07:00:00.002-06:00

No, that's not a euphemism.

Do you know what happens in pig finishing barns? I'm pretty sure you don't want to know. And I like bacon too much to ever find out. Still, I guess that they're pretty stinky places.

A lot of time and effort has gone into researching the methane and carbon dioxide (read: pig stink) given off by these finishing barns, and the best ways to reduce them (no, raising fewer pigs was not an option). It turns out that sprinkling vegetable oil actually helps reduce the omissions, while essential oil misting and misting of essential oil with water do jack squat--no surprise, given how "essential oils" seems like just a phrase used to bump up the cost of shampoo and skin lotion.

The research is all thanks to a study by those unsung heroes of the academic community: soil scientists.

Thank god for soil scientists. I mean, they're the ones who first realized that the robot uprising may be led by plants. I think we can all agree that we need more of them.

I Can't Believe It's Not Bone Marrow!

2009-01-22T07:00:00.001-06:00

Well, actually it is bone marrow. It's just bone marrow that's created artifically, and not meant to be implanted into the human body. Still, it cranks out red and white blood cells just like the real thing, and that's Kind Of A Big Deal.

If, like me, you're wondering why anyone should bother making bone marrow if they're not going to put it into people, the University of Michigan has some ideas. Hell, that's why they created it in the first place. This artificial marrow is supposed to allow new ways to test drugs in development, allow for closer study of problems with the immune system, and most importantly (to me) generate a supply of blood for transfusions. If it means that I won't have people begging me to give blood anymore, I'm all for it!

What impresses me is the amount of work that went into it. They had to design a tiny 3-D scaffold to develop the material. Because of the conditions inside the human body, they were very particular about where the openings were for the cells and how large they were so that the cells interacted properly. I suck at sculpture, and can't even put together furniture from IKEA, so it's not something I would have been able to do.

How to Dismantle an Atomic Bully

2009-01-21T07:00:00.000-06:00

Even though college students are more likely to be criminals, it turns out that they're less likely to be bullies. College students are above the whole stuffed-in-a-locker, head-in-the-toilet type of physical bullying shenanigans, according to Kansas State University. However, they're breaking new ground in the field of cyberbullying.

The study has an interesting note on the motives of bullies. They think that grade school bullying is done for fun, or out of boredom, while college-level bullying is done out of jealousy. It makes sense when paired with the rise of cyberbullying. Some of those college gossip sites can get really catty.

The best part of the study is that it calls out one particular college gossip website as a major source of bullying. Is that a good idea? It's kind of up there with making the schematics for building a nuclear device widely available in terms of keeping your mouth shut about potentially harmful information.

Inauguration Day

2009-01-20T07:00:00.001-06:00

Yeah, so, new President, huh? That's a pretty big deal.

Big enough that I'm not really sure what to say about it.

I mean, I don't think that my usual reports of health, science, or technology happenings are really appropriate. And I'm not going anywhere near that controversy about who should lead the nation in prayer (I will go on record as saying that bigotry is Not Cool). So I'm kind of at a loss for words.

Still. New president. Wow.

When is Earth not an Earth?

2009-01-19T14:31:00.000-06:00

When it's a super-Earth. Don't get me wrong, the planet we live on is pretty super, but Ohio State University thinks that it's not the only type of planet that could support life.

I'm not sure if it's "thinking outside the box" or wishful thinking. Assume that there's other life out there in the galaxy. Most of the sci-fi I've read assumes that life is only going to develop on planets similar to earth. Now, a few scientists are moving in a different direction.

They think that if a planet has a liquid ocean, it can support life, so they came up with the name "super-Earth" to describe planets that could support life. This new super-Earth description can be applied to a number of larger, colder planets that are much more common than planets like ours. Super-Earths might even be present in about one-third of all solar systems. So we might actually find life out there after all.

Or it might find us first.

Illness

2009-01-11T22:27:00.001-06:00

Ugh. I think I ended up with that illness/bug/virus that has been going around. I don't have a new post for today. Sorry.

Cheer Up, You'll Be Incapacitated

2009-01-10T22:00:00.002-06:00

And that will be good for your marriage. Brigham Young University now has research showing that when someone can't do normal daily activities, they end up being happier in their marriage. The people they were married to? Eh, it's a mixed bag.

Men and women end up happier in their marriages if they become disabled. Men with disabled wives become happier in their marriage, while women with disabled husbands don't care very much (about the disability, that is. They generally weren't more or less happy with the marriage than they were before the disability).

I guess they're happier because they're forced to spend more time with each other getting through the chores of the day. That has to be the reason, right? After all, it's not like people answering questionnaires would lie because they felt guilty about resentment for being burdened with the care of a spouse, right?

I just hope my son doesn't see this study and try to cripple me with a sledgehammer so he can bring mommy and daddy back together.

Bloggers of Interest: Beyond Don's Left Field

2009-01-09T17:00:00.005-06:00

For the second blog in my Bloggers of Interest series, I chose to interview Don, the man behind Beyond Left Field.

Don has quite an impressive biography, and at his blog he writes about 60-year-old paperboys, some rules for funerals, and places to use K-Y jelly. But he can tell you more about his blog in his own words...

What got you into blogging?

I began blogging just six months ago, because I wanted to do something where I could curse and not get yelled at too much... Actually, I wanted to share some of the funnier things that I've seen, or experienced, or both.

How did you choose your blog's name?
When I first set out to write a blog, I figured that I could really relate to morons and idiots well. However, the bulk of my subjects were going to be others that I could point a finger towards and exclaim, "Yeah, you moron! What were you thinking, you idiot?" Then I realized that question would be best answered if asked of me. So, here I am. Answering the question on everyone's mind--"What were you thinking?"

Does it have anything to do with liberal or left-leaning politics?
My blog's name is simply derived from the expression that describes a strange or clueless thought or idea or some really odd behavior such as, "Where did that idea come from? Left field?!" Then I thought I wanted to get way out there with some of my stories as far as the "funny" goes. Hence, the "beyond" was added.

Do you track the search terms that people use to find your blog? What's the weirdest?
I don't track the search terms that people have used to find me, although some of us at Humorbloggers have compared ours with one another's for fun. I still get a lot of queries into "doggy butt skids" and "Mexican hot wax baths." Go figure...

I'd imagine that your "incredible life and history" pulls in some people looking for rapist Viking pimps that they can buy slaves from.
Actually, my profile doesn't garner much in the way of search words, and initially I thought that may be a good use of the profile--a hook and catch so to speak.

Do you believe in reincarnation?
No. I believe in not dying though, if that counts. I was thinking of Shirley McLaine when I took that reincarnation route with my profile... she was nuts! Although Popeye and John Dillinger were definitely "special."

You've got quite an awards cabinet. Which award are you proudest of?
Ahhh, those well deserved, ugh....I mean hard earned--no wait! My awards are really cool to get. It's nice to be recognized and thought of in a positive way by so many fellow bloggers. Especially the humor bloggers. The one that I'm most proud of is the Zuchinni Award bestowed upon me by no other than Da Old Man at Crotchey-Old-Man-Yells-At-Cars

. That one is not passed around so there are not too many of us that have earned the right to "own" one. It's for a captioning contest that I won which is amazing because I truly suck at those. I just got lucky that one day though and voila!

Tell me about the Humor Bloggers Blog Roll.
The Humorbloggers genesis goes back to only August '08. I joined 5 days after it went online. Chelle B. from The Offended Blogger is the site owner and masseuse. Really, our only goal besides from spreading it on thick is total world domination. So far, it's going well! However, since most bloggers aren't as funny as we are... ahem, then we proudly share the interwebs with blogs of all types!

Do you think that there's a place for "serious" blogs in the blogosphere, and if so, what topics do you think that serious blogs could cover well?
Serious blogging can be of great use, and there are already millions of serious blogs out there. I believe that they can actually perform a service to the average person. For example, the news media is to general, too slanted, too brief (due to time constraints) and too damn ill informed! That's where some heavy duty blogging can come in and step up to the plate. It already has in many ways.

Speaking of serious subjects, Is there any truth to the allegations that you were personally involved in Mississippi having the highest teen birth rate in the United States?
No. I quit drinking a couple of years ago for the most part... but I'm glad to see that Mississippi is still forging ahead with its failing policies. It warms the heart to know that our state legislature is as least as good as that of the fed's.

Where do you see yourself (and your blog) in 3 years?
I see myself still plugging away at this blog in a few short years. It's really growing at an impressive rate so far, and I will try to maintain that growth and even "shoot" for far more. I may possibly introduce a new blog in the future, but I'm still undecided. Right now, one is enough! Blogging is just something that has almost turned into an obsession at this point.

So, no worries about running out of material,then?
The future should be interesting, and I'm looking forward to it for sure. People (including myself) will never cease doing crazy things, and I intend to cover as much as possible!!!

It just got a little less fun to be a teenager.

2009-01-09T07:00:00.000-06:00

Thanks, University of Utah. It figures that the state that hates chocolate would come up with a device that keeps you from talking on your cell phone in the car.

That's right, researchers there have developed a new ignition key that interferes with cell phones. It's supposed to keep teenagers driving safely by not talking on their cell phones or sending text messages.

"But wait," I hear you asking, "What if there's been a bad accident, and the driver needs to call for help?" Well, they appear to have prepared for that by making the device activate when you take the key out (going into "driving mode") and having it stop messing with your cell phone when you put the key away (it sounds like it's one of those flippy things like on the fancy Volkswagen key fobs. You know, the ones where the metal part of the key flips out like a switchblade?).

It looks like you're still boned if you get into an accident and the key gets stuck in the ignition, though. In that case, you'd better pray that someone else sees you and goes to get help.

This is all well and good, but I wish they'd gone in a different direction. I'd do unspeakable things to get my hands on a device that could block the cell phones in other cars. Oh, what I wouldn't give to be able to stop those reckless jerks who almost get me killed while they yak on their cell phone...

Are Potatoes the New Brain Food?

2009-01-08T07:00:00.001-06:00

They may not make you smart, but they will keep you from getting stupid... er. Your cognitive skills like attention, long- and short-term memory, spatial memory, and visual attention will all take a hit if you eliminate carbohydrates from your diet. That means that the bag of potato chips I ate this afternoon was brain food. The french toast I like to have on weekends? Absolutely vital for my spatial memory. (The gallons of syrup? Not so much.)

I'm not making it up. A Tufts University study tracked volunteers on low carbohydrate diets, and a separate set of subjects on balanced, low-calorie diets. The low carbohydrate test subjects did worse on memory-based tests. Luckily, it's not a permanent effect, and they returned back to normal as soon as carbohydrates were reintroduced.

The study only involved 19 test subjects, so it's not as though there's a massive body of data available. Still, I'm going to load up on twinkies, mashed potatoes, liquor and pie so that I'm ahead of the curve. I've got to keep my edge, after all!

Slap Wraps as an Evolutionary Imperative

2009-01-07T07:00:00.001-06:00

See also: acid-wash jeans, beanie babies, and those goddamn Wii Fits that are cropping up everywhere I look. They're all fads, but now Science offers the reason behind our societal obsession (and later abandonment) of the Latest Big Thing: we evolved that way.

The idea is that 1) We see something (a corporate logo). 2) We start to unconsciously associate that something with a "reward" (the product), but we see it infreqently and assume it is scarce. 3) That's when we work to actively acquire it and make it part of our lives. 4) The logo & product are suddenly everywhere, because everybody has one 4) and our unconscious mind decides that this product isn't worth working for, since it can be found so easily all over the place and decide that it must be worthless (Oh, how I wish my subconscious would skip to the part where it decides that a Wii is worthless!). And that, boys and girls, is the life cycle of a fad.

That's all well and good, but after announcing this theory, those maniacs at Rensselaer decide that marketers should use this information to find new ways of pushing things on us subconsciously. That's like announcing that bears should look into getting stainless steel claws. People, they have enough of an advantage already.

Then again, you shouldn't be suprised at the professor who recommended this. It's the same guy who wants to harvest your eyes for robots.

Man was TOTALLY meant to play god.

2009-01-06T07:00:00.001-06:00

Especially if he's a man from Belgium. Men from Ireland, not so much. And by "play god," I mean work with nanotechnology.

Wait, what? Yeah, apparently if you're trying to work with objects on an atomic level, you're playing god (which isn't that outrageous of a claim, I mean, c'mon, you're messing with the fabric of the universe itself). Like most other worthwhile and entertaining activities, you have to ask yourself, just because you CAN do it, does that mean that you SHOULD do it?

According to the University of Wisconsin-Madison, religious individuals do not believe that nanotechnology is morally acceptable. They studied the number of people that agreed or disagreed with the statement "nanotechnology is morally acceptable" and cross referenced it with the general level of religous belief in that country. In their fun and exciting graph:

they show that on average, as people identify themselves as less religious, they are more willing to find nanotechnology morally acceptable.

Are you right along that dashed red line (i.e., ultrareligious and nanotech-opposed, or atheistic and pro microbots)? Or are you an exception?

Apples, Pears, Livers, and Fat

2009-01-05T07:00:00.001-06:00

Had you heard about apple fat vs. pear fat? I first learned about it when I was leafing through a Cosmo a few years ago (What? Don't look at me like that. It was for valid research purposes). It was a very helpful article, with silhouettes superimposed over fruits and everything. It made me a better person.

Anyway, the idea was that people with big round apple-shaped beer guts are headed for trouble with all kinds of heart problems, while the people with big behinds and thick legs (making them look kind of pear-shaped) have less to worry about. It's not what fat you're carrying, it's where you carry it, was the idea. It turns out that the article was wrong. Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis says that the best way to tell if you are headed for trouble with insulin resistance, cholestoral problems, and the fast track to diabetes and heart disease is to check for excess fat in the liver ("nonalcoholic fatty liver disease").

So now it turns out I've got to worry about whether or not I have a chubby liver. I thought fretting about love handles was bad enough. I mean, what exercises can you do to tone up a liver?

Kick Unhappy Friends to the Curb

2009-01-04T15:56:00.000-06:00

Also, the people at the center of social networks are happier.

UC San Diego and Harvard Medical School are publishing research in the British Medical Journal discussing happiness spreading through social networks. No, they're not involving sites like myspace, linkedin, or facebook because they're analyzing data collected from 1983 to 2003. Still, they tracked almost 5,000 people and their moods, determining that happy people keep happy friends, and an increased number of social contacts was associated with happier people.

Mind you, this is all self-reporting using statements like "I feel hopeful about the future" and "I felt that I was just as good as other people," so it's kind of cute that they're appling percentages to the amount of happiness that's being spread around, but I guess that's how science works.

The good news? Happiness is supposed to spread. The study cites a 15% increase in happiness if directly connected to a happy person, a 10% increase if connected to the friend of a happy person, and 6% if it's one step further out than that.

The bad news is that while having a happy friend gives you a 9% greater chance of being happy yourself, having an unhappy friend makes you 7% less likely to be happy.

So, what does this study mean for you? Is it important for you to keep up a good front, to seem happy so you keep your friends happy? Or is it time to trim the dead wood and get rid of unhappy friends who are dragging you down, while you go out to look for some happier people?

Making Night Shifts Suck More to Suck Less

2009-01-03T08:56:00.003-06:00

I can't imagine what a pain in the ass it must be to make a living working the night shift. I had a friend who worked nights at the post office, unloading and sorting all the mail that came in on the trucks through the night, and he hated it. He said that even on his days off, he still couldn't feel like a normal person, because everyone he knew was operating on a completely different schedule.

So, Rush University Medical Center looked into night shift workers. They're trying to make sure that night shift employees are efficient. I guess that they're workin' for the Man, trying to squeeze every last drop of productivity out of the workers, but whatever.

The medical center is now claiming that people can offset some of the difficulties of adapting to night shift work, as long as you are strict about monitoring when you sleep and make sure to wear wicked dark sunglasses when outside in the daytime. It sounds like a hassle, but I guess that the trade off is that you're less likely to hate your job as much. Or, you still hate it as much but manage to work more efficiently.

The good news is that they're calling it a "compromise" adaptation, in that people aren't sleeping entirely through the daytime, they're just reducing the hours that they spend awake during the day. It still sounds like it kind of sucks, though. How high would the pay have to be before you considered a night shift job?

Bloggers of Interest: Cromely and his World

2009-01-02T13:00:00.000-06:00

I wanted to learn more about some of the people behind some of my favorite blogs, so I'm starting a series I call "Bloggers of Interest." Cromely of Cromely's World was kind enough to get the ball rolling by answering a few of my questions.

He's from Seattle and works in the tech industry. His blog has book reviews, Seattle politics, technology, business travel, TV, Star Trek, and the current state of of the world. It's a random collection of thoughts, rants, raves, and trivia, which is what makes it so much fun to read.

Does it really rain all that much in Seattle?

Yes and no. You could say we have two seasons—wet and not quite so wet but still pretty darn moist. Basically it's overcast for about 8 months out of the year and in a seemingly perpetual drizzle. So it's gray. A lot. You don't get all that green in the hills without an awful lot of gray. If you can handle the gray, Seattle is a great place.

Despite the gray, it's still a very outdoorsy kind of town. Not that I'm a particularly outdoorsy kind of person, but it's nice to have options. Generally, June through September is simply fantastic.

So, to answer the question: Sorta.

What about Seattle’s other two stereotypes, coffee shops and tech companies?

The gray makes Seattle ideal for writing and for the coffee renaissance of the past 15 years. Cool, drizzly weather makes people want warm beverages—which also explains the prevalence of Pho shops. Also, the coffee shop has always been a center of literary evolution throughout history (that spills over nicely into the blogging world, where the literary and the technological collide).

In any given (independent) coffee shop, after the morning rush, easily 70% of people will be using laptops to do whatever it is they are doing. In those 4 months of the year when the sun comes out—they're sill in there. But if they do come out, it's absolutely gorgeous.

I'm not sure why both Seattle and the San Jose area spawn so many tech companies. Aside from that they appear to have very little in common.

What got you into blogging?

About three years ago, I realized I hadn't written anything that wasn’t work related in more than 5 years. I decided that it wasn't healthy, and worried that I might be getting dumber about the world because those muscles weren't getting used.

Around that time, my friend Jon started his blog and I found myself leaving long comments there. After I spent half an hour commenting on the musical stylings of Weird Al, I knew I needed to get my own blog.

Weird Al is pretty awesome. It’s only through superhuman effort that I am able to restrain myself from writing a detailed literary analysis of his song, “Stuck in a Closet with Vanna White.” So what gets you excited? Are there some things you can't wait to write about?

A good William Shatner story will always get a fairly good writeup. Shatner-Palooza was one of my early themes. I'll comment on the stupid things I do if I think they might be entertaining. Unusual travel stories are also good, but I try to avoid the airline commentary that stand up comedians beat into the ground in early nineties (We’re looking at YOU, Jerry Seinfeld! -S!). I also rant about stupid or offensive things the government does, if no one else it ranting about them.

I try not be a “me too” blogger. There is so much other stuff to talk about. If I do talk about something that everyone else is talking about, I try to find an aspect of it that doesn't get nearly enough attention.

Other topics I get excited about include document management (getting rid of paper) technology in general, public speaking, the power of reading, personal finance and other topics. They don't always fit a post, but those topics become sort of meta-themes for what I do.

What aspects of blogging do you find most fulfilling?

I enjoy releasing my book reviews into the wild. They're lengthy and I know most people never read through them to the end, but I write them for people that are really interested in the books. I also write them so I remember what the book was about. It's easy to forget the details of even an awesome book two years down the road. The process of writing the reviews makes the books stick in my memory because of the effort involved, and it gives me something I can go back and review in the future.

I also enjoy the posts where I "write" instead of just post. I do the occasional piece where I focus on the creative writing side of it and really try to put the reader inside of it. Time and energy constraints don’t let me do that often, so when I can do it, I get a nice sense of accomplishment.

Is there anything you won’t blog about?

I don't write about anything I wouldn't want my mother to know. After all, she's one of my regular readers. About two years ago she even started her own blog.

I also won't write about my employer, my industry, or items relating directly to my job. I will write about my business trips and generic corporate things on occasion—it’s not that my whole work life is off limits—but not about my company.

Was it your choice to avoid job-specific subjects, or does your company have rules about blogging?

My employer doesn't have an employee bloging policy (that I know of), and I prefer not to be the reason they create one. Plus, I spend enough time writing about work during the work day. Cromely's World is my alternative to that.

On a related note, I don't blog under my IRL name. It's not really about guaranteeing anonymity, because there is really no such thing when someone can look up my real name with a bit of work. Rather, it's about discretion. It's about building a separate blogging world. It's about not associating my blog with my employer in the minds of my employer’s customers.

At this point, Cromely is almost a brand in its own right. It raises the interesting question of how I introduce myself when I actually meet bloggers or tweeters in meat space.

Credit card arbitrage is an unusual subject to tackle. What gave you the idea of writing about it?

I made several thousand dollars doing it for relatively little labor, and wanted to share the process. I've been a long time member of the Motley Fool and used to hang out on the credit card forums quite a bit. I lurked mainly, but posted when I had something to contribute. It was a helpful tool while I was getting my own financial life straightened away.

As I started to think about the topic, I realized it was more than one post. So I split it up into multiple posts that I could just publish during the Consumer Electronics Show (CES). I work at CES and have no energy by the time I get back to my hotel room. I wrote the arbitrage series several weeks before, spent just about 5 minutes on my blog each day during the show, and still provided (what I hope is) high quality, useful content. CES also gave birth to Star Trek Book Review Week last January, and Star Trek Book Review Week Part II this January.

Are we the only two people who think that the Lincoln MKS ads connecting their cars with space disasters were completely insane?

There are a few others, but sadly, most people don't even know the song anymore. And most people don't stop to think about these things. This is not a new phenomenon, though.

I remember hearing a story in the 80s about how one New Jersey town wanted to pay tribute to their town and Bruce Springsteen by naming "Born To Run" as their official song. They almost got to a vote before someone read the lyrics and realized it was about how they had to get out of the town because it was deathtrap.

In a similar vein, and awful lot of people think "Born in the USA" is a patriotic song, when really it's about how the Viet Nam–era military was filled with people whose alternative was jail, and when they came back from war their life sucked. Yet people still see it as a rally around the flag song.

I don't usually talk this much about Springsteen. I'm more of a Billy Joel fan.

Fun fact: Allentown, Pennsylvania bears very little resemblance to the town described in Billy Joel’s song. In fact, the tales of woe and steel mill closings are much more applicable to Allentown’s neighbor, Bethlehem.

What do you think the Blogosphere needs more of?

I suppose it could use more RSS conent and fewer blogrolls. The great thing about blogs is the ability to always have fresh content, and I'm not sure that static blogrolls are the best way to do that. Blogger’s Following tool is interesting and helps promote this shift. I've been using Feed Digest to accomplish the same thing in my side bar. Alan just launched an entire blog of RSS feeds.

What I find really interesting is that blogs were not originally designed to be a writing/publishing platform. They were intended to make it easy to highlight cool things on the web and provide brief commentary. The format evolved away from that.

Go back even further to the early nineties, and you encounter the early homepages on the web. When people first started creating homepages, it was more to organize daily links. Your home page would be where you started your web journey that day by clicking on your favorites. Eventually, home pages turned into individual platforms for self expression. Suddenly, they were intended to be seen by the general public and not just the creator. At the same time, the web portals (Excite, Yahoo!, etc.) started filling the traditional homepage role of organizing customer content, and they took over the Home button in the browser. Google broke that trend with its simplified search page.

What could it do without?

Fewer blogs about blogging. The meta level is interesting, but most of those blogs bring nothing new to the table. They post the same tips and slap a bunch of ads on them. The “Make Money Blog” genre has been done to death.

Blogs about blogs can be useful when they are specific. Some are specific to the Blogger platform, or specific to Wordpress hacks. Those kinds of things get beyond the basics and beyond the cliched hype you see a lot of places.

I guess my point is that even in an overexposed content area there is still room for a niche, but the author needs to be passionate about that niche.

The blogosphere could do without some pretension. I'm not sure that's what I mean here, but when I hear someone in real life say, "I'm a Blogger," I can't help but roll my eyes. Somehow it strikes me as too self-important. Maybe it's the self identification rather than saying, "I blog." I feel the same way when someone tells me they're an artist. If they tell me they're a painter or a sculptor or that they dance, or paint, or sculpt, it doesn't bother me. But claiming a label like Artist or Blogger just puts me off. (I realize I'm describing this reaction very poorly.)

The blogospere needs greater social acceptance in the non-blogging world, but that’s less likely to happen the more it seeks self acceptance. It's almost like the blogospere is a little yippy dog jumping up and down around the knees of journalists, writers and the non-tech world, saying, "See, I'm jsut like you! I'm cool! I'm cool!" The rest of the world scratches it behind the ears, smiles, and says, "Sure you are."

I'm not sure how to address that, but I do think that the harder you argue for legitimacy, they less likely you are to achieve it.

Where do you see yourself (and your blog) in 3 years?

I have very little idea. Most of my projects are on a six month time frame. At work that means involving more Web 2.0 technologies in what we do. IRL, it means interacting with more people who blog and Tweet in the Seattle area.

For my blog, I don't see a lot of change coming. I might transition over to Wordpress to take advantage of threaded comments. Right now, I think that's the only thing I'd like to do that I can't do with Blogger. It might be nice to transition to a three column template, but that's all little stuff.

My traffic is growing slowly, and of course I'd like to see it higher. But aside from the Powells affiliate program (through which I've made $0) I doubt I'll monetize. It just doesn't seem worth it given the time required and the results people see. Besides, I didn't get into this for money. It's about the writing.

Anthropologists Check Out Ladybutts

2009-01-02T07:00:00.002-06:00

At least, that's how they do it in Utah. Seriously. do you spend a lot of time worrying about a lady's waist-to-hip ratio? Because anthropologists in Utah do. But they're a little hung up on reality versus fantasy.

First, they state that men prefer a hip-to-waist ratio of 0.7 when selecting a mate (which "makes perfect sense, according to evolutionary psychologists"). Then they note that the average waist-to-hip ratio for women is higher than 0.8. Dedicated couch potato that I am, this is the part where I'd say "Men want what they can't have, end of story."

But the anthropologists at the University of Utah wouldn't let it rest there. Instead, they've released this study declaring that the larger-than-desired ratios are actually desired in some parts of the world. According to them, narrow waists and wide hips show a predominance of estrogen, making for more dependent women who need to be provided for. Wider waists are associated with an increased level of androgens, meaning that the women are more assertive, dominant, and willing to take initiative. Then they go on to say that in cultures that value submissive women (like Greece, Japan, and Portugal), men prefer their women to have narrow waists (and so they try to make themselves that way), but some cultures value women who can fend for themselves and their women are correspondingly wide of waist.

Honestly, does anyone really work that way? I mean, aside from sitcoms where the guy's mother makes some crack about his girlfriend's "child-bearing hips," are there people out there who are evaluating the waist-to-hip ratio of women and basing their decision to get involved in a relationship with them solely on that information?

In completely unrelated news, check back this afternoon! I'm rolling out an entirely new series for this site, and I'm very excited about it. The first installment goes up later today.

Proof that Phoning and Driving Will Kill You

2009-01-01T07:00:00.001-06:00

Look, I think that talking on a cell phone while driving will not only kill you, it will kill other drivers around you as well. And I'm not talking the slow death-by-cancerous-tumor business that has people scared enough to use those devices where they clip the phones to their belts and talk into headsets designed to look ridiculous. I'm talking the fast, violent death that results from car crashes.

And science has proven me right. Talking on a cell phone while driving is more dangerous than talking with a passenger because the passenger can see what's happening around the car and will adjust the pace of the conversation so as not to distract the driver during intense situations. Inconsiderate jerks on the other end of the cell phone won't stop yapping no matter how many times the driver has to change lanes while boxed in by a sixteen wheeler.

If you're a hitman trying to off someone, consider a cell phone. Call them when they're driving. Ask them how their day went. Keep them talking, and ignore any traffic conditions your target might be dealing with. They'll get into an accident eventually. Trust me.

When Is Intolerance a Good Thing?

2008-12-31T07:00:00.003-06:00

According to health experts, having a high alcohol tolerance is a bad sign. I disagree. As we should be tolerant of others who may have different religious, social, or romantic values, we should also be tolerant of alcohol and all of the friendly pranks it can play on our minds, hearts, and livers.

Like most forms of tolerance, alcohol tolerance is easiest to teach to the young. Studies show that binge drinking at an early age can lead to increased alcohol tolerance later on in life. What better way to prepare your children for the rigors of college life than by giving them a celebratory six pack every time they bring home a good report card?

Okay, I'm just kidding (to a point). Binge drinking children aren't cool. But I also think that there's an unnecessary hate out there for having a high alcohol tolerance. Alcohol is our misunderstood friend. Remember, Science has proven that it's better to keep drinking than to stop.

Keep that in mind when you're out having fun tonight. Happy New Year!

How a (partly) blind brain sees

2008-12-30T07:00:00.002-06:00

Our knack for improvisation and workarounds is more than just a way we cope with external problems. It's practiced by our very cells themselves.

It turns out that our brains can reorganize themselves to compensate for loss of eyesight due to macular degeneration. Macular degeneration, the leading cause of blindness in the elderly, is a disease that results in damaged retinas and a loss of vision. Because the vision loss occurs in the center of the visual field, the brain makes up for it by using other parts of the visual field to focus.

What does that mean in English? If your brain can't see what's right in front of you, it compensates by getting information from your peripheral vision (or other areas that your eye can focus on) to fill in the blanks. Kind of cool, really.

Biological Clocks In Reverse

2008-12-29T07:00:00.001-06:00

The candle that burns twice as bright lasts half as long, and until recently it was thought that that the fly that produces twice as many offspring lives half as long. Thank goodness, then, for the USC biologists who found a way to express genes for fruitflies to have more children and expand their lifespan by 5 to 30 percent. I'm sure this is welcome news to all the career-minded fruitflies out there who were worried about their biological clocks.

Of course, the USC researchers are cagey, stating that "the implications for mamals are not clear." I'll tell you what I'd like them to clarify: whether I can live longer by doin' it more often. Oh, sure, there are alread quacks out there making just that claim, but I'd like to have some hard scientific evidence before I commit. (Hee hee, "hard"! Wait, I mean "That's what she said!")

So, in five or ten years, we may have some useful information about human reproduction and genes that can reduce aging. In the meantime, we're stuck with a lot more flies that will be hanging around a lot longer. Way to go!

Better than Re-Gifting

2008-12-28T16:28:00.001-06:00

Ugh. I thought that I was totally boned. I'm meeting my friend Dave (not you, Dave K, this is some other Dave that you don't know) after work tomorrow night, and he mentioned that he was bringing my Christmas present.

I'll let you in on a little secret. I don't really like Dave, and I certainly don't need the hassle of rushing out and buying yet another gift, especially now that I thought all of my holiday shopping was FINALLY done. Dave's not the kind of guy I want to spend a lot of money on, either.

Usually I'd re-gift in this situation, but I actually like the gifts I got this year. Some problem, right? K-mart's got my back, though. There's a special going on now for last minute gifts from Kmart (although honestly, I'm not sure if I can say "last minute" in good conscience, since it's more like "post-Christmas").

They've got 25,000 gifts that are less than $25, which is about my price range for Dave. (They're also still running their layaway program, but I'm working on a very limited timetable, here.) They've got a craftsman toolbox that looks about right for Dave, and I can probably pick one up at Kmart on my lunch hour (real men don't wrap gifts, so I'm all set there).

I wish I was the kind of person who bought next year's Christmas presents in advance, because some of the other stuff they have would come in handy next December. If my son was a little older, I'd get him this toy chainsaw gift set because it's both totally cheap and totally awesome. You can never start them too young!

Plastics Are Just Straight Crazy

2008-12-28T07:00:00.002-06:00

So the University of Wisconsin-Madison has issued a press release about plastics that isn't saying much. It's saying a lot of stuff I already knew--rah rah, plastics are great, plastics are in everything, plastics have some weird properties--but nothing outrageous.

Unlike glass, which is weird for completely different reasons, plastics still maintain the ability to "flow" and rearrange their structure, which makes them so versatile. Unlike regular, crystalline structures, the molecular components of plastic are just kind of jumbled around depending on how the plastic cooled and solidified. This means that they can be rearranged without destroying the plastic completely, and that makes them handy in applications where more rigid materials would be destroyed.

Besides the plastic, there was some other weird stuff in the press release. Did you know that Boeing's new plane, the 787, is going to be 50% polymer (plastic) materials? For comparison, the Boeing 777 is only 10% polymer. There's also a line about how "anyonee who has ever dropped a plastic container from the freezer" knows that low temperatures can make polmers brittle.

I'm clumsy. I've dropped plastic containers, and containers taken from the freezer, and even plastic containers taken from the freezer hundreds of times. I wouldn't say that they were particularly brittle. Am I the only one who didn't notice this?

Single Moms: Don't Judge 'Em.

2008-12-27T07:00:00.000-06:00

It's not like they're bad parents, according to the University of Maryland. Okay, let me rephrase that. It's not like they're not trying as hard as married parents. I'll explain in a minute.

It turns out that single mothers spend 83%-90% as much time caring for their children as married mothers. It's understandable that they have less time to spend with their children, but researchers were surprised to see that single mothers came so close to matching the amount of childcare time that married mothers provide. True, the constraints of their jobs can dictate how much time they will have available for their children, but some single mothers appear to be able to rely on support networks outside of traditional marriage to help them balance their work and their families.

The whole "bad parents" thing? Well, let's just say that time spent with your children doesn't automatically make you a good parent. There are plenty of bad parents--both single and unmarried--who spend lots of time with their kids. They still do a crappy job.

You Can Finally Rest Easy

2008-12-26T07:00:00.002-06:00

Back in 1936, unfettered by the demands on his time that would have been posed by cable television, internet pornography, and the XBox, Sir James Gray had nothing better to think about than dolphins. He wondered how they were able to swim at speeds upwards of 20 mph (no, I refuse to convert that into kilometers, you Europeans are on your own), given their muscle mass.

It sounds cute, but honestly, I'm not sure why anyone cared. They already had that staple of faux-science small talk, the old saw about how a bumblebee is aerodynamically impossible, and should not be able to fly, but I guess that everyone's looking for a new gem of useless trivia that they can trot out when they need something to talk about but want to sound smart.

So the dolphins, right. Rensselaer Polytechnic actually started studying the whole dolphin business. I'm not sure why they needed to; it has already been proven that dolphins can swim fast, why do we need to study whether or not it should be possible for them to swim fast? I guess that's why I'm not a scientist.

Now, more than 70 years later, "Gray's Paradox" has been solved. "The short answer," said the professor who led the project, "is that dolphins are simply much stronger than Gray or many other people ever imagined.”

Well, I never. What are the odds of that?

Are You Going to Church Today?

2008-12-25T07:00:00.001-06:00

I hope so. Not because of the whole "observing the birth of Christ" thing, either. I hope you go because it will make you 20% less likely to die.

Researchers, who had to roll up their sleeves and grit their teeth to Do What Must Be Done for Science, studied 92,395 post-menopausal women. In their studies, they found that women who regularly attented religious services could cut their "risk of mortality" by up to 20%. I like those odds. I'm one of those people who goes to church on holidays anyway, but with news like this, I might want to go more often!

Wait, let me think about that. No, it doesn't seem like you get some kind of "frequent attendance" bonus that reduces your risk of death even further, and I am pretty lazy. I also like sleeping in on Sundays. Maybe I'll keep my churchgoing habits unchanged.

Anyway, Merry Christmas*, everyone! (I know I said it yesterday, but I'm saying it again today. I'm positively overcome with holiday spirit!)

*No, I'm not being insensitive to those observing other holidays. In this case, I am someone who celebrates Christmas, using the traditional phrase of my religion for recognizing the holiday. I am also ~~still a little drunk~~ giddy with the tidings of the season.

Yeah, Right, Like I've Got Something to Say

2008-12-24T07:00:00.000-06:00

Friends, acquaintances, faithful blog readers and e-entrepreneurs who swing by this blog just long enough to leave an Entrecard, I'd like to thank you all. It's been a great couple of months, I've had a fun time writing this blog, and I wouldn't have had the motivation to keep at it without each and every one of you.

Of course, I'm also crazy busy getting everything ready for Christmas (Yes, it's tomorrow, yes, I should have started earlier, yes, I'm kind of freaking out about it. DON'T YOU JUDGE ME!). Sadly, this means that I can't deliver the kind of hard-hitting, quasi-investigative blather that you've all come to know and love today. I hope you can forgive me for it.

So for those of you celebrating tomorrow, I'd like to wish you a Merry Christmas. Those of you who celebrate other holidays, or observe Christmas on other days, you have fun, too, whenever it's culturally appropriate for you to do so. (Enjoy all the commas in the preceding sentence. They are my Christmas gift to you.) Have fun, be safe, and I'll be back at it tomorrow.

In the meantime, I have a lot of things to take care of before my annual Christmas tradition of getting blind drunk on vodka.

Cheers!

-Stanley!

Dementia and the Internet

2008-12-23T07:00:00.001-06:00

What does FTD (frontotemporal dementia, not the florist) have in common with internet message boards? They both give people extreme difficulty detecting sarcasm.

FTD is the second most common form of dementia, and leaves its victims unable to detect the moods of other people. One in 4,000 people are suffering from FTD and unable to tell when their caregivers are depressed or angry. They're also quite frequently conned into giving away large amounts of money (no, there is no directory of FTD patients. ~~I checked.~~)

Researchers have now developed a test to diagnose FTD, to tell if patients can spot discrepancies between a person's words and the tone of their voice. Basically, they have actors run through a script once playing it "straight," and a second time loading up their words with sarcasm ("I'm ever so glad we're spending millions of dollars to study soil composition.") FTD patients always take the spoken words literally.

"When questioned about the applicability of the test to people from countries not renowned for their appreciation of sarcasm or irony, Hodges said the test could be modified." Are they sure he wasn't being sarcastic?

Vibrating Keeps You Slim (WARNING: May Contain Gratuitous Use of the Word "Bone")

2008-12-22T07:00:00.000-06:00

Oh, the things they do to mice, in those science labs of theirs. Recent studies have shown that exposing mice to "high frequency and low magnitude mechanical signals" (read: vibrations) can keep them from developing fat, and also helps to regulate their bone production. This sounds to me a lot like those old school exercise machines with the belt that would jiggle you around, but I'm sure that this study was done for valid medical reasons and not just because the mice wanted to be members of a very tiny gym.

Somebody with deep pockets had to see some sort of potential in it, because they're handing out a grant for $1.8 million to study the phenomenon further. Okay, you twisted my arm, the "somebody" issuing the grant is the National Institutes of Health.

It does seem like good news, in that this is supposed to be research that will treat diabetes and osteoporosis. More than 60% of Americans are overweight and obese, while approximately 200 million people worldwide are struggling with osteoporosis. Still, if I was going to use loaded words like bone, vibration, and possibly vibrator in a story of my own, I think it would steer clear of fatties and old people. And it probably wouldn't be something that was safe for kids to read.

And yes, I could have put a Beach Boys joke about "good vibrations" in this post, but I chose to take the high road.

Sea Worms and Shattered Faces

2008-12-21T07:00:00.001-06:00

If I lived near a beach, I'd spend most of my time walking along it and looking for crap that I could use as a makeshift glue to hold things in place inside my body. Wouldn't you? I mean, what else is there worth doing at a beach?

Sadly, any breakthroughs I wished to make in the glamorous field of seaborne adhesives look like they've already been made. The University of Utah has been studying Sandcastle worms, which live in intertidal surf (naturally, Utah would be the source of that kind of research, due to its proximity to the oceans). The worms build their homes by gluing together whatever materials are on hand, be they eggshells, beads, sand, etc.

The glue is worth studying because most current glues don't stick to wet surfaces. How often do you think surgeons deal with dry surfaces when they're trying to reconstruct broken bones? Since current glues are useless in the bloody environs of the human body, this new worm glue might help hold small bone fragments in place while they heal (which is necessary because screws and wires aren't great for smaller bone pieces).

It's premature to celebrate, though. The synthetic worm glue that researchers have synthesized only performs 37% as well as commercial superglue. I'd say that some more research is in order.

This article was fun to read for a few reasons, but mostly because of the phrase "shattered faces."

Great Leapers, or Greatest Leapers?

2008-12-20T07:00:00.000-06:00

Dalhousie University (remember them? Famous for their groundbreaking study of psychopaths?) has crowned a new highest jumper of the insect kingdom: the spit bug.

Have you ever seen spitbug nests? Maybe you have and didn't recognize them. It looks like someone hocked a big loogie on a plant (hence the name). Those bubbles? The spitbug blows them out its rear to build a frothy nest.

Anyway, as nasty as they are, they're apparently incredibly high jumpers. They can leap 100 of their own body lengths in a single jump. That's like a person jumping 600 feet.

It's supposed to be a defense mechanism to escape birds. It builds up muscle power and --KAPOW-- jumps away at 13 feet per second. Pretty impressive.

Fat Chicks Gone Wild

2008-12-19T07:00:00.001-06:00

Obese women just can't control themselves. That's what they're claiming at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. According to their studies, obese women have "a more feeble impulse control."

It's back to delay discounting. UAB thinks that obese women aren't able to do it as effectively. I guess you could make an argument that the two are linked. After all, the ability to put off present (food) rewards in favor of long term (health) benefits would explain the weight gain. Still, I love eating, hate exercising, and don't think about the future consequences of my current meals, but I wouldn't say that I have poor impulse control.

Then again, I haven't been subjected to a medical study like UAB's. They determined how effectively the participants could delay their rewards by offering them cash now or more cash later. I would totally participate in medical studies for cash, no matter how quickly they paid me.

Does Church Make You Feel In Control?

2008-12-18T07:00:00.000-06:00

Or does the feeling that you have some control over your life make you more likely to go to church?

The University of Toronto has uncovered a link between religious devotion and the feeling that one has personal control over events in one's life. (Yes, I know that using "one" in that sentence was awkward, but it's tough to convey what they're studying in a simple sentence.)

Do you think you have control over your life? Do you spend much time in church, or observing religious rituals? The UT study expected to find that people who were very involved with religious activities felt as though they had less control. After all, the universe supposed to follow God's plan, right? And who are we to question (or worse yet, influence!) what God does? I think it's fine for people to let the church play an active role in their lives, as long as it's not telling them to do things that are harmful.

The question that it raises for me is which is the cause, and which is the effect. Does going to church help people feel like they are taking more control over the events around them? Or do people go to church because they already think that they can control things in their lives, and they are using prayer to exert that control?

You Could Do It In Your Sleep

2008-12-17T07:00:00.001-06:00

Well, you could learn it while awake, and then sleep to be sure you formed strong memories about it. I'm a fan of sleep. I think it cures a lot of problems. That's why I'm not surprised by the University of Chicago's report that sleep can help you learn.

Of course, the study is also near and dear to my heart because it involved video games. They looked at people playing video games and tested groups that slept in between rounds versus groups that did not. It turns out that the most effective way to learn something is to study, sleep, and then study some more; the test subjects that showed the most improvement were the ones that slept in between rounds.

Sadly, I don't think you can get the same effect from sleeping in class. If it did, my grades would have been much better. Rather, it looks like sleep is a way for your mind to sort and file the information you have learned, so that it can be recalled more effectively later.

Calling All Developers

2008-12-16T23:28:00.002-06:00

Are you handy with coding languages? Do you enjoy showing off? Are you looking for something that will pad your resume, make you attractive to potential employers, and earn the respect of your peers?

You should enter the IDUG contest, and take their XML challenges.

They want to show off what XQuery, XML, and DB2 can do, and they're hoping that the contest will get entrants to put them through their paces. There are actually five different challenges for different skill levels, but you can create entries for all five challenges.

Video Contest: The easiest, and one that awards a prize every month. All you have to do is make a video that references XML, XQuery, or DB2, whether it be in song, interpretive dance, spoken word, or some other method. I've actually got a shot at winning this one, so please don't blow me out of the water.

Gadget Contest: By "gadget," they also mean "widget," but this one asks you to write a gadget that helps perform a useful database task. It's easier than the video challenge because you don't need a camera, but you do have to develop a working code. It also awards a monthly prize.

Query Contest: Have you wanted to learn more about the CIA World Factbook? Here's your chance, even if it starts getting a little over my head. The challenge gives you 24 hours to complete 5 tasks writing five SQL or XQuery queries. It's for higher stakes (read: bigger prizes), but your answer has to be both correct and in a correctly structured XQuery query.

Port an Application Contest: The winner is picked from this one by a panel of judges. I'm hopeless, but you might have a shot. First, you have to choose an application (and I can't read application codes for squat). Then you have to port the application so that it works with XML, XQuery, or DB2.

Develop an Application Contest: Also uses a panel of judges. It's harder than the porting contest because you're starting from scratch, but it might also be easier to build something from the ground up without having to look under the hood of an existing application to see how it works.

By entering the contests, you also accumulate participation points. They're kind of a big deal, since you can become an XML Grand Master. Besides bragging rights, it gets you into a drawing for a Bose Wave Radio II.

So by all means, take a shot at the prizes (if you think you've got the skills). No need to thank me.

Cybernetic Tiger Lillies

2008-12-16T07:00:00.001-06:00

Are they still cyborgs if they're part machine, part plant? I ask because that's going to be the wave of the future, if our discarded nanotechnology ends up in plants. Now we not only have to worry about robot insurrection, but rhododendron ascension as well.

The University of Delaware has proven that plants can absorb nanoparticles into their tissues. With a little work, they found that pumpkin seeds were able to absorb iron oxide nanoparticles. Naturally, it was a soil physicist who did the study.

The alarm they're raising is that if the nanoparticles can get into plants, then other animals that eat those plants will be passing the particles along the food chain. That's not good news, but neither is the thought of these plants getting hold of advanced nanotechnolgy and using it to become superplants. Then we're screwed.

Is your new friend a Psychopath?

2008-12-15T07:00:00.001-06:00

Because psychopaths can smell fear.

Just kidding. It's far more mundane than that; psychopaths just notice women who are sad, lonely, and downtrodden, and remember details about them more easily so that they can target them later. Kind of like lions picking the slowest and weakest of the herd.

Dalhousie University, which is apparently breaking new ground in the exciting field of psychopath studies, has released a new study. First, they singled out the study participants who were psychopaths. Then, they separated the test subject psychopaths from the ones who were running the study (ZING!). Then they showed them a series of pictures of women.

All of the test subjects were told that some of the women from the pictures were happy, some were sad, some had high-paying jobs, and some had low-paying jobs. In addition to the mini-biographies, the subjects were told the names of the women in the photos.

The psychopaths did a better job recalling the details of the unhappy, poor women, and a worse job remembering details for everyone else. Other test subjects weren't as focused on the sad, lonely, victim demographic, and couldn't recall details about them as well.

It raises an interesting question. Why is this professor so interested in psychopaths?

Toothlessness: Nature or Nurture?

2008-12-14T07:00:00.001-06:00

Nearly one-fourth of the children in the United States didn't see the dentist last year. Now, I hate going to the dentist, and I find it tough to care about other people's children (I'm a jerk like that), but according to the University of South Carolina, it's a public health problem.

I guess that they have a point. For one thing, these kids are going to grow up to be toothless adults. And Halitosis ain't pretty.

Still, I learned some things from this study. Did you know that the United States can designate Dental Health Professional Shortage Areas? It's a fact! Of course, I don't see the federal government training any new dentists to improve the situation, but at least they're keeping an eye on it.

Also interesting? Vermont led the nation in children receiving dental care. Actually, by "interesting," I meant to say "boring." Vermont, call me when you decide to start living on the edge. Until then, you have fun with your cheese and your dentists, but don't think for a second that you're hardcore.

Why Your Coworkers Want You Fired

2008-12-13T07:00:00.001-06:00

It's not personal, it's just business. They think that by getting you in trouble, they can distract attention from themselves. They'll throw you under the bus in a heartbeat if it means keeping their own job.

An assistant professor of management at the University of New Hampshire thinks that as the economy gets worse, you'll see more and more of that behavior. I don't know if I'd go so far as to agree with his claim that we're "obsessed with assigning blame," but I've definitely taken the fall for idiot coworkers before (and probably will in the future!). The tough part, as he accurately points out, is when you've been wrongfully accused--working to clear your name just makes you look more guilty.

So, I guess that the moral of the story is that the worse the economy gets, the more important that it is to ~~blame other people~~ watch your ass, and make sure you won't be left holding the bag if things fall apart.