Should math be taught in schools?
Props, yo. (And thanks to Wendy Redal for passing it along….)
Tag Archives: evolution
Four Percenters Unite!: Study says some humans are four percent caveman
Hey, I’m not making this stuff up.
We have met Neanderthals, and they are us – or about 1 to 4 percent of each of us.
That is one implication of a four-year effort to sequence the Neanderthal genome – essentially setting out in order some 3 billion combinations of four key molecules that together represent the Neanderthals’ genetic blueprint. (Full story…)
Interesting. So, if some folks have more Neanderthal slouching around their genome than others, who might these four percenters be? I have theories. Read more
Predicting the 21st Century: Nostraslammy’s ten-year review
Ten years ago, at the turn of the millennium, Nostraslammy took a stab at predicting the 21st Century, with a promise to check back every ten years to see how the prognostications were turning out. Odds are good I won’t be able to do a review every ten years until 2100, but I figure I’m probably good through 2030, at least, barring some unforeseen calamity. And if you’re Nostraslammy, what’s this “unforeseen” thing, anyway?
Let’s see how our 22 articles of foresight are holding up, one at a time.
1: Researchers will develop either a vaccine or a cure for AIDS by 2020. However, it will be expensive enough that the disease will plague the poor long after it has become a non-issue for the rich and middle classes (although this is one case where political leaders might fund free treatment programs). The end of AIDS will trigger a sexual revolution that will compare to or exceed that of the 1960s and 1970s (unless another deadly sexually-transmitted disease evolves, which is certainly a possibility). Read more
Are Americans smart enough to vote?
I recently offended some people, quite unintentionally, with my modest suggestion that perhaps it wasn’t in the best interests of the nation to hand over so much decision-making power to people who aren’t informed about the issues and their own system of government. (Responses ranged from “thoughtful disagreement” to what I believe is referred to as a “galloping hissy fit.”) Honestly, I was a bit shocked by the reaction – when I penned those remarks it hardly occurred to me that I was saying something controversial. On the other hand, it seemed to me that I was merely stating common sense.
Since that post I’ve been ruminating about the assumption embedded in the premise – that a goodly number of Americans aren’t intelligent enough to be safely entrusted with the vote. In order to bring a little more depth to this debate I thought I’d do some research to discover whether or not the nation’s citizens are under-informed, and if so, to what degree. Read more
Nostrasamus Prophesies the 21st Century
What kind of place will the ground upon which we now stand be come January 1, 2101?
As we turn into a new millennium I imagine many people have pondered what the coming century holds for them, their children, and their grandchildren. Will the 2000s be a time of peace, of prosperity, an age of enlightenment and human achievement?
Or will humanity succumb to its darker instincts, engulfing the planet in war, environmental disaster, and economic inequity? Read more
Scatterlings of the Metrocene: Evolution, Education and the Dawn of the Cyberhuman Epoch
Samuel R. Smith, University of Colorado
Jim Booth, Surry Community College
She held out her hands, palms up, the fingers slightly spread, and with a barely audible click, ten double-edged, four centimeter scalpel blades slid from their housings beneath the burgundy nails. She smiled. The blades slowly withdrew.
– William Gibson, Neuromancer (1984)Pat Diener…is 26 years old, and she is going deaf. Landing her in the annals of science are the microscopic electrodes that doctors have buried deep inside her brain. Two fine platinum wires – as thin as a human hair and insulated in teflon – run underneath the young woman’s skull, connecting the electrical circuitry inside her head to a black plastic plug that sticks out from behind her left ear. From there, Diener can wire herself into a pocket-sized “speech processor” that picks up sound and transmits it to the electrodes, enabling the brain to interpret it.
– Associated Press Wire Report, 12/2/92
The technological explosion of the last few decades has made workaday fact of once-wild science fictions like genetic engineering, space travel, laser surgery and computer-generated animation – not to mention the handy little construct used to produce this document, the IBM-compatible 386-SX personal computer. Read more
lullaby pit 