All things Science related. λν = c

Oh RR, just sit back, relax and be assimilated. You know resistance is futile.

And now the good news!

Anti-CD47 antibody may offer new route to successful cancer vaccination (http://med.stanford.edu/ism/2013/may/cd47.html)

In the new study, the Stanford team showed that after engulfing the cancer cells, the macrophages presented pieces of the cancer to CD8+ T cells, which, in addition to attacking cancer, are also potent attackers of virally infected or damaged cells. As a result, the CD8+ T cells were activated to attack the cancer cells on their own. “It was completely unexpected that CD8+ T cells would be mobilized when macrophages engulfed the cancer cells in the presence of CD47-blocking antibodies,” said MD/PhD student Diane Tseng, the lead author of the study. Following engulfment of cancer cells, macrophages activate T cells to mobilize their own immune attack against cancer, she said.

Cow's vagina! (http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2013/07/genetics-of-iq/)

Zhao’s goal is to use those machines to examine the genetic underpinnings of genius like his own. He wants nothing less than to crack the code for intelligence by studying the genomes of thousands of prodigies, not just from China but around the world. He and his collaborators, a transnational group of intelligence researchers, fully expect they will succeed in identifying a genetic basis for IQ. They also expect that within a decade their research will be used to screen embryos during in vitro fertilization, boosting the IQ of unborn children by up to 20 points. In theory, that’s the difference between a kid who struggles through high school and one who sails into college.

Some people are smarter than others. It seems like a straightforward truth, and one that should lend itself to scientific investigation. But those who try to study intelligence, at least in the West, find themselves lost in a political minefield. To be sure, not all intelligence research is controversial: If you study cognitive development in toddlers, or the mental decline associated with Alzheimer’s disease, “that’s treated as just normal science,” says Douglas Detterman, founding editor of Intelligence, a leading journal in the field. The trouble starts whenever the heritability of intelligence is discussed, or when intelligence is compared between genders, socioeconomic classes, or—most explosively—racial groupings.

For the most part, an IQ test—the most common of which today is called the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale—is a series of brainteasers. You fit abstract shapes together, translate codes using a key, sort numbers or letters into ascending order in your mind. It’s a weirdly playful exercise, the sort of test you would expect to have no bearing on anything else. But studies make it clear that IQ is strongly correlated with the ability to solve all sorts of abstract problems, whether they involve language, math, or visual patterns. The frightening upshot is that IQ remains by far the most powerful predictor of the life outcomes that people care most about in the modern world. Tell me your IQ and I can make a decently accurate prediction of your occupational attainment, how many kids you’ll have, your chances of being arrested for a crime, even how long you’ll live.

I am very excited at the convergence of so many scientific advances that will eventually clean our planet of this infestation known as 'Mankind'.

Researchers at Harvard University (http://www.richarddawkins.net/news_articles/2013/8/1/harvard-creates-brain-to-brain-interface-allows-humans-to-control-other-animals-with-thoughts-alone-extremetech#) have created the first noninvasive brain-to-brain interface (BBI) between a human… and a rat.

Simply by thinking the appropriate thought, the BBI allows the human to control the rat’s tail. This is one of the most important steps towards BBIs that allow for telepathic links between two or more humans — which is a good thing in the case of friends and family, but terrifying if you stop to think about the nefarious possibilities of a fascist dictatorship with mind control tech.

In recent years there have been huge advances in the field of brain-computer interfaces, where your thoughts are detected and “understood” by a sensor attached to a computer, but relatively little work has been done in the opposite direction (computer-brain interfaces). This is because it’s one thing for a computer to work out what a human is thinking (by asking or observing their actions), but another thing entirely to inject new thoughts into a human brain. To put it bluntly, we have almost no idea of how thoughts are encoded by neurons in the brain. For now, the best we can do is create a computer-brain interface that stimulates a region of the brain that’s known to create a certain reaction — such as the specific part of the motor cortex that’s in charge of your fingers. We don’t have the power to move your fingers in a specific way — that would require knowing the brain’s encoding scheme — but we can make them jerk around.


Not responsible for any of my future posts.

Not responsible for any of my future posts.LOL, it was all the robots fault!

But a team of Swiss scientists yesterday demonstrated a robot that could do just that. They tapped into the brain of partial quadriplegic Mark-Andre Duc, who was in a hospital 60 miles away, the AP reports. A laptop decoded the electrical signals his brain was emitting almost instantaneously, then transmitted his commands to the bot. (http://www.newser.com/story/144709/meet-the-robot-you-control-with-your-mind.html)

LOL, it was all the robots fault!

But a team of Swiss scientists yesterday demonstrated a robot that could do just that. They tapped into the brain of partial quadriplegic Mark-Andre Duc, who was in a hospital 60 miles away, the AP reports. A laptop decoded the electrical signals his brain was emitting almost instantaneously, then transmitted his commands to the bot. (http://www.newser.com/story/144709/meet-the-robot-you-control-with-your-mind.html)

Just think of all the possible unintended consequences.

"I am in a very boring meeting. This guy just wont stop talking. I daydream about getting up and punching this guy in his face.

Crash! My robot kicks in the conference room door and punches the guy in his face instantly killing him.

I say ****, Im going to jail and have instant thoughts about being butt raped in prison. My robot interprets my mental image as a command and proceeds to fulfill command .."

wait a minute. this will never happen. Robots in I-robot were programmed to never accept an order that would endanger another human being .. problem solved.

This is why some people will be excluded from technological advances once I'm in charge.

Just think of all the possible unintended consequences.

"I am in a very boring meeting. This guy just wont stop talking. I daydream about getting up and punching this guy in his face.

Crash! My robot kicks in the conference room door and punches the guy in his face instantly killing him.

I say ****, Im going to jail and have instant thoughts about being butt raped in prison. My robot interprets my mental image as a command and proceeds to fulfill command .."

wait a minute. this will never happen. Robots in I-robot were programmed to never accept an order that would endanger another human being .. problem solved.Well, like you said there's inadvertent thoughts. "Officer, I really don't know why my robot tried to have sex with that woman over there." (guiltily bows head as everybody glares at me.)

If we get that far technologically while I'm alive, I hope there's some filter or manual on/off control available. Otherwise, like you said, oh the possibilities for all kinds of stuff to go wrong.

If we get that far technologically while I'm alive, I hope there's some filter or manual on/off control available. Otherwise, like you said, oh the possibilities for all kinds of stuff to go wrong.

No worries, we'll have the Thought Crimes Police for that.

Science Is Not Your Enemy (http://www.richarddawkins.net/news_articles/2013/8/7/science-is-not-your-enemy-an-impassioned-plea-to-neglected-novelists-embattled-professors-and-tenure-less-historians-new-republic#)

An impassioned plea to neglected novelists, embattled professors, and tenure-less historians

One would think that writers in the humanities would be delighted and energized by the efflorescence of new ideas from the sciences. But one would be wrong. Though everyone endorses science when it can cure disease, monitor the environment, or bash political opponents, the intrusion of science into the territories of the humanities has been deeply resented. Just as reviled is the application of scientific reasoning to religion; many writers without a trace of a belief in God maintain that there is something unseemly about scientists weighing in on the biggest questions. In the major journals of opinion, scientific carpetbaggers are regularly accused of determinism, reductionism, essentialism, positivism, and worst of all, something called “scientism.” The past couple years have seen four denunciations of scientism in this magazine alone, together with attacks in Bookforum, The Claremont Review of Books, The Huffington Post, The Nation, National Review Online, The New Atlantis, The New York Times, and Standpoint.