A little known fact about me: I love ghost hunting shows. There's something about the unknown and maybe finding proof that there is life beyond death that appeals. I'm someone who need answers. I want to know what makes something tick, to dissect the working. So when I watch these ghost hunting shows, I'm always a bit intrigued by the various pieces of "evidence". I'll admit, most of the time, watching those shows, I'm left feeling disappointed because I expect MORE to come from it. Silly of course, but I want a more clear defined...yes there is or no there isn't.
However, sometimes there ARE scientific explanations for what's going on. It's pretty easy to conclude first off that a place that is 'haunted' is going to have more witnesses, more people who say something's going on. It's the lemming effect. If something happens that you can't explain and you've heard stories that something's not quite right, well then you're going to start to believe it and you're going to follow suite and say that what you experienced was paranormal.
Ever wake up unable to move? You might want to say that a ghost is holding you down or whatever, but there are other explanations for this paralysis that doesn't have to be paranormal such as sleep paralysis or hynagogic trance. It's said that most people experience a hypnagogic trance once or twice in their lives, although it is far more common in people with epilepsy or suffer from certain sleep disorders.
Most of the time, however, those who claim to have a ghostly encounter were awake. So then we have to look to other explanations. Some paranormal investigators think that the presence of stronger than normal electronic magnetic fields (EM fields) may be an indication of something supernatural. These fields may come from electronic equipment or geological formations. You'll often see investigators carrying around an EM reader. The first step when finding stronger than normal readings would be to make sure that what you're reading isn't coming from something electronic. Researchers believe that these EM fields can interact with the brain, causing hallucinations, dizziness or other neurological symptoms. They theorize that this is one of the reasons people report more ghostly activity at night, because of the way solar wind interacts with the Earth's magnetosphere. Electrical stimulation, for instance, to the angular gyrus of the brain can cause the sensation of someone behind you mimicking your movements. In other parts of the brain, it can cause people to hallucinate or have near death experiences.
All right but if it's just an effect on the brain, what about the cold spots? Those are physical symptoms. Cold spots are a common phenomenon in buildings believed to be haunted. Usually it's described as sudden drops in temperature or localized cold areas in an otherwise warm room, thought to be from the ghost drawing the energy out of the room. Often, however, these can be traced back to specific sources such as a drafty window or a chimney.
There may be one other thing playing tricks on you. Infrasound (an extremely low frequency between .1 -20Hz). At these levels, humans can't hear it, but we can FEEL it. It's believed that a good portion of the population is thought to be hypersensitive to these low frequencies-- causing nausea, extreme fear or awe, anxiety and chills. Researchers also believe it can affect vision by causing vibrations of the eye, making you 'see' things. Infrasound can be produced by storms, strong seasonal winds, weather patterns and some earthquakes.
In 1998, the Journal of the Society for Psychical Research published a paper called ‘The Ghost in the Machine’ by Vic Tandy. It described Tandy’s experiences with infrasound in his lab. While doing some experiments, his coworkers complained of various unknown 'spooky' feelings and chills in his lab. One woman even was said to have seen something. While working late at night, Tandy claimed to have had the feeling of being watched and catching the figure of something at the edge of his vision, but when he turned, there was nothing. When he brought in a fencing foil to repair, it started to vibrate. As he moved the blade around the room, it began to vibrate more strongly in the centre of the lab and at the edge of the room, stopped. He discovered that there was a 19Hz standing wave in his lab and that the walls had caused the sound waves to double back on itself, producing an area with enough energy to vibrate the blade. The source of this wave was a newly installed fan. When turned off, all phenomena associated with it stopped.
There are many natural reasons for paranormal activity if you know about it and where to look. What others can you think of?
Showing posts with label interesting. Show all posts
Showing posts with label interesting. Show all posts
Tuesday, February 14, 2012
Monday, February 13, 2012
If the Dead Could Speak
This article isn't new, but I found it recently and the musecrack just sparkles in it. It's about an archaeological site in the walled port of Acre, where the alleys of an Ottoman-era town is being rediscovered after it was found uniquely intact underground.
"Etched in plaster on one wall was a coat of arms — graffiti left by a medieval traveler. Nearby was a main street of cobblestones and a row of shops that once sold clay figurines and ampules for holy water, popular souvenirs for pilgrims."
Used by residents in 1291, (the year a Muslim army from Egypt defeated Acre's Christian garrison) these items and more were preserved in this town, under an existing city built by the Ottoman Turks around 1750.
Under Christian rule, the city became an unruly trading hub to combative orders of soldier-monks, European factions that distrusted each other, and competing merchants, all sharing an enclosed area that was barely the size of two football fields. In 1216, a french bishop went to the town and wrote about the murders that took place constantly, the prostitutes and all the residents he believed to be outlaws who'd fled their own lands.
He described Acre “like a monster or a beast having nine heads, each fighting the other.”
In the 1990s, Israeli excavations got under way. They found the Hospitaller knights, with its pillared dining hall and storerooms, an orderly latrine and a dungeon with stone walls that still had holes for shackles. Also found was a passage constructed by the knights of the rival Templar order, leading from their own fortress to the port. Underwater digs in Acre's harbor revealed sunken fortifications and more than 20 lost ships, some armed with cannons and special weapons to shred enemy sails that dated to Napoleon Bonaparte's failed siege of the city in 1799.
It’s like Pompeii of Roman times — it’s a complete city,” said Eliezer Stern, the Israeli archaeologist in charge of Acre.
Can you just imagine the stories that must have come out of a place like this? What was life like to be there? We have some idea from the french bishop, but what about when the city fell?
 |
| Photo by: AP |
"Etched in plaster on one wall was a coat of arms — graffiti left by a medieval traveler. Nearby was a main street of cobblestones and a row of shops that once sold clay figurines and ampules for holy water, popular souvenirs for pilgrims."
Used by residents in 1291, (the year a Muslim army from Egypt defeated Acre's Christian garrison) these items and more were preserved in this town, under an existing city built by the Ottoman Turks around 1750.
Under Christian rule, the city became an unruly trading hub to combative orders of soldier-monks, European factions that distrusted each other, and competing merchants, all sharing an enclosed area that was barely the size of two football fields. In 1216, a french bishop went to the town and wrote about the murders that took place constantly, the prostitutes and all the residents he believed to be outlaws who'd fled their own lands.
He described Acre “like a monster or a beast having nine heads, each fighting the other.”
In the 1990s, Israeli excavations got under way. They found the Hospitaller knights, with its pillared dining hall and storerooms, an orderly latrine and a dungeon with stone walls that still had holes for shackles. Also found was a passage constructed by the knights of the rival Templar order, leading from their own fortress to the port. Underwater digs in Acre's harbor revealed sunken fortifications and more than 20 lost ships, some armed with cannons and special weapons to shred enemy sails that dated to Napoleon Bonaparte's failed siege of the city in 1799.
It’s like Pompeii of Roman times — it’s a complete city,” said Eliezer Stern, the Israeli archaeologist in charge of Acre.
Can you just imagine the stories that must have come out of a place like this? What was life like to be there? We have some idea from the french bishop, but what about when the city fell?
Tuesday, January 17, 2012
Vampire Burials vs the Science of Decomposition
Vampires or zombies? What were our ancestors trying to keep from reviving? In my post about Zombie: Historical Accounts, I talked about how 8th century medieval skeletons were unearthed with large rocks wedged in their mouth (one where, to a point, the jaw was dislocated to fit the rock). Initially, archaeologists thought that it was a vampire-slaying ritual. During the Black Death, it was believed that vampires spread the plague. A rock in the mouth was thought to be a disease-blocking method to ensure the vampires didn't wake to continue spreading the plague. However, because the belief of vampires didn't emerge until the 1500s, the theory was disregarded and it was thought that maybe the stones was simply a barrier to stop the dead from coming back.
I'd wondered why people back then thought it was vampires. Well, in 2006, a 16th-century woman was unearthed in a mass grave near Venice among some graves of plague victims. The woman also had a stone in her mouth, a "vampire".
But why did the people during the Middles believe in vampires? Well, apparently the "first recorded use of the term vampire was to refer to a Russian prince that scientists now believe may have been suffering from rabies. At some point the Bohemians switched to driving a stake through the hearts of vampires, but in the early period burials with a stone in the mouth were the accepted 'cure' to prevent them coming back to life."
During early burials, vampires were "recognized" probably because of decomposition, a phenomenon not understood back then. When the body decays, the stomach releases a dark "purge of fluid". Bloodlike, this liquid can flow from the corpse's nose and mouth. Often the burial grounds were reopened during the plague to add new bodies, a way to recycle graves. Gravediggers would have seen the decomposing remains and may have been confused the purge of fluid for the blood of the vampire's "victim".
Not only was there this "purge" that they thought was evidence, but sometimes the shroud near the corpse's mouth was torn, giving the impression that the dead was chewing through the cloth. In reality, the fluid expelled from the body sometimes moistened the shroud, causing it to sag into the jaw.
I'd wondered why people back then thought it was vampires. Well, in 2006, a 16th-century woman was unearthed in a mass grave near Venice among some graves of plague victims. The woman also had a stone in her mouth, a "vampire".
But why did the people during the Middles believe in vampires? Well, apparently the "first recorded use of the term vampire was to refer to a Russian prince that scientists now believe may have been suffering from rabies. At some point the Bohemians switched to driving a stake through the hearts of vampires, but in the early period burials with a stone in the mouth were the accepted 'cure' to prevent them coming back to life."
During early burials, vampires were "recognized" probably because of decomposition, a phenomenon not understood back then. When the body decays, the stomach releases a dark "purge of fluid". Bloodlike, this liquid can flow from the corpse's nose and mouth. Often the burial grounds were reopened during the plague to add new bodies, a way to recycle graves. Gravediggers would have seen the decomposing remains and may have been confused the purge of fluid for the blood of the vampire's "victim".
Not only was there this "purge" that they thought was evidence, but sometimes the shroud near the corpse's mouth was torn, giving the impression that the dead was chewing through the cloth. In reality, the fluid expelled from the body sometimes moistened the shroud, causing it to sag into the jaw.
Vampires were thought by some to be the causes of plagues, and the superstition took root that shroud-chewing was the "magical way" that vampires infected people, Borrini said.Inserting objects, then, such as the stones, into the mouths of alleged vampires was thought to halt the spread of disease.
Thursday, December 8, 2011
Thursday 13: Round up of Science /Humanities links
1. First mini-earth may have been spotted
2. New dinosaur species discovered in Natural History Museum after nearly a century
3. A 3D printer
4. Plasma could cure the common cold
5. Intelligence agency recruits spies with online code
6. Forget antibiotics, try nanoparticles instead
7. Morphing mirror could clear the skies for astronomers
8. Ultrathin, foldable sensors probe secrets of the brain
9. First superpredator had enormous eyes on stalks
10. Earliest animals looked like baseballs
11. Woolly mammoth to be cloned
12. Why aren't we smarter? Evolutionary limits on cognition
13. Acquired traits can be inherited via small RNAs
2. New dinosaur species discovered in Natural History Museum after nearly a century
3. A 3D printer
4. Plasma could cure the common cold
5. Intelligence agency recruits spies with online code
6. Forget antibiotics, try nanoparticles instead
7. Morphing mirror could clear the skies for astronomers
8. Ultrathin, foldable sensors probe secrets of the brain
9. First superpredator had enormous eyes on stalks
10. Earliest animals looked like baseballs
11. Woolly mammoth to be cloned
12. Why aren't we smarter? Evolutionary limits on cognition
13. Acquired traits can be inherited via small RNAs
Tuesday, December 6, 2011
Star Trek's Holodeck May Indeed Be in our Future
If you've watched Star Trek, you're probably aware of the holodeck. It's like one big simulated reality room where you can interact with "programmed world". It'd be like living in your tv and interacting with your favourite characters. You become part of that story. That world.
I'm not sure about you, but I've been waiting for the day when a holodeck-like virtual reality system was created. Just think what you could do...you could travel the world without ever having to leave your livingroom! Ok, I'd still want to go, but it'd still be pretty cool. It could be a very cool way for authors to learn about a new subject they're writing about.
Well a a holodeck may not be too far off. A couple of companies in Britain have started to work on something similar using a bunch of projectors, Sony Move controllers, and some creative visual tricks. What they do is project the images on the walls in a way to adjust to the geometry of the objects in the room (such as the couch in the video or the box), creating the illusion that the surface itself has changed. The controllers are attached to the camera and the position is fed back to the projectors in real time, allowing the projectors to adjust for the distortion of the image. This lets the camera move around, adding to the three-dimensional effect.
Sony Europe, Studio Output and Marshmallow Laser Feast shot three web videos to highlight the immersiveness of movies rented or purchased from the PlayStation Store. In the videos, all were made with just one take and no postproduction work. The effects look apparently nearly as good (and cheaper) and could even be used to replace the CGI technology used in the film industry that created Avatar.
I'm not sure about you, but I've been waiting for the day when a holodeck-like virtual reality system was created. Just think what you could do...you could travel the world without ever having to leave your livingroom! Ok, I'd still want to go, but it'd still be pretty cool. It could be a very cool way for authors to learn about a new subject they're writing about.
Well a a holodeck may not be too far off. A couple of companies in Britain have started to work on something similar using a bunch of projectors, Sony Move controllers, and some creative visual tricks. What they do is project the images on the walls in a way to adjust to the geometry of the objects in the room (such as the couch in the video or the box), creating the illusion that the surface itself has changed. The controllers are attached to the camera and the position is fed back to the projectors in real time, allowing the projectors to adjust for the distortion of the image. This lets the camera move around, adding to the three-dimensional effect.
Sony Europe, Studio Output and Marshmallow Laser Feast shot three web videos to highlight the immersiveness of movies rented or purchased from the PlayStation Store. In the videos, all were made with just one take and no postproduction work. The effects look apparently nearly as good (and cheaper) and could even be used to replace the CGI technology used in the film industry that created Avatar.
Thursday, November 24, 2011
Thursday 13: Round up of Science /Humanities links
1. Bionic contact lens 'to project emails before eyes'
2. Faster-than-light neutrino results queried
3. 15 infant dinosaurs discovered in crowded nest
4. First teeth grew outside the body
5. Climate may have doomed Neandertals
6. Walking through doorways make you forget
7. Insect cyborgs may be the first responders: search and monitor hazardous place
8. Smart swarms of bacteria inspire robotics: Adaptable decision-making found in bacteria communities
9. Ancient skull found in China may be oldest evidence of violence between humans
10. Discovery of a new muscle repair gene
11. Key to aging? Key molecular switch for telomere extension by telomerase identified
12. Psychopaths' brains show differences in structure and function
13. Key gene function against cell death discovered
2. Faster-than-light neutrino results queried
3. 15 infant dinosaurs discovered in crowded nest
4. First teeth grew outside the body
5. Climate may have doomed Neandertals
6. Walking through doorways make you forget
7. Insect cyborgs may be the first responders: search and monitor hazardous place
8. Smart swarms of bacteria inspire robotics: Adaptable decision-making found in bacteria communities
9. Ancient skull found in China may be oldest evidence of violence between humans
10. Discovery of a new muscle repair gene
11. Key to aging? Key molecular switch for telomere extension by telomerase identified
12. Psychopaths' brains show differences in structure and function
13. Key gene function against cell death discovered
Thursday, November 17, 2011
Thursday 13: Round up of Science /Humanities
1. Mimicking the brain -- in silicon: new computer chip models how neurons communicate
2. Fossilized skin reveals ancient predator's sharklike move
3. Toyota introduces robots that helps patients walk again
4. Hubble discovers tiny galaxies bursting with starbirth in early universe
5. A rare survivor from the birth of Earth
6. A realistic look at the promises and perils of nanomedicine
7. New "smart" material could help tap medical potential of tissue-penetrating light
8. Archeologists discover huge ancient Greek commercial area on island of Sicily
9. Why your hips don't lie
10. Reading the brain: Mind-boggling
11. Real-Life Inception: Army looks to 'counteract nightmares' with digital dreams
12. Antarctica's "Ghost" Mountains Explained
13. "Great Lakes" discovered on Jupiter Moon?
2. Fossilized skin reveals ancient predator's sharklike move
3. Toyota introduces robots that helps patients walk again
4. Hubble discovers tiny galaxies bursting with starbirth in early universe
5. A rare survivor from the birth of Earth
6. A realistic look at the promises and perils of nanomedicine
7. New "smart" material could help tap medical potential of tissue-penetrating light
8. Archeologists discover huge ancient Greek commercial area on island of Sicily
9. Why your hips don't lie
10. Reading the brain: Mind-boggling
11. Real-Life Inception: Army looks to 'counteract nightmares' with digital dreams
12. Antarctica's "Ghost" Mountains Explained
13. "Great Lakes" discovered on Jupiter Moon?
Tuesday, November 15, 2011
Beam me up Scotty!... or why everyone on Star Trek is a clone
While I'm still holding out for a car that drives itself (I don't just mean to park by itself but to also navigate the roads) to come on the market, I daydream constantly about having the ability of teleportation. Just imagine--you blink and you're at your destination a second later. Awesome right? No waiting in traffic. No having to pay for gas or insurance. But best of all, you'd be able to sleep and still be at work in time.
I was watching Jumper on Saturday night and if you haven't watched it before, the main character can teleport himself anywhere. Cool right? That is, when he's not being hunted. The idea of teleportation isn't a new one. While in Jumper it was an innate psychic ability that has existed for centuries, in Star Trek, the characters use a machine, a transporter that gets them to one place to another by dispersing the molecules in their bodies to another location.
But is it possible? Can a person successfully disappear and then reappear intact and alive?
Historically, the earliest mention of teleportation can be found in religious texts. Teleportation then found mention in a 1877 in a science fiction story by Edward Page Mitchell and even Sir Arthur Conan Doyle wrote a novel on it called The Disintegration Machine. The word teleportation, however, wasn't coined until 1931 by author Charles Fort in his book, Lo! Since then, it has not only been used in Star Trek, but Stargate Atlantis and even Heroes and movies like the Fly and Jumper. While the ability varies depending on what you're watching (psychic ability vs some kind of technology that allows it), the same physics would apply.
While Newton's theory states that teleportation is impossible (objects don't move until they are pushed and cannot suddenly disappear and then reappear somewhere else), in 1925 Erwin Schrodinger and colleagues developed the quantum theory, overthrowing Newton's laws after 250 years. After analyzing the properties of atoms, they discovered that electrons acted like waves and could make quantum leaps in their seemingly chaotic motion within the atom.
In order for this to make sense, I need to explain what is called an EPR (Einstein, Podolsky and Rosen) experiment. In 1935 they proposed that if two electrons are vibrating in unison they remain in wavelike synchronization even if separated by distance because of an invisible Schrodinger wave connecting both of them. If something happens to one electron, some of the information is immediately transmitted to the other in what is called quantum entanglement that was thought to happen faster than the speed of light. Because Einstein didn't think anything could move faster than the speed of light, he thought he'd proven that quantum theory was wrong. But in 1980 Alan Aspect and colleagues performed an experiment that measured the spin of photons and agreed with the quantum theory.
Everything changed in 1993, when scientists had their first success, proving that it was physically possible to teleport objects, at least on an atomic level using the EPR experiment. A research team at IBM, led by Charles Bennett, confirmed that quantum teleportation (the transmission of characteristics--that is, the quantum state of a particular photon, or particle of light--from one place to another) was possible, but only if the original object was destroyed. While the original was destroyed, every distinguishing feature is re-created at the new location. Even now physicists have only been able to teleport particles of light and atoms over a distance.
In 2002, researchers in Australia successfully teleported a laser beam, but the most recent successful teleportation experiment happened in 2006 at the Niels Bohr Institute where Dr. Eugene Polzik and his team teleported information stored in a laser beam into a cloud of atoms.
While we have had some successes, we are far away from creating anything that could transport a human from one spot to another. From HowStuffWorks, "For a person to be transported, a machine would have to be built that could analyze all the atoms that make up the human body. The machine would then have to send this information to another location, where the person's body would be reconstructed with exact precision. Molecules couldn't be even a millimeter out of place, lest the person arrive with some severe neurological or physiological defect." If we go with what happened above where information was copied in the attached, electron, we would have to assume that the machine would act like a fax machine and duplicate the person on the receiving end, possibly destroying the original, thereby "killing" the person.
While teleportation isn't possible today, it would make an interesting sci-fi novel. If the original person was destroyed and a clone made, would that clone be EXACTLY like the original. Sure, it would have the same memories and emotions and whatnot, but what if things go wrong? Is the the person really dead since he/she has been cloned? What do you think?
I was watching Jumper on Saturday night and if you haven't watched it before, the main character can teleport himself anywhere. Cool right? That is, when he's not being hunted. The idea of teleportation isn't a new one. While in Jumper it was an innate psychic ability that has existed for centuries, in Star Trek, the characters use a machine, a transporter that gets them to one place to another by dispersing the molecules in their bodies to another location.
But is it possible? Can a person successfully disappear and then reappear intact and alive?
Historically, the earliest mention of teleportation can be found in religious texts. Teleportation then found mention in a 1877 in a science fiction story by Edward Page Mitchell and even Sir Arthur Conan Doyle wrote a novel on it called The Disintegration Machine. The word teleportation, however, wasn't coined until 1931 by author Charles Fort in his book, Lo! Since then, it has not only been used in Star Trek, but Stargate Atlantis and even Heroes and movies like the Fly and Jumper. While the ability varies depending on what you're watching (psychic ability vs some kind of technology that allows it), the same physics would apply.
While Newton's theory states that teleportation is impossible (objects don't move until they are pushed and cannot suddenly disappear and then reappear somewhere else), in 1925 Erwin Schrodinger and colleagues developed the quantum theory, overthrowing Newton's laws after 250 years. After analyzing the properties of atoms, they discovered that electrons acted like waves and could make quantum leaps in their seemingly chaotic motion within the atom.
In order for this to make sense, I need to explain what is called an EPR (Einstein, Podolsky and Rosen) experiment. In 1935 they proposed that if two electrons are vibrating in unison they remain in wavelike synchronization even if separated by distance because of an invisible Schrodinger wave connecting both of them. If something happens to one electron, some of the information is immediately transmitted to the other in what is called quantum entanglement that was thought to happen faster than the speed of light. Because Einstein didn't think anything could move faster than the speed of light, he thought he'd proven that quantum theory was wrong. But in 1980 Alan Aspect and colleagues performed an experiment that measured the spin of photons and agreed with the quantum theory.
Everything changed in 1993, when scientists had their first success, proving that it was physically possible to teleport objects, at least on an atomic level using the EPR experiment. A research team at IBM, led by Charles Bennett, confirmed that quantum teleportation (the transmission of characteristics--that is, the quantum state of a particular photon, or particle of light--from one place to another) was possible, but only if the original object was destroyed. While the original was destroyed, every distinguishing feature is re-created at the new location. Even now physicists have only been able to teleport particles of light and atoms over a distance.
In 2002, researchers in Australia successfully teleported a laser beam, but the most recent successful teleportation experiment happened in 2006 at the Niels Bohr Institute where Dr. Eugene Polzik and his team teleported information stored in a laser beam into a cloud of atoms.
While we have had some successes, we are far away from creating anything that could transport a human from one spot to another. From HowStuffWorks, "For a person to be transported, a machine would have to be built that could analyze all the atoms that make up the human body. The machine would then have to send this information to another location, where the person's body would be reconstructed with exact precision. Molecules couldn't be even a millimeter out of place, lest the person arrive with some severe neurological or physiological defect." If we go with what happened above where information was copied in the attached, electron, we would have to assume that the machine would act like a fax machine and duplicate the person on the receiving end, possibly destroying the original, thereby "killing" the person.
While teleportation isn't possible today, it would make an interesting sci-fi novel. If the original person was destroyed and a clone made, would that clone be EXACTLY like the original. Sure, it would have the same memories and emotions and whatnot, but what if things go wrong? Is the the person really dead since he/she has been cloned? What do you think?
Thursday, November 10, 2011
Thursday 13: Round up of Science /Humanities
1. Water shifting to a new kind of liquid
2. What the brain sees when the eye looks away
3. Which way you lean (physically) affects your decision making
4. We all experience fantasy differently
5. Brain parasite directly alters brain chemistry
6. Re-programmable cells could be key to creating new life forms
7. Cyborgs may be sci-fi but brain-computer interfacing is real
8. New procedure to turn brown eyes blue
9. Skin sees sunlight to trigger tanning
10. Periodic table adds three new elements
11. 66 leg predator roamed ancient BC sea floor
12. First brain image of a dream created
13. Humans' entry into Europe pushed earlier
2. What the brain sees when the eye looks away
3. Which way you lean (physically) affects your decision making
4. We all experience fantasy differently
5. Brain parasite directly alters brain chemistry
6. Re-programmable cells could be key to creating new life forms
7. Cyborgs may be sci-fi but brain-computer interfacing is real
8. New procedure to turn brown eyes blue
9. Skin sees sunlight to trigger tanning
10. Periodic table adds three new elements
11. 66 leg predator roamed ancient BC sea floor
12. First brain image of a dream created
13. Humans' entry into Europe pushed earlier
Tuesday, November 8, 2011
Why Sliders may be possible--the science of multi-universes
When I was younger, I was hooked on a television show called Sliders--a concept based on a group of travelers who end up by accident going through a "gateway" to an alternate universe. Throughout the series, they have to go through world after world as they try to find their way back home to their reality. Not sure about you but as a teen, I had a crush on Jerry O'Connell. Anyway, through their travels, the each new 
world is completely different than the last. Sometimes, they barely make it out into another (they have a device that helps them "slide" to the next location and that device runs on a timer. If it runs out, they're stuck in that world forever).
But what if multi-universes are real? The potential for a multiverse comes from a theory called eternal inflation--postulating that shortly after the Big Bang that formed the universe, space-time expanded at different rates in different places, giving rise to bubble universes that may function with their own separate laws of physics.
In a recent study, a team of researchers have revealed that they have discovered four statistically unlikely circular patterns in what they call the cosmic microwave background (or CMB-- essentially, it is the thermal radiation filling the observable universe). Bubble universes are thought to be not only irregular-shaped, but that they can move about. The researchers believe that these marks could be "bruises" that our universe received when it bumped into other universes.
On researcher said:
This paddle, about a width of a human hair was cooled in the fridge. After dimming the lights and being placed und
er a special bell jar with all the air sucked out to eliminate vibrations, the paddle was plucked-- and was noted to move and stand still at same time (kind of hard to picture that, I'll admit). As it's explained, electrons, which circle the nucleus of an atom, are swirling around in multiple states at the same time.
What does it mean? One physicist says:
others remain in motion, out of sight.
While both of the findings (the bubbles and the paddle being in two states at once) could just be coincidental, it could also be a step in the direction of learning more and perhaps proving that our world may not be the only one. What do you think? Do you believe we live in a multiverse?
For fun, there's a site out there that allows you to input your picture and to find your doppelganger. Who do you look like?
world is completely different than the last. Sometimes, they barely make it out into another (they have a device that helps them "slide" to the next location and that device runs on a timer. If it runs out, they're stuck in that world forever).But what if multi-universes are real? The potential for a multiverse comes from a theory called eternal inflation--postulating that shortly after the Big Bang that formed the universe, space-time expanded at different rates in different places, giving rise to bubble universes that may function with their own separate laws of physics.
In a recent study, a team of researchers have revealed that they have discovered four statistically unlikely circular patterns in what they call the cosmic microwave background (or CMB-- essentially, it is the thermal radiation filling the observable universe). Bubble universes are thought to be not only irregular-shaped, but that they can move about. The researchers believe that these marks could be "bruises" that our universe received when it bumped into other universes.
On researcher said:
If you imagine two ordinary soap bubbles colliding, then the surface where they intersect is going to be a circle, so that's the key signature we're looking for in the CMB. It's not any old perturbation, it's circular and it's got a particular type of profile. There's no obvious sort of other thing that could cause this.But this wasn't the only strange discovery. Before the bubbles were discovered, quantum physicists in 2010 at the University of California found that an object you can see in front of you may exist simultaneously in a parallel universe (causing some scientists to believe that time travel may be plausible-- if you're interested in reading more on time travel, I wrote two posts on it: Pt 1 and Pt 2). What the physicists found, was a way to move a tiny metal paddle, and yet keep it still at the same time.
Based on this thought, the researchers developed a computer algorithm to analyze CMB observations for patterns that would fit.
This paddle, about a width of a human hair was cooled in the fridge. After dimming the lights and being placed und
er a special bell jar with all the air sucked out to eliminate vibrations, the paddle was plucked-- and was noted to move and stand still at same time (kind of hard to picture that, I'll admit). As it's explained, electrons, which circle the nucleus of an atom, are swirling around in multiple states at the same time.What does it mean? One physicist says:
"When you observe something in one state, one theory is it that it splits the universe into two parts."So because of this, only one universe would be seen and therefore would "freeze" while all the
others remain in motion, out of sight.
While both of the findings (the bubbles and the paddle being in two states at once) could just be coincidental, it could also be a step in the direction of learning more and perhaps proving that our world may not be the only one. What do you think? Do you believe we live in a multiverse?
For fun, there's a site out there that allows you to input your picture and to find your doppelganger. Who do you look like?
Thursday, November 3, 2011
Thursday 13: Round up of Science /Humanities
1. E-readers get heavier with each book
2. One step closer to the borg
3. Stretchy solar cells make self-powering 'skin'
4. Mind-reading devices help the speechless speak
5. Brain scans reveal lucid dreaming's sleep cinema
6. Smart chimp gets speech like a human
7. First known Europeans identified
8. Cancer found in 2,000 year old mummy
9. Blood from a stone? No. Blood from a rice? Sure.
10. Eyes are the window to the soul; skin is a window to the brain
11. Vampire-like predatory bacteria could become a living antibiotic
12. Your brain knows a lot more than you realize
13. NASA to develop dust grabbing tractor beams for future missions
2. One step closer to the borg
3. Stretchy solar cells make self-powering 'skin'
4. Mind-reading devices help the speechless speak
5. Brain scans reveal lucid dreaming's sleep cinema
6. Smart chimp gets speech like a human
7. First known Europeans identified
8. Cancer found in 2,000 year old mummy
9. Blood from a stone? No. Blood from a rice? Sure.
10. Eyes are the window to the soul; skin is a window to the brain
11. Vampire-like predatory bacteria could become a living antibiotic
12. Your brain knows a lot more than you realize
13. NASA to develop dust grabbing tractor beams for future missions
Thursday, September 29, 2011
Thursday 13: Round up of Science /Humanities
1. Mind-reading research: the major breakthroughs
2. Spontaneous Human Combustion: how might it occur?
3. Florescing bacteria used to encode secret messages
4. New species of genuflecting plant buries its own seeds
5. 'Antimagnet' joins list of invisibility approaches
6. Resurrected ancient protein is a potent antibiotic
7. Your brain's family album, from hydra to human
8. Brain needs serotonin to restrain aggression
9. Habits form when brains slow down
10. Double whammy gene therapy clears HIV from body
11. How smells rules your life
12. Small lizard solves a problem its never seen before
13. Young bonobo show signs of autism
2. Spontaneous Human Combustion: how might it occur?
3. Florescing bacteria used to encode secret messages
4. New species of genuflecting plant buries its own seeds
5. 'Antimagnet' joins list of invisibility approaches
6. Resurrected ancient protein is a potent antibiotic
7. Your brain's family album, from hydra to human
8. Brain needs serotonin to restrain aggression
9. Habits form when brains slow down
10. Double whammy gene therapy clears HIV from body
11. How smells rules your life
12. Small lizard solves a problem its never seen before
13. Young bonobo show signs of autism
Thursday, September 22, 2011
Thursday 13: Round up of Science /Humanities
1. Revealed, Irelands real life zombie scare: Eighth century skeletons buried with stones in mouths
2. Video gamers solve microbiology puzzle
3. The end of "archaic" H. sapiens
4. New gene sequencing technique opens doors for studying elusive bacteria
5. Genetic defect that leaves some without fingerprints
6. Continents influenced ancient human migration, spread of technology
7. New techniques fill in gaps of fossil record
8. What will the next influenza pandemic look like?
9. Shark molecules kill human viruses, too
10. Tiniest baby dinosaur discovered
11. Deep sea can put global warming on temporary hiatus
12. Our universe may be a multiverse
13. Dino-killing impact wiped out many ancient birds too
2. Video gamers solve microbiology puzzle
3. The end of "archaic" H. sapiens
4. New gene sequencing technique opens doors for studying elusive bacteria
5. Genetic defect that leaves some without fingerprints
6. Continents influenced ancient human migration, spread of technology
7. New techniques fill in gaps of fossil record
8. What will the next influenza pandemic look like?
9. Shark molecules kill human viruses, too
10. Tiniest baby dinosaur discovered
11. Deep sea can put global warming on temporary hiatus
12. Our universe may be a multiverse
13. Dino-killing impact wiped out many ancient birds too
Thursday, September 15, 2011
Thursday 13: Round up of Science /Humanities
I'm going to do something a bit different. I've always liked Thursday 13, but I thought I would use it as an opportunity to cross-link the round up of science/humanities articles that I've found particularly interesting around the net this week.
1. Man's Immune System Trained to Kill Cancer
2. Fossils Revise Human Evolution Theories
3. Hair Chemistry Could Help Solve Cold Cases
4. New Emotion Detector can See When We're Lying
5. Egypt's Ancient Fleet: Lost for Thousands of Years, Found in Desolate Cave
6. Enzyme Might be Target for Treating Smoking and Alcoholism
7. Sea Urchins See with their Whole Body
8. Powered by Seaweed, Polymer from Algae may Improve Battery Performance
9. Blood Vessels from Your Printer?
10. New Species of Ancient Predatory Fish Discovered
11. Can Scientists Look at Next Year's Climate?
12. The Lost Plague: London's Graveyards Suggest that Black Death Strain May be Extinct
13. Bacteria Use Electric Wires to Uranium out of Groundwater
1. Man's Immune System Trained to Kill Cancer
2. Fossils Revise Human Evolution Theories
3. Hair Chemistry Could Help Solve Cold Cases
4. New Emotion Detector can See When We're Lying
5. Egypt's Ancient Fleet: Lost for Thousands of Years, Found in Desolate Cave
6. Enzyme Might be Target for Treating Smoking and Alcoholism
7. Sea Urchins See with their Whole Body
8. Powered by Seaweed, Polymer from Algae may Improve Battery Performance
9. Blood Vessels from Your Printer?
10. New Species of Ancient Predatory Fish Discovered
11. Can Scientists Look at Next Year's Climate?
12. The Lost Plague: London's Graveyards Suggest that Black Death Strain May be Extinct
13. Bacteria Use Electric Wires to Uranium out of Groundwater
Saturday, June 19, 2010
Letters to characters
Ever have the urge to write a letter to a fictional character? Obviously a lot of people do because there is a site dedicated to such letters! I can't recall who it was but someone twittered about the site yesterday. It's actually quite entertaining. While my brownies (recipe from this site!) were cooling down, I decided to read some of the letters. See below for an example of one such letter:
Mother Goose | Mother Goose's Fairy Tales | c. 1660
Dear Man in the Moon,
You never reply to any of my letters. I send you one every night when I go to sleep; my mind writes you a story and sends it up to you in the first-class dream post so you have something nice to read at bedtime. I imagined, until now, that you liked my letters, that you anticipated the stories my nights commanded. So this will be my last.
Do you remember when I dreamed that I joined you on the moon? You were a lot smaller than I had imagined, but compared to me you were still a giant. Your face was white-- white as bone, I had thought--and your body was encrusted with shining stones. They were not diamonds, though you could be forgiven for mistaking them for such things, because, until you looked closely at their surface, you would not notice the reflections of human imagination that generated your very being. Without those stones, those ideas, notions, you would disintegrate, drifting into the night to join the stars as an outcast.
You were nice to me when I joined you on the moon. You didn’t say anything--I’ve never heard your voice--but you smiled a smile that I will never forget. I understand now that I misinterpreted your expression of kindness for the same affection I felt for you.
I end my final letter by saying this. I once saw you leave the moon. I was awake; it was much too soon to sleep, so I know it was not another of my mind’s stories. I watched you, from my window, head south through thick woodland that tugged at you with selfish fingers. The stones began to break off, littering the forest floor as your strength faded. You disappeared into the forest, ravenous, desperately seeking a source of strength.
People said you came to a village--that you were given cold pease porridge, that you burnt your tongue, unaware that the porridge was not cold at all, that it was hot as your sister, the sun, and, so unused were you to the heat, it became the cause of your death. I know that is not true. You died in the forest. Your life was clutched by the branches and their cruel inhabitants. By the owls, the foxes, the woodsmen. All stole a stone. All played a part.
Farewell, Man in the Moon, and good-night.
With love,
Ailsa Sutcliffe
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