Archive for the ‘Science’ Category
Reasons to be cheerful?
Very interesting article from the Economist as to why the world is getting better:
In China 25 years ago, over 600m people—two-thirds of the population—were living in extreme poverty (on $1 a day or less). Now, the number on $1 a day is below 180m. In the world as a whole, a stunning 135m people escaped dire poverty between 1999 and 2004. This is more than the population of Japan or Russia—and more people, more quickly than at any other time in history.
Poverty alleviation has gone hand in hand with improvements in basic services. Digging canals and building water-treatment plants has increased the number of people with access to safe water: in South Asia, for instance, the number of those without clean water has been nearly halved since 1990. Thanks to this, and to better public-health provision, the rate at which people die from infectious diseases such as malaria and tuberculosis is falling in most poor countries, Africa excepted.
That in turn has cut child mortality. In 2007 Unicef, the United Nations child-welfare body, said that for the first time in modern history fewer than 10m children were dying each year before the age of five. That is still an awful lot but it represents a fall of a quarter since 1990. Life expectancy has increased a bit in low- and middle-income countries. The long march to literacy is nearing an end: three-quarters of people aged 15-25 were literate in 1975; now the rate is nearly nine-tenths.
The Garden of Eden sucked:
One of the most entertaining things I’ve read in the economist in a while…
Constant warfare was necessary to keep population density down to one person per square mile. Farmers can live at 100 times that density. Hunter-gatherers may have been so lithe and healthy because the weak were dead. The invention of agriculture and the advent of settled society merely swapped high mortality for high morbidity, allowing people some relief from chronic warfare so they could at least grind out an existence, rather than being ground out of existence altogether.
Some Dr.Who parodies:
a creationist explaining why god and science can co-exist…
Oddly enough, while I still think that god doesn’t exist, I find that I’d support this kind of religious nutter a lot quicker than others:
Take testosterone: The more a person has, the more a person tends to take risks and think about sex. If people think they have sex on the brain because their great-great-grandmother ate an apple, or because they’re fundamentally flawed, then they won’t be able to live with integrity. Evolutionary psychology gives us a way of understanding our true nature. It makes it easier for us to live.
Who of us would let a first-century dentist fix our children’s teeth? Yet every day we let first-century theologians fill our children’s brains.
The information age in numbers
Interesting stuff:
Definitely not safe for work
Very interesting interview here with Habakuk here who the sharp-eyed amongst you may have seen in both this blog and Cians blog. Anyway, its certainly an interesting look into a lifestyle that many people will find disturbing to say the least.
I have pierced myself for years, but I cannot have permanent ones yet. My new wife may allow me some in due course but she is scared of these things. I have made a special ring design around the root of the penis going through the skin just above the scrotum and I also have designs for permanent 4mm stainless steel pins — not rings — through the nipples to be connected with a string of beads to the penis rings. Maybe one day…
Enviormentalism is ‘bullshit’?
I’m doing a course on Enviornmental Politics (least I think that’s its title) and given that I came across this Penn & Teller episode I decided I’d have a look. As usual with ‘Bullshit!’ you do feel that they may be going a bit OTT but its still interesting watching….
Some great lines in this - ‘those that oppose Globablisation use the tools of it to organise’ and ‘we’re not sure exactly of the numbers of species that go extinct’ (and its great who says that line) being my two personal favourites.
Also, its weird to see people like Bjorn Lomborg who I have already come across in this course. It does point out that plenty of Lomborg’s figure’s are … questionable. Anyway, its worth a look.
The begining of history?
Interesting article here from the BBC website by Sci-fi author Charles Stross - in it he suggests that ‘history has only just begun’ because while we can guess at the ‘wide stuff’ the day to day minute of peoples lives are largely unknown.
His idea? As I can figure it its that with modern technology being what it is future history students may use my blog, facebook and bebo accounts to reconstruct my life (or at least a significant portion of it anyway). Its an interesting idea but I’m not sure if its totally convincing….
My lack of belief lies mainly on the grounds of whether the technology he talks about will ever become fully available and even if it does finding the time to figure it all out would be ridiculous. I mean, in some ways I’m reminded of an issue of Warren Ellis’ future set ‘Transmetropolitan’ comic where the lead character points out that even big business or government groups hardly even bother to hide information becuase the sheer amount of information they release by themselves is nearly impossible to follow and that’s without contextualisation - so even if it Stross’ idea is the right one it may be a case of ‘drought to a flood’…
”Ten Politically Incorrect Truths About Human Nature”
From ‘Psychology Today’ supposed truths about human nature that you won’t hear said too often owing to their un-pc nature. Some of them ring fairly true or at least as being somewhat correct - why men are better off in monogamous societies or why men like thin blonds;
Men prefer young women in part because they tend to be healthier than older women. One accurate indicator of health is physical attractiveness; another is hair. Healthy women have lustrous, shiny hair, whereas the hair of sickly people loses its luster. Because hair grows slowly, shoulder-length hair reveals several years of a woman’s health status.
Men also have a universal preference for women with a low waist-to-hip ratio. They are healthier and more fertile than other women; they have an easier time conceiving a child and do so at earlier ages because they have larger amounts of essential reproductive hormones. Thus men are unconsciously seeking healthier and more fertile women when they seek women with small waists.
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But not all of them ring as true - the claim that ‘men sexually harass women because they are not sexist’ is one that I just can’t follow (whether its just a case of me needing to reread it a few times or whether its a case of it being rubbish I’ll leave you to decide) or the part about what Bill Gates and criminals have in common for example which ends with this paragraph
Women often say no to men. Men have had to conquer foreign lands, win battles and wars, compose symphonies, author books, write sonnets, paint cathedral ceilings, make scientific discoveries, play in rock bands, and write new computer software in order to impress women so that they will agree to have sex with them. Men have built (and destroyed) civilization in order to impress women, so that they might say yes.
which to be honest I don’t fully accept. I do know the logic of it is good, but at the same time I know there’s something wrong with that argument - perhaps its just a feeling that the example is a bit too OTT?Still though, its worth a look.