Planarian Flatworms

 

Invasion of the brain snatchers - Nature of things

Fruits and vegetables, before and after cultivation

Washington Post: Fruits and vegetables used to look so different you might not even recognize them

TOXO A Conversation with Robert Sapolsky

Edge Video: TOXO A Conversation with Robert Sapolsky

Error management theory

Error management theory: Wikipedia

Horizon: Homeopathy - The Test

Horizon: Homeopathy: The Test (2002)


Program Summary found here

Mice Inherit Specific Memories, Because Epigenetics?

"The researchers made mice afraid of a fruity odor, called acetophenone, by pairing it with a mild shock to the foot...Ten days after this fear training, Dias allowed the animals to mate. And that’s where the crazy begins. The offspring (known as the F1 generation) show an increased startle to the fruity smell even when they have never encountered the smell before, and thus have no obvious reason to be sensitive to it. And their reaction is specific: They do not startle to another odor called propanol. Craziest of all, their offspring (the F2 generation) show the same increased sensitivity to acetophenone."



National Geographics: Mice Inherit Specific Memories, Because Epigenetics?

Richard Feynman quote

“ I can live with doubt, and uncertainty, and not knowing. I think it’s much more interesting to live not knowing than to have answers which might be wrong. I have approximate answers, and possible beliefs, and different degrees of certainty about different things, but I’m not absolutely sure of anything, and then many things I don’t know anything about, such as whether it means anything to ask why we’re here, and what the question might mean. I might think about it a little, but if I can’t figure it out, then I go on to something else. But I don’t have to know an answer. I don’t feel frightened by not knowing things, by being lost in a mysterious universe without having any purpose, which is the way it really is, as far as I can tell, possibly. It doesn’t frighten me. ”
                              ~ Richard Feynman; (Born 95 years ago today, May 11, 1918)

Hydrodynamic Levitation!

Place where two oceans meet?

A Facebook friend posted the following intriguing video.


It's a striking video depicting two different colors in a large body of water with a definitive separation between the two. The caption says that it's the place "where two oceans meet but do not mix." This of course doesn't make any sense. The ocean is just one large body of water which humans have subdivided into the five oceans for mapping purposes. So what is actually happening in the video?

In actuality, this has nothing to do with two oceans meeting. A little internet searching led me to this article which explains that it is the result of sediment rich water from glacial rivers pouring into the ocean around the Gulf of Alaska. Here's a small excerpt from the article:

"Glacier rivers in the summertime are like buzzsaws eroding away the mountains there," Bruland said. "In the process, they lift up all this material -- they call it glacial flour -- that can be carried out."

Once these glacial rivers pour out into the larger body of water, they're picked up by ocean currents, moving east to west, and begin to circulate there. This is one of the primary methods that iron -- found in the clay and sediment of the glacial runoff -- is transported to iron-deprived regions in the middle of the Gulf of Alaska.

It's also a falsehood that these two types of water don't mix at all, he said.

"They do eventually mix, but you do come across these really strong gradients at these specific moments in time," he said. Such borders are never static, he added, as they move around and disappear altogether, depending on the level of sediment and the whims of the water.

By Ken Bruland

Here's another video capturing the effect

Tour of the International Space Station

Lo and Behold, Reveries of the Connected World

LO AND BEHOLD: REVERIES OF THE CONNECTED WORLD, is a 2016 documentary by director Werner Herzog which chronicles the virtual world and contemplates its implications for humankind.

How a rebellious scientist uncovered the surprising truth about stereotypes

Interesting article in Quillete about social psychologist Lee Jussim's work on stereotypes, the liberal bias in the field of social psychology and how social justice, rather than discovering truth, has become the fields prime directive.

How a rebellious scientist uncovered the surprising truth about stereotypes

Robot Abuse Parodies

Last month, the robotics company Boston Dynamics released their latest video demonstrating the capabilities of it's two legged robot named Atlas. As with past Boston Dynamics videos, the developers knocked the poor robot around to showcase it's ability to maintain it's balance and deal with obstacles.

Here's the (unedited) video if you haven't seen it yet.



All this bullying has led to a number of funny parodies showing the plight of the robot at the hands of the callously cruel humans. Here are a few of the better ones I've come across.







And if you really want to get take action to stop the abuse check out StopRobotAbuse.Com

The Scale of the Universe

Scale of the Universe

Volcanic Lightning

Last week, Japan's Sakurajima volcano erupted in spectacular fashion with fiery lava pouring down the mountain side and lightning flashing above.

This was enough to prompt me to google volcanic lightning which led to my finding some pretty amazing images.

Puyehue-Cordon Volcano in Chile (2011)
Photo: Carlos Gutierrez

Mount Merapi, Indonesia (2010)
Jeffe Castan

Eyjafjallajokull Volcano, Iceland (2010)
Photo: Sigurdur Hrafn Stefnisson

Eyjafjallajokull Volcano, Iceland (2010)
Photo: Marco Fulle

Mt. Etna, Italy 2015
Photo: Marco Restivo/Demotix/Corbis

Sakurajima, Japan (2013)
Photo: Martin Rietze

Here's a pretty good explanation as to what causes volcanic lightning on EarthSky.com

What's invisible? More than you think - John Lloyd

An interesting and entertaining TED talk with english television producer and writer John Lloyd.

Are babies of twins married to twins twins?

A friend posted on Facebook the above picture with the caption "2 twin brothers married, 2 twin sisters, resulting ..... Identical babies!!!

He commented his skepticism with the question "This can't be legit can it?"

While I don't remember much from my biology classes I do recall that twins can be either fraternal or identical. Fraternal twins are the result of two different eggs that are fertilized by two different sperm cells within the same pregnancy. So essentially they are normal siblings that happen to be born at the same time. Identical twins are the result of a single egg that is fertilized by a single sperm cell to form one zygote which then splits in half. The two halves (embryos) develop into babies that are nearly genetically identical.

The conclusion then to the question posed by my friend is that it is not possible for the babies of identical twin parents to be identically the same since they did not develop from the same embryo. Just as we are different from our older and younger siblings, these babies would also be different. But this leads to an interesting thought. Technically they would be considered first cousins but since their parents are genetically nearly identical to each other, wouldn't that mean that they are genetically siblings?

As strange as it may be, the answer is yes, the children would be as closely related, genetically speaking, as siblings born from the same parents. Below are a couple of articles I found which support this.




ABC Science: Do twins x twins = twins?
Popular Science: If a pair of female identical twins mates with a pair of male identical twins, will their kids also be identical?

Aurora Australis From Space

Cool video of the Aurora Australis created from various images and videos taken from the International Space Station.



NASA ISS : Aurora Australis from space from FullWerks on Vimeo.

Animal Vision

Clip of a new video game which attempts to simulate what it is like to see the world through the eyes of a hawk, cat, dog, bee and rat.


NewScientist