Show Notes for TWS119: We Are All Made Up Of What We Give Others
On the show this week:
- Records, Numbers and Statistics Count For Something
- Built For Sharing
- Apocalypses, Both Big And Small
- The Rest of the Universe (EXTRA)
This week’s Challenge Question:
Given that human perception is apparently limited to what we need to survive — no X-ray vision, no infrared, no ultraviolet, no sound visualization (although you might argue that’s what our ear does..) and no radiation vision — but the universe has more beyond what we can see, does the universe hold surprises that we just don’t perceive? And will we ever perceive the rest of the universe?
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Full links to all stories covered and many more after the jump!
- Theme Song: Caffeine by Grubspoon from The Podsafe Music Network
- Promo: The House Of Grey — When you don’t remember who you are, the world is not that stable, either. A tale of mystery and magic in a slightly alternate present.
- Records, Numbers and Statistics Count For Something
- They say that practice makes perfect. This one might be a counter-example.. – Indy.com: Married, for the record
- I think this makes her bulletproof at this point.. – The UK Telegraph: World’s most pierced woman adds to her collection
- EXTRA: I keep thinking: I should put golf balls in trees to create new trophies. Good business! Then I remember that I can’t afford golf balls, let alone trees and a dozen years.. – EDP24: Golf ball found embedded in tree trunk
- EXTRA: Um.. They must have driven while the ice covered the ocean, I guess.. – Ananova: Family of five drive 21,000 miles to Australia
- EXTRA: I smell a commercial.. A big, smelly, fishy commercial.. – Ananova: Missing mobile found inside fish
- Is this the last, great artistic building now that we are all afraid of money? – Ananova: House of 1,000 windows
- Sightings are up dramatically, yet still very bulletproof evidence. Keep searching the skies, folks: eventually, we’ll be right! – The Canadian Press: Record number of Canadians report UFO sightings in 2008
- Curious as to where the UFOs are visiting in the US? No general pattern that I noticed, other than “there are more sightings where there are more people”. – Popular Mechanics: U.S. Map of the Top UFO Hotspots and How to Report a Sighting
- Turns out, it’s all special lightning from thunderstorms. UFOs without thunderstorms, you ask? Well, if you use this explanation, that can’t happen.. – LiveScience: Natural Explanation Found for UFOs
- EXTRA: From what I’m seeing, it seems to me that lightning looks pretty much like you’d expect it to.. Still, we understand it so little, at least most of us do. – USA Today: High-speed video captures the nuts and bolts of lightning
- If its the politicians who we blame for being “in the know” and yet not “transparent”, why do we not listen when they actually *try* to tell us information? – The Globe and Mail: Former defence minister says UFO proof ‘irrefutable’
- EXTRA: UFO sightings are often claimed to either be military aircraft or about military aircraft. It’s not *whether* they are keeping secrets and experimenting on far-out tech — it’s *which* tech they are experimenting with.. – The UFO Examiner: UFOs ‘buzz’ two U.S. military bases
- EXTRA: Reasonable advice to take when you see something — or a piece that will make you automatically self-doubt your sighting into oblivion? Granted: the scientific method always assumes, first and foremost, that you are wrong.. – Popular Mechanics: What to do Before You Report a UFO
- EXTRA: Turns out, if you sell oranges, you can make life better. – Ananova: Student’s future is orange
- EXTRA: It’s impressive how quickly the notion of remote, Internet based hunting went from scifi concept to actual practice that needs laws against it. It won’t be long before all wars are conducted this way.. – MSNBC/AP: Wyoming Senate votes to end Internet hunting
- Built For Sharing
- Turns out that “sociable!” might have as much to do with your genes as your beer.. – New Scientist: Rare syndrome points to sociability gene
- Einstein saw it with numbers and equations; modern scientists see it with expensive machines; but could everyday eyes see it? – The Physics arXiv Blog: Human eye could detect spooky action at a distance
- EXTRA: I think they call this phenomena GROPING FOR AN ANALOGY, which is a practice I endulge in far too frequently.. ๐ – New Scientist: How camels could explain quantum uncertainty
- It’s more just confirmation than groundbreaking here: music stimulates the brain, music and memory are related. – ScienceDaily: Brain Hub That Links Music, Memory And Emotion Discovered
- I think I was dreaming when I discussed this story; whatever I was, it wasn’t coherent.. – ScienceDaily: When Dreaming Is Believing: Dreams Affect People’s Judgment, Behavior
- EXTRA: Turns out, the world is just too messed up to understand.. I think I could use some chaos filters of my own.. – New Scientist: Chaos filter helps robots make sense of the world
- The “brightside” gene is probably a myth perpetrated by those that have it. I don’t have it, therefore it doesn’t exist. ๐ – The UK Guardian: Psychologists find gene that helps you look on the bright side of life
- EXTRA: Sometimes, I think I understand — even from an intellectual, evolutionary point of view. Sometimes, I think I understand too well.. – New Scientist: Why do some people kill themselves?
- Where do you draw the line between preserving knowledge and abusing controls? – The UK Telegraph: India moves to patent yoga poses in bid to protect traditional knowledge
- EXTRA: Um.. Isn’t this obvious? I mean, why do you think that we say that something is done “in poor taste”? – New Scientist: Did aversion to bitter tastes evolve into moral disgust?
- Forget wishing for a pony, this is *much* cooler.. – Stuff/The Dominion Post: Mermaid dream comes true thanks to Weta
- EXTRA: Turns out, if you can observe fossils still trapped in the stone (rather than digging them out, taking them back to a lab environment nothing like where they were found), you might learn more about them. Actually, the cool part of this story is to think of it as first, lurching steps toward a tricorder.. – ScienceDaily: X-rays Used To Reveal Secrets Of Famous ‘Dinobird’ Fossil
- Is this for real? The pictures all look fake, but the explanations seem plausible. Are we being hoodwinked, or does something this bizarre really exist? And when are they firing up their spaceship and leaving? ๐ – MSNBC/LiveScience: Strange fish has a see-through head
- Imagine yourself on a boat in a river, with catfish companions and bat-guano walls.. – BBC: Diary: New Guinea’s secret species
- In a way, it’s basic science: they’ve got a theory, they’re testing it. So what if the theory is more folk wisdom than lab smarts? – NewsDaily: Florida tests using magnets to repel crocodiles
- If you want to give religous rights to anyone claiming religion, can you discriminate? – The Billings Gazette: Satanist inmate sues county
- EXTRA: I *think* they really mean “we’ve found a gene which controls teeth growth”, as all things grown on the body have to be ultimately controlled by genes (although influenced by environment). Or maybe I should look closer at Sheldrake’s “morphic resonance”? – BBC: Gene could allow lab-grown teeth
- EXTRA: I think that anything, taken to excess, is ultimately unhealthy. Except maybe sleep… – BBC: Game consoles ’cause skin sores’
- EXTRA: It was a typo — although I’m still not sure why it was typed in the first place.. – The UK Telegraph: Firm apologises to blind man for calling him ‘Mr BlindMan’
- Apparently, she’s been pulling her hair out over him.. – Ananova: Hairy problem
- You know that old saying “wearing a hair shirt”? It’s actually pretty soft.. – Ananova: Woman makes clothes out of her hair
- Apocalypses, Both Big And Small
- How’s that saying go? “Pay attention to the future: that’s where you’ll spend the rest of your lives.” – New Scientist: How to survive the coming century
- EXTRA: Hey, he’s not to blame! He was high at the time.. ๐ – The UK Telegraph: Cannabis grower caught by police after posting video of crop on YouTube
- EXTRA: Moral of the story? Um. Maybe: sometimes you have to let go of the little pursuits and consider the big picture? – The UK Telegraph: Woman fell to her death while chasing a feather
- Trying to predict the future is often about the outlook of the present, rather than the actual likelihood of what will happen. Is there a potential for dire consequences as the world changes? Sure! But it will still be remarkably slow, I suspect, like the dribbling of glass (it’s a slow liquid, don’t you know?). – Yahoo!/AP: Mass migrations and war: Dire climate scenario
- EXTRA: It was the multiple parking tickets that is the real story here. Humans are just not observant, when we do the same thing over and over and over and over.. – The Gainesville Sun: Body in car identified as Gainesville engineer
- EXTRA: Sometimes, you have to appeal to authority. – Ananova: School bus driver takes kids to cops
- EXTRA: They left out “in church” from the title. Hey: it’s not like “though shalt not stab your kid with a knife in the butt” is all that explicitly mentioned anywhere in the commandments.. In fact, isn’t there something about honouring your mother and father? Blind obedience to tradition is the upper ground here! – Ananova: Dad stabbed son’s bum in hat row
- EXTRA: Funny, I don’t see all those firefighters also being suspended.. – Ananova: SWAT team suspended over nude photos
- EXTRA: Don’t tell them about the spicy food I tend to make, then; it might be classed as a WMD… – The UK Telegraph: Biohazard officers investigate HP Sauce spill
- It’s generally accepted that a rock hit the Earth and flattened the dinosaurs, but at least most of the rest didn’t die in fire. Or is that better? – Yahoo!/ANI: ‘Dino-killing’ meteorite did not start global wildfires 65 million years ago
- EXTRA: At least he wasn’t wearing them.. – The UK Telegraph: Man tried to smuggle snakes out of Australia in suitcase
- EXTRA: The joke is: it was a real worm. Ew.. – Ananova: Worm causes computer crash
- While in principle I wholeheartedly agree with the ethic that suggests that we get actively involved in the programming of the matrix of our reality, I can’t help but wonder if malicious individuals will unleash a new level of malware unto the world… (Of course, that suggests even more strongly that the creation of white-hat eco-hackers is very important.) – New Scientist: Hacking the planet: The only climate solution left?
- EXTRA: I didn’t see any Hugh Briss or Kat House on the list, tho’.. – Ananova: Britain’s funniest names
- EXTRA: Conversely, if you can force yourself to barrel through any description, are you a risk-taker? Or do you overcome your fears? – ScienceDaily: If It’s Hard To Say, It Must Be Risky
- EXTRA: Turns out, our fears are all based on a lack of education. It has nothing to do with creepy, crawly, hairy, icky, multi-eyed, sinister, sneaky, multi-legged, gracefully confident bugs. – The UK Telegraph: Zoo launches ‘spiderphobia’ course
- EXTRA: Not being able to accurately trust your own judgement would seem to logically lead to fear of that judgement.. Although it’s likely multiple causes, rather than all explained by one. – New Scientist: Fear of heights linked to vertical perception
- I really should have sought out a funner degree.. – Ananova: College launches two year surfing course
- EXTRA: Is this patronizing, empathizing or just publicizing? – Ananova: Worcester to twin with Gaza City
- EXTRA: Floating mats of life are in the Great Lakes. Remind me never to drown there — it is likely an eternal prison like Rly’eh.. – LiveScience: Odd Life Found in Great Lakes
- EXTRA: Everybody jokes about doing this, but it might just save the future.. – The UK Telegraph: Hamsters in jackets harnessed for energy
- EXTRA: What is going “boom” along the Mississippi? Pranks? Pocket universe implosions? Teleportation experiments? ๐ – MyFox9.com: Mysterious Explosions
- EXTRA: While you might be tempted to call the child “feral”, it sounds like the parent was more of a brutish animal.. – The UK Daily Mail: Girl, 3, raised by dogs in her home after her alcoholic mother neglected her
- EXTRA: Apparently his eyes glow too. Ah, how I miss the Weekly World News… – The UK Sun: Cat-boy can see in the dark
- EXTRA: No, not *recently*! Although “camel ribs” *may* have just been added to some local menus.. – LiveScience: Ice Age Camels Butchered in Colorado
- EXTRA: Turns out, having a contest of mistresses might just drive some people nuts. Plan ahead. – CNN: Chinese mistress contest takes tragic turn
- EXTRA: Ok, can we reveal the likely truth: his application was denied.. – Ananova: Bush turns down job at DIY store
- The Rest of the Universe (EXTRA)
- EXTRA: Now that’s just mean.. and disgusting. – BBC: Accused ‘doused chips with urine’
- EXTRA: “Dark Matter” seems like the universal explanation these days, but since it has yet to be observed, either directly or indirectly, we might as well blame the Easter bunny.. – Discovery News: Dark Energy to Erase Big Bang’s Fading Signal
- EXTRA: Yay! The US is going back to the moon! Do you suppose us Canadians might tag along? – New Scientist: Obama backs Moon return in NASA budget
- EXTRA: Why does something go from solid to liquid? What does “solid” or “liquid” *mean*, anyway? Sometimes, its the things tha are right in front of us that we understand the least.. – ScienceDaily: Materials Science Mystery Of ‘Hidden Order’ Solved: How A New Phase Arises And Why
- EXTRA: Apparently, there are fantastic treasures buried *everywhere* around the pyramids that no one had bothered to look for; this was found within *inches* of the surface of the sand. (Wow – they have sand like we have snow! ;)) – MSNBC/Reuters: Ancient statue found buried at Egypt pyramids
- EXTRA: It sounds like it was just the cheap knockoff early version of a sarcophagus, but I seem to recall that wood was actually quite scarce in that area — making this perhaps very opulant. – Yahoo!/Reuters: Wooden sarcophaguses found in Egypt tomb
- EXTRA: Turns out, the lines discovered on Google Maps in the water are just “processing errors” and “an artifact of the scanning process”. Reality is even more editted than you might realize.. – The UK Daily Mail: Atlantis revealed at last… or just a load of old Googles?
- EXTRA: The trouble with Google Earth is it is top-down, and the perspective leads to optical illusions. Although, be careful of dismissing all things as optical illusions… – Ananova: Flying saucer ‘spotted on Google Earth’
- EXTRA: It amazes me that people still sail there — and still get stuck there. And that people think it is just a myth. – BBC: Pair rescued in Bermuda Triangle
- EXTRA: At least they didn’t just *over* the car.. – The Lancashire Telegraph: Darwen road’s tarmac is laid AROUND car!
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