Blah Blah Flowers

Scientific American has an article on the evolutionary history of depression, as the article states, although depression isn't just a problem for the young, surely by now we would have evolved our way away from such problems if they were just brain malfunctions.

So what could be so useful about depression? Depressed people often think intensely about their problems. These thoughts are called ruminations; they are persistent and depressed people have difficulty thinking about anything else. Numerous studies have also shown that this thinking style is often highly analytical. They dwell on a complex problem, breaking it down into smaller components, which are considered one at a time.

This analytical style of thought, of course, can be very productive. Each component is not as difficult, so the problem becomes more tractable. Indeed, when you are faced with a difficult problem, such as a math problem, feeling depressed is often a useful response that may help you analyze and solve it. For instance, in some of our research, we have found evidence that people who get more depressed while they are working on complex problems in an intelligence test tend to score higher on the test.

The snarky side of me suggests that the article is arguing that all mathematicians should immediately be put in mental hospitals before they slit their wrists and that all those scientists who said that quantum theory was 'mindblowing' weren't talking in metaphor. But then six or seven years ago, when I was less of the happy bunny you see before you today, I found writing a lot easier than I do today and that a big mental Iron Curtain of a block has been raised as I developed techniques to either deal with or avoid bouts with the Black Dog. Seeing as Winter is a more difficult time for me I have been pondering doing the opposite of what I do normally and actually follow the habits that tended to lead to depression and see whether it actually has a corresponding increase in my creativity once more. I'm not saying 'great depression is necessary for great art', more like 'a little moodiness is necessary to write piddling little stories'.

Labels: depression, mental health, science

In Douglas Adam's Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency one of the characters was a computer programmer that had developed a program to turn company financial reports into music. Now philosopher Dan Lloyd has developed a computer program to turn brain scans into sound, healthy brains produce quite standard melodies, the brains of people with diagnosed mental conditions goes a bit Cage or Stockhausen-y.

Labels: brain/mind, music, science, the brain

The World Without Technology. Or perhaps, slightly more accurately, 'The History of Technology (Guest-Starring The World Without Technology as an Encore)'. A fascinating essay that's well worth a read.

Labels: science, technology

I don't know if, like me, you were disappointed when the giant Flupocalypse of 2003 didn't wipe out all the life on the planet that had worked out how to get the fire out of the rocks. We weren't prepared, we didn't have enough vaccines, Osama Bin Laden was working out how to teach ducks with a cough to hijack planes, and yet, we survived, we go on, and we wonder whether Joss Whedon will ever make another TV show that goes beyond a series. But don't worry, just because Avian Bird Flu didn't get us, those dirty birds have teamed up with pigs and, it would seem, Mexicans? to give us a new killer virus to worry about. This does lead to the interesting question: Has Michelle Malkin already reached the maximum that she can hate Mexicans or will this enable her to take her racism to new heights? We'll wait and see.

The comments on this article are typical of the great minds of the world vomiting forth into the electro-ether.

I strongly feel that children and elderly people will be at risk from this killer flu the most.

Harpreet, Stafford.

Everyone seems to have decided to ignore the second page of the article, where it says:

Avian flu, which has killed 250 people since 2003

Look at that. The media went batshit-mental back then, convincing us we were all going to die and, like the MMR vaccine scare, it turned out not to be the case. Two hundred and fifty people? That's nothing. Somali pirates have killed more than that, and they bankrupt themselves in millet seed for their parrots. So I see no reason for keeping on keeping on and not worry that we're going to all be killed until, perhaps, people start falling ill?

These medical sounding scares based on absolutely no evidence are one of the many reasons why I don't bother to pay for news any more.

Meanwhile Tory MP Nadine Dorries sues someone over something. Nadine Dorries is a fairly obscure MP only well known to followers of the Westminster soap opera that is the House of Commons for her Sarah Palin-like ability to seize and repeat the stupid in any subject that gets her interest. She's normally pretty quiet between bouts of conservative Christian sponsored attempts to get the date by which a woman can have an abortion put back to eight months before her own birth. I'm not sure if she can successfully sue someone over suggesting to someone else that they spread a rumour she had an affair if they don't do it, even if the only reason they didn't might be because they were revealed to be thinking about it, but her primary reason for this bout of legal action is presumably to keep it in the news as long as possible in the lead up to the next general election. Of course, one doesn't need to tell lies in order to recognise them...

The Sindy has more positive news, namely that the BNP is as equally messed up a party as the proper political groups full of burned-out members who are just bitter and more likely to fight with one another than the vast majority of people who they think shouldn't be in the country. Less comforting is the comments, in which it seems that a cadre of BNP supporters have taken up residence, you might need the Independent Livejournal thread if you want to see them though, they have a tendency to keep vanishing from the 'proper' website.

Labels: abortion, BNP, Conservatives, Fundamentalists- Christian, media, media scares, newspapers, science

Canadian Scientists from Canadia have discovered fossilised evidence of a prehistoric ancestor to the seals of today, an animal that walked on feet. [via Pharyngula] Big deal, we've seen these kind of animals for years now.

Labels: Evolution, humour, science, YouTube

Latest study on déjà vu.

Labels: science, the brain

Meaningless survey! 'When women shop it's using skills their ancestors developed as cave women' nonsense.

The study was commissioned by Manchester Arndale shopping centre.

Aah, I see.

Arndale's business manager, Karl Clawley, said: "It seems our gatherer instincts are coming to the fore and affecting the way we shop in these testing times."

Okay, stop talking now please.

Labels: science, shopping, stupidity

Fairey Obama parody t-shirts and posters for Darwin now available. Hmmm, I wonder what the exchange rate is like these days, much as I'm glad to see the back of Shrubya the one positive thing about his presidency was that one British pound bought several American states. [via Pharyngula]

Labels: Barack Obama, Charles Darwin, Evolution, science

Quadruplets that put on weight after having a son and then a daughter all separately plug a diet involving acai berries and colon cleansing. [via Bad Science]

Labels: scams, science, stupidity

A pictoral history of the Internet. Even if you know the story, it's very prettily told here. [via Grinding]

Labels: internet, science

Having a "good cry" can and usually does allow people to recover some mental balance after a loss. But not always and not for everyone, argues a review article in the current issue of the journal Current Directions in Psychological Science. Placing such high expectation on a tearful breakdown most likely sets some people up for emotional confusion afterward.

That's < sniff > really sad news...

Labels: emotions, science

Have physicists finally worked out how the universe started, not with a bang but a bounce?

Labels: science

Cool science! By using video goggles and tactile stimulation scientists were able to fool people into believing that mannequins and the bodies of other people were actually their own.

I don't know why but this really interests me. Still...

Dr Ehrsson said that the findings could be used to create new therapies for people with abnormal body image, as well as to confront bigotry by allowing people to identify with people of different races and sexes. It could also be used to improve robotics technology and even virtual reality video games.

What's the betting this becomes something to add on to your Wii before it makes it to be something actually beneficial?

Labels: science

If you want to be reassured that the Large Hadron Collider hasn't destroyed the world yet, even though it's not going to be used until next year, check the LHC webcams.

Labels: humour, science

So the Large Hadron Collider didn't destroy the world in an infinitesimally small chance of creating a black hole. Well, that's just terrific. That means we're still left with hoodies, the ruined housing market and brown people on the street. Aah, Daily Mail readers, not about to let their stupidity get in the way of displaying their ignorance.

Labels: Daily Mail, science, stupidity

How smart is the octopus? [via Pharyngula]

Labels: animals, intelligence, science

Religious belief means you are stupid. To be fair to God-botherers I would humbly suggest that the kind of belief where you believe something is true because someone wrote it down in a very old book and there's no way to actually test this, AND YOU ACCEPT THIS AS A PERFECTLY VALID WAY TO BEHAVE IN YOUR DEALINGS WITH OTHERS, is the sign of room temperature IQs.

Labels: religion, science

Nanotechnology will kill us all! Though only if you write articles for the Daily Mail and so don't understand science.

Labels: Daily Mail, science, stupidity

Just about to head out for my secular, non-religious, Christ-hatingz, X-Massss, pausing only to point in a disbelieving manner at this enormous festering bubo of an article in which some fuckwit of a unicycling doctor states (or, in my best Bad Science manner, is reported to believe ) that humour comes from testosterone, because women encouraged him in his unicyclery and men told him he was an arsehole.

"The difference between the men and women was absolutely remarkable and consistent," said Professor Shuster. "At 11-13 years, the boys began to get really aggressive. Into puberty, the aggression became more marked, then it changed into a form of joke. The men were snide." The initial aggressive intent seems to become channelled into a more subtle and sophisticated joke, so the aggression is hidden by wit, explained Professor Shuster.

It's nothing to do with men being correct in thinking you're an arsehole?

Aaah Christmas, I see that the well of real news has been blocked. If I don't see you first, have a great time. I'm off out to try and persuade the Sun to come back.

Labels: science, stupidity

Women prefer sad stories if they are real, men like them if they aren't.

Labels: science