Science, research and technology links
Made me laugh: Dante’s Internet.
Ms Eleven argues for why she should get a laptop.
About beer and the rise of civilisation.
A nice rant on energy drinks, with a recipe for a healthy energy drink.
Study finds that “pre-flight” style surgery checklists save lives.
Nice presentation on different cultural attitudes to time.
Post with link to a paper on how the internet is changing publication of research.
Antimatter atoms have been trapped for the first time.
Looking at cognitive biases for regulators.
Trying to track down cliometric data on whether ancient cities were demographic sinks (i.e. death rates higher than birth rates).
Group of scholars about social collapses in history being slow, rather than sudden, phenomena.
About issues with looking at life expectancy data.
Evidence that culture matters for trust.
Google™ successfully sued for “defamation by algorithm”.
Study suggests a volcanic eruption 40,000 years ago severely restricted Neanderthal numbers.
Marriage and divorce rates vary a lot by occupation.
About a study which suggests how you think about your diet and exercise affects where and how any weight loss occurs. Nutrition professor loses weight (and gets healthier) on a counting-calories junk food diet.
Study suggests that increasing freedom increases happiness. Really nice piece on the science of well-being and being honest about the data.
Looking at Attention Deficit Disorder as a problem of controlling attention.
Examining the effects of different gender parenting combinations on children:
The gender of parents correlates in novel ways with parent-child relationships but has minor significance for children's psychological adjustment and social success.
Gay actor John Barrowman (“Captain Jack”) is having his brain mapped.
Why uploading your mind is not going to happen anytime soon.
Examining the moral psychology of libertarians.
About thorium as a possible cheap energy source.
About three quarters of the oil spilled into the Gulf of Mexico is now gone.
Proposing more broadband coverage for a lot less. The open letter on the proposal.
Sexual hook-ups can lead to long-term relationships. Examining what different genders and racial groups express in interests and dating preferences. Arguing women are more culturally sensitive than men when it comes for marriage partners:
The sex difference in race preference in the dating literature seems relatively robust. …
In other words, women aren’t being shallow at all, race is an excellent proxy for all sorts of social-cultural variates which might effect the outcomes of a relationship success, and also the fullness of life which their offspring may experience. Women are then in this model being prudent by using a coarse variate, race, as a proxy for the multi-textured reality of how race is lived in America, and how it matters deeply in the lives of human beings.
About medical and biological basis of race. Arguing for a particular understanding of race. A response:
But race mainly matters because people think it matters and because language and culture do matter for interactions while language and culture have some (often, but not always, quite strong) association with ethnicity and thus race. But language and culture are a lot more plastic over time than ethnicity which is a lot more plastic over time than race. So, even conceding the sensible bits in Sailer, race is not what one should be concerned with for moral judgment, for public policy (outside some medical applications) and so on.
US study finds that nearly one-in-five gay men in the US are infected with HIV: more than a quarter of black gay men. Study has tried to trace how HIV emerged from central Africa: doctors re-using needles and prostitution are suggested vectors. About the success of Dubya’s AIDS initiative in Africa:
(c) America’s efforts are helping to create a remarkable shifts in how, in Africa, boys view girls - reflected in a decline of more than 50 percent in sexual partners among boys.
… But in Africa, gender violence and abuse is involved in the first sexual encounter up to 85 percent of time. And where President Bush’s PEPFAR initiative has been particularly effective is in slowing the transmission of the disease from mothers to children. …
President Bush’s policies were animated by the belief that the way to save lives was to rely on the principle of accountability. That is what was transformational about Bush’s development effort. He rejected handing out money with no strings attached in favor of tying expenditures to reform and results. And it has had huge radiating effects. When PEPFAR was started, America was criticized by others for setting goals. Now the mantra around the world is “results-based development.”
… (A recent Stanford study found that PEPFAR was responsible for saving the lives of more than a million Africans in just its first three years.)
Ms Eleven argues for why she should get a laptop.
About beer and the rise of civilisation.
A nice rant on energy drinks, with a recipe for a healthy energy drink.
Study finds that “pre-flight” style surgery checklists save lives.
Nice presentation on different cultural attitudes to time.
Post with link to a paper on how the internet is changing publication of research.
Antimatter atoms have been trapped for the first time.
Looking at cognitive biases for regulators.
Trying to track down cliometric data on whether ancient cities were demographic sinks (i.e. death rates higher than birth rates).
Group of scholars about social collapses in history being slow, rather than sudden, phenomena.
About issues with looking at life expectancy data.
Evidence that culture matters for trust.
Google™ successfully sued for “defamation by algorithm”.
Study suggests a volcanic eruption 40,000 years ago severely restricted Neanderthal numbers.
Marriage and divorce rates vary a lot by occupation.
About a study which suggests how you think about your diet and exercise affects where and how any weight loss occurs. Nutrition professor loses weight (and gets healthier) on a counting-calories junk food diet.
Study suggests that increasing freedom increases happiness. Really nice piece on the science of well-being and being honest about the data.
Looking at Attention Deficit Disorder as a problem of controlling attention.
Examining the effects of different gender parenting combinations on children:
The gender of parents correlates in novel ways with parent-child relationships but has minor significance for children's psychological adjustment and social success.
Gay actor John Barrowman (“Captain Jack”) is having his brain mapped.
Why uploading your mind is not going to happen anytime soon.
Examining the moral psychology of libertarians.
About thorium as a possible cheap energy source.
About three quarters of the oil spilled into the Gulf of Mexico is now gone.
Proposing more broadband coverage for a lot less. The open letter on the proposal.
Sexual hook-ups can lead to long-term relationships. Examining what different genders and racial groups express in interests and dating preferences. Arguing women are more culturally sensitive than men when it comes for marriage partners:
The sex difference in race preference in the dating literature seems relatively robust. …
In other words, women aren’t being shallow at all, race is an excellent proxy for all sorts of social-cultural variates which might effect the outcomes of a relationship success, and also the fullness of life which their offspring may experience. Women are then in this model being prudent by using a coarse variate, race, as a proxy for the multi-textured reality of how race is lived in America, and how it matters deeply in the lives of human beings.
About medical and biological basis of race. Arguing for a particular understanding of race. A response:
But race mainly matters because people think it matters and because language and culture do matter for interactions while language and culture have some (often, but not always, quite strong) association with ethnicity and thus race. But language and culture are a lot more plastic over time than ethnicity which is a lot more plastic over time than race. So, even conceding the sensible bits in Sailer, race is not what one should be concerned with for moral judgment, for public policy (outside some medical applications) and so on.
US study finds that nearly one-in-five gay men in the US are infected with HIV: more than a quarter of black gay men. Study has tried to trace how HIV emerged from central Africa: doctors re-using needles and prostitution are suggested vectors. About the success of Dubya’s AIDS initiative in Africa:
(c) America’s efforts are helping to create a remarkable shifts in how, in Africa, boys view girls - reflected in a decline of more than 50 percent in sexual partners among boys.
… But in Africa, gender violence and abuse is involved in the first sexual encounter up to 85 percent of time. And where President Bush’s PEPFAR initiative has been particularly effective is in slowing the transmission of the disease from mothers to children. …
President Bush’s policies were animated by the belief that the way to save lives was to rely on the principle of accountability. That is what was transformational about Bush’s development effort. He rejected handing out money with no strings attached in favor of tying expenditures to reform and results. And it has had huge radiating effects. When PEPFAR was started, America was criticized by others for setting goals. Now the mantra around the world is “results-based development.”
… (A recent Stanford study found that PEPFAR was responsible for saving the lives of more than a million Africans in just its first three years.)