Me, 10am: I didn’t sleep well and I still have the headache I had last night and my nose is stuffy and I have cramps and a backache and I have skinless patches of psoriasis in spots where it’s very awkward not to have any skin and there’s a big pile of laundry and waaaaah, it’s too early to start drinking isn’t it?
Him: Yes.
[pause]
Him: But it’s not too early for drugs.
There were other incidents, too; so many incidents. Every one underscored the message that I wasn’t safe, that I deserved whatever was coming to me, because I was young and a woman and that was how it was and also I should appreciate it. I tried to look unapproachable, but I don’t think my face works that way; I just looked sad and then men barked at me to cheer up, to give them a smile. I wanted to look hard and angry. Lord knows I wanted to be intimidating. It just didn’t work.
These days I feel like I’m off the hook. Like I’m free. I still do want to be intimidating, though. There are days when I want to be terrifying.
What began as a physical problem has given rise to novel spiritual rituals in many Asian cities. In the February issue of Urban Studies, Lily Kong, a geographer at the National University of Singapore, describes how commemorative practices in Hong Kong, Taiwan, and China have changed in response to shrinking amounts of physical space for the dead.
Here’s the big finding: in the placebo group of 1174 patients, the people who took all of their placebo pills on time (the good adherers), were significantly less likely to die than the patients who missed lots of doses. People who took over 75% as directed were 40% less likely to die than those with less than 75% adherence:
In those very rare cases when sex-related cardiac death occurs, it’s almost always in men and mostly in those who are having extramarital sex, in most cases with a younger partner in an unfamiliar setting and/or after excessive food and alcohol consumption.
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Jonathan Coulton is wise. http://www.jonathancoulton.com/2012/01/21/megaupload/ (via neil-gaiman)
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Scientists from the University of Guelph, Canada have used thermal imaging cameras to record how Asian elephants at the Busch Gardens zoological park in Florida, US handle the heat
Answer: at night they use their trunks to help disperse the heat.
26 residents of Tübingen (who had lived in Tübingen for at least two years) were put into a virtual-reality headset and seated in a chair that didn’t allow them to swivel. Participants found themselves in the virtual three-dimensional photorealistic model of their hometown, at locations familiar to them, surrounded by fog masking all but the near distance. Then they had to point to an invisible location — say, the main gate of the university or the fire station. The scenes changed, and so did the participant’s spatial orientation. After 60 three-location trials, participants were asked to draw a map of the town including all the locations they’d pointed to. The results: Although participants drew differently oriented maps, everyone performed most accurately when facing north and got worse the further they deviated from north. The only explanation the researchers could figure was that they’d all seen, and internalized, a map of Tübingen at some point, and Western maps are all oriented the same way — north on top.
The perspective that behavior is often driven by unconscious determinants has become widespread in social psychology. Bargh, Chen, and Burrows’ (1996) famous study, in which participants unwittingly exposed to the stereotype of age walked slower when exiting the laboratory, was instrumental in defining this perspective. Here, we present two experiments aimed at replicating the original study. Despite the use of automated timing methods and a larger sample, our first experiment failed to show priming. Our second experiment was aimed at manipulating the beliefs of the experimenters: Half were led to think that participants would walk slower when primed congruently, and the other half was led to expect the opposite. Strikingly, we obtained a walking speed effect, but only when experimenters believed participants would indeed walk slower. This suggests that both priming and experimenters’ expectations are instrumental in explaining the walking speed effect. Further, debriefing was suggestive of awareness of the primes. We conclude that unconscious behavioral priming is real, while real, involves mechanisms different from those typically assumed to cause the effect.
Three hundred years ago, a surgeon claimed elephants had six toes instead of the usual five, setting off a debate about whether an extra digit was really possible. Modern anatomists scoffed at the idea, insisting instead that the extra toe was really just a big lump of cartilage. Now a study of scores of elephant feet shows that the lump really does turn into bone. The digit is not a true toe — it’s more like a panda’s faux thumb. But it nonetheless helps support the pachyderm’s mighty girth.
One group of 6 men ate Gemini-type diet (S) and another received a bland formula (F), for 42 days. Breath and rectal gases were analyzed during the first and final weeks. Flatus gases varied widely within dietary groups but much more gas was generated with diet S than with F.
The diagram in this is wonderful.
Granted, it seems… impractical. Over the course of one night, St. Nick has to stop by the home of every Christian child in the world. Of which there are a lot – an indeterminately large number of kids waiting for their gifts.
I decided to figure out how many, how big a task Mr. Claus faces as he races west across the face of the globe, staying ahead of the sun. And I did. Or, anyway, I came up with a pretty solid estimate.
You can try the experiment at home (without grievous bodily harm). Take your favorite motor oil (I prefer 5W30) at room temperature and fill a small pail. Motor oil at room temperature should have a density of ~920 kg/m3 and viscosity of ~1 Pa-s – this will be your lava. Cut a little fellow out of styrofoam. It has a density of ~300 kg/m3, so it is roughly 1/3 the density of the oil. Now, position your Styroguy on the edge and push him in. Does he sink instantly into the oil? No! So, neither should you in you fall into lava. Now, Stryoguy didn’t get the full effect by then proceeding into bursting into flames, which would be your bonus for falling into lava — remember, most of the red-hot lava pictures in movies like likely basaltic lava at ~1,100 to 1,200°C (for comparison, your oven on broil is ~275°C). However, if you’re already in a position to fall into lava, you had it coming.
The rule says that when a tree’s trunk splits into two branches, the total cross section of those secondary branches will equal the cross section of the trunk. If those two branches in turn each split into two branches, the area of the cross sections of the four additional branches together will equal the area of the cross section of the trunk. And so on.
The answer has to do with wind, apparently. Interesting!
Exfoliating belugas!
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This is a picture I did not take of a man in his late 50s in a beat-up burgundy car with all the windows down, driving down Bloor Street on a warm November afternoon belting out Rod Stewart’s Maggie May with great feeling and much volume, slightly out of tune.
I absentmindedly pick up and throw out loose elastic bands, thanks to my old cat Tigr, who ate them (elastic bands are not good for cats).
I never leave Swiss Chalet undefended on the kitchen counter, thanks to our old cat Oliver who was a fierce, fierce predator of all things Swiss Chalet.
I put my slippers on a high shelf when I take them off so Elwood can’t bite through the drawstrings, and I pick up plastic bags left on the floor so Elwood can’t pee on them (he had a serious fondness for piddling on plastic).
All these cats are gone, but I’ll probably be doing all these things until I’m 90.
We are, or at least I am, a creature of habit.
They’ve been sitting there greenly for several weeks now and I was starting to lose hope that they’d ever turn red. Of course, they’re finally doing so at a very inopportune time.
They’re so pretty! I wish I liked them. I’ll enjoy feeding them to the rest of the family, though.
