"I'd like to share a revelation that I've had during my time here," Agent Smith tells Morpheus in The Matrix. "It came to me when I tried to classify your species and I realized that you're not actually mammals. ... You move to an area and you multiply and multiply until every natural resource is consumed and the only way you can survive is to spread to another area. There is another organism on this planet that follows the same pattern. Do you know what it is? A virus." It's a memorable speech, but it turns out not to … [Read more...] about Science Corner — Let There Be Peace Between Man and Virus
Science
Science Corner: Which bird gets the LEGO worm?
The tiny worm Caenorhabditis elegans has been a boon to science. Adult worms have a consistent number of cells, and we have been able to work out where each one comes from during the developmental process. They also have a consistent set of neurons, and the way that they connect to each other has been mapped out as well. So, naturally, someone reproduced those connections in a software simulation and got that running on a LEGO Mindstorm robot kit. The robot sensors were set up to correspond to certain sensory inputs on … [Read more...] about Science Corner: Which bird gets the LEGO worm?
Science Corner: Problem? What Problem?
You know how Wile E. Coyote can run in midair, as long as he doesn't realize he has gone past the edge of the cliff? We've probably all had a moment when we've hoped a problem would go away if we just didn't acknowledge the problem existed. A new study might have shed some light on what situations are most likely to elicit this kind of denial. A correlation was observed between disliking or objecting to the solution and rejecting an assertion that a problem exists. … [Read more...] about Science Corner: Problem? What Problem?
Science Corner: Name that Everything!
For this week, I couldn't choose between a pair of items about science as exploration of the unknown, so I didn't. First, an essay on the value of pushing past the boundaries of what is known, even when mistakes are made. I'd probably make that point even stronger than the essay did. Negative results are valuable in science, a reality that isn't always appreciated in a culture where winning and losing is the lens through which we view every endeavor. Even when Eddington and Hoyle were wrong, they were giving us language … [Read more...] about Science Corner: Name that Everything!
Science in Review: I Think I Can, I Think I Can’t
"The Little Engine That Could" is a popular children's tale, clearly intended to impart a lesson about the power of positive thinking. Through self-encouragement, a small locomotive is able to pull a train up a tall, steep mountain he originally believed to be insurmountable. If you just believe hard enough, kids, you can do anything! The physics of the story may be a bit dubious, although it is plausible that the work required to haul that train up that track is near the rated limits of the locomotive, allowing for … [Read more...] about Science in Review: I Think I Can, I Think I Can’t