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anonymous

Why did nearly all life on Earth die 250 million years ago? - 0 views

io9.com/...arth-die-250-million-years-ago

longnow layscience

shared by anonymous on 11 Jun 10 - Cached
  • Among paleontologists, it's sometimes called the "Great Dying." Roughly a quarter of a billion years ago, 90-95 percent of all life on Earth died out. It took 30 million years for the planet to recover. What happened?
  • The era before the Great Dying - also known as the Permo-Triassic Extinction - is called the Permian, and it was a time of rapid animal evolution, including mammal-reptile hybrids called synapsids that looked sort of like giant lizards - some even had big sails on their backs.
  • there were actually three die-offs during the Permian, but the one at the end of the Permian and the beginning of the Triassic, 250 million years ago, was extreme.
  • ...5 more annotations...
  • Put another way: It's likely that 9 out of 10 marine species and 7 out of 10 land species went extinct.
  • So you've got massive volcanic eruptions, spewing tons of sulfur and greenhouse gas into the atmosphere. Billowing clouds cut plants off from life-giving light, and acid rain pours from the skies. The ozone layer is shredded. Then you've got this major asteroid impact, whose heat is so intense that it ignites forests. The burning trees release carbon dioxide and other toxins. The end result? A long-term transformation in the Earth's climate, similar to what environmentalists predict in a worst-case scenario for our near future if we continue to burn fossil fuels and release other toxins. Carbon dioxide levels rise, oxygen levels fall, and animals and plants die off by the millions.
  • Not all scientists agree that the asteroid impact caused the volcanic eruptions. Whether the volcanoes or the asteroid came first, it's certain that the Great Dying was caused by the buildup of carbon dioxide both in the sea and on land.
  • What does the Great Dying tell us about our place in Earth's current ecosystem? Most importantly it reminds us that our existence is short, contingent, and precarious.
  • More specifically, the Permo-Triassic extinction event proves that climate change caused by greenhouse gasses can kill nearly every creature on the planet.
anonymous

Pandora's Seed - 0 views

seedmagazine.com/...pandoras_seed

layscience longnow

shared by anonymous on 07 Jun 10 - Cached
  • From obesity to chronique fatigue syndrome, jihadism to urban ennui, the costs of civilization are becoming ever more apparent. Spencer Wells explores adapting to a world where accelerating change is the new status quo.
  • Everywhere there is a feeling that the world is in flux, that we are on the brink of a historic transition, and that the world will be fundamentally changed somehow in the next few generations.
  • Trying to imagine what the world will be like at the close of the 21st century is nearly impossible.
  • ...15 more annotations...
  • Is there some sort of fatal mismatch between western culture and our biology that is making us ill? And if there is such a mismatch, how did our present culture come to dominate? Surely we are the masters of our own fate, and we created the culture that is best suited to us, rather than the other way around?
  • It turns out that early farmers were actually less healthy than the surrounding hunter-gatherer populations. So why did the farmers ‘win’ so resoundingly, to the extent that virtually no one on Earth today lives as a hunter-gatherer?
  • necessity is the mother of invention.
  • It is likely that we have changed more at the DNA level in the past 10,000 years than we did in the previous 100,000.
  • As we settled down into farming villages, and then towns and cities, society became more complicated. Hunter-gatherers, having fewer people in their groups, tend to have fairly simple and egalitarian social structures. A chief perhaps, but certainly not a specialized bureaucracy, a professional army, a priesthood and other trappings of what we call civilization.
  • The existence of these things is a direct outcome of the decision to settle down and start growing food.
  • ow can a species that spent almost all of its evolutionary history adapting to hunting and gathering in small, fairly dispersed groups learn to cope with the challenges posed by this relatively new culture?
  • The first is the growing power of genetic engineering.
  • unlike other technologies that have witnessed explosive growth over the past couple of decades, from computers to nanotechnology, the applications of genetics have the potential to affect the biological identity of future generations, through our ability to choose the traits our children – and all subsequent generations – will carry.
  • The second enormous challenge that we need to face as a result of the events set in motion 10,000 years ago with the development of agriculture is climate change.
  • The final significant challenge, unlike the other two, is not fundamentally technological in nature, though some of the solutions will likely involve the application of technology. We have now evolved culturally to the point where the entire world is connected in a way it has never been before.
  • For secular rationality, read loss of faith and certainty. For improving living standards, read increased consumption. For increased social mobility, read loss of traditional roles and threats to vested interests.
  • The rise of fundamentalism in the latter half of the 20th century reflects the very real loss of the traditions that guided much of humanity over the past several thousand years.
  • Providing an inclusive mythos for the modern age will be a significant challenge of the next century.
  • The biggest revolution of the past 50,000 years was not the advent of the Internet, the growth of the industrial age out of the seeds of the Enlightenment, or the development of modern methods of long-distance navigation. Rather, it was a seemingly trivial event that happened rather quickly around 10,000 years ago – the dawn of the age of agriculture, when a few people living in several locations around the world decided to stop gathering their food from the land, abiding by limits set in place by nature, and grow their food.
  • anonymous on 07 Jun 10
     
    A guest essay by Spencer Wells at Seed Magazine on June 7, 2010.
anonymous

The Genome At Ten: Two Pictures - 0 views

blogs.discovermagazine.com/...the-genome-at-ten-two-pictures

layscience

shared by anonymous on 18 Jun 10 - Cached
  • And second, a warning to anyone who believes in an iron law that the more protein-coding genes in a species, the more sophisticated/complex/cool/human that species is: I for one welcome our grapey overlords.
  • anonymous on 18 Jun 10
     
    By Carl Zimmer at The Loom (Discover Magazine) on June 15, 2010.
anonymous

'Voice Blind' Man Befuddled By Mysterious Callers - 0 views

www.npr.org/...story.php

layscience

shared by anonymous on 12 Jul 10 - Cached
  • Royster couldn't understand why his friends and family had this semi-miraculous ability to instantly discern who was speaking. It was befuddling until finally, Royster hit upon the only possible explanation.
  • In fact, Royster has phonagnosia — or voice blindness — a very rare and very strange disorder. Like everyone else, phonagnosics can tell from the sound of your voice if you're male or female, old or young, sarcastic, upset, happy.
  • "I'm often at a loss and have to fake it," Royster says about his phone calls with his mom. "Just continue to say, 'Well, that's nice,' until [she] eventually hits on something about the house or one of my brothers, and that will clue me in that this strange woman who has called me is, in fact, the one that gave birth to me."
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  • It took his office mate several days to convince him that voice recognition was something that actually existed — that other people could usually tell who was calling by their voice.
  • Whoever invented caller ID, Royster says, was a great, great person.
  • anonymous on 12 Jul 10
     
    "Royster couldn't understand why his friends and family had this semi-miraculous ability to instantly discern who was speaking. It was befuddling until finally, Royster hit upon the only possible explanation." By Alix Spiegel at NPR on July 12, 2010.
anonymous

'Econophysics' points way to fair salaries in free market - 0 views

www.labspaces.net/...o_fair_salaries_in_free_market

layscience economics

shared by anonymous on 13 Jul 10 - Cached
  • A Purdue University researcher has used "econophysics" to show that under ideal circumstances free markets promote fair salaries for workers and do not support CEO compensation practices common today.
  • In the new work, the researcher has determined that fairness is integral to a normally functioning free market economy. Findings are detailed in a research paper that appeared in June in the online journal Entropy and is available at http://www.mdpi.com/1099-4300/12/6/1514/
  • anonymous on 13 Jul 10
     
    "A Purdue University researcher has used "econophysics" to show that under ideal circumstances free markets promote fair salaries for workers and do not support CEO compensation practices common today." By LabSpaces on July 13, 2010.
anonymous

Did Dining on Seafood Help Early Humans Grow These Big Brains? - 0 views

blogs.discovermagazine.com/...y-humans-grow-these-big-brains

layscience longnow

shared by anonymous on 02 Jun 10 - Cached
  • Near a place called Lake Turkana, archaeologists David Braun found two intriguing groups of items: The bones of fish, turtles, and even crocodiles with the scars of stone tools still showing, and stone fragments that Braun says come from the simple tools these hominins used to carve up the marine animals.
  • anonymous on 02 Jun 10
     
    By Andrew Moseman at Discover Magazine (80beats) on June 2, 2010.
anonymous

How did higher life evolve? - 0 views

www.labspaces.net/...How_did_higher_life_evolve_

layscience longnow

shared by anonymous on 08 Jun 10 - Cached
  • "During earth's history, complex multicellular life has evolved from unicellular organisms along five independent paths, which are: animals, plants, fungi, red algae and brown algae."
  • With the world's first complete sequencing of a brown algal genome, an international research team has made a big leap towards understanding the evolution of two key prerequisites for higher life on Earth - multicellularity and photosynthesis.
  • anonymous on 08 Jun 10
     
    By Lab Spaces on June 4, 2010.
anonymous

Bank of America Building: A New Green Standard? - 0 views

www.time.com/...0,8816,1994554,00.html

layscience sustainability technology

shared by anonymous on 08 Jun 10 - Cached
  • The tower's air circulation system is equipped with sensors to detect what are known as volatile organic compounds (VOCs), and a rapidly evaporating substance like Purell is full of them.
  • That drooping feeling you get midway through a meeting in a crowded conference room may not be caused by boredom, but by too little oxygen circulating in an overpopulated space.
  • Do celebrity tenants and a shiny LEED label really mean as much as they seem, or will an exercise in enormity like the BOA building wind up being more of a feel-good project than a do-good one?
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  • Even if every LEED point is justly earned, however, the question isn't how the building performs the day you take the shrink wrap off, it's how it does 5 or 10 or 100 years down the line.
  • anonymous on 08 Jun 10
     
    A fascinating look at the newest BOA building in Manhattan. By Jeffrey Kluger at Time on June 6, 2010.
anonymous

The world's only immortal animal - 0 views

green.yahoo.com/...ld-s-only-immortal-animal.html

layscience longnow

shared by anonymous on 19 Jun 10 - Cached
  • anonymous on 19 Jun 10
     
    By Bryan Nelson at Yahoo! Living Green on March 16, 2010.
anonymous

The Heartbreaking Truth About Flying Cars - 0 views

www.theatlantic.com/...58972

technology layscience

shared by anonymous on 01 Jul 10 - Cached
  • Every principle of engineering leads to one inescapable conclusion about a flying car, or "roadable aircraft": it can ONLY be a lousy example of both. The practical reality is, you can have a crap car, and a crap airplane, for five times the money and ten times the chance of dying from sudden impact. IMHO, this particular pursuit can only be evidence of American greatness IF you think techno-triumphalism without foresight is a great thing. Americans love cars because they associate them with "freedom" in a quasi-religious fashion. But look at the unintended consequences of happy motoring: the astounding wealth squandered on the doomed project of suburbanization, and the paving of the American West. Suppose we were able to build a Blade Runner-esque hover-car that runs on magical cheap biofuel made from lawn clippings? Every alpine meadow, mountain lake, canyon rim, and forest vale would be colonized by fat "extreme suburbanites" who would fly to and from their "green" modular McMansions. Dude: walkable cities connected by mass transit. * P.S. As an avid paraglider pilot, I wince at the "Maverick" para-car. Once you understand that rudderless paragliders have no cross-wind landing capacity, and the wing-loading of that size canopy dictates a landing speed in excess of 30mph, you realize that the roll cage is there for a reason...
  • anonymous on 01 Jul 10
     
    By James Fallows in the Science and Tech section of The Atlantic on July 1, 2010. Thanks to @paleofuture (and then @thebrandi) for the hat tip.
anonymous

The Stress of a Busy Environment Helps Mice Beat Back Cancer - 0 views

blogs.discovermagazine.com/...nt-helps-mice-beat-back-cancer

layscience cancer

shared by anonymous on 09 Jul 10 - Cached
  • Whereas most people live in fairly safe environments, with plenty of food and some degree of social interaction, “our data suggests that we shouldn’t just be avoiding stress, we should be living more socially and physically challenging lives,” During says [Scientific American].
  • Mice were then injected with tumor cells, which led to malignancies in all of the control animals within 15 days… The rate of tumor formation in animals living in the enriched environment was significantly delayed, and 15 percent had not developed tumors after nearly three weeks; when tumors were visible, they were 43 percent smaller than the lesions on control animals
  • anonymous on 09 Jul 10
     
    'Whereas most people live in fairly safe environments, with plenty of food and some degree of social interaction, "our data suggests that we shouldn't just be avoiding stress, we should be living more socially and physically challenging lives," During says.' By Andrew Moseman at 80beats (Discover Magazine) on July 9, 2010.
anonymous

For Goodness' Sake - 0 views

www.nytimes.com/...deWaal-t.html

humanity sociology altruism layscience

shared by anonymous on 12 Jul 10 - Cached
  • “The Price of Altruism” is about far more than Price himself. It covers the entire 150-year history of scientists’ researching, debating and bickering about a theoretical problem that lies at the core of behavioral biology, sociobiology and evolutionary psychology: Why is it that organisms sacrifice themselves for the benefit of others?
  • Haldane was one of the architects of the now familiar “gene’s-eye view” of evolution. Looked at from the gene’s perspective, altruism seems a little less perplexing. When an organism sacrifices its life to save a relative, it helps perpetuate the genes they share.
  • anonymous on 12 Jul 10
     
    "[The book] is about far more than Price himself. It covers the entire 150-year history of scientists' researching, debating and bickering about a theoretical problem that lies at the core of behavioral biology, sociobiology and evolutionary psychology: Why is it that organisms sacrifice themselves for the benefit of others?" By Frans de Waal at The New York Times Book Review on July 1, 2010.
anonymous

How facts backfire - 0 views

www.boston.com/...how_facts_backfire

humanity sociology layscience science

shared by anonymous on 12 Jul 10 - Cached
  • anonymous on 12 Jul 10
     
    "It's one of the great assumptions underlying modern democracy that an informed citizenry is preferable to an uninformed one. "Whenever the people are well-informed, they can be trusted with their own government," Thomas Jefferson wrote in 1789" But is this true? By Joe Keohane at The Boston Globe on July 11, 2010.
anonymous

Jon Stewart, you let me down - 0 views

scienceblogs.com/...on_stewart_you_let_me_down.php

religion science layscience

shared by anonymous on 10 Jul 10 - Cached
  • anonymous on 10 Jul 10
     
    "The low point came as Stewart tried to justify Robinson's nebulous argument that science and religion need each other, and he offered stock apologetics." By PZ Myers at Pharyngula on July 9, 2010
anonymous

Queen's Brian May Rocks Out To Physics, Photography - 0 views

www.npr.org/...story.php

layscience

shared by anonymous on 06 Aug 10 - Cached
  • But May's interests aren't limited to the rock world. Before Queen made it big, May was studying astrophysics at Imperial College in London. He gave it up to hit the road with Queen, but his background in physics helped the band in the recording studio: In "We Will Rock You," for example, he designed the sound of the famous "stomp stomp clap" section — in order to make it sound like thousands of people were stomping and clapping — based on his knowledge of sound waves and distances. (A more detailed explanation exists in interview highlights below, but he constructed the stomps based on a series of distances based on prime numbers.)
  • anonymous on 06 Aug 10
     
    "Brian May, the lead guitarist in the British glam-rock band Queen, is a modern-day renaissance man." By Fresh Air (NPR) on August 3, 2010.
anonymous

Artificial meat? Food for thought by 2050 | Environment | The Guardian - 0 views

www.guardian.co.uk/...ficial-meat-food-royal-society

layscience technology longnow predictions

shared by anonymous on 16 Aug 10 - Cached
  • Artificial meat grown in vats may be needed if the 9 billion people expected to be alive in 2050 are to be adequately fed without destroying the earth, some of the world's leading scientists report today.
  • A team of scientists at Rothamsted, the UK's largest agricultural research centre, suggests that extra carbon dioxide in the air from global warming, along with better fertilisers and chemicals to protect arable crops, could hugely increase yields and reduce water consumption.
  • Instead, says Dr Philip Thornton, a scientist with the International Livestock Research Institute in Nairobi, two "wild cards" could transform global meat and milk production. "One is artificial meat, which is made in a giant vat, and the other is nanotechnology, which is expected to become more important as a vehicle for delivering medication to livestock."
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  • seven multinational corporations, led by Monsanto, now dominate the global technology field."These companies are accumulating intellectual property to an extent that the public and international institutions are disadvantaged. This represents a threat to the global commons in agricultural technology on which the green revolution has depended," says the paper by Professor Jenifer Piesse at King's College, London.
  • anonymous on 16 Aug 10
     
    "Leading scientists say meat grown in vats may be necessary to feed 9 billion people expected to be alive by middle of century" By John Vidal at The Guardian on August 16, 2010.
anonymous

Experiencing Teen Drama Overload? Blame Biology - 0 views

www.npr.org/...story.php

layscience neurology

shared by anonymous on 16 Aug 10 - Cached
  • Parents wanted higher self-esteem for their kids and closer relationships with them. Fear-based, power-coercive relationships went the way of the rod in classrooms. So it's no wonder that today's teens feel much more free to act out than their predecessors ever hoped. And they do. Just ask any parent of a teenager, who will likely complain about rudeness, ill manners, constant criticism and even being yelled at by their teenager.
  • Teens may actually not be able to help engaging in questionable behavior. And their reactions may be, in large part, due to dramatic changes in their rapidly developing brains.
  • "She's really a beautiful person," says Cregon. "I see her with small children at camp and her little cousins and stuff, and she's fabulous. And she's really sweet with her uncle, her aunt, my mom. It's just me!"
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  • "I'm good. You're bad," says Kastner. "And they're both doing that at the same time." Kastner describes it as the worst time in any intimate relationship.
  • About half of the "thinking" neurons in certain regions of the brain, Chattra says, are literally "wiped out."
  • "Sometimes, parents say, 'What were you thinking?' " says Kastner. "And the joke's on us. They weren't thinking. They were running like wildebeests in the canyon. Just go, go, go. You know, they were flooded and excited and not really thinking through the consequences of their actions."
  • "It will be small, medium or large, based on the quality" of the self-critique and how much the parents believe their children learned from the mistake, she says. Parents might even have the teenager suggest their own discipline. And there's an added benefit to the teens' writing. It engages the "thinking" part of the brain, and gets the teenager away from the emotional frenzy of the night.
  • And forget having the last word, she says. "Let them have the last word," Kastner says about the kids.
  • "We need to let that riffraff go," she says, "and cease-and-desist because it's going nowhere." Kastner likens such a cease-and-desist reaction to the protocol exercised by police, firefighters and pilots: Don't think. Just follow protocol, which is — first and foremost — cool down. She says, "We don't want to drive under the influence of alcohol, and we don't want to talk to our loved ones under the influence of extreme emotion."
  • anonymous on 16 Aug 10
     
    "Back in the days of authoritarian parenting in the '50s, obedience and propriety were high values. Digressions from good manners, respect and good behavior were often met with punishment. But then in the '60s and '70s, things changed." By Patti Neighmond at NPR on August 16, 2010.
anonymous

Victims of bullying suffer academically as well - 0 views

www.labspaces.net/...ng_suffer_academically_as_well

layscience

shared by anonymous on 20 Aug 10 - Cached
  • The UCLA study was conducted with 2,300 students in 11 Los Angeles–area public middle schools and their teachers. Researchers asked the students to rate whether or not they get bullied on a four-point scale and to list which of their fellow students were bullied the most — physically, verbally and as the subject of nasty rumors.
  • A high level of bullying was consistently associated with lower grades across the three years of middle school.
  • "We cannot address low achievement in school while ignoring bullying, because the two are frequently linked," said Jaana Juvonen, a UCLA professor of psychology and lead author of the study. "Students who are repeatedly bullied receive poorer grades and participate less in class discussions. Some students may get mislabeled as low achievers because they do not want to speak up in class for fear of getting bullied. Teachers can misinterpret their silence, thinking that these students are not motivated to learn.
  • anonymous on 20 Aug 10
     
    "Students who are bullied regularly do substantially worse in school, UCLA psychologists report in a special issue of the Journal of Early Adolescence devoted to academic performance and peer relationships." No surprises here. At Lab Spaces on August 20, 2010.
anonymous

BPA Receipts Bombshell: Paper Slips Contain High Levels of Bisphenol A - 0 views

www.cbsnews.com/763_162-20011903-10391704.html

health layscience

shared by anonymous on 28 Jul 10 - Cached
  • Animal tests have linked BPA exposure to a range of health problems, including cancer, obesity, diabetes, and early puberty. The studies are controversial though, and how they related to human health is not fully clear, according to WebMD.
  • If you're worried about being exposed to the cancer-causing compound BPA, you may already know to be wary of some water bottles and food cans. But you'll never guess where BPA, a.k.a. bisphenol A, is showing up now:Cash register receipts.
  • anonymous on 28 Jul 10
     
    "...you'll never guess where BPA, a.k.a. bisphenol A, is showing up now: Cash register receipts." By Aina Hunter at CBS News Health Blog on July 28, 2010.
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