In a wide-ranging talk, Vilayanur Ramachandran explores how brain damage can reveal the connection between the internal structures of the brain and the corresponding functions of the mind. He talks about phantom limb pain, synesthesia (when people hear color or smell sounds), and the Capgras delusion, when brain-damaged people believe their closest friends and family have been replaced with imposters.
To see the original video, comments and more information from TED, link here.
CNN To Launch Bureau in Second Life Virtual World
As news organizations slash budgets and scale back bureaus, CNN is expanding--except not in real life.
In the week of Nov. 5, the news giant is set to open a news-gathering outpost in Second Life. And unlike news service Reuters, which embedded a real reporter in the online virtual world last year, CNN will rely on Second Life "residents" to do all the legwork.
The Last Supper in 16 Billion Pixel Detail
Also, see gigapixel renditions of: Gaudenzio Ferrari's Vita di Cristo and Andrea Pozzo's Gloria di Sant'Ignazio.
Cognitive Science and FactCheck.org, or Why We (Still) Do What We Do by Joe Miller
Have you heard about how Al Gore claimed to have invented the Internet? What about how Iraq was responsible for the attacks on the World Trade Center? Or maybe the one about how George W. Bush has the lowest IQ of any U.S. president ever? Chances are pretty good that you might even believe one (or more) of these claims. And yet all three are false. At FactCheck.org our stock in trade is debunking these sorts of false or misleading political claims, so when the Washington Post told us that we might just be making things worse, it really made us stop and think.
To question genetic intelligence is not racism By James Watson
Science is no stranger to controversy. The pursuit of discovery, of knowledge, is often uncomfortable and disconcerting. I have never been one to shy away from stating what I believe to be the truth, however difficult it might prove to be. This has, at times, got me in hot water.
Fury at DNA pioneer's theory: Africans are less intelligent than Westerners By Cahal Milmo
Celebrated scientist attacked for race comments: "All our social policies are based on the fact that their intelligence is the same as ours - whereas all the testing says not really"
Your Brain is Not Your Friend - lifehack.org
A mind is a terrible thing. Whether because of the brain's internal structure or the way social and cultural pressures cause our minds to develop and function, in the end the result is the same: minds that are not only easily deceived and frequently deceptive in their own right, but when caught out, refuse to accept and address their errors.
Report on Hindu god Ram withdrawn -- BBC NEWS
The Indian government has withdrawn a controversial report submitted in court earlier this week which questioned the existence of the Hindu god Ram.
Head and Heart: American Christianities, by Garry Wills - Los Angeles Times
Wills' argument is that American history has been marked by an oscillation between Enlightenment and Evangelism -- between head and heart. He contends that the fruitful tension between these two poles contributed directly to the U.S. Constitution's single wholly original contribution to the political tradition: "disestablishment of the official creed and separation of church and state." It is precisely this innovative separation, Wills contends, that has allowed religion to flourish in America as it does nowhere else in the developed world. It's also why he finds the hostility toward separation evinced by George W. Bush and the religious right so alarming.
Diet and Fat: A Severe Case of Mistaken Consensus New York Times Online
We like to think that people improve their judgment by putting their minds together, and sometimes they do. The studio audience at "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire" usually votes for the right answer. But suppose, instead of the audience members voting silently in unison, they voted out loud one after another. And suppose the first person gets it wrong.
If the second person isn't sure of the answer, he's liable to go along with the first person's guess. By then, even if the third person suspects another answer is right, she's more liable to go along just because she assumes the first two together know more than she does. Thus begins an "informational cascade" as one person after another assumes that the rest can't all be wrong.
BACK OFF! I'M NOT DEAD YET.
I Don't Want a Living Will. Why Should I? By Charlotte F. Allen
Do I have to have a living will? Last year, I had an experience that gave me the distinct impression that if I didn't have one, my life was hardly worth, well, living.
How to spot political ads powered only by hot air.
In this article we examine two examples of what we call "fact-free" advertising, which we see in abundance. These ads seek to associate the candidate with a string of positive words and images but are void of specifics. Voters should beware.
Patience, fairness and the human condition From The Economist print edition
PEOPLE love to catalogue the traits they think characteristic of their species. Some, such as language, are obvious. Others, such as patience and a sense of fairness, are more subtle. These traits, however, did not spring into existence fully formed. They evolved--and to understand human evolution it would help to know their genetic underpinnings and the order in which they evolved.
Are You living Uprightly? Keith Burgess-Jackson comments on Peter Singer.
It is tempting to dismiss Singer as a liberal do-gooder, someone who goes around imposing his values on others, a moral preceptor. He would vehemently deny the charge, and rightly so. He is not imposing his values on you; he is imposing your values on you. He is trying to show you that your own principles commit you to changing your behavior and reorienting your life. He is challenging you, in the grand philosophical fashion personified by Socrates, to sort through, reflect on, critically examine, and ultimately live up to, your deepest moral convictions, the convictions that integrate you as a person and give your life meaning.
There are poor children starving in Africa, so you should really eat up your food, shouldn't you? Perhaps you should, but why are their needs morally more significant than your desire for enjoyment. This week, The Philosopher's Zone looks at morality, restraint and the case for selfishness.
Steven Pinker takes on violence. We live in violent times, an era of heightened warfare, genocide and senseless crime. Or so we've come to believe. Pinker charts a history of violence from Biblical times through the present, and says modern society has a little less to feel guilty about.
Mike Wallace interviews Ayn Rand about her philosophy of Objectivism.
Psychologist Barry Schwartz takes aim at a central belief of western societies: that freedom of choice leads to personal happiness. In Schwartz's estimation, all that choice is making us miserable. We set unreasonably high expectations, question our choices before we even make them, and blame our failures entirely on ourselves. His relatable examples, from consumer products (jeans, TVs, salad dressings) to lifestyle choices (where to live, what job to take, whom and when to marry), underscore this central point: Too many choices undermine happiness.
Psychologist Dan Gilbert challenges the idea that we'll be miserable if we don't get what we want. Our "psychological immune system" lets us feel real, enduring happiness, he says, even when things don't go as planned. He calls this kind of happiness "synthetic happiness," and he says it's "every bit as real and enduring as the kind of happiness you stumble upon when you get exactly what you were aiming for."
MILL: CULTURE AND THE SATISFIED PIG
Most Liberal Arts colleges require that their students take courses in history, literature, philosophy, and the fine arts, even if students prefer to be just athletes, business majors, or future doctors and lawyers. And most sufficiently affluent societies are pledged to the support of the arts and humanities in one way or another, even if the majority of citizens have only a very moderate interest in higher education or "high" culture, if any at all. Whence, then, this commitment to the idea of a culture and education which clearly goes beyond the necessities of everyday life and the more immediate interests of most people? Is the official regard for these matters just a thoughtless tradition? Is it pretentiousness?
Women's Rights in the Brave New World Where Eggs are People -- Jim Spencer
Neuroscience and Fundamentalism -- A Jewish Magazine, an Interfaith Movement
The evolving and growing complexity of the human brain allowed our ancestors the ability to question, wonder, and consider new possibilities--to be creative. Life altering advances were the result. Is unconditional adherence to dogma (whether religious or secular) at odds with this evolved capability and our full potential as creative beings?
