| Is neuroscience sexist? Professors Gina Rippon and Robert Winston discuss the evidence base for brain differences between the sexes news.bbc.co.uk |
Black holes and falling objects | Lily Asquith Lily Asquith from Argonne National Lab in the US on what killed the E687 experiment, and what won't kill youI was driving into Argonne with a colleague yesterday morning and he was telling me about the experiment (E687) that he worked on when he was a graduate student. It caught fire and burnt down. The fire was found to have originated from a very high voltage power supply with no fuse. This alone would not have caused the fire. But the wires in those days were flammable, and they were hanging down a bit where they were fed into the detector so they were separated with (highly flammable) polystyrene wedges. The wires were also of exactly the right length and separation to smoulder and ignite the surrounding material rather than just breaking when the power shorted. The experiment went down for a year.For some reason I am fascinated by this story. I know that there was no such thing as health and safety in those days, as we are reminded by this internal memo from the Fermilab archives stating that people should "watch out for falling objects":The halcyon days of health and safety in particle physics.Anyone who has sat through day after day of excruciating talks on unbelievable topics such as which bin to use (~2 hours) and what to do if you see someone in camouflage climbing over the lab security fence (~3.5 hours) will understand my nostalgia for the good old dangerous days. I like to keep track of how much of my life has been taken from me in the name of safety. If I include airports I think the current total is about 135 hours. And now I'm writing about it ... should this count towards the total?Of course the only danger discussed by normal people (normal = not fascinated by health and safety issues) is the risk of the LHC producing a black hole that will swallow our planet. When this story first came out I chuckled and thought to myself that maybe the Cern press office had pushed it out in order to get publicity for the LHC startup. In fact the Cern press office does not count Max Clifford among its staff, so this is not likely.I stopped chuckling (briefly) when one of the mums at my daughter's school approached me about it at an after-school fencing club at Brixton recreation centre. She was a really smart, sensible, friendly woman. And she was genuinely very worried. Humans like a bit of danger, but The End Of The World is possibly a bit too much for some sensitive types.She wanted to know why it was being reported in the media all around the world that there is a possibility of this happening. I told her that there is a possibility of it happening, because there is a possibility of absolutely anything happening. I could walk into a wall later on this afternoon, head in the clouds, and actually just walk straight through it. These things are allowed to happen within our current understanding of physics. I don't know if anyone has shown that the danger of this happening with the LHC/without the LHC are equal, but I know of no reason why this would not be the case.The problem is that in everyday life when we think of something as possible we only really consider possibilities such as there is a 50:50 chance of rain or a 1 in 14 million chance of winning the lottery. Probability is not a user-friendly branch of maths - it is counterintuitive and weird a lot of the time. See the Monty Hall problem for an example of this weirdness.So the physicist who answered "Yes" to the question, "Is there a chance that the LHC might make a black hole that swallows the Earth?" was right. Unfortunately the interviewer did not follow that question with "Is there a chance I will suddenly just disappear through the floor at half past four this afternoon?" because the answer to that would also have been yes.Jon ButterworthLily Asquithguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds guardian.co.uk |
Today's Mystery Bird for you to identify | GrrlScientist At first glance, this elegant species might appear to be impossible to ID from this photograph, but the pose is part of the typical behaviours shown by one of the several closely related species found in this location. What is that behaviour and what species is this?Mystery Bird photographed at Quintana Neotropical Bird Sanctuary, close to the towns of Freeport and Lake Jackson on the upper Texas coast, USA. [I will identify this bird for you in 48 hours]Image: Joseph Kennedy, 29 September 2010 (would you like to see this bird using a 'scope?).Nikon D200, Kowa 883 telescope with TSN-PZ camera eyepiece 1/400s f/8.0 at 1000.0mm iso400At first glance, this elegant species might appear to be impossible to ID from this photograph, but this pose is part of the typical behaviours shown by just one of the several closely related species found in this location. What is that behaviour and what species is this?Daily Mystery Bird Rules: 1. Please name at least one field mark that supports your identification, keeping in mind that more than one field mark is often necessary to distinguish between species. IDs without any supporting information are not valid and may be deleted by the moderators. 2. Expert and intermediate level birders: do NOT try to be the first to blurt out the mystery bird's ID. Instead, please provide helpful hints, such as descriptions, literary references, puns, personal anecdotes, and other forms of discussion and assistance for beginning birders and for those following on their iPhones without naming the species. Expert and intermediate birders are free to name the bird species 24 or more hours after it was first published.3. Each mystery bird is usually accompanied by a question or two. These questions can be useful for identifying the pictured species, but may instead be used to illustrate an interesting aspect of avian biology, behaviour or evolution, or may be intended to generate conversation on other topics, such as conservation. 4. Each bird species will be demystified 48 hours after publication. If you have bird images, video or mp3 files that you'd like to share with a large and appreciate audience, feel free to email them to me for consideration.GrrlScientistguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds guardian.co.uk |
Turtle nesting research on track Conservation Volunteers Australia says it plans to tag more nesting flatback turtles with tracking devices. abc.net.au |
Colonise space or else face 'extinction' STEPHEN Hawking proposes a solution to dwindling resources on earth - move to outer space. news.com.au |