31 October 2010
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knitting
One of the earliest known examples of knitting was finely decorated cotton socks found in Egypt in the end of the first millennium AD.[13]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virgil
In the Middle Ages, Virgil was considered a herald of Christianity for his Eclogue 4 verses (Perseus Project Ecl.4) concerning the birth of a boy, which were read as a prophecy of Jesus' nativity.
Also during the Middle Ages, as Virgil was developed into a kind of magus, manuscripts of the Aeneid were used for divinatory bibliomancy, the Sortes Virgilianae (Virgilian lottery), in which a line would be selected at random and interpreted in the context of a current situation (Compare the ancient Chinese I Ching). The Old Testament was sometimes used for similar arcane purposes.
In some legends, such as Virgilius the Sorcerer, the powers attributed to Virgil were far more extensive.
It is said that the Chiesa della Santa Maria di Piedigrotta was erected by Church authorities to neutralize this adoration and "Christianize" the site. The tomb, however, is a tourist attraction, and still sports a tripod burner originally dedicated to Apollo, although the tripod is not original to the site.
"Omnia vincit amor "
"Love conquers all"
(Ecl.10.69)
http://www.gutenberg.org/files/230/230-h/230-h.htm#book10
One of the earliest known examples of knitting was finely decorated cotton socks found in Egypt in the end of the first millennium AD.[13]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virgil
In the Middle Ages, Virgil was considered a herald of Christianity for his Eclogue 4 verses (Perseus Project Ecl.4) concerning the birth of a boy, which were read as a prophecy of Jesus' nativity.
Also during the Middle Ages, as Virgil was developed into a kind of magus, manuscripts of the Aeneid were used for divinatory bibliomancy, the Sortes Virgilianae (Virgilian lottery), in which a line would be selected at random and interpreted in the context of a current situation (Compare the ancient Chinese I Ching). The Old Testament was sometimes used for similar arcane purposes.
In some legends, such as Virgilius the Sorcerer, the powers attributed to Virgil were far more extensive.
It is said that the Chiesa della Santa Maria di Piedigrotta was erected by Church authorities to neutralize this adoration and "Christianize" the site. The tomb, however, is a tourist attraction, and still sports a tripod burner originally dedicated to Apollo, although the tripod is not original to the site.
"Omnia vincit amor "
"Love conquers all"
(Ecl.10.69)
- Ómnia vincit amor; et nos cedamus amori.
- Love conquers all things; let us too surrender to love.
- Book X, line 69
http://www.gutenberg.org/files/230/230-h/230-h.htm#book10
30 October 2010
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XjLmixigCH
The Human League
''(Keep Feeling) Fascination"
Writers:Jo Callis, Philip Oakey
If it seems a little time is needed
Decisions to be made
The good advice of friends unheeded
The best of plans mislaid
Just looking for a new direction
In an old familiar way
The forming of a new connection
To study or to play
And so the conversation turned
Until the sun went down
And many fantasies were learned
On that day
Keep feeling fascination
Passion burning
Love so strong
Keep feeling fascination
Looking learning
Moving on
Well the truth may need some
Re-arranging
Stories to be told
And plain to see the facts are changing
No meaning left to hold
And so the conversation turned
Until the sun went down
And many fantasies were learned
On that day
And so the conversation turned
Until the sun went down
And many fantasies were learned
On that day
http://sverigesradio.se/sida/artikel.aspx?programid=3925&artikel=4135827&play=2705063&playtype=Ljudklipp
http://www.youtube.com/user/YaleCourses#p/c/6299F3195349CCDA/35/XAfZd1lVZvo
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Jacob_Niles
29 October 2010
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrey_Kurkov
He started writing at the age of seven when after the death of two of his three pet hamsters, he wrote a poem about the loneliness of the remaining pet.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_and_the_Penguin
http://www.abc.net.au/rn/arts/bwriting/stories/s1461208.htm
Andrey Kurkov: Well, it is absurd, and in the Soviet time it was much more absurd. I started writing when I was seven years old. I started writing poetry. My father was a military test pilot so he was almost never at home. I had cactuses—1500 cactuses—and I had three hamsters, and actually two of the hamsters died accidentally because I let them run in a small two-room flat (not a one-room flat)…
Ramona Koval: They got lost?
Andrey Kurkov: No, one was actually crushed to death by the door accidentally by my father, and the other one was eaten by the stray cat that I brought from the street to feed, but I wanted to give some sausage to the cat. The cat has seen the hamster and the hamster was gone, and I had one last hamster still alive, so I wrote a piece of poetry about the solitude of a hamster who has lost his friends. Two or three days later he fell down off the balcony from the fifth floor, so I don’t know whether it was a suicide or it was an accident, but it is a real story. It sounds absurd, yes? And the second piece of poetry I wrote the day after the third hamster’s death, it was about Lenin because I knew already that he was also dead. I didn’t know how he died, but I went to a Soviet kindergarten where we had lots of ideology so I knew that Lenin loved children, animals and hard work. I like these characteristics, so I decided to start writing, and I wrote a lot of this ideologically sound stuff as a child.
Ramona Koval: Fifteen-hundred cacti? That’s hard to believe.
Andrey Kurkov: You see, it was a so-called Khrushchev flat on the fifth floor, so we had three windows and a balcony. I remember I bought these tin shelves for the kitchen, and I attached them to the inside of every window, and the cactuses were in plastic cubes which were sold in toy shops, with one side cut off, and they were small. There is still about 200 alive in my parents flat after all this time.
He started writing at the age of seven when after the death of two of his three pet hamsters, he wrote a poem about the loneliness of the remaining pet.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_and_the_Penguin
http://www.abc.net.au/rn/arts/bwriting/stories/s1461208.htm
Andrey Kurkov: Well, it is absurd, and in the Soviet time it was much more absurd. I started writing when I was seven years old. I started writing poetry. My father was a military test pilot so he was almost never at home. I had cactuses—1500 cactuses—and I had three hamsters, and actually two of the hamsters died accidentally because I let them run in a small two-room flat (not a one-room flat)…
Ramona Koval: They got lost?
Andrey Kurkov: No, one was actually crushed to death by the door accidentally by my father, and the other one was eaten by the stray cat that I brought from the street to feed, but I wanted to give some sausage to the cat. The cat has seen the hamster and the hamster was gone, and I had one last hamster still alive, so I wrote a piece of poetry about the solitude of a hamster who has lost his friends. Two or three days later he fell down off the balcony from the fifth floor, so I don’t know whether it was a suicide or it was an accident, but it is a real story. It sounds absurd, yes? And the second piece of poetry I wrote the day after the third hamster’s death, it was about Lenin because I knew already that he was also dead. I didn’t know how he died, but I went to a Soviet kindergarten where we had lots of ideology so I knew that Lenin loved children, animals and hard work. I like these characteristics, so I decided to start writing, and I wrote a lot of this ideologically sound stuff as a child.
Ramona Koval: Fifteen-hundred cacti? That’s hard to believe.
Andrey Kurkov: You see, it was a so-called Khrushchev flat on the fifth floor, so we had three windows and a balcony. I remember I bought these tin shelves for the kitchen, and I attached them to the inside of every window, and the cactuses were in plastic cubes which were sold in toy shops, with one side cut off, and they were small. There is still about 200 alive in my parents flat after all this time.
http://www.achievement.org/autodoc/page/sal0bio-1
In 1955 Salk's years of research paid off. Human trials of the polio vaccine effectively protected the subject from the polio virus. When news of the discovery was made public on April 12, 1955, Salk was hailed as a miracle worker. He further endeared himself to the public by refusing to patent the vaccine. He had no desire to profit personally from the discovery, but merely wished to see the vaccine disseminated as widely as possible.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludwig_Lewisohn
Ludwig Lewisohn (May 30, 1882 – December 31, 1955)[1][2] was an American Jewish critic, novelist and translator, known for his novel The Island Within.
In 1955 Salk's years of research paid off. Human trials of the polio vaccine effectively protected the subject from the polio virus. When news of the discovery was made public on April 12, 1955, Salk was hailed as a miracle worker. He further endeared himself to the public by refusing to patent the vaccine. He had no desire to profit personally from the discovery, but merely wished to see the vaccine disseminated as widely as possible.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludwig_Lewisohn
Ludwig Lewisohn (May 30, 1882 – December 31, 1955)[1][2] was an American Jewish critic, novelist and translator, known for his novel The Island Within.
MUTUAL AID A FACTOR OF EVOLUTION BY P. KROPOTKIN 1902
And finally, I saw among the semi-wild cattle and horses in Transbaikalia, among the wild ruminants everywhere, the squirrels, and so on, that when animals have to struggle against scarcity of food, in consequence of one of the above-mentioned causes, the whole of that portion of the species which is affected by the calamity, comes out of the ordeal so much impoverished in vigour and health, that no progressive evolution of the species can be based upon such periods of keen competition.
Consequently, when my attention was drawn, later on, to the relations between Darwinism and Sociology, I could agree with none of the works and pamphlets that had been written upon this important subject. They all endeavoured to prove that Man, owing to his higher intelligence and knowledge, may mitigate the harshness of the struggle for life between men; but they all recognized at the same time that the struggle for the means of existence, of every animal against all its congeners, and of every man against all other men, was "a law of Nature." This view, however, I could not accept, because I was persuaded that to admit a pitiless inner war for life within each species, and to see in that war a condition of progress, was to admit something which not only had not yet been proved, but also lacked confirmation from direct observation.
On the contrary, a lecture "On the Law of Mutual Aid," which was delivered at a Russian Congress of Naturalists, in January 1880, by the well-known zoologist, Professor Kessler, the then Dean of the St. Petersburg University, struck me as throwing a new light on the whole subject. Kessler's idea was, that besides the law of Mutual Struggle there is in Nature the law of Mutual Aid, which, for the success of the struggle for life, and especially for the progressive evolution of the species, is far more important than the law of mutual contest. This suggestion— which was, in reality, nothing but a further development of the ideas expressed by Darwin himself in The Descent of Man—seemed to me so correct and of so great an importance, that since I became acquainted with it (in 1883) I began to collect materials for further developing the idea, which Kessler had only cursorily sketched in his lecture, but had not lived to develop.
... I consequently directed my chief attention to establishing first of all, the importance of the Mutual Aid factor of evolution, leaving to ulterior research the task of discovering the origin of the Mutual Aid instinct in Nature.
http://books.google.com/books?id=dyXC3oyvmqcC&pg=PA37&lpg=PA37&dq=%22proof+of+altruism%22&source=bl&ots=vICL0yORjU&sig=9-lM3ayeSzcrQL7oiXLFwhLAyLI&hl=en&ei=eNXHTMOgBIrtOYTwnPAI&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=4&ved=0CCAQ6AEwAw#v=onepage&q=%22proof%20of%20altruism%22&f=false
27 October 2010
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=what-causes-chest-pains
... terms such as “heartache” and “gut wrenching” are more than mere metaphors: they describe the experience of both physical and emotional pain. When we feel heartache, for example, we are experiencing a blend of emotional stress and the stress-induced sensations in our chest...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Love_sickness
... terms such as “heartache” and “gut wrenching” are more than mere metaphors: they describe the experience of both physical and emotional pain. When we feel heartache, for example, we are experiencing a blend of emotional stress and the stress-induced sensations in our chest...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Love_sickness
http://www.nyupress.org/books/Generations_of_Youth-products_id-381.html
http://books.google.com/books?id=dyXC3oyvmqcC&printsec=frontcover&dq=joe+austin+generations&source=bl&ots=vICL0yQQjP&sig=MFt_J4DZdDz9H6eouq5ZyxvMZ1Y&hl=en&ei=39zHTN_YFdHtOaOC8e8I&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CBIQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q&f=false
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Kropotkin
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutual_Aid:_A_Factor_of_Evolution
Written partly in response to Social Darwinism and in particular to Thomas H. Huxley's Nineteenth Century essay, "The Struggle for Existence", Kropotkin's book drew on his experiences in scientific expeditions in Siberia to illustrate the phenomenon of cooperation. After examining the evidence of cooperation in nonhuman animals, pre-feudal societies, in medieval cities, and in modern times, he concludes that cooperation and mutual aid are the most important factors in the evolution of the species and the ability to survive.
Daniel P. Todes, in his account of Russian naturalism in the 19th century, concludes that Kropotkin’s work "cannot be dismissed as the idiosyncratic product of an anarchist dabbling in biology" and that his views "were but one expression of a broad current in Russian evolutionary thought that pre-dated, indeed encouraged, his work on the subject and was
no means confined to leftist thinkers." [1]
http://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/4341/pg4341.html
http://books.google.com/books?id=dyXC3oyvmqcC&printsec=frontcover&dq=joe+austin+generations&source=bl&ots=vICL0yQQjP&sig=MFt_J4DZdDz9H6eouq5ZyxvMZ1Y&hl=en&ei=39zHTN_YFdHtOaOC8e8I&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CBIQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q&f=false
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Kropotkin
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutual_Aid:_A_Factor_of_Evolution
Written partly in response to Social Darwinism and in particular to Thomas H. Huxley's Nineteenth Century essay, "The Struggle for Existence", Kropotkin's book drew on his experiences in scientific expeditions in Siberia to illustrate the phenomenon of cooperation. After examining the evidence of cooperation in nonhuman animals, pre-feudal societies, in medieval cities, and in modern times, he concludes that cooperation and mutual aid are the most important factors in the evolution of the species and the ability to survive.
Daniel P. Todes, in his account of Russian naturalism in the 19th century, concludes that Kropotkin’s work "cannot be dismissed as the idiosyncratic product of an anarchist dabbling in biology" and that his views "were but one expression of a broad current in Russian evolutionary thought that pre-dated, indeed encouraged, his work on the subject and was
no means confined to leftist thinkers." [1]
http://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/4341/pg4341.html
26 October 2010
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Altruism Jorge Moll and Jordan Grafman, neuroscientists at the National Institutes of Health and LABS-D'Or Hospital Network (J.M.) provided the first evidence for the neural bases of altruistic giving in normal healthy volunteers, using functional magnetic resonance imaging. In their research, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA in October, 2006,[9] they showed that both pure monetary rewards and charitable donations activated the mesolimbic reward pathway, a primitive part of the brain that usually lights up in response to food and sex. However, when volunteers generously placed the interests of others before their own by making charitable donations, another brain circuit was selectively activated: the subgenual cortex/septal region. These structures are intimately related to social attachment and bonding in other species. Altruism, the experiment suggested, was not a superior moral faculty that suppresses basic selfish urges but rather was basic to the brain, hard-wired and pleasurable.[10]
Another experiment funded by the National Institutes of Health and conducted in 2007 at the Duke University in Durham, North Carolina suggests a different view, "that altruistic behavior may originate from how people view the world rather than how they act in it".[11] In the study published in the February 2007 print issue of Nature Neuroscience, researchers have found a part of the brain that behaves differently for altruistic and selfish people.
The researchers invited 45 volunteers to play a computer game and also to watch the computer play the game. In some instances, successful completion of the game resulted in them winning money for themselves, and in other instances, it resulted in money being donated to a charity which each person had chosen. During these activities, the researchers took functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) scans of the participants' brains and were "surprised by the results". Although they "were expecting to see activity in the brain's reward centres" and that "people perform altruistic acts because they feel good about it", what they found was that "another part of the brain was also involved, and it was quite sensitive to the difference between doing something for personal gain and doing it for someone else's gain". That part of the brain is called the posterior superior temporal cortex (pSTC).
In the next stage, the scientists asked the participants some questions about type and frequency of their altruistic or helping behaviours. They then analysed the responses to generate an estimate of a person's tendency to act altruistically and compared each person's level against their fMRI brain scan. The results showed that pSTC activity rose in proportion to a person's estimated level of altruism. According to the researchers, the results suggest that altruistic behavior may originate from how people view the world rather than how they act in it. "We believe that the ability to perceive other people's actions as meaningful is critical for altruism", said lead study investigator Dharol Tankersley.[12]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maria_Gripe
I klockornas tid
Pappa Pellerins dotter
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E._Nesbit
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Enchanted_Castle http://www.gutenberg.org/catalog/world/readfile?fk_files=1452600&pageno=8
Det förtrollade slottet
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Webster
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daddy-Long-Legs_%28novel%29
Pappa Långben
I klockornas tid
Pappa Pellerins dotter
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E._Nesbit
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Enchanted_Castle http://www.gutenberg.org/catalog/world/readfile?fk_files=1452600&pageno=8
Det förtrollade slottet
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Webster
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daddy-Long-Legs_%28novel%29
Pappa Långben
20 October 2010
http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/toc/isis/current
Research using virtual reality finds that humans in spite of living in a 3-dimensional world can without special practice make spatial judgments based on the length of, and angle between, line segments embedded in four-dimensional space.[10] The researchers noted that "the participants in our study had minimal practice in these tasks, and it remains an open question whether it is possible to obtain more sustainable, definitive, and richer 4-D representations with increased perceptual experience in 4-D virtual environments."[10] In a another study[11] the ability of humans to orient oneself in 2-D, 3-D and 4-D mazes has been tested. Each maze consisted of four path segments of random length and connected with orthogonal random bends, but without branches or loops (i.e. actually labyrinths). The graphical interface was based on John McIntosh's free 4-D Maze game.[12] The participating persons had to navigate through the path and finally estimating the linear direction back the starting point. The researchers found that some of the participants were able to mentally integrate their path after some practice in 4-D (the lower dimensional cases were for comparison and for the participants to learn the method).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fourth_dimension
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_ratio
Adolf Zeising, whose main interests were mathematics and philosophy, found the golden ratio expressed in the arrangement of branches along the stems of plants and of veins in leaves. He extended his research to the skeletons of animals and the branchings of their veins and nerves, to the proportions of chemical compounds and the geometry of crystals, even to the use of proportion in artistic endeavors. In these phenomena he saw the golden ratio operating as a universal law.[51] In connection with his scheme for golden-ratio-based human body proportions, Zeising wrote in 1854 of a universal law "in which is contained the ground-principle of all formative striving for beauty and completeness in the realms of both nature and art, and which permeates, as a paramount spiritual ideal, all structures, forms and proportions, whether cosmic or individual, organic or inorganic, acoustic or optical; which finds its fullest realization, however, in the human form."[52]
In 2003, Volkmar Weiss and Harald Weiss analyzed psychometric data and theoretical considerations and concluded that the golden ratio underlies the clock cycle of brain waves.[53] In 2008 this was empirically confirmed by a group of neurobiologists.[54]
In 2010, the journal Science reported that the golden ratio is present at the atomic scale in the magnetic resonance of spins in cobalt niobate crystals.[55]
Several researchers have proposed connections between the golden ratio and human genome DNA.[56][57][58][59][60]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fibonacci_sequence
http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/full/10.1086/652024?prevSearch=%2528feelings%2529%2BAND%2B%255Bjournal%253A%2Bisis%255D&searchHistoryKey= A “STRUCTURE OF FEELING,” as Kathleen Woodward has observed, identifies “a particular and pervasive feeling, or a structured complex of feelings … [and] can help us recognize the emergence of a new social formation. Thus an attention to feeling can itself be a methodology … whose goal is to comprehend the ways in which the spheres of subjectivity—here feelings—and sociality mutually constitute each other.”1 The “structure of feeling” construct is thus a way of mediating between the macro and micro levels of analysis, or between “structure” in a structuralist sense and individual experience (what people actually feel).
Research using virtual reality finds that humans in spite of living in a 3-dimensional world can without special practice make spatial judgments based on the length of, and angle between, line segments embedded in four-dimensional space.[10] The researchers noted that "the participants in our study had minimal practice in these tasks, and it remains an open question whether it is possible to obtain more sustainable, definitive, and richer 4-D representations with increased perceptual experience in 4-D virtual environments."[10] In a another study[11] the ability of humans to orient oneself in 2-D, 3-D and 4-D mazes has been tested. Each maze consisted of four path segments of random length and connected with orthogonal random bends, but without branches or loops (i.e. actually labyrinths). The graphical interface was based on John McIntosh's free 4-D Maze game.[12] The participating persons had to navigate through the path and finally estimating the linear direction back the starting point. The researchers found that some of the participants were able to mentally integrate their path after some practice in 4-D (the lower dimensional cases were for comparison and for the participants to learn the method).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fourth_dimension
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_ratio
Adolf Zeising, whose main interests were mathematics and philosophy, found the golden ratio expressed in the arrangement of branches along the stems of plants and of veins in leaves. He extended his research to the skeletons of animals and the branchings of their veins and nerves, to the proportions of chemical compounds and the geometry of crystals, even to the use of proportion in artistic endeavors. In these phenomena he saw the golden ratio operating as a universal law.[51] In connection with his scheme for golden-ratio-based human body proportions, Zeising wrote in 1854 of a universal law "in which is contained the ground-principle of all formative striving for beauty and completeness in the realms of both nature and art, and which permeates, as a paramount spiritual ideal, all structures, forms and proportions, whether cosmic or individual, organic or inorganic, acoustic or optical; which finds its fullest realization, however, in the human form."[52]
In 2003, Volkmar Weiss and Harald Weiss analyzed psychometric data and theoretical considerations and concluded that the golden ratio underlies the clock cycle of brain waves.[53] In 2008 this was empirically confirmed by a group of neurobiologists.[54]
In 2010, the journal Science reported that the golden ratio is present at the atomic scale in the magnetic resonance of spins in cobalt niobate crystals.[55]
Several researchers have proposed connections between the golden ratio and human genome DNA.[56][57][58][59][60]
19 October 2010
Abou Ben Adhem (may his tribe increase!)
Awoke one night from a deep dream of peace,
And saw, within the moonlight in his room,
Making it rich, and like a lily in bloom,
An angel writing in a book of gold:—
Exceeding peace had made Ben Adhem bold,
And to the Presence in the room he said
"What writest thou?"—The vision raised its head,
And with a look made of all sweet accord,
Answered "The names of those who love the Lord."
"And is mine one?" said Abou. "Nay, not so,"
Replied the angel. Abou spoke more low,
But cheerly still, and said "I pray thee, then,
Write me as one that loves his fellow men."
The angel wrote, and vanished. The next night
It came again with a great wakening light,
And showed the names whom love of God had blessed,
And lo! Ben Adhem's name led all the rest.
James Henry Leigh Hunt (19 October 1784 – 28 August 1859)
Ibrahim Bin Adham (?—AD 777), also known as Abu Ben Adhem or Abou Ben Adhem, was an Arab Muslim saint and Sufi mystic. His full name was Sultan Ibrahim bin Adham, Bin Mansur al-Balkhi al-Ijli, Abu Ishaq or, translated, Saint Abraham, son of Adham.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ibrahim_Bin_Adham
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leigh_Hunt
17 October 2010
Alcor, 1 half of the first known binary star system, has its own surprise star companion.
In ancient times, people with exceptional vision discovered that one of the brightest stars in the Big Dipper was, in fact, two stars so close together that most people cannot distinguish them. The two stars, Alcor and Mizar, were the first binary stars—a pair of stars that orbit each other—ever known.
Modern telescopes have since found that Mizar is itself a pair of binaries, revealing what was once thought of as a single star to be four stars orbiting each other. Alcor has been sometimes considered a fifth member of the system, orbiting far away from the Mizar quadruplet.
Now, an astronomer at the University of Rochester and his colleagues have made the surprise discovery that Alcor is also actually two stars, and is apparently gravitationally bound to the Mizar system, making the whole group a sextuplet. This would make the Mizar-Alcor sextuplet the second-nearest such system known. The discovery is especially surprising because Alcor is one of the most studied stars in the sky.
Benedetto Castelli, Galileo's protege and collaborator, first observed with a telescope that Mizar was not a single star in 1617, and Galileo observed it a week after hearing about this from Castelli, and noted it in his notebooks, says Mamajek. Those two stars, called Mizar A and Mizar B, together with Alcor, in 1857 became the first binary stars ever photographed through a telescope. In 1890, Mizar A was discovered to itself be a binary, being the first binary to be discovered using spectroscopy. In 1908, spectroscopy revealed that Mizar B was also a pair of stars, making the group the first-known quintuple star system.
Mamajek is continuing his efforts to find planets around nearby stars, but his attention is not completely off Alcor and Mizar. "You see how the disk of Alcor B doesn't seem perfectly round?" says Mamajek, pointing toward an image of Alcor and its new companion. "Some of us have a feeling that Alcor might actually have another surprise in store for us."
http://www.rdmag.com/News/2009/12/General-Science-First-known-binary-star-discovered-to-be-triplet-and-more/
Not only does the Rodin´s Solution introduce a new type of processor for computers, its application also enables Rodin to create a new artificial intelligence operating system that replaces the binary code with a new code Rodin calls the binary triplet. Former Microsoft senior researcher, Russell P. Blake, treats the binary triplet briefly in his article, "The Mathematical Formulation of the Rodin Coil Torus", in which he states that the Rodin Torus has perfect mathematical coherence on all six axes and is not only three dimensional, but actually higher omni fourth dimensional. and higher.
With the Rodin Solution, Marko Rodin is able to navigate on all axes of a Rodin Coil Torus, thus resolving the obstacles to creating artificial intelligence by being able to compute multi-dimensionally. Rodin also adds a new factor of polarity to the binary code by using his binary triplet code which is based on the fact that all numbers begin and end at a point. The basis of the binary triplet is Rodin´s binary combinational explosion tree which enables Rodin to map this process through the event horizon of a torus and into the vortex-well singularity where it inverts. No mathematics, other than Rodin´s, can calculate while inverting, since all existing branches of mathematics self-destruct before emerging on the other side of the toroid.
The Rodin Solution harnesses a heretofore unavailable mathematical skill, or language, that takes advantage of number patterns´ six different self-referencing axis configurations over the surface topology of the Rodin Coil´s toroidal matrix, thus enabling the creation of new revolutionary artificial intelligence hardware and software.
Marko Rodins binary-triplet based operating system relies upon the discovery of the Bifilar Doubling Circuit.
http://www.markorodin.com/content/view/13/31/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life_expectancy
With the Rodin Solution, Marko Rodin is able to navigate on all axes of a Rodin Coil Torus, thus resolving the obstacles to creating artificial intelligence by being able to compute multi-dimensionally. Rodin also adds a new factor of polarity to the binary code by using his binary triplet code which is based on the fact that all numbers begin and end at a point. The basis of the binary triplet is Rodin´s binary combinational explosion tree which enables Rodin to map this process through the event horizon of a torus and into the vortex-well singularity where it inverts. No mathematics, other than Rodin´s, can calculate while inverting, since all existing branches of mathematics self-destruct before emerging on the other side of the toroid.
The Rodin Solution harnesses a heretofore unavailable mathematical skill, or language, that takes advantage of number patterns´ six different self-referencing axis configurations over the surface topology of the Rodin Coil´s toroidal matrix, thus enabling the creation of new revolutionary artificial intelligence hardware and software.
Marko Rodins binary-triplet based operating system relies upon the discovery of the Bifilar Doubling Circuit.
http://www.markorodin.com/content/view/13/31/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life_expectancy
| Humans by Era | Average Lifespan at Birth (years) | Comment |
|---|---|---|
| Upper Paleolithic | 33 | At age 15: 39 (to age 54)[7][8] |
| Neolithic[9] | 20 | |
| Bronze Age and Iron Age[10] | 35+ | |
| Classical Greece[11] | 28 | |
| Classical Rome[11] | 28 | |
| Pre-Columbian North America[12] | 25-30 | |
| Medieval Islamic Caliphate[13] | 35+ | |
| Medieval Britain[14][15] | 30 | |
| Early Modern Britain[10] | 40+ | |
| Early 20th Century[16][17] | 30-45 | |
| Current world average[18] | 67.2 | 2010 est. |
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-11560101
Benoit Mandelbrot developed fractals as a mathematical way of understanding the infinite complexity of nature.
His seminal work, The Fractal Geometry of Nature, was published in 1982. In it, he argued that seemingly random mathematical shapes in fact followed a pattern if broken down into a single repeating shape. The concept enabled scientists to measure previously immeasurable objects, including the coastline of the British Isles, the geometry of a lung or a cauliflower.
Mandelbrot was also highly critical of the world banking system, arguing the economic model it used was unable to cope with its own complexity.
"His work, which was entirely developed outside the main research channels, led to a modern information theory"
http://www.markorodin.com/
Vortex Based Mathematics by Marko Rodin
4:35:03 - 2 years ago
Within, you will be taken on a spiraling tour through the toroidal roller coaster of our deterministic universe. Dark Matter, the vibratory essence of all that exists, is no longer on its elusive hide and seek trip -- it has been found! With the introduction of Vortex-Based Mathematics you will be able to see how energy is expressing itself mathematically. This math has no anomalies and shows the dimensional shape and function of the universe as being a toroid or donut-shaped black hole. This is the template for the universe and it is all within our base ten decimal system! You have entered a place where Numbers are Real and Alive not merely symbols for other things. You will discover that the relationships between numbers are not random or man-made but that numbers are actually elementary particles of which everything is composed. This lost knowledge was well known to our ancients and is now being uncovered for us today. Gradually you will come to see numbers in a simple yet profoundly perfect three-dimensional matrix grid pattern that forms the shape of a torus. The number grid reveals the calibration and timing for an engine that can take us throughout the universe and solve mankind's energy needs. Interested? Delve in... http://www.markorodin.com/ http://www.youtube.com/markorodin Within, you will be taken on a spiraling tour through the toroidal roller coaster of our deterministic universe. Dark Matter, the vibratory essence of all that exists, is no longer on its elusive hide and seek trip -- it has been found! With the introduction of Vortex-Based Mathematics you will be able to see how energy is expressing itself mathematically. This math has no anomalies and shows the dimensional shape and function of the universe as being a toroid or donut-shaped black hole. This is the template for the universe and it is all within our base ten decimal system! You have entered a place where Numbers are Real and Alive not merely symbols for other things. You will discover that the relationships between numbers are not random or man-made but that numbers are actually elementary particles of which everything is composed. This lost knowledge was well known to our ancients and is now being uncovered for us today. Gradually you will come to see numbers in a simple yet profoundly perfect three-dimen...all » Within, you will be taken on a spiraling tour through the toroidal roller coaster of our deterministic universe. Dark Matter, the vibratory essence of all that exists, is no longer on its elusive hide and seek trip -- it has been found! With the introduction of Vortex-Based Mathematics you will be able to see how energy is expressing itself mathematically. This math has no anomalies and shows the dimensional shape and function of the universe as being a toroid or donut-shaped black hole. This is the template for the universe and it is all within our base ten decimal system! You have entered a place where Numbers are Real and Alive not merely symbols for other things. You will discover that the relationships between numbers are not random or man-made but that numbers are actually elementary particles of which everything is composed. This lost knowledge was well known to our ancients and is now being uncovered for us today. Gradually you will come to see numbers in a simple yet profoundly perfect three-dimensional matrix grid pattern that forms the shape of a torus. The number grid reveals the calibration and timing for an engine that can take us throughout the universe and solve mankind's energy needs. Interested? Delve in... http://www.markorodin.com/ http://www.youtube.com/markorodin
Benoit Mandelbrot developed fractals as a mathematical way of understanding the infinite complexity of nature.
His seminal work, The Fractal Geometry of Nature, was published in 1982. In it, he argued that seemingly random mathematical shapes in fact followed a pattern if broken down into a single repeating shape. The concept enabled scientists to measure previously immeasurable objects, including the coastline of the British Isles, the geometry of a lung or a cauliflower.
Mandelbrot was also highly critical of the world banking system, arguing the economic model it used was unable to cope with its own complexity.
"His work, which was entirely developed outside the main research channels, led to a modern information theory"
http://www.markorodin.com/
Vortex Based Mathematics by Marko Rodin
4:35:03 - 2 years ago
Within, you will be taken on a spiraling tour through the toroidal roller coaster of our deterministic universe. Dark Matter, the vibratory essence of all that exists, is no longer on its elusive hide and seek trip -- it has been found! With the introduction of Vortex-Based Mathematics you will be able to see how energy is expressing itself mathematically. This math has no anomalies and shows the dimensional shape and function of the universe as being a toroid or donut-shaped black hole. This is the template for the universe and it is all within our base ten decimal system! You have entered a place where Numbers are Real and Alive not merely symbols for other things. You will discover that the relationships between numbers are not random or man-made but that numbers are actually elementary particles of which everything is composed. This lost knowledge was well known to our ancients and is now being uncovered for us today. Gradually you will come to see numbers in a simple yet profoundly perfect three-dimensional matrix grid pattern that forms the shape of a torus. The number grid reveals the calibration and timing for an engine that can take us throughout the universe and solve mankind's energy needs. Interested? Delve in... http://www.markorodin.com/ http://www.youtube.com/markorodin Within, you will be taken on a spiraling tour through the toroidal roller coaster of our deterministic universe. Dark Matter, the vibratory essence of all that exists, is no longer on its elusive hide and seek trip -- it has been found! With the introduction of Vortex-Based Mathematics you will be able to see how energy is expressing itself mathematically. This math has no anomalies and shows the dimensional shape and function of the universe as being a toroid or donut-shaped black hole. This is the template for the universe and it is all within our base ten decimal system! You have entered a place where Numbers are Real and Alive not merely symbols for other things. You will discover that the relationships between numbers are not random or man-made but that numbers are actually elementary particles of which everything is composed. This lost knowledge was well known to our ancients and is now being uncovered for us today. Gradually you will come to see numbers in a simple yet profoundly perfect three-dimen...all » Within, you will be taken on a spiraling tour through the toroidal roller coaster of our deterministic universe. Dark Matter, the vibratory essence of all that exists, is no longer on its elusive hide and seek trip -- it has been found! With the introduction of Vortex-Based Mathematics you will be able to see how energy is expressing itself mathematically. This math has no anomalies and shows the dimensional shape and function of the universe as being a toroid or donut-shaped black hole. This is the template for the universe and it is all within our base ten decimal system! You have entered a place where Numbers are Real and Alive not merely symbols for other things. You will discover that the relationships between numbers are not random or man-made but that numbers are actually elementary particles of which everything is composed. This lost knowledge was well known to our ancients and is now being uncovered for us today. Gradually you will come to see numbers in a simple yet profoundly perfect three-dimensional matrix grid pattern that forms the shape of a torus. The number grid reveals the calibration and timing for an engine that can take us throughout the universe and solve mankind's energy needs. Interested? Delve in... http://www.markorodin.com/ http://www.youtube.com/markorodin
16 October 2010
15 October 2010
http://www.scribd.com/full/24853212?access_key=key-14v78c61amaz68xnxzm4
http://www.daviddarling.info/index.html
http://caltek.net/dan/connectivity/phibiz/philotactics/index.htm
Phi-Lo-Tactics: (Golden Ratio) Recursion / Self Re-Entry for Waves
at the Heart of Self Organization?
Using this example from ekg power spectra (below)... looking for Golden Ratio non linear interval harmonic analysis could be a tool to reveal when oscillators are becoming self - organizing?
Originally Inspired by Dan Winter, Assembled by Ken Wyrick , for CalTek Distance Learning
New animation of perfect compression / pics of Phylotaxis / new technology literature exerpts:"maximum Complexity is found via self-organised criticality at the edge of Chaos, which is epitomised by the Golden Mean, as the emergent geometric manifestation of the principle of least action: therefore its full temporal/ spatial action is analogous to creation itself." (quote from below) Also....(The lo-phi way in business) Approaches to the application of perfect embedding, as the mechanism of love and recursion in principle, to business and corporate structure. This (PHIlotaxis perfect branching) will be the most successful business 'TREE' structure for: data / personell / decision hierarchy / building and land geomancy...(pics below) {same as heart space & temple enveloping} Perfectly distributable - the definition of the PHILOTACTIC wave - perfectly compressible & therefore perfectly SHARE-ABLE... Coherence Physics approaches embedding, literature review follows. (a little science to tip the hats of the corporate bean-counters toward a more heart centered approach).
original article: What is Focused Attention?, Is ATTENTION ITSELF FRACTAL?, by Dan Winter, ../attention/attention.html "Attending to the Phi-lo Tactic Tree... A Network of Light." Is it attention's focus itself that nests waves to spin, inventing dimensionthe embedding of spin upon spin? Reflecting upon the matter, Alice, it was all done with mirrors.... I only send this tweak note that if we rattle enough cages, we may get a planet where enough people see in their minds, what indeed needs to happen in their hearts, we may get action... Like Hearts embedding into ONE!
Dan
http://www.daviddarling.info/index.html
http://caltek.net/dan/connectivity/phibiz/philotactics/index.htm
Phi-Lo-Tactics: (Golden Ratio) Recursion / Self Re-Entry for Waves
at the Heart of Self Organization?
Using this example from ekg power spectra (below)... looking for Golden Ratio non linear interval harmonic analysis could be a tool to reveal when oscillators are becoming self - organizing?
Originally Inspired by Dan Winter, Assembled by Ken Wyrick , for CalTek Distance Learning
Application Links
original article: What is Focused Attention?, Is ATTENTION ITSELF FRACTAL?, by Dan Winter, ../attention/attention.html "Attending to the Phi-lo Tactic Tree... A Network of Light." Is it attention's focus itself that nests waves to spin, inventing dimensionthe embedding of spin upon spin? Reflecting upon the matter, Alice, it was all done with mirrors....
Dan
14 October 2010
http://www.rdmag.com/News/2010/08/Industries-Agriculture-Celebrated-Russian-seed-bank-fights-for-its-land/
Head of Pavlovsk Agricultural Station Fyodor Mikhovich gestures speaking in Pavlovsk, near St.Petersburg, Russia, Thursday, Aug. 19, 2010. The world's first seed bank survived World War II thanks to 12 Russian scientists who chose to starve to death rather than eat the grain they were saving for future generations. Now the Vavilov Institute of Plant Industry's seed bank is in danger again, this time because of court-approved plans to rip up its vast fields of genetically diverse plants and build fancy homes on the prime real estate they occupy near St. Petersburg.
Head of Pavlovsk Agricultural Station Fyodor Mikhovich gestures speaking in Pavlovsk, near St.Petersburg, Russia, Thursday, Aug. 19, 2010. The world's first seed bank survived World War II thanks to 12 Russian scientists who chose to starve to death rather than eat the grain they were saving for future generations. Now the Vavilov Institute of Plant Industry's seed bank is in danger again, this time because of court-approved plans to rip up its vast fields of genetically diverse plants and build fancy homes on the prime real estate they occupy near St. Petersburg.
13 October 2010
Researchers within the various sciences tend to have their own unique way of expressing the information of their particular area of expertise. Therefore arguments tend to arise when the language or semantics of each researcher does not exactly correspond with another researcher. We have chosen to utilize the concepts of PiALOGUE as a means of enabling researchers to not only be able to communicate with each other but also to be able to come up with better expressions of what it is that they are attempting to communicate so that a common level language is achieved.
PiALOGUE is a disambiguation communication process that enables people to reach ever greater levels of common understanding and awareness. PiALOGUE is written in ALL CAPS except for the lower case "i" to distinguish the word Pi as part of Pi Dialogue which became PiALOGUE. PiALOGUE began as an off-shoot of Bohm Dialogue or Dialogue in the Spirit of Bohm. Proponents of Bohm Dialogue prefer a form of free association conducted in groups, with no predefined purpose in mind other than mutual understanding and exploration of human thought with the aim to allow participants to examine their preconceptions, prejudices, and patterns of thought. PiALOGUE on the other hand has a purpose of triangulating or converging upon commonality where the participants endeavor to not only understand each other but to communicate their own knowledge and awareness with ever greater effectiveness for the people with whom they are in dialogue. PiALOGUE enables ever greater understanding of what is actual as opposed to what might only appear to be real or potentially illusionary. As the symbol Pi represents the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter, as a means of finding the area of a circle or sphere, PiALOGUE is a process to determine the totality of what is or what can be known and/or understood similarly to using Pi along with measurable elements to compute the total area contained within a circle or sphere. The further out that you carry the non-ending decimal digits of Pi with your calculations the greater your level of accuracy. With PiALOGUE the longer that you participate, combining what you know or think that you know along with that which you learn or receive from other people, the more accurate (and practically useful) your own knowledge and awareness will become. In PiALOGUE terms, Enlightenment is an on-going process. PiALOGUE has an equation which is X -> 0 or as X approaches zero which refers to as a person's dysfunctional or less-than-optimal thought processes or emotional reactivity approaches zero or becomes less and less thereby enabling a person's genius to become more and more. A person realizes their own genius to a greater and greater extent to the point where they can understand another person or group's point-of-view well enough to communicate their genius to that specific person or group of people in the person or group's own form or style of language. PiALOGUE recognizes that true genius has its own internal language that facilitates genius for that specific person. The challenge is for each genius to figure out how to communicate that genius to and with other people on gradually lower and lower levels of intellectual capability in order to communicate with as many people as possible in each moment or as necessary. http://www.rense.com/RodinAerodynamics.htm
12 October 2010
...the story of the universe is that information, which I call novelty, is struggling to free itself from habit, which I call entropy... and that this process... is accelerating... It seems as if... the whole cosmos wants to change into information... All points want to become connected... The path of complexity to its goals is through connecting things together... You can imagine that there is an ultimate end-state of that process—it's the moment when every point in the universe is connected to every other point in the universe. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terence_McKenna
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MLc6i29yhDM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MLc6i29yhDM
http://www.regjeringen.no/en/dep/lmd/campain/svalbard-global-seed-vault/history.html?id=489075 Svalbard Global Seed Vault lies about 1 kilometre from Longyearbyen Airport as the crow flies, at about 130 metres above sea level and consists entirely of an underground facility, blasted out of the permafrost (at about minus 3-4 degrees Celsius). The facility is designed to have an almost “endless” lifetime.
06 October 2010
... Therefore, go forth, companion: when you find
No highway more, no track, all being blind,
The way to go shall glimmer in the mind.
Though you have conquered Earth and charted Sea
... And planned the courses of all Stars that be,
Adventure on, more wonders are in Thee.
Adventure on, for from the littlest clue
Has come whatever worth man ever knew;
The next to lighten all men may be you...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Masefieldhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Midnight_Folk
http://www.thefullwiki.org/Author:John_Masefield
http://www.thefullwiki.org/The_Wanderer_%28Masefield%29
No highway more, no track, all being blind,
The way to go shall glimmer in the mind.
Though you have conquered Earth and charted Sea
... And planned the courses of all Stars that be,
Adventure on, more wonders are in Thee.
Adventure on, for from the littlest clue
Has come whatever worth man ever knew;
The next to lighten all men may be you...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Masefieldhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Midnight_Folk
http://www.thefullwiki.org/Author:John_Masefield
http://www.thefullwiki.org/The_Wanderer_%28Masefield%29
04 October 2010
http://www.axess.se/magasin/english.aspx?article=762 Why We Love Fiction By Brian Boyd
Art, I suggest, is open-ended cognitive play with pattern, with patterns of intersecting patterns, in the information modes that matter most to us: sight, in the visual arts; sound, especially in music; and social information, in fiction.
It takes much repetition and focused attention, as first some new neural connections are made, then more on top of those, then still more on top of those. As the most successful connections strengthen, mental processing becomes more efficient, until the whole network is established and increasingly efficiently tuned and fast-tracked.
To compete for attention with the real and immediate, fictional stories therefore tend to offer high-intensity information, with striking characters, often with unusual powers, facing high stakes and extreme situations.
Ape minds grew in order to deal with complex social relations, and human minds developed still further as we became ultrasocial. Our minds are most finely tuned for understanding agents, that is, any creatures who can act: animal, human, and by extension, monsters, gods and spirits.
As we move into completely offline fictions, we continue to try out new possibilities and roles, testing social options and social emotions. The compulsiveness of story helps us improve our skills of social cognition, of switching perspectives, of seeing from other points of view, of imagining alternative or counterfactual scenarios.
In the same way we have been shaped to savor art and stories more immediately, more viscerally, more emotionally than we can respond to new scientific explanations. Science may help explain why and how art and fiction have come to matter, but that will not give science their emotional impact, nor allow it to find a formula for art or fiction, nor make them matter less. If anything, it will only clarify why and how they matter so much.
Art, I suggest, is open-ended cognitive play with pattern, with patterns of intersecting patterns, in the information modes that matter most to us: sight, in the visual arts; sound, especially in music; and social information, in fiction.
It takes much repetition and focused attention, as first some new neural connections are made, then more on top of those, then still more on top of those. As the most successful connections strengthen, mental processing becomes more efficient, until the whole network is established and increasingly efficiently tuned and fast-tracked.
To compete for attention with the real and immediate, fictional stories therefore tend to offer high-intensity information, with striking characters, often with unusual powers, facing high stakes and extreme situations.
Ape minds grew in order to deal with complex social relations, and human minds developed still further as we became ultrasocial. Our minds are most finely tuned for understanding agents, that is, any creatures who can act: animal, human, and by extension, monsters, gods and spirits.
As we move into completely offline fictions, we continue to try out new possibilities and roles, testing social options and social emotions. The compulsiveness of story helps us improve our skills of social cognition, of switching perspectives, of seeing from other points of view, of imagining alternative or counterfactual scenarios.
In the same way we have been shaped to savor art and stories more immediately, more viscerally, more emotionally than we can respond to new scientific explanations. Science may help explain why and how art and fiction have come to matter, but that will not give science their emotional impact, nor allow it to find a formula for art or fiction, nor make them matter less. If anything, it will only clarify why and how they matter so much.
03 October 2010
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludwik_Fleck
http://fleck.umcs.lublin.pl/teksty.sady.introduction.htm
Another important hint can possibly be provided by Fleck's remarks that the passive element can sometimes be transformed, within a different thought style, into an active one. Elements developed within older thought styles, becoming autonomous, could give rise to new systems. Possibly, an important role is played by misunderstandings during the intercollective exchange of ideas. Words change their meanings in many ways and this in turn creates new facts and opens new cognitive possibilities. In this way, an avalanche of transformations can begin, as within scientific systems there are internal connections so that every new fact changes all facts known before.
His remarks on what happens in the result of such transformation are much more important. Fleck opposes the view that old, false statements are replaced by new ones, more true then their predecessors. Before and after the scientific revolution "the same" words have different meanings, so we do not talk more truly about the same facts, objects, etc. but rather we talk in a different way about different things.
As a result, a comparison of the cognitive advantages of incommensurable theoretical systems is not possible. All debates between adherents of different thought styles consist almost entirely of misunderstandings. Members of both parties are talking of different things (although they are usually under an illusion that they are talking about, the same thing). They are applying different methods and criteria of correctness (although they are usually under an illusion that their arguments are universally valid and if their opponents do not want to accept them, then they are either stupid or malicious).
IV. There are not only gains but also losses involved in the changing of a thought style. We become able to see new facts but at the same time we lose ability to perceive something that was perceived by our predecessors. For ancient thinkers things of which their world was composed had deep, symbolic meaning - those things were related to gods, good and evil, and destiny. Within some thought styles numbers were not only tools of description but were significant in themselves and formed meaningful connections. All those senses disappeared in our times. Contemporary thinkers read old books with the feeling of superiority - for they cannot understand that ancient people had more to say about what was of superior value for them.
Scientific thought styles are distinguished by the larger number of passive elements relative to the number of active ones. There are passive elements in every thought style, even in myths or fairy-tales. However, internal connections within mythical systems are more detached and that is why the world appears to the adherents of such thought styles as unstable and full of miracles. In contrast, scientific thought styles are characterized by a relatively large degree of internal connections, and this leads to the belief that there is objective reality that exists independently of our thoughts, feelings and wishes.
http://fleck.umcs.lublin.pl/teksty.sady.introduction.htm
Another important hint can possibly be provided by Fleck's remarks that the passive element can sometimes be transformed, within a different thought style, into an active one. Elements developed within older thought styles, becoming autonomous, could give rise to new systems. Possibly, an important role is played by misunderstandings during the intercollective exchange of ideas. Words change their meanings in many ways and this in turn creates new facts and opens new cognitive possibilities. In this way, an avalanche of transformations can begin, as within scientific systems there are internal connections so that every new fact changes all facts known before.
His remarks on what happens in the result of such transformation are much more important. Fleck opposes the view that old, false statements are replaced by new ones, more true then their predecessors. Before and after the scientific revolution "the same" words have different meanings, so we do not talk more truly about the same facts, objects, etc. but rather we talk in a different way about different things.
As a result, a comparison of the cognitive advantages of incommensurable theoretical systems is not possible. All debates between adherents of different thought styles consist almost entirely of misunderstandings. Members of both parties are talking of different things (although they are usually under an illusion that they are talking about, the same thing). They are applying different methods and criteria of correctness (although they are usually under an illusion that their arguments are universally valid and if their opponents do not want to accept them, then they are either stupid or malicious).
IV. There are not only gains but also losses involved in the changing of a thought style. We become able to see new facts but at the same time we lose ability to perceive something that was perceived by our predecessors. For ancient thinkers things of which their world was composed had deep, symbolic meaning - those things were related to gods, good and evil, and destiny. Within some thought styles numbers were not only tools of description but were significant in themselves and formed meaningful connections. All those senses disappeared in our times. Contemporary thinkers read old books with the feeling of superiority - for they cannot understand that ancient people had more to say about what was of superior value for them.
Scientific thought styles are distinguished by the larger number of passive elements relative to the number of active ones. There are passive elements in every thought style, even in myths or fairy-tales. However, internal connections within mythical systems are more detached and that is why the world appears to the adherents of such thought styles as unstable and full of miracles. In contrast, scientific thought styles are characterized by a relatively large degree of internal connections, and this leads to the belief that there is objective reality that exists independently of our thoughts, feelings and wishes.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synesthesia from the Ancient Greek σύν (syn), "together," and αἴσθησις (aisthēsis), "sensation"—is a neurologically-based condition in which stimulation of one sensory or cognitive pathway leads to automatic, involuntary experiences in a second sensory or cognitive pathway.
Over 60 types of synesthesia have been reported by people, but only a fraction have been evaluated by scientific research. Even within one type, synesthetic perceptions vary in intensity and people vary in awareness of their synesthetic perceptions.
O tends to be white or black
The Gift by Vladimir Nabokov.
Over 60 types of synesthesia have been reported by people, but only a fraction have been evaluated by scientific research. Even within one type, synesthetic perceptions vary in intensity and people vary in awareness of their synesthetic perceptions.
O tends to be white or black
- Synesthesia is involuntary and automatic.
- Synesthetic perceptions are spatially extended, meaning they often have a sense of "location." For example, synesthetes speak of "looking at" or "going to" a particular place to attend to the experience.
- Synesthetic percepts are consistent and generic (i.e., simple rather than pictorial).
- Synesthesia is highly memorable.
- Synesthesia is laden with affect.
The Gift by Vladimir Nabokov.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2010/oct/03/fred-hoyle-nobel-prize
... was simply "the most outrageous prediction" ever made in science. "If [the 7.65 MeV state] did not exist, Hoyle reasoned, the universe would contain no carbon. And if there was no carbon, there would be no human beings. Thus Hoyle was saying – and nobody had ever used logic as outrageous as this before – that the mere fact he was alive and pondering the question of carbon was proof the 7.65 MeV state existed."
http://reading.academia.edu/PatParslow
http://brains.parslow.net/node/1569
The problem is, we can never know exactly what stimuli someone (or something) else is experiencing, nor can we know what the sum-of-experience is that provides them with their own internal models. Even if we are entirely behaviouristic animals the simplest way of modelling the Other is to ascribe some form of free-will and self-awareness to them. It is a black box model, which allows our own internal modelling systems to take some shortcuts and guess what their behaviour will be on the basis of some abstractions from previous experience; a parameterisation of the 'other' to allow us to make timely predictions of what they might do next.
I think we do that, at least to a large extent, before we come to be fully self-aware of ourselves. Furthermore, I think we then go on to model our own 'self' in the light of those we have grown up amongst. This seems to be borne out by the rare cases of feral children which have been adequately reported, and it seems to be a relatively energy efficient way of organising our minds - we only need to develop the sense of self and ability to be independent once we start getting to a stage where we are also physically capable of surviving on our own.
So my thesis is that we have an emergent consciousness, coming out of a system which models other agents for the simple survival need of having to know what they are going to do, and then through self-similarity we recognise that we are similar to them, and consequently re-use the same modelling technique to provide ourselves with a model of our own minds.
01 October 2010
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oswald_Spengler
A new culture starts, Spengler held, when persons in a dying, static, or purposeless society—at first only a few visionaries, often widely isolated—begin to see their surroundings from a new perspective. This intruding viewpoint, he suggests, becomes a driving force that grows to dominate their thinking like a Jungian archetype. Step by step the increasing influence of this new point of view transforms that entire society—its political and social structures, its business organizations and commercial practices, its technologies, mathematics, religious beliefs, music and visual arts, and architecture—to exemplify this unique outlook; he terms it the culture’s “prime symbol.”
The process, always similar, takes 1000–1200 years to run its course. In their final 200–300 years, Spengler said, all civilizations stiffen into rigidity and formalism; creativity dies out and cynicism surges...
Spengler made detailed analyses of six cultures, illustrating in charts of parallel columns how five passed through the same changes at corresponding stages in their development. Spengler described the dominating viewpoints of these cultures as:
The ossified forms of exhausted cultures, he wrote, can persist like pyramids for thousands of years. A new culture may emerge from their detritus or from within a society hitherto lacking a prime symbol. If the new culture’s start overlaps a dominant but dying culture, its early development will be masked and for a time, warped by that prior culture.
Cedric Villani
My main research interests are in kinetic theory (especially Boltzmann equation and its variants; see my long review paper), and optimal transport and its applications (I wrote a book on that subject too; and then another book). More generally, I am fond of subjects which combine several (if not all) of the following themes: evolution partial differential equations, fluid mechanics, statistical mechanics, probability theory, smooth and nonsmooth "metric" Riemannian geometry, and functional inequalities with geometric content.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C%C3%A9dric_Villani
A new culture starts, Spengler held, when persons in a dying, static, or purposeless society—at first only a few visionaries, often widely isolated—begin to see their surroundings from a new perspective. This intruding viewpoint, he suggests, becomes a driving force that grows to dominate their thinking like a Jungian archetype. Step by step the increasing influence of this new point of view transforms that entire society—its political and social structures, its business organizations and commercial practices, its technologies, mathematics, religious beliefs, music and visual arts, and architecture—to exemplify this unique outlook; he terms it the culture’s “prime symbol.”
The process, always similar, takes 1000–1200 years to run its course. In their final 200–300 years, Spengler said, all civilizations stiffen into rigidity and formalism; creativity dies out and cynicism surges...
Spengler made detailed analyses of six cultures, illustrating in charts of parallel columns how five passed through the same changes at corresponding stages in their development. Spengler described the dominating viewpoints of these cultures as:
- Egyptian—An arrow-straight path into eternity.
- Chinese—An indirect, seemingly-meandering path towards life’s goal.
- Hindu—Prime symbol not diagnosed by Spengler. Possibly nirvana, extinction through fulfillment. (The mathematical concept of zero was invented by the Hindu culture, which passed it to the West via Arabic mathematicians).
- Classical (Greek-Roman)—The tangible, free-standing object, exemplified by the nude statue.
- Magian (early Christianity, Mohammedanism)—A magical closed cavern, from whose upper reaches divine grace descends like a golden mist.
- Western (present culture, born in Western Europe about 1000 A.D.)—A spiritual reaching out into boundless space.
The ossified forms of exhausted cultures, he wrote, can persist like pyramids for thousands of years. A new culture may emerge from their detritus or from within a society hitherto lacking a prime symbol. If the new culture’s start overlaps a dominant but dying culture, its early development will be masked and for a time, warped by that prior culture.
Cedric Villani
My main research interests are in kinetic theory (especially Boltzmann equation and its variants; see my long review paper), and optimal transport and its applications (I wrote a book on that subject too; and then another book). More generally, I am fond of subjects which combine several (if not all) of the following themes: evolution partial differential equations, fluid mechanics, statistical mechanics, probability theory, smooth and nonsmooth "metric" Riemannian geometry, and functional inequalities with geometric content.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C%C3%A9dric_Villani
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