TIZER'S SCIENCE NEWS

[Cathy]

Oh can't wait for the opinions on this issue... very interesting.

[chinatyke]

In the beginning there was nothing, which exploded. Now they discuss Nobel prizes for folks hearing nothing. Defies all reason.

In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. Some people will believe anything!

[Marilyn]

You have caught me in a particularly deflated mood tonight and I concur with Chinatyke....
On a better day, I would still concur, but would likely not respond.

[Bodger]

hartley353 wrote:In the beginning there was nothing, which exploded. Now they discuss Nobel prizes for folks hearing nothing. Defies all reason.

For 2000 years people have been offered a better life when they die, providing you pay the vendor a few bob every week, nobody has proven the existence of an afterlife, but a lot of money has been made flogging the concept !

[plaques]

Generally speaking the concept of "nothing" is the opposite of infinity. But it is said that some infinities or larger than others. The sum of all even numbers being larger than the sum of odd numbers for example. So the question may be posed as to how big "nothing" is? Could it be the size of the universe with the big bang starting at its centre?
"God" always raises difficulties in anyone's definition. The fact remains that large numbers of people get support and satisfaction from believing in God. As long as they don't threaten me with his wrath if I don't join the club its Ok by me.

[Stanley]

"Defies all reason" Many things 'defy reason', think of love and forgiveness. As for there being 'nothing' before the Singularity, we don't know that, all we know is that we don't know. That's why those pesky scientists keep digging.
As for the existence of God, that's a puzzle as well. I've been looking for him/her for a long time. A failed nun called Karen Armstrong wrote a good book with a splendid title 'The History of God' because she was disillusioned by what she was expected to believe. Not a bad place to start because if nothing else it proves that we are not alone in our scepticism. At the moment I'm reading MacCulloch's 'A History of Christianity' again. My mate Amado, a Catholic priest understands and I forgive him for wanting to baptise me.....

[plaques]

Karen Armstrong wrote a good book with a splendid title 'The History of God'

I would agree. Probably one of the best explanations of the different forms of religion I have read. Easy going for the layman.

On "nothing" Sir Roger Penrose offered that the Universe would end when entropy reaches a maximum. Everything would then stop including time. This is not to say that this end of universe "nothing" is the same as the singularity "nothing". Although as a second starting point it would explain why it was so vast.

[Tripps]

" Everything would then stop including time. This is not to say that this end of universe "nothing" is the same as the singularity "nothing".

Thank goodness that I'm not clever enough to have the first idea what that means.

[Tizer]

Our everyday experience shows different types of `nothing'. We'll say "My glass has nothing in it" when it's full of a mixture of nitrogen, oxygen and carbon dioxide. Most people think of the `outer space' between planets and between stars as having nothing in it yet it's filled with radiation, electromagnetic waves. And if we think that the sea of electromagnetic waves is really `nothing' then it's worth remembering that the chair on which you sit is made up almost completely of a sea of electromagnetic waves.

Religion and gods...I've just read that Issac Asimov said that religions didn't really believe in an all-powerful god. If they did, why would they put lightning conductors on churches?

[Stanley]

The important thing in science is not so much to obtain new facts as to discover new ways of thinking about them. Sir Lawrence Bragg.

"Religion and gods...I've just read that Issac Asimov said that religions didn't really believe in an all-powerful god. If they did, why would they put lightning conductors on churches?"

Better safe than sorry?

[Marilyn]

I just got a twinge in my bum when I read Tiz's account of my chair being electro-magnetically charged. Time to don the rubber undies!
My explanation of nothing is looking in my purse on the day before pay day...

Stanley, there is a church in Portloe, Cornwall with a lovely story pinned up on it's wall about the day the church got struck by lightening. Three holes blown in the wall, Fourteen people injured and one lad died. So not the safest place to be...

[hartley353]

I just got a twinge in my bum when I read Tiz's account of my chair being electro-magnetically charged. Time to don the rubber undies!
My explanation of nothing is looking in my purse on the day before pay day...

Stanley, there is a church in Portloe, Cornwall with a lovely story pinned up on it's wall about the day the church got struck by lightening. Three holes blown in the wall, Fourteen people injured and one lad died. So not the safest place to be...

Does that make God a fool, they say only a fool would knock his own home down.

[Stanley]

Maz one of the old beliefs about Holly was that if it was planted close to buildings it attracted lightning. For many years, sceptics pooh-poohed the idea but then research showed that there was truth in the belief, all to do with 'the action of points', it was the spikes on the leaves that did the trick. Another little known fact for you. In the early days of lightning protection platinum was used on the tips of the familiar air terminal, the copper ball with spikes on. My mate Peter Tatham told me he always checked old terminals and had occasionally found platinum.

[Tizer]

This news story was released by the University of Basel, Switzerland, on 13 March 2014 and was one of the 10 most popular science news stories coming out of Europe in March.

Forgetting Is Actively Regulated
In order to function properly, the human brain requires the ability not only to store but also to forget. Through memory loss, unnecessary information is deleted and the nervous system retains its plasticity. A disruption of this process can lead to serious mental disorders. Basel scientists have now discovered a molecular mechanism that actively regulates the process of forgetting.

The human brain is buillt in such a way, that only necessary information is stored permanently - the rest is forgotten over time. However, it has not been clear whether this process was active or passive. Scientists from the University of Basel have now found a molecule that actively regulates memory loss. The so-called musashi protein is responsible for the structure and function of the synaptic connections of the brain, the place where information is communicated from one neuron to the next.

Using olfactory conditioning, the researchers Attila Stetak and Nils Hadziselimovic first studied the learning abilities of genetically modified ringworms (C .elegans) that were lacking the musashi protein. The experiments showed that the worms exhibited the same learning skills as unmodified animals. However, with extended duration of the experiment, the scientists discovered that the mutants were able to remember the new information much better. In other words, the genetically modified worms lacking the musashi protein were less forgetful.

Further experiments showed that the protein inhibits the synthesis of molecules responsible for the stabilization of synaptic connections. This stabilization seems to play an important role in the process of learning and forgetting. The researchers identified two parallel mechanisms. One the one hand, the protein adducin stimulates the growth of synapses and therefore also helps to retain memory; on the other hand, the musashi protein actively inhibits the stabilization of these synapses and thus facilitates memory loss. Therefore, it is the balance between these two proteins that is crucial for the retention of memories.

Forgetting is thus not a passive but rather an active process and a disruption of this process may result in serious mental disorders. The musashi protein also has interesting implications for the development of drugs trying to prevent abnormal memory loss that occurs in diseases such as Alzheimer’s. Further studies on the therapeutic possibilities of this discovery will be done.

[Bodger]

Tizer, that explains the wifes birthday & annivesary then !

[Cathy]

So nice to know that when i walk into a room and can't remember why I'm there, that it's perfectly normal. Just hope it never happens that one day I may do something like turn the grill on and forget all about it. I can perfectly understand that the brain doesn't need to remember unused/unimportant information but I worry that sometimes it temporarily forgets current information. I'm sick of talking-heads - uninteresting, badly informed, repetitive, boring tv and radio shows - I am switching them off more and more and hopefully my brain hangs onto the stuff that I benefit from, instead of being clogged with nonsense. Makes sense ??

[Stanley]

Definitely Cathy! My old friend John Pudney was an advocate of consciously learning to forget. He reckoned we are bombarded with so much incoming information that we have to learn to forget to protect our brains. I'd never thought about this before and started trying to do it, I think I succeeded. As John said, there is no need to remember info that is stored elsewhere like telephone numbers etc.
There's another interesting theory about memory that was recommended to me by a mentor when I was reading for exams. If you keep cards with keywords about specific subjects and read the cards just before going into the exam they trigger the brain off and open the memory of what you read in revision. It worked for me....

[Marilyn]

I have a specific block with mobile phone numbers...I can't even tell you my own without looking it up!
And yet I can rattle off every home phone number I have ever had back to when I was a kid.
Thankfully I have everyone on speed dial...( which, no doubt, contributes to my mental block re learning the numbers).

[hartley353]

My obsession with diary keeping means I can let go of most trivia on a daily basis. Yet if any one asked for detail of a specific time, or action my brain can direct me to the page it is on. Where ever I have worked in time I become the oracle, folks turn to me to have the detail in my diary. The brain is only a memory stick it can be filled, so best it is not filled with rubbish.

[Stanley]

"The brain is only a memory stick it can be filled, so best it is not filled with rubbish."

Like evidence?

[Stanley]

Great news! After a 13 year campaign Dr Raj Mattu has won his case against the Warwickshire health trust which drove him out after he exposed malpractice. (LINK)
MD in Private Eye will be pleased, he has consistently supported Dr Mattu and it was largely due to this constant pressure that the Bristol heart surgery problems were exposed. The criminal aspect of this is the amount of NHS money that has been spent on this cover up.

[Stanley]

I was talking to Daughter Janet the other day about her latest project and mentioned that I had thought about her and Harry often during the search for the Malaysian airliner because I knew that the years she and Harry spent on underwater acoustics and sound signatures played a large part in the technology being used. She made an interesting observation that if they could have sunk three of the NASNET underwater stations and triangulated the pings they could have got an exact location but of course there wasn't time. She told me that it was amazing how sound bends underwater which makes it difficult to get any accurate direction information from a single signal. The NASNET stations can survive and operate at almost any depth by the way.
All this came to mind this morning when I saw the news that scientists have finally identified a mysterious noise that has been puzzling them for 50 years ever since submarines picked it up. See this LINK for the full story. It turns out that the quacking noise is the chatter of Minke whales talking to each other.
LINK for NASNET.

[Tizer]

With the recent Malaysian airliner event I've been surprised to see that passenger aircraft don't seem to have constant tracking systems, sending out an unbroken signal defining their exact position and which cannot be switched off.

[Stanley]

I heard a piece on air about this and one expert said it was a disgrace that this wasn't happening. It is so easy and cheap to do these days.

[Stanley]

See this LINK for news that the Tetse Fly genome has been cracked.