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As best I can tell from the scant information in the article, this is merely a hardware implementation of standard neural network architectures. Many of these were described, as software implementations in the mid-1980s by Rumelhart, McClelland et. al. in their two volume work*Parallel Distributed Processing*. Many of the putatively revolutionary features of this implementation, like on-board memory and modifiable connections are described. Since that time, neural network technology has advanced quite a bit, as can be seen by inspecting journals such as *Connection Science*, or *Neural Computation*. So, despite all the hyperbole here, as best I an tell, this is not really news.

I'm not as familiar with the scientific fields, but in many of the other fields such as humanities and social science a great number of journals are published by for profit publishers, see here for examples.

I can conceive of no reason why such a statement should be considered even remotely plausible.

You have to bear in mind that "longer", in this context, means "wider measured in pixels" and not actually wider physically. It's a lot more plausible now, isn't it? Furthermore, isn't the burden of proof on the person claiming that studies done on one medium apply to another medium? So really, I should be asking why anybody should believe that the studies done with printed material automatically apply to a completely different medium.

Please provide a good reference for your statement.

How physical text layout affects reading from screen. Please provide a good reference that shows that longer line lengths are bad for online material.

Lol. I didn't even notice WorldNetDaily was a bunch of crackpots until just now that you pointed it out and I took a second look. I actually found their link through another site that I do regularly read, iFeminists.net. (Yes, I was the one who posted the original Slashdot report.)

They did accurately report the results of the peer-reviewed study, even though the got the name of the journal incorrect in their article (which I did correct in my post). Considering that, I thought it was a great piece of important research that I hadn't read anywhere else. I don't particularly care that the right-wing is using this as propaganda, but I still think that the research is important to highlight.

The fact that they don't include the title, author, or volume for the journal article isn't particularly damning. None of the regular news articles from general news sites ever has this level of detail. The fact that they reported the actual journal name is a step up from most news sites. You could have found the correct article from that alone had you tried, like several of the other posters.

The damning part, as you pointed out, is the fact that they only talk to the Discovery Institute. Most news sites wouldn't even think of talking to these people since they had nothing to do with the actual discovery. Places like Fox News might call them up, but only to obtain a false sense of "balance" in order to be "fair", as if it actually matters what a bunch of non-scientists think regarding science reporting.

A 37-year-old spinal cord-injured female patient, transplanted of multipotent stem cells from human UC blood, with improved sensory perception and mobility, both functionally and morphologically: a case study

HLA-matched UC blood-derived multipotent stem cells were directly transplanted into the injured spinal cord site of a 37-year-old female patient suffering from spinal cord injury (SPI). In this case, human cord blood (UCB)-derived multipotent stem cells improved sensory perception and movement in the SPI patient's hips and thighs within 41 days of cell transplantation. CT and MRI results also showed regeneration of the spinal cord at the injured site and some of the cauda equina below it. Therefore, it is suggested that UCB multipotent stem cell transplantation could be a good treatment method for SPI patients.

Title:

A 37-year-old spinal cord-injured female patient, transplanted of multipotent stem cells from human UC blood, with improved sensory perception and mobility, both functionally and morphologically: a case study pp. 368 - 373
            K-S Kang, SW Kim, YH Oh, JW Yu, K-Y Kim, HK Park, C-H Song, H Han
            DOI: 10.1080/14653240500238160

Abstract:

HLA-matched UC blood-derived multipotent stem cells were directly transplanted into the injured spinal cord site of a 37-year-old female patient suffering from spinal cord injury (SPI). In this case, human cord blood (UCB)-derived multipotent stem cells improved sensory perception and movement in the SPI patient's hips and thighs within 41 days of cell transplantation. CT and MRI results also showed regeneration of the spinal cord at the injured site and some of the cauda equina below it. Therefore, it is suggested that UCB multipotent stem cell transplantation could be a good treatment method for SPI patients.

http://journalsonline.tandf.co.uk/(hibl2tibmt1yldq lfhsywa55)/app/home/contribution.asp?referrer=pare nt&backto=issue,8,9;journal,1,40;linkingpublicatio nresults,1:107693,1

The study referred to in the story was published last year in Critical Reviews in Plant Sciences. Abstract free, the article, like most journal articles, is probably very expensive.

Inhalation Toxicology, the journal referenced at the bottom of the article, has some other interesting articles on nanoparticles. I searched for all the cancer-related articles that mention nanoparticles, and they do have several articles discussing nanoparticles being used in immunizations and various 'cures', which is kind of encouraging. It seems to me that any medication that we could just shoot through the brain/blood barrier, would be quicker and possibly more effective.

Unfortunately, the archived articles require a membership, that I'm too lazy to get, to read.

Baloney. That's just rather narrow political correctness.
If it's so bad to use Third World, then why do The Third World Network and The Third World Academy of Science and The Third World Quarterly and Friends Of The Third World - all worthy institutions - all feel able to use the title without being derogatory or racist?