I used to work in an environment where we assembled handrails, which came in mirror-image pairs based on where the bolt holes were located. Some people could glance at a scrambled pile of them and immediately pull out a symmetrical pair, but others would have to fish them out of the pile and put them side-by-side in order to determine whether two were the same or mirror images. And it didn't seem to have anything to do with how long they had been doing it.
That doesn't seem like a task that depends on "smart", but rather, whether you can visualize an object and change its orientation in your mind. Perhaps it's learned, but it's not obvious why some people would learn it and others wouldn't - especially since the people who worked in the task described above seemed to either have it or not-have it, without regard to experience. So maybe it's easier to learn as a child, or maybe it's just an innate difference between people.
Also oddly, IMO, is that I was one of the best at it, despite what I said about my difficulties with left-vs-right in the parent post.
I don't have the reference to hand but I recall there is a South American tribe which don't have words for left and right as most languages do.
I don't think left & right are very intuitive. For most of my life I had to stop, close my eyes, imagine the plane of symmetry of my body, and ask myself which side of the plane something was on.
Of course, that may have just been a cognitive disorder, rather than in indication that the distinction is unintuitive. Either way, I finally outgrew it.
I wonder whether people who take great pride in their mensa membership realize that it's the bottom tier in a hierarchy of brainy-clubs that's at least 4-5 layers deep.
the mission of the university as a place of refuge, contemplation, and investigation for its own sake
It was really nice when the college's mission used to be refuge, contemplation, and investigation for its own sake, but in today's shrinking economy that is (more and more) no longer the case. Now-a-days not only does the college as a whole feel immense budget pressure, but if individual departments don't ante up each year then they'll be on the chopping block
It's unfortunate, IMO, that most people go to college to get a job rather than to get an education.
The energy output of the sun is tied to the electric field strength of the surrounding galactic neighborhood, which fluctuates over time.
Indeed. I'm working on a unification for Electric Universe Theory and Time Cube Theory, which, if I can pull it off, should make me the Crank of the Century.
>Whenever the Sun and its planets have visited regions of enhanced star formation in the Milky Way Galaxy, where exploding stars are most common, life has prospered.
Nothing like repeated blasts of high-energy gamma radiation to stir things up.
TFA does in fact explain that when he says "prospered" it means increased biodiversity.
However, his mechanism is that nearby supernovae cause cooler climates (how???), and that when the earth is cooler there's a broader range of thermal environments between the equator and the poles, thus more niches for life to diversify into.
Thanks. I've only read about it in science popularization venues, but I think a dozen or more times I've read the words "information cannot be transmitted faster than the speed of light, because that would violate causality".
AIUI, the notion that information can't be transferred faster than the speed of light is based on the fact that it would violate causality. I have wondered whether causality is an assumption rather than an actual property of the universe.
If it is (I'm not qualified to interpret this experiment), we'll have a lot of new physics coming down the pike over the next few decades.
I couldn't agree more. It's crazy: the author publishes the work without getting paid; there are little to no advertising costs and yet it costs a fortune to access the work. It made sense 20 years ago when the articles were published in small quantities and trucked over to university libraries. But now? The cost of distribution approaces 0.
It's another example of the internet as a disruptive technology. People who have been making money off of this are going to hold out as long as they can, well past the point that everyone else identifies it as crazy.
Actually most researchers publish their result in technical reports or on arXiv before sending a paper to a journal.
It is streamlined in Physics and is becoming popular in Computer Science. I am not sure about other disciplines though.
A lot of journals now allow "self-archiving". I think you can find most CS articles with a search engine and download a PDF from the authors' web sites.
Isn't one of the primary functions of a journal to facilitate the peer review process?
I seem to remember it goes something like this: Paper is submitted, editors evaluate, if it's not complete garbage, they send it to other scientists in that field, they provide feedback, decision to publish is made.
In the general case, the editors and peer reviewers work for free. AFAIK all the publisher provides is the stylesheet, some higher-level organization, and the printing/distribution.
In the internet age the traditional publishers are easily bypassed, and a lot of efforts are being made. I don't know whether there have been any big successes.
Slashdot Mirror
I should have mentioned in the same post:
I used to work in an environment where we assembled handrails, which came in mirror-image pairs based on where the bolt holes were located. Some people could glance at a scrambled pile of them and immediately pull out a symmetrical pair, but others would have to fish them out of the pile and put them side-by-side in order to determine whether two were the same or mirror images. And it didn't seem to have anything to do with how long they had been doing it.
That doesn't seem like a task that depends on "smart", but rather, whether you can visualize an object and change its orientation in your mind. Perhaps it's learned, but it's not obvious why some people would learn it and others wouldn't - especially since the people who worked in the task described above seemed to either have it or not-have it, without regard to experience. So maybe it's easier to learn as a child, or maybe it's just an innate difference between people.
Also oddly, IMO, is that I was one of the best at it, despite what I said about my difficulties with left-vs-right in the parent post.
I don't have the reference to hand but I recall there is a South American tribe which don't have words for left and right as most languages do.
I don't think left & right are very intuitive. For most of my life I had to stop, close my eyes, imagine the plane of symmetry of my body, and ask myself which side of the plane something was on.
Of course, that may have just been a cognitive disorder, rather than in indication that the distinction is unintuitive. Either way, I finally outgrew it.
Intuitive? Watch a toddler try and fill a cup from a jug sometime.
A toddler trying to fill a bathtub from a jug gives just about the same result.
Show me a culture that doesn't have the concept of ordered sets -- which is all that a "number line" is.
No, the number line has a metric in addition to an ordering.
There's a sort of hierarchy of these things, but I never can remember the terminology.
Start by studying the Hopi.
Best way to study something is from the inside.
That's how I studied yo mama's vagina.
You're siblings?
I need to know the "watery tart lobbing scimitars" to miles conversion.
Unfortunately there's not a constant conversion, since the number of watery tarts lobbing scimitars per mile varies with geographical location.
Well, i for one, will at least wait to see his final mod score before i take sides!
although, you do have a lower UID then him
now I am torn.
It's a well-known fact that you can use the ratio of two people's UIDs to determine the probability of who's right.
I wonder whether people who take great pride in their mensa membership realize that it's the bottom tier in a hierarchy of brainy-clubs that's at least 4-5 layers deep.
the mission of the university as a place of refuge, contemplation, and investigation for its own sake
It was really nice when the college's mission used to be refuge, contemplation, and investigation for its own sake, but in today's shrinking economy that is (more and more) no longer the case. Now-a-days not only does the college as a whole feel immense budget pressure, but if individual departments don't ante up each year then they'll be on the chopping block
It's unfortunate, IMO, that most people go to college to get a job rather than to get an education.
One Slashdotter's trash is another's treasure.
Also, I've heard over and over again the lots of businesses have a high regard for liberal arts majors as organizers.
Stop assuming nothing can travel faster than the speed of light.
Uh... if you read the post you replied to, I was *questioning* that assumption.
The code names are just priceless
I'm eagerly awaiting zaftig zebu.
Let's see, on the one hand I have the opinion that almost every cosmologist holds, and the other I have the opinion of a Slashdotter.
I'm really torn on this one.
The energy output of the sun is tied to the electric field strength of the surrounding galactic neighborhood, which fluctuates over time.
Indeed. I'm working on a unification for Electric Universe Theory and Time Cube Theory, which, if I can pull it off, should make me the Crank of the Century.
>Whenever the Sun and its planets have visited regions of enhanced star formation in the Milky Way Galaxy, where exploding stars are most common, life has prospered.
Nothing like repeated blasts of high-energy gamma radiation to stir things up.
TFA does in fact explain that when he says "prospered" it means increased biodiversity.
However, his mechanism is that nearby supernovae cause cooler climates (how???), and that when the earth is cooler there's a broader range of thermal environments between the equator and the poles, thus more niches for life to diversify into.
Thanks. I've only read about it in science popularization venues, but I think a dozen or more times I've read the words "information cannot be transmitted faster than the speed of light, because that would violate causality".
in the 90s she was goddess of all geeks
This ain't the 90s anymore, gramps.
AIUI, the notion that information can't be transferred faster than the speed of light is based on the fact that it would violate causality. I have wondered whether causality is an assumption rather than an actual property of the universe.
If it is (I'm not qualified to interpret this experiment), we'll have a lot of new physics coming down the pike over the next few decades.
Are you sure you are not talking about prolog?
Right, thanks.
Senility always sets in early in my family...
Do you remember what the journals were? In my experience the academics who are editors do it as part of their expected "service" for their field.
You're confusing "theory" and "hypothesis". In science, they are not the same.
I couldn't agree more. It's crazy: the author publishes the work without getting paid; there are little to no advertising costs and yet it costs a fortune to access the work. It made sense 20 years ago when the articles were published in small quantities and trucked over to university libraries. But now? The cost of distribution approaces 0.
It's another example of the internet as a disruptive technology. People who have been making money off of this are going to hold out as long as they can, well past the point that everyone else identifies it as crazy.
Actually most researchers publish their result in technical reports or on arXiv before sending a paper to a journal.
It is streamlined in Physics and is becoming popular in Computer Science. I am not sure about other disciplines though.
A lot of journals now allow "self-archiving". I think you can find most CS articles with a search engine and download a PDF from the authors' web sites.
Isn't one of the primary functions of a journal to facilitate the peer review process?
I seem to remember it goes something like this: Paper is submitted, editors evaluate, if it's not complete garbage, they send it to other scientists in that field, they provide feedback, decision to publish is made.
In the general case, the editors and peer reviewers work for free. AFAIK all the publisher provides is the stylesheet, some higher-level organization, and the printing/distribution.
In the internet age the traditional publishers are easily bypassed, and a lot of efforts are being made. I don't know whether there have been any big successes.
(Are the PLoS outlets open access?)
At a minimum publicly funded research should be available to the public for free.
Some funding agencies require that. Some middle-men are fighting it.
Academic journals should be replaced with something akin to blogs much as newspapers have.
Maybe "akin" to blogs, but there still needs to be peer review.