Archive for the ‘science’ category
December 26, 2010
– – Santa’s reindeer may require a slight assist to gain altitude. Scientist Andrew Haynes reports in the respected Pharmaceutical Journal that reindeer deliberately seek out the mind-bending agaric fungi in the wild, and are often seen staggering around afterwards, making odd noises.
It is felt that the reindeer deliberately seek out the mushrooms to escape the monotony of dreary long winters. A common side effect of psychedelic mushroom consumption in humans is the feeling of flying, so the flight capabilities of Santa’s reindeer are interesting.
Herdsmen are also reported in some parts of the world to drink the urine of the reindeer to get high themselves, but I find that a little hard to swallow…
Categories: animal behavior, animal oddities, animals, furry, science
Tags: altered reindeer states, high flying reindeer
Comments: 3 Comments
December 20, 2010
– – Excessive fear is certainly not a good thing, but it’s likewise undesirable to be afraid of nothing. A woman with a rare genetic disorder, Urbach-Wiethe disease, falls into the latter category, and is literally afraid of nothing. Her condition is associated with damage to her amygdala, an almond-shaped portion of the brain strongly associated with fear responses in past research on animals.
Researchers at the University of Iowa tried their best to scare a 44-year old female with the condition, exposing her to live snakes and spiders, taking her on a tour of a supposedly haunted house, and showing the subject emotionally-evocative films; they got nothing! The subject also had a life history full of dangerous situations, including being held up at both knifepoint and gunpoint, and almost killed by domestic violence. Even in those situations, the subject did not experience fear.
Through study of this woman, researchers hope to be able to better understand how the amygdala is connected to human fear, leading to better treatments for post-traumatic stress disorder.
Categories: animals, psychology, research, science
Tags: studying fear, the fear response
Comments: 2 Comments
December 18, 2010
– – Not the cosmological model…but rather what was once called the “dumb show about smart guys.” Featuring brilliant but socially inept science nerds, the show has an undeniable chemistry among ensemble cast members and makes intellectualism admirable. You might catch a glimpse of someone you know among these characters, certainly not yourself (snorts while laughing and adjusts his pocket protector)!
Theory is centered around the character of Sheldon as played to perfection by Jim Parsons, who looks as he is taunted on a recent show “like a preying mantis.” “That’s very hurtful,” he responded. Sheldon speaks with precise, impeccable, comically fussy grammar, possibly the best delivery on television. Neurotically afflicted with OCD and hypochondriasis, Sheldon is living in a world that he can never really be a part of; he is in the world, but not of it. Truly there is, as Peanuts once observed, no greater burden than having a high potential.
This is one of the best, most intelligently written comedies ever on television! Who ever would have thought that post-doctoral physicists could be featured in an engaging show on a major network? Big Bang Theory works on a variety of levels…maybe there’s hope for us yet!
Categories: cool things, humor, science, television
Tags: Bang-up television, intelligent comedies, The Big Bang Theory
Comments: 2 Comments
December 16, 2010
– – Scientists believe that thousands of young children are being bitten by dogs because they can’t tell when the animals are giving aggressive warnings. Surveys have shown that 43% of school children in England have been bitten, often at home by a familiar dog. Some suffer serious injuries.
Tests by psychologists show that children as old as six believe that a dog baring its teeth is smiling, and may think that such a dog is happy and receptive to being given a hug and kiss! Eye-tracking studies at Lincoln University show that children tend to look only only at a dog’s mouth, ignoring other signs of aggression that adults key into, such as pointed ears.
A computer game called The Blue Dog has been created by psychologists to help teach children when it is best to leave dogs alone…
Categories: animal behavior, animal occurrences, animals, psychology, science
Tags: dog attack signals
Comments: 6 Comments
October 24, 2010
– – Did you know it’s legal to buy real plastinated body parts online?–Yuppers, a German anatomist famous for his controversial Body World exhibition is selling both human and animal body parts which have had water and fat replaced with plastic for preservation purposes. One of the tamer examples of such a process is pictured, but you can get a whole body, torso, or just a head. For the budget-conscious, transparent body slices are also available…
Only “qualified users” who can provide written proof that they intend to use the parts for research, teaching, or medical purposes can place an order, however. This doesn’t mean that the general public can’t buy jewelry crafted from animal corpses or reproductions of the real human body parts.- -I swear I am not making this up!
A bit of the ghoulish submitted for your approval as we approach Halloween…
Categories: medical, science, strange, strange happenings, weird
Tags: body parts, plastinated body parts
Comments: 2 Comments
October 16, 2010
– – Someone once said that animals sweat, men perspire, and women have a rosy glow.–Well, a study performed at Osaka International University in Japan and reported in the journal Experimental Physiology indicated that men sweat more and more efficiently than women, with men who are physically fit sweating more than anyone else!
Physically fit people begin to sweat at a lower core body temperature, which is adaptive since sweating is the body’s way of cooling off and preventing overheating. A sweating person can then perform longer and better at whatever it is that they are doing. Fit men tended to sweat the most, whereas fit women had higher sweat rates than inactive men or inactive women.
Sweating may be the manly thing to do, too, as prior research has shown a link between the male-sex hormone testosterone, physical training, and an increase in sweat rate…so sweat proudly, knowing that you are a manly man, and that the proof is in the nostrils!
Categories: medical, research, science
Tags: sweating, sweating and fitness
Comments: 2 Comments
September 29, 2010
– – It kinda feels like a Syfy movie offering, these tales of genetically-engineered animals for human consumption. A fast-growing Atlantic salmon developed by AquaBounty Technologies in Massachusetts contains an extra growth gene that makes it grow twice as fast as conventional farm-raised salmon, and is the first such genetically-engineered animal to be promoted for a food source.
The FDA says that studies conducted by AquaBounty show that the gene is safe for the salmon, safe for humans, and safe for the environment. Some scientists and consumer groups say, however, that the agency should slow down and get more information, citing concerns over potential consumer allergies to such fish and questions about what would happen if such genetically-modified fish escaped from fish farms into the wild, there to mate with wild fish, out-compete with them for food, or irreversibly change their environments. Soon, such fish might be running for elected office…
It all sounds a bit fishy…and there’s gotta be a bad horror movie in this somewhere! 
Categories: animals, scalies, science, trends
Tags: Frankenfish?, genetically-engineered salmon
Comments: 3 Comments
September 6, 2010
– – I realize that it’s hard to form an emotional attachment with a crustacean. I also know that Klingons eat some of their food raw and wiggling. I am glad, however, that a restaurant in Sacramento, California will no longer serve a cruel dish that’s often called “dancing shrimp” or “dancing prawns.” The dish’s name is a reference, you see, to the writhing that the animals engage in when their protective shells are ripped off and acidic lemon juice is squeezed onto their raw flesh before they are eaten alive...
Scientific research has demonstrated that prawns feel pain, just as other animals do. A 2007 Queen’s University Belfast study found that when prawns have acid dabbed onto one of their antennae, they respond by grooming the affected area and rubbing it against the side of the tank, just as a dog might lick an injured paw. When given painkillers, the prawns felt no need to groom or rub their acid-dabbed antennae. The researchers concluded that these results are consistent with the idea that these crustaceans can experience pain.
When PETA presented their findings and numerous complaints about the practice of serving “dancing shrimp” as cruel, the restaurant agreed to stop serving live shrimp…
Categories: animal rights, animals, Invertebrates, science
Tags: dancing shrimp, serving "dancing shrimp" to stop at Sacramento restaurant
Comments: 3 Comments
August 21, 2010
– – A new study presented at the Annual Convention of the American Psychological Association suggests that personality may be more than just a psychological construct, but rather reflect underlying neural differences in the brain.
Study researcher Inna Fishman of the Salk Institute for Biological Sciences found that more extroverted test subjects showed a higher change in a particular brain electrical activity known as P300 when they were exposed to images of human faces as opposed to pictures of flowers. Those scoring lower on a test of extroversion had very similar P300 responses to both human faces and flowers.
The findings might partly explain why extroverts are more motivated to seek the company of others than are introverts, who might not place a larger weight on social stimuli than on other stimuli…
Categories: psychology, research, science
Tags: Personality and neural differences, the brain and personality
Comments: 1 Comment
August 12, 2010
– – Orangutans aren’t exactly balls of fire but rather simian slackers; they can sleep for twelve hours a day, and then nap for several hours more! In fact, orangutans use less energy, pound-for-pound, than any animal except for the tree sloth. This is not necessarily a bad thing…
It turns out that orangutans are not lazy, but simply energy-efficient. In the wild, orangutans live mainly off fruit, which can be hard to come by in their forest habitat for several months of the year. Those who can survive on the least food for the longest therefore have the best chance of surviving and reproducing. Although a large male orangutan can weigh in at over 250 pounds, a new study in the Journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences shows that such an animal consumes less than 2,000 calories a day, which is 20% less than a typical human male.
This can be considered an evolutionary adaptation to deal with their habitat, with sleep being a low-energy state…
Categories: animals, environmental, evolution, furry, science
Tags: animal energy efficiency, orangutan
Comments: 5 Comments
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