Why do some people never get depressed? Planning a Conference. Acknowledging mistakes is key to advancement – and not just in science. Stephen Fry's Planet Word. Episode One: Babel Pt 1 of 4. Radio 4 - So You Want to Be A Scientist - Home. Quant trading: How mathematicians rule the markets. 26 September 2011Last updated at 00:22 By Richard Anderson Business reporter, BBC News Mathematicians and their trading programs are increasingly taking the place of professional investors in financial centres across the world.
New study says birds learn how to build nests. 26 September 2011Last updated at 00:01 Footage of southern masked weaver birds formed the basis of the study A new study has found birds learn the art of nest-building, rather than it being just an instinctive skill.
Researchers from Edinburgh, Glasgow and St Andrews Universities studied film of southern masked weavers recorded by scientists in Botswana. This colourful species was chosen because individual birds build many complex nests in a season. Dr Patrick Walsh of Edinburgh University said the study revealed "a clear role for experience". Women on pill remember things differently. It looked at how women on the contraceptive pill or experiencing natural hormonal cycles remembered a car accident involving a mother and son.
Women using hormonal contraceptives for as little as one month remembered more clearly the main steps in the traumatic event - that there had been an accident, that the boy had been rushed to the hospital, that doctors worked to save his life and successfully reattached both his feet, for instance. Women not using them remembered more details, such as a fire hydrant next to the car. Shawn Nielsen, a graduate researcher involved in the study, said those who use contraceptives like birth control pills remember the gist of an emotional event while women not using the contraceptives better retain details.
Occ.ibo.org/ibis/documents/dp/drq/tok/d_0_tokxx_prt_1211_1.
Reindeer body clock switched off. Reindeer have to survive the light polar summer and dark polar winter Reindeer have no internal body clock, according to scientists.
Researchers found that the animals are missing a "circadian clock" that influences processes including the sleep-wake cycle and metabolism. Fish living in dark caves still feel the rhythm of life. 10 September 2011Last updated at 02:17 By Leila Battison Science reporter Millions of years of evolution in the dark have led to this Somalian cavefish losing its eyes, scales, and pigmentation.
A blind, cave-dwelling fish in Somalia knows what time it is, but its "day" is twice as long as ours. Most animals have an internal body clock, or circadian rhythm, that lasts around 24 hours and is modified by the light-dark cycle of a day. But an international team, whose research is published in the open access journal PloS Biology, shows that certain blind cave fish have a circadian rhythm that lasts almost two days. Rodin's Thinker cast vandalised in Argentina. 9 September 2011Last updated at 12:51 The sculpture is a popular tourist attraction in Buenos Aires A cast of Auguste Rodin's famous The Thinker sculpture has been vandalised in Buenos Aires.
Supercomputer predicts revolution. 9 September 2011Last updated at 15:57 Sentiment mining showed a sharp change in tone around Egypt ahead of President Mubarak's ousting Feeding a supercomputer with news stories could help predict major world events, according to US research.
A study, based on millions of articles, charted deteriorating national sentiment ahead of the recent revolutions in Libya and Egypt. Theory of Knowledge. Internet Explorer users 'have below-average IQ' It found that Internet Explorer users scored lower than average, while Chrome, Firefox and Safari users were very slightly above average.
Camino, Opera and Internet Explorer with Chrome Frame were scored "exceptionally" high. "The study showed a substantial relationship between an individual's cognitive ability and their choice of web browser," AptiQuant concluded. "From the test results, it is a clear indication that individuals on the lower side of the IQ scale tend to resist a change/upgrade of their browsers. " Geoffrey West: The surprising math of cities and corporations. Scientists warn of 'Planet of the Apes' scenario.
Ethical rules needed to curb 'Frankenstein-like experiments' on animals. Go Figure: What can 72 tell us about life? 20 July 2011Last updated at 22:43 By Michael Blastland GO FIGURE - Seeing stats in a different way Is 72 the answer to life, the universe and everything?
It's definitely the answer to a few economic questions, says Michael Blastland in his regular column. You know the joke from The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy in which the answer to the ultimate question about life, the universe and everything is 42? It was a typo. So, 72. The rule of 72 helps clarify half the serious economic issues of the day. The World at 7 Billion: Can We Stop Growing Now? by Robert Engelman. 18 Jul 2011: Opinion by robert engelman Demographers aren’t known for their sense of humor, but the ones who work for the United Nations recently announced that the world’s human population will hit 7 billion on Halloween this year.
Since censuses and other surveys can scarcely justify such a precise calculation, it’s tempting to imagine that the UN Population Division, the data shop that pinpointed the Day of 7 Billion, is hinting that we should all be afraid, be very afraid. We have reason to be. The 21st century is not yet a dozen years old, and there are already 1 billion more people than in October 1999 — with the outlook for future energy and food supplies looking bleaker than it has for decades. Westerners 'programmed for fatty foods and alcohol' 14 July 2011Last updated at 14:26 Obesity levels have risen sharply in many western countries since the 1970s Westerners could be genetically programmed to consume fatty foods and alcohol more than those from the east, researchers have claimed. Scientists at the University of Aberdeen say a genetic switch - DNA which turns genes on or off within cells - regulates appetite and thirst.
The study suggests it is also linked to depression. A good book offers the ultimate escape. It's not ADHD, Sir, it's in my genes. . . Slime mould prefers sedatives, say researchers. 10 June 2011Last updated at 12:16 By Jason Palmer Science and technology reporter, BBC News. Proof and Science. By the time you have completed this material you should be able to define "proof" explain why it is wise to avoid the word "proof" when discussing ideas in science state what the difference is between a law and a theory First let's get this straight.
Proof, as we mean it when we say "prove me wrong", has nothing to do with science. RÓMPETE EL OJO. Fotos y noticias. Un pasadizo atraviesa dos habitaciones tapiadas con lívidos cerebros contenidos en frascos dispuestos en anaqueles. El pasaje va a dar a un pequeño recinto donde una anciana mujer, de baja estatura y ancho cuerpo, inclina ávida su cabeza cana sobre una mesa salpicada de más sesos.
Ella es la doctora Adriana Ciudad de Andrade, encargada del Museo de Patología del Instituto Especializado de Ciencias Neurológicas (IECN), donde se conservan más de tres mil cerebros destinados al estudio de las enfermedades mentales en el Perú. El museo se ubica muy cerca del río Rímac, en la parte posterior del Instituto que da al jirón Ancash de Barrios Altos. Única en Latinoamérica, la cerebroteca de Lima fue creada en 1947, por Oscar Trelles Montes, padre de la neurología en el Perú, a imagen y semejanza de la que había visto en París, donde estudió.
7,000,000,000. Everything Bad is Good for You: How Today's Popular Culture is Actually Making Us Smarter (9781594481949): Steven Johnson. EndGame HQ full length version. Book Review - Soul Dust - The Magic of Consciousness - By Nicholas Humphrey. Probability distribution. In applied probability, a probability distribution can be specified in a number of different ways, often chosen for mathematical convenience: A probability distribution can either be univariate or multivariate. A univariate distribution gives the probabilities of a single random variable taking on various alternative values; a multivariate distribution (a joint probability distribution) gives the probabilities of a random vector—a set of two or more random variables—taking on various combinations of values. Important and commonly encountered univariate probability distributions include the binomial distribution, the hypergeometric distribution, and the normal distribution.
The multivariate normal distribution is a commonly encountered multivariate distribution. Introduction[edit] The probability mass function (pmf) p(S) specifies the probability distribution for the sum S of counts from two dice. Terminology[edit] Probability theory. As a mathematical foundation for statistics, probability theory is essential to many human activities that involve quantitative analysis of large sets of data.
Methods of probability theory also apply to descriptions of complex systems given only partial knowledge of their state, as in statistical mechanics. A great discovery of twentieth century physics was the probabilistic nature of physical phenomena at atomic scales, described in quantum mechanics. History[edit] Is graphene a miracle material? Consciousness.