Tag Archives: Science

The other day I read this, about evidence that there are other universes outside our own. I imagined each universe as a soap bubble, floating in nothingness and occasionally bumping into one another. And I thought to myself: “Nothing we … Continue reading →

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Posted on December 15, 2010

To sleep, perchance through the night…

Posted on August 24, 2010 | 2 Comments

Many nights I wake up around 3 a.m. Then I lie awake for an hour or three, while random thoughts flit and bump around my brain like moths. I think about blog posts to write, recipes to try, my to-do list, ideas for that novel that I keep telling myself I might one day tackle. Usually, I do get back to sleep, but the broken nights are becoming very frustrating.

A while ago, I learned about “segmented sleep.” I’ve written about this before, but this seemed like a good time to revisit the concept. Before there was artificial lighting, apparently, it was normal for the night’s sleep to be broken into two periods: “first sleep” and “second sleep.” According to this editorial by A. Roger Ekirch, people actually made use of this midnight wakefulness:

Others remained in bed to pray or make love. This time after the first sleep was praised as uniquely suited for sexual intimacy; rested couples have “more enjoyment” and “do it better,” as one 16th-century French doctor wrote. Often, people might simply have lain in bed ruminating on the meaning of a fresh dream, thereby permitting the conscious mind a window onto the human psyche that remains shuttered for those in the modern day too quick to awake and arise.

I like to think of this time as a dim period of half-consciousness, when the subconscious can percolate ideas. That sounds nicer than insomnia. I should try not to get upset or frustrated by my insomnia — or my segmented sleep, as I should call it — but rather look upon it as a chance for some meditative time, when I can just be rather than doing.

I only wish I could get up and do some quiet yoga or write in my journal during that time, but I don’t want to disturb my husband. He gets distressed enough by my lack of sleep anyway. Still, just lying there in bed can be so boring.

I have heard people say that they would do away with sleep if they could, that it’s a waste of a good 8 hours every day. But even if we did come up with a pill or technology that enabled us to forgo sleep, I don’t think I would do it. I love sleep, whether I get a lot or a little. I relish that descent into oblivion every night, when my brain is forced to take a time-out and make up dreams for me, rather than buzzing on about what I have or have not done

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Thoughts on free will & fatalism…

Posted on July 20, 2010 | 3 Comments

It’s a question we’ve asked ourselves for millennia: Do we make our own choices, or are we controlled by outside forces, such as the gods or — as science has ascended and we’ve learned more about these things — our genes, our subconscious and/or our animal instincts for survival and reproduction?

When I read an article like this or a blog like this, I tend to think it’s the latter. Despite inventing high-fructose corn syrup, we eat as if food were still scarce, and we all get fat. We hire people based on their beauty, which can be defined as traits we want passed on to the seceding generations. We find it difficult to comprehend long-term problems like global warming and can’t sacrifice our short-term rewards to solve them.

When we start believing that our instincts or our subconscious behaviors determine every choice we make, fatalism could set in. Someone who accepts such fatalism could logically conclude that he is not responsible for his actions and behave unethically or even break the law. And why not? If my subconscious or my genes determine my behavior, then what’s the point of doing anything?

I believe that the great story of being human is the struggle to operate as if we in fact do shape our own lives, even if that’s not strictly true. Identifying a purpose in life and believing we have the free will to pursue that purpose are what make consciousness bearable. It’s no accident that our most enduring stories are about people who struggled for freedom and sacrificed their own needs or desires to achieve a greater good.

Even if the concept of free will is just an invention to help us cope with our consciousness of our finite lives, it is a useful one. We should behave as if we have free will, even if that behavior is coded into our genes. That is the only way we can advance as a species, a goal that may provide that much-needed purpose to life.

Read more:
The Beauty Advantage (Newsweek)
Think You’re Operating on Free Will? Think Again (Time)
You Are Not So Smart
Naturalism.org

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Thoughts on urban rooftop gardening…

Posted on June 14, 2010 | 1 Comment

A Green Copenhagen

Recently, I have become interested in the concept of urban rooftop gardening. This may seem odd because I don’t live in an urban environment, and indeed, where I live it is much more convenient to garden on the ground, which we do.

But I like to imagine a large apartment building in a city like New York City. The roof is planted with vegetables and herb borders. Maybe there are even a couple of fish tanks, and the fish’s water is recycled to water and feed the vegetables. Everyone in the building helps caretake the garden in exchange for a portion of the food produced. This is truly producing food locally. So why aren’t we doing this?

Green roofs have many benefits. The most important, besides producing food, is to mitigate the “heat island” effect of cities, which contributes to climate change. Conventional roofs reflect back sunlight, making urban areas 7 degrees warmer, on average, than surrounding areas. If all roofs in a city were “greened,” the temperature could be reduced as much as 12 degrees.

In addition, the green roofs provide a habitat for birds and insects such as bees. They capture pollutants and keep rainwater from running off roofs. They also extend the life of the roof and make the buildings more energy-efficient. What’s not to love?

Copenhagen has taken an important step by mandating green roofs in all new buildings as part of the city’s efforts to go carbon neutral. More cities should follow this example. Greening city roofs is a low-impact, relatively low cost solution with a lot of benefits and very few cons. It’s frustrating that it seems like we resist these simple ideas.

For more:
Here Comes Urban Heat (NASA)
Copenhagen Adopts a Mandatory Green Roof Policy (Inhabit)
Green Roofs (Wikipedia)
Plant a Green Roof
LivingRoofs.org

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There is room for optimism…

Posted on May 21, 2010 | Leave a comment

Interesting reading in the New York Times Science section this week: Doomsayers Beware, a Bright Future Beckons. It’s a review of the book The Rational Optimist by Matt Ridleybut makes some points about people who focus overmuch on the idea that mankind is doomed. Apparently, there are two types of “apocaholics”: those who despair because they think the end is inevitable, and those who are more optimistic, because they also think the end is inevitable but that gives us a chance to start over and build a better world.

Ridley makes the case that what sets us apart from the Neanderthals was global trade, and that because we freely trade goods, ideas and knowledge, things just keep getting better and better. Here’s his prediction for the future:

Prosperity spreads, technology progresses, poverty declines, disease retreats, fecundity falls, happiness increases, violence atrophies, freedom grows, knowledge flourishes, the environment improves and wilderness expands.

Sounds a little utopian to me, but I truly hope he’s right.The Rational Optimist sounds like an interesting read, in any case.

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On the science of near-death experiences…

Posted on April 12, 2010 | Leave a comment
Rosa Celeste: Dante and Beatrice gaze upon the...
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The unexplained phenomenon of the near-death experience is the source of many cliches about death and the afterlife. The term near-death experience (NDE) was coined by Dr. Raymond Moody in his 1975 book, Life After Life. However, reports of such experiences have occurred throughout history. For example, Plato’s Republic describes an NDE.

In a typical NDE, a person who is pronounced dead or is very close to death leaves their body and floats toward the ceiling. The person typically reports seeing a bright light or moving down a tunnel toward a light. Sometimes the person sees angels or dead loved ones. Sometimes their life flashes before their eyes, or a spiritual being tells them it is not their time yet and sends them back to their bodies.

Just as we can never know for sure what happens to us after death, we will probably never know whether the NDE is real, hallucination or some combination of both. However, a recent study has posited that excess carbon dioxide may cause typical NDE hallucinations. In a study of 52 heart attack victims, 11 reported NDEs, and their carbon dioxide levels were all significantly higher than those who didn’t have NDEs. Other people who have inhaled excess carbon dioxide have reported similar experiences as the typical NDE. But this study is the first to find a direct link between carbon dioxide in the blood and NDEs.

A person having an NDE often feels calm and at peace or experiences a feeling of unconditional love. These feelings may correspond to the sense of detachment, lack of emotion and calm that many people feel during traumatic events. In a defense mechanism, the brain releases large amounts of endorphins, which can produce these sensations.

Still, many people who have NDEs afterward feel a renewed appreciation for life, a sense of compassion toward others and a lack of fear about death. I just wish more of us could experience these things without having to almost die first. Well, perhaps we can. A stiff dose of ketamine, a horse tranquilizer, can produce remarkably similar hallucinations. Maybe when we start feeling depressed about life or our fellow human beings, the prescription should be a dose of ketamine and its accompanying NDE.

As always, when we want to understand anything, it is a good idea to turn to writers for insight. Here are some novels on the subject:

  • The Matt Zander Journals by Gary Denne
  • Passage by Connie Willis
  • Fearless by Rafael Yglesias

For more…

Near-Death Experiences Explained? (National Geographic)
How Near-Death Experiences Work (How Stuff Works)
Can Science Explain Heaven (Newsweek)
Patients Draw Life-After-Death Experiences (Newsweek)
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What is reality? Conspiracy theories and the New World Order…

Posted on January 31, 2010 | 3 Comments
Information Awareness Office logo; from http:/...
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Something that has always fascinated me is the conspiracy theory, and the person who would believe in them. Because such a person has a radically different view of reality than I do.

I am an Occam’s Razor type of person. I always look for the simplest explanation. A hallmark of conspiracy theories is that they are never simple. For me, the idea that more than a handful of people could keep anything a secret for years, even across generations, is frankly unbelievable, no matter what their motivations. When the conspiracy theory involves pragmatic people like scientists (global warming conspiracy theories) or doctors (vaccine conspiracy theories), where keeping silent means violating their professional ethics, I can’t believe it at all. That’s why I will always tend to favor the opinions of large group of scientists or doctors or other respected professionals over organizations or groups I know nothing about, namely the theorists.

In essence, I believe most people are, in general, decent sorts who will not for long periods of time keep a secret that goes against their principles, and there isn’t enough money to throw at all of them to coerce them to do so. Even if they are not decent or principled, they will be gossipy or stupid. And a conspiracy depends on everyone involved keeping quiet.

I first got introduced to the idea of conspiracy theories and conspiracy theorists via The X-Files, where the theorists are generally depicted as being right. I was an avid fan but still had a hard time keeping the complex conspiracies straight. I imagine the actual conspirators don’t find it much easier. I also learned quite a bit about the details of the most prevalent conspiracy theories (such as JFK’s shooting and “we never landed on the moon”) via the excellent book The Big Book of Conspiracies, which relates the theories in comic book format.

Last weekend I spent a whole afternoon immersed in the details of the granddaddy of all conspiracy theories: the New World Order conspiracy. I don’t have the energy to summarize all of the details here, but Wikipedia has a wonderful article on it. The New World Order theory combines elements from many other conspiracies, including black helicopters, barcodes and the mark of the beast, the projected 2012 apocalypse and lizard alien overlords, to portray pretty much everything that has happened in history in a paranoiac light.

The goal of the New World Order is — what, exactly? That part is not entirely clear, but it generally has to do with bringing the entire world under a single government headed by the elite or possibly aliens or even the Antichrist. It seems rather laughable that economic and political unions that become mired in bureaucracy or corporate interests that crash the global financial system or ineffective international organizations can possibly get it together enough to overthrow all of the world’s governments and bring us all under one rule. But then again, I am not a conspiracy theorist.

Sidenote: One of the most fascinating parts of the New World Order conspiracy theory is exactly how this overthrow would be accomplished. A radical population reduction or even genocide is advocated as an initial step, accomplished through epidemics or environmental disasters. So the New World Order conspiracy may be responsible for everything from AIDS to the 2004 tsunami. This explains why so many people refused to get the swine flu vaccine.

Which brings me to my point: This is not a worldview I share, or could probably even begin to understand. But it is one that is held by lots and lots of people, from many facets of society. The Wikipedia article points out how the New World Order theory, once solely the belief of militant extremists and millennialist Christian fundamentalists, has now crossed over to New Agers and is seeping into the popular culture.

For me, this is science fiction. For these people, this is perfectly believable. People who feel out of control of their own lives, fearful of the increasingly complex world we live in and hopeless about the future seem more inclined to turn to conspiracy theories for some measure of comfort. Rather than believing that world events are the result of explicable (if complex) natural, social and economic forces, they would prefer to believe that an all-powerful cabal is running absolutely everything.

For the theorists, that is reality. Perhaps it gives their lives purpose to believe they are participating in a global or even cosmic struggle for freedom. Perhaps it makes their personal story more exciting. These motivations make it easier for me to understand why people would want to believe in such a theory, even if they don’t make the theories themselves any more believable.

For more: Arthur Goldwag’s blog; The Conspiracy Skeptic
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Climategate: The climate change conspiracy explained in three simple steps…

Posted on January 30, 2010 | Leave a comment

Step 1: Convince everyone on the planet that human activity in the Industrial Age has resulted in a global warming of the planet that will likely have catastrophic consequences if left unchecked.

Step 2: ???

Step 3: Profit!

Although they are human and thus prone to sometimes doing stupid things, scientists, for the most part, are interested in finding and promoting the truth, or as close as we can get to it. When new facts are uncovered, scientists may be reluctant to change their beliefs — another highly human trait — but they do eventually come to a consensus if the new facts can be systematically proven using the scientific method.

25 yrs

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The scientific data show that the Earth is undergoing a large and rapid warming trend that coincides with the onset of industrial activity, specifically the large-scale burning of fossil fuels. The average surface temperature has increased by 1.2-1.4°F over the past 100 years. If greenhouse gases continue to increase, the surface temperature could rise by 3.2-7.2°F by 2100. Observed changes due to climate change have included rising sea levels, longer growing seasons, earlier melting of ice and snow, shrinking glaciers, and changes in the distribution of plants and animals. The faster temperatures rise, the more these effects will be exacerbated.

Despite the overwhelming scientific evidence to the contrary, denial about the reality of climate change, that it is caused by human activity or that it will have devastating effects is at a high. Fear of the effects of climate change, a resistance to change and the lack of an easy fix contribute to this denial. Again, how human of us.

But what do the world’s leading scientific organizations have to gain by convincing us that climate change is happening and we need to take action?After examining the conspiracy theories, it seems that the simplest explanation is usually the correct one. Here, the explanation is that this is what the data show, and the scientists are concerned for the future of humanity.

Also see: Climate Wire; The Copenhagen Diagnosis; RealClimate; How to talk to a climate skeptic
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What will the Earth be like in 2050 if we do nothing about climate change?

Posted on October 15, 2009 | 1 Comment

 

Today is Blog Action Day. The subject this year is climate change. This is my contribution.

My son was born in 2008. In 2050 he will be 42 years old, still young and healthy, perhaps with children of his own.

In 2050, if carbon emissions continue to grow at today’s rate, the Earth’s temperature will rise an average of 2 degrees Centigrade by the year 2050. By 2050, outputs of corn, rice and wheat could be severely curtailed. Rising sea levels, water shortages and famine could create up to 1 billion homeless refugees. Natural disasters, such as hurricanes, droughts and floods, will increase, while we will lose many species of plants and animals forever. Disease, particularly insect-borne diseases, will spread to more areas. The effects of global warming will be most felt in developing areas, destabilizing these regions and leading to more conflict. This is the world I’m leaving to my 18-month-old son and his children. This is the world you are leaving too.

But if we halve our carbon emissions by 2050 compared to 1990, global warming can be contained within the all-important 2-degree increase. Scientists predict that keeping the temperature rise under 2 degrees will contain global warming and mitigate its worst consequences.

Scientific evidence (data you’d study in an online school science course) tells us that climate change is real and happening, and it is largely due to human causes. I believe it is the greatest crisis that has ever faced our species. Sometimes, when I think about what is happening to our planet, I feel a profound sense of hopelessness. To effectively address global warming and to curb the effects, we will have to come together in a way that humanity has never been able to before. But more often, I feel a sense of optimism. I know that one of our greatest strengths is that when we put our minds and will to something, we will accomplish it.

At the Nature Conservancy’s Planet Change site, learn more and then spread the word.

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