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Friday, April 21, 2006
SCIFRI 3: Sign this petition
I wrote a little about Net Neutrality last week. Move On has a petition you should sign. If you want to decide how you use the Internet, sign the petition. If you want the backbone providers to decide for you, then I urge you to reconsider.
Now, the rest of the cool science news of the week:
Revolution: more new games
Looks like there will be a new NiGHTS Into Dreams for the Revolution. I never played the Sega original, but the Sonic team produced some very good games. Hudson Entertainment (Mario Party, Bomberman) is producing a flight game which will also take advantage of Nintendo's new controller. The big news, though, is that Metroid Prime 3 is slated to be fully playable for E3.
Nintendo is calling its new controller a "Gesture System".
Evolution
Says here that God planted more fossils to trick more scientists. This time, they seem to think that snakes evolved on land. This is backwards. Snakes were created in apple trees. They later slithered down to the land.
There's a new carnivore in town. Provided, of course, your town is actually in Patagonia, 100 million years ago. Sit, Ubu, sit:
Hey! Where'd Ubu go?
Cornell University is going to offer a class on Intelligent Design. The author of one of the ID texts is concerned that his "fair-minded" views will be misrepresented by the professor.
Sounds stupid
Use big words? You might sound stupid.
That cross-platform virus
I also noted a new cross-platform (Windows and Linux) virus in last week's SCIFRI. Here's something that makes Linux cool. Linus Torvalds, father of Linux, created a patch (a small fix to a computer program) for the virus. Not for Linux -- for the virus. See, the virus, as written, wouldn't actually run on the current version of Linux (for various programming reasons that I barely understand). So Linus patched the virus, so that it would work. I guess he doesn't see it as much of a threat.
Biodiesel
There's a new, tiny chemical reactor that directly converts vegetable oil into biodiesel. Very preliminary -- but promising. This could really help farmers reduce their fuel costs.
Biotech: which region or nation will supplant the U.S. first?
Will Singapore be the top spot for biotech research in the coming decades? Or will it be another nation committed to scientific exploration and discovery? It's getting harder and harder to believe that the United States has a strong future in biotech. I hope to heck I'm wrong.
"Use more psychedelic drugs"
I've never used psychedelic drugs. I understand, from television, that ecstasy makes you feel really good, then really thirsty. Oh, and even the worst music in the world starts sounding great. I doubt there's enough LSD in the world to make me enjoy Semisonic's Sculpture Garden -- but under proper medical supervision, I'll give it a try.
I mention this, because Lancet is calling for renewed research into psychedelic drugs:
"Use more psychedelic drugs," is not advice you would expect from your GP, but that is the call from an influential UK medical journal to researchers.
An editorial in the Lancet says that the "demonisation of psychedelic drugs as a social evil" has stifled vital medical research that would lead to a better understanding of the brain and better treatments for conditions such as depression.
...MDMA, the active ingredient in ecstasy, has shown promise in treating post-traumatic stress disorder and anxiety in cancer patients, while LSD and psylocibin - the active ingredient in magic mushrooms - are being investigated as treatments from cluster headaches. Sativex, a treatment for multiple sclerosis derived from cannabis, is already available in Canada.
