Friday, November 30, 2018
Teen court
What an innovative program! I can see how teens would react very differently to this court.
This is an official court, which youth offenders are sent to after a heading by a regular judge. It is coached by adults but court proceedings are entirely managed by youth, peers of the offenders.
https://youtu.be/yirexx-Xfv8Wednesday, November 28, 2018
Sea level rise - more than melting ice
A really clear explanation of why sea level is rising faster in New York than elsewhere.
Aspirin no longer recommended as prevention
This news today from uptodate.com
In secondary prevention of cardiovascular disease (CVD), the absolute benefits of aspirin on occlusive events are greater than the absolute harm of major bleeding. However, for primary prevention, three recent large randomized trials evaluating all-cause mortality associated with aspirin use indicate that the benefits and harms of aspirin for primary prevention are very closely balanced [1-5]. In both the ASCEND trial in patients with diabetes as well as the ARRIVE trial in patients with moderate CVD risk, the risk of all-cause death was similar with or without aspirin [1,5]. In the ASPREE trial of individuals 70 years or older, the risk of death was higher with aspirin (13 versus 11 percent) [2-4]. While we had previously suggested aspirin for primary prevention for most patients over age 40, based on these recent trials indicating that the benefits and harms are so closely balanced, we have chosen not to make a recommendation for or against aspirin use. The decision whether to use aspirin for primary prevention should be made only after a detailed discussion between the patient and health care provider, guided by personal patient preferences and estimated benefits and harms relative to the specific patient. The balance between benefits and harms may weigh more heavily for harms over benefits in those over 70 years of age.
1. ASCEND Study Collaborative Group, Bowman L, Mafham M, et al. Effects of Aspirin for Primary Prevention in Persons with Diabetes Mellitus. N Engl J Med 2018; 379:1529.
2. McNeil JJ, Woods RL, Nelson MR, et al. Effect of Aspirin on Disability-free Survival in the Healthy Elderly. N Engl J Med 2018; 379:1499.
3. McNeil JJ, Wolfe R, Woods RL, et al. Effect of Aspirin on Cardiovascular Events and Bleeding in the Healthy Elderly. N Engl J Med 2018; 379:1509.
4. McNeil JJ, Nelson MR, Woods RL, et al. Effect of Aspirin on All-Cause Mortality in the Healthy Elderly. N Engl J Med 2018; 379:1519.
5. Gaziano JM, Brotons C, Coppolecchia R, et al. Use of aspirin to reduce risk of initial vascular events in patients at moderate risk of cardiovascular disease (ARRIVE): a randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial. Lancet 2018; 392:1036
Tuesday, November 27, 2018
Aral sea - a massive environmental disaster
A lsake reduced in size by the area of Ireland...and the government's respone - spend $5Billion promoting their conversion to renewable energy, with only lip service to the Aral sea disaster nearby, with desperate communities lacking running water.
China orders inquiry into 'world's first gene-edited babies' | The Guardian
Remember Monday's date, November 25 2018 - it will go down in history. Mankind is forever changed.
To quote Stephen Hawking: "Once such super humans appear, there will be significant political problems with unimproved humans, who won't be able to compete … Presumably, they will die out, or become unimportant. Instead, there will be a race of self-designing beings who are improving at an ever-increasing rate."
Monday, November 26, 2018
Flex 9 Flight
Intriguing to watch what happens when you join 9 radio-controlled planes together abreast of each other.
Electric vehicles could save billions on energy storage
Save thousands on mandated energy storage for peak demand by setting up two-way transfer of energy between the entire vehicles and the grid.
Wednesday, November 21, 2018
Bamboo Bikes Are Helping This Community
4000 bicycles later, he has quite a business going.
http://ghanabamboobikes.org/http://ghanabamboobikes.org/shop/
Also, there's competition form Mexico at twice the price:
https://bamboocycles.com/
This video shows the manufacturing process with reinforcement of the joints.
Tuesday, November 20, 2018
Monday, November 19, 2018
Huge solar farms in India
I think the last one has been sharply criticized for ruining large tracts of arable land with the solar farm.
Friday, November 16, 2018
Imagined celebrity faces
Predatory tow truck tricks: Don't get scammed after an accident!
Wow, what terrible, low-life scammers. Talk about kicking people when they're down. You're in shock after an accident, and this guy tows you to his kickback-scam-ridden repair shop not approved by your insurance company. Then they charge you exorbitant storage and repair fees.
Rape charge dropped after video surfaces
The woman was the aggressor! I've never heard of security footage being used to acquit a rapist. Wow.
Why ramen is so valuable in prisons
Ramen noodles are used as currency in prison. They've actually studied it.
"Where cigarettes once reigned as the de facto token of exchange in the underground economy, the contemporary American prison is now home to a new form of informal money: cheap, reliable food items like ramen noodles."
"Ramen Politics: Informal Money and Logics of Resistance in the Contemporary American Prison"
"Where cigarettes once reigned as the de facto token of exchange in the underground economy, the contemporary American prison is now home to a new form of informal money: cheap, reliable food items like ramen noodles."
"Ramen Politics: Informal Money and Logics of Resistance in the Contemporary American Prison"
Why The East Sides of Cities Are Poorer Than The West
I've often wondered why affluent neighborhoods are on the west side of cities. I used to think it was something about commuting into the sunset after work having a sentimental appeal. The roots of it appear to be a little darker - sootier. For industrial cities in the mid-latitudes, here's why.
https://youtu.be/my9fsBix630
Thursday, November 15, 2018
Eco fan - fan powered by heat
This fan sits atop your wood stove, draws heat and makes electricity using the thermoelectric effect.
Here's the fan in operation:
Wednesday, November 14, 2018
How to Shuck Corn Better: Kitchen Tip
A brief microwaving builds up enough steam to separate the corn from the husk.
Tuesday, November 13, 2018
Mesmerizing
Mandelbrot Fractal Zoom
Here's Madelbrot himself scrathcing the surface of how his mathematics simplifies complex shapes.
Consumer Reports ranks self driving cars
"...we are at a tipping point where they are now going mainstream...
"Cadillac's Super Cruise was top-rated because our testing shows it does the best job of balancing high-tech capabilities with ensuring that the car is operated safely and that the driver is paying attention.
"Our tests were designed to determine how well each system performs, not only at the task of steering and controlling a car's speed but also at helping drivers pay attention...it's a critical distinction because research shows that when these systems are engaged, drivers may pay less attention and become overreliant on the automated steering and speed control.
"The top-rated Super Cruise by Cadillac tries to ensure that drivers stay focused by training a small camera on their eyes that assesses whether they're watching the road. If the system determines that a driver isn't paying enough attention, the driver gets red warning lights on the steering wheel, audible alerts, and/or a vibrating seat before the system starts to slow the car down.
"Whether these systems actually improve a driver's safety remains to be seen..."
"[Tesla's] Autopilot and [Cadillac's] Super Cruise were the clear winners. These systems accelerated and slowed comfortably and were able to reliably keep the vehicle centered in the lane for several miles at a time.
"Testers evaluated how easy it was for drivers to engage the systems and make adjustments to settings. They also reviewed the types and amount of information that were displayed to drivers—and how clear it was for drivers to see.
"CR found that it's easy to engage Tesla's Autopilot and that it's clear to drivers whether the system is on or off. It has a unique display that provides the driver with information about what the car's sensors can recognize.
"Cadillac's Super Cruise is the best system at knowing when it's within its operational limits. It can't be used on back roads or in other places where it could be difficult for the car to maintain control. Super Cruise is available only on limited-access highways that GM has already mapped, and if it cannot be engaged, it lets the driver know why. Super Cruise is the only system that provides ample warning to the driver as it approaches merging lanes, off-ramps, and difficult traffic patterns.
"On some secondary roads, Tesla's Autopilot limits how fast the car can go but still allows the system to be used. It even allows use on small, curvy roads with poor lane markings—and operates erratically in these situations rather than locking the system out.
"None of the other systems we tested use eye tracking; rather, they prompt the driver to hold on to, or apply pressure to, the steering wheel. This is an insufficient way of measuring driver attention, and it provides little assurance that the driver is even awake."
Monday, November 12, 2018
Play solos like Slash on the piano
Did you have any idea you could turn a piano into a head-smashing lead guitar sound?
Can an entire town run on solar?
An entire city that's sustainable, runs on solar, has an autonomous shuttle, manages water well, and every building has to be green-certified.
Sunday, November 11, 2018
Why Doctors Hate Their Computers - Atul Gawande
I thought you'd enjoy this article by the regardless Dr. Gawande. If you don't have time for the whole article, the salient excerpts are below.
"...we've reached a point where people in the medical profession actively, viscerally, volubly hate their computers."
[The hospital software upgrade to EPIC software] would cost the hospital system...a staggering $1.6 billion, but it aimed to keep us technologically up to date.
More than ninety per cent of American hospitals have been computerized during the past decade, and more than half of Americans have their health information in the Epic system.
physicians spent about two hours doing computer work for every hour spent face to face with a patient
Doctors' handwritten notes were brief and to the point. With computers, however, the shortcut is to paste in whole blocks of information...
The inconsistencies began to make sense when a team at the Mayo Clinic discovered that one of the strongest predictors of burnout was how much time an individual spent tied up doing computer documentation.
...defined burnout as a combination of three distinct feelings: emotional exhaustion, depersonalization (a cynical, instrumental attitude toward others), and a sense of personal ineffectiveness.
Indeed, the computer, by virtue of its brittle nature, seems to require that it come first. Brittleness is the inability of a system to cope with surprises, and, as we apply computers to situations that are ever more interconnected and layered, our systems are confounded by ever more surprises.
The story of modern medicine is the story of our human struggle with complexity. Technology will, without question, continually increase our ability to make diagnoses, to peer more deeply inside the body and the brain, to offer more treatments. It will help us document it all—but not necessarily to make sense of it all. Technology inevitably produces more noise and new uncertainties.
Don't change your engine oil so often!
Bottom line? Check your owner's manual for how infrequently you actually have to change the oil, and wait for a warning light on the dash.
On many cars, it's once a year or every 10,000 miles not every three months as the lube shops tell you on the sticker.
Saturday, November 10, 2018
Where Hair Extensions Come From | Shady
A touching and revealing documentary about how a "fair trade" system for sourcing hair extensions, much like fair trade coffee, could change a crime-riddled industry for the better, paying women who give up their hair thirty to fifty times more money for their hair.
OxyContin patients, then and now
A sad and sobering look at what oxycontin does, even to the most happy and successful patients.
Thursday, November 8, 2018
The State of Self-Driving Cars in 2018
This engineer's nitpicking about how about the current (cautious) self-driving cars are annoying to drive behind.
Wednesday, November 7, 2018
The solution to Australia’s drought crisis?
A fascinating documentary about a stubborn heretical visionary farmer, Peter Edwards, who overcame tremendous opposition to implement his method of "natural sequence farming" that emphasizes slowing the passage of water through the landscape with plants that act like a sponge - which then gradually releases water during drought periods. At 5:57 they describe all the plants he was cultivating, that were specially being blacklisted and removed by the government elsewhere at the time - willows, blackberry, etc that allow the landscape to hold back water.
It's also the story of an unlikely pairing of a stubborn visionary and a retired-jeweler-gentleman-
farmer who complemented each other in their quest to modify a 23000 hectare farm according to their methods, and finally got the attention of government with their remarkable success.
What if AI gets too smart?
If AI gets too clever, it might calculate that human beings are counterproductive to its aims, and eliminate them.
"[People] assume that intelligence equals consciousness - a misconception that annoys many AI researchers." Because a machine doesn't need to be conscious to calculate that human beings are not aligned with its goals.
The article explores how we can ensure that computers are prevented from wiping out the human race when they get too smart - a big off switch (but the computer could gain control of it, or push it inadvertently) 2) tech the computer human values or 3) ensure the computer is also coded to e.g. maintain a steady number of people crossing the street in Tokyo, a surrogate for maintaining human population.
Tuesday, November 6, 2018
Sikh Immigrants Behind 'Italian' Cheese
Without an influx of 16000 Sikhs in the 1990's, the parmesan industry in Cremona would have gone bankrupt.
These Doctors Got Fed Up With Insurance.
Direct primary care - patients pay a monthly subscription and small additional fees for services, bypassing the massive health care insurance industry and streamlining the system. Works great for primary care but not for the specialities, where the fees would be too much for patients to handle, since they would all come at the same time with a major hospitalization. So patients will still need health insurance, and it will be hard to create a hybrid model that encompasses all this.
What happens if you skyrocket to fame at 15?
This is what happens, especially if you're a dark, insouciant artist. She has lost that edge of excitement and anticipation, nothing fazes her now. Notice at the very end how her interaction with her mother has changed - more distant and dismissive.
Clever juxtaposition of an artist before and after she rose to fame.
Pickpocket Huntress of Barcelona's Subways
Vigilantism done right - warn people, let the police know. Such altruism, because she lives her city and wants to encourage tourism.
Don’t Harass Wildlife With Drones
"In the most extreme example, we saw a bear's heart rate increase from 41...to 162 beats per minute when the drone was overhead."
Downloading a scammer's files
I love it! Scamming the scammers - he shuts down the scammer's computer and downloads all their files, locking them out of their own computer.
Building Their Own Internet in Detroit
At 11:30, "Everyone needs a high-speed connection, or we're going to have a digital class system. Communication is a fundamental human right."
I don't agree, I think high speed internet is a privilege, not a right. But it's a privilege that will help lift people out of a cycle of poverty, and these people are doing something about it at a grassroots level.
How reform happens: When Feds Took Over the Cincinnati PD
See how reform takes place, even though they first came to the table "kicking and screaming" and were very antagonistic to outside review and monitoring.
Monday, November 5, 2018
Why Tunnels Don't Collapse
Great explanation of the engineering challenge of building tunnels. He builds a layer of loose gravel suspended in the air that he can stand on. Watch how.
Why Does Protein Stick to the Pan?
Wait until protein browns before turning it in the pan; the reactions that produce browning indicate heat high enough to break the bonds with the pan surface.
Phage therapy for MRSA and Drug-Resistant Superbugs
"Fishing" for phages, literally, in a fight against infections in the post-antibiotic era.
At 1:55 they state that by 2050, "we will have more people die from antibiotic resistant infections and die currently from cancer." That's quite a claim.
Sunday, November 4, 2018
Magnetic Wand Cleans Oil Spills
What a great idea - add tiny grains of magnetite to oil in water and scoop it up with a magnet.
Eating (and Breathing) Dragon’s Beard in Singapore
At 2:15, he shows how the candy releases some kind of smoke for the trademark "Dragon's breath" effect.
How bighorn sheep use crowdsourcing to find food on the hoof.
Some evidence that migration patterns in higher mammals are learned patterns rather than innate.
China's Wallet-Free Living
China is way ahead of other countries in paying for everything with their phones, in part because of a more relaxed mentality about letting a large corporation collect data about you, to which US customers have an aversion.
Human Population Through Time
Interesting graphic of exponential human population, annotated with key events that sorted population growth.
Monsanto and Roundup
Does the weed spray "Roundup" cause NHL lymphoma?
At 9:00 she says that Monsanto was just bought by Bayer for $63 billion dollars. This product means big money.
What's Killing America's White Men? BBC News
A someone tale of suicide on the rise. A clever but if reporting, going to a call for grieving daughters. Then a nearby town to talk to the mayor.
What's inside car carriers
Deck heights adjusted to exactly for the vehicles. They often transport large industrial vehicles in the bottom.
Saturday, November 3, 2018
Why you can't get tickets: The Ticket Game (CBC Marketplace)
This is super annoying, and revealing. This reporter interviewed all the brokers who snatch up thousands of tickets within minutes of going on sale, and resell them for many times more. Make sure to catch the "remorse" of the Vegas guy who made millions of dollars and now feels bad for what he did, 4:17-4:35.
Friday, November 2, 2018
How Footpaths Help Shape Our Technology
Desire lines - the path we choose
because it's easy, even if there's a different suggested way to do it.
Thursday, November 1, 2018
Waking up with foreign accents - 60 Minutes Australia
Believe it or not, it's a real thing, with several articles written about it.
Foreign accent syndrome: anatomic, pathophysiologic and psychosocial considerations. S D J Med. 2005.
"...described by Pick in 1919... Manifestations include disruption in segmental and prosodic elements of speech, which results in a listener's perception of the speech as foreign. In the majority of these rare cases, the patients present without having been exposed to the accent in the past..."
Functional foreign accent syndrome. Pract Neurol. 2016.
"characteristics that help to distinguish functional from structural cases: ...inconsistencies in accent production, the adoption of unusual mannerisms in speech and the speech disturbances being transient and reversible"
The foreign accent syndrome: a reconsideration. Brain Lang. 1996.
"quantitative acoustic data...challenging the notion that a general prosodic disturbance is the sole underlying mechanism in FAS..."
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)