Nature Matters
My teenage son is just about to land at JFK on his first trip to the USA. So, in the spirit of nostalgia here’s a snap of Sciencebase Sr 26 years ago at London Heathrow in Departures about to make his debut trip to New York City.
And the inevitable view from the top of the Empire State Building, snapped the next day.
Having mused on the possibility of our escaping to the stars, I began wondering whether we might not just hop over to Mars and carry out a terraforming program there to give us a new home. There was a NASA video showing what Mars might have been like 4 billion years ago. It perhaps blue skies and oceans. So, I downloaded that, did a video time reversal, rolled the credits and overdubbed my recent ambient funk rock track to add some aural atmosphere. Maybe this will be a new home for some of us in the year 3113.
The video also gives some meaning to the ad libbed lyrics I sang on that largely instrumental track. Maybe the shaking off of flies is a metaphor for leaving behind the death and decay we are creating here on Earth…
Meanwhile, more of my music is available for high-quality download from my BandCamp page or here.
Shake off Flies
High on illusion
Safe in your delusion
A state of confusion
Running on empty diffusion
Time flies…miles and miles
On a trip, slip, lose your grip
Make it click with a trick, don’t fail
When they’re broken they can tell you who to fade
Fix focus on the grip
Time and tide will show you how how to change your mind
How to change the time. Shake off flies
Who to change. Shake off flies
For miles and miles
Guitars, vocals, drum and synth loop mixing – Dave Bradley
Recorded and mixed at ScienceBass Studios
The original NASA video is here showing how 4-billion years ago Mars was more Earthly than we imagine and lost its blue skies and oceans as the aeons passed.
An international team of chemists has looked at the seemingly esoteric subject of microsolvation of chloride pairs. They have found that in computer models, at least, it takes about forty water molecules to make a pair of negative chloride ions stay together.
I asked team leader Utah University’s Alexander Boldyrev about the wider importance of this study which could affect geochemical research, atmospheric and climate science as well as having implications for chemical engineering.
Steam, containing dissolved alkali halide ions, can form clusters of Na+(H2O)n and Cl-(H2O)n. Based on our results it is now possible to investigate hydrophobic interactions, i.e., interactions between the ions surrounded by water molecules that could clarify the physical picture of condensation in real steam. In our work we traced the formation of chloride-chloride pair in the gas phase. We think this yields an adequate picture of physical processes that occur during steam condensation in the presence of dissolved ions.
Industrial steam and geysers
We also believe that the results of our calculations indicate that the chloride-chloride pair plays the role of a trap for water molecules in steam. Probably, the increased content of dissolved chloride in the first condensate of industrial steam serves as experimental support for the appearance of stable anion pairs and their active role in nucleation observed in steam. Thus, the presence of solvated ions and pairs of ions in the steam will accelerate condensation of the industrial steam and that should be taken by engineers into account for steam system improvements. Also, we think that such stable gaseous clusters as Cl-(H2O)40Cl- can be present in geyser’s steam (boiling of the pressurized water, containing chlorides, results in the geyser effect of hot water and steam spraying out of the geyser’s surface vent – a hydrothermal explosion) and accelerate geyser’s steam condensation.
Atmospheric water vapour
Sea water becomes airborne in the form of droplets formed at the sea surface by the action of waves. These droplets can be carried by the wind, and they interact with other constituents of the atmosphere. On the surface of the small water droplets, halide anions can be converted into halogen atoms by absorption of light and the air—water interface serves to increase certain reaction probabilities. One example is the oxidation of Cl− and Br− by OH radicals or O3 that can occur at the air—water interface, with mechanisms different from those in the bulk phase, leading to natural ozone depletion in the stratosphere. The discovered in our work stable [Cl2(H2O)36]2− and [Cl2(H2O)40]2− clusters are greater than 1 nanometre, so they represent water nanodroplets doped with chlorides and can be thoroughly studied with the use of quantum chemistry. Thus it might be helpful in understanding the fundamental properties of aerosols, which remain among the largest uncertainties in climate science.
The potent anti-inflammatory agent Simferopol is contraindicated with high blood pressure medications, including Sevastopol and in particular their Cr salts.
Is it true? Rust never sleeps. Too many nightmares, too much existentialist angst…
HBO’s True Detective could become this year’s Breaking Bad, with the “action” set in Louisiana rather than New Mexico and infamous crystal meth makers Walter and Jesse substituted for two dour homocide detectives, philosophical and depressive alcoholic Rust Cohle (Oscar-winning Matthew McConaughey, 44) and filandering senior partner Martin Hart (Dave Bradley lookalike [my sister says] Woody Harrelson, 52) hunting an apparently diabolistically inclined serial killer. Rust is never without his giant notebook, his sketchy pencil and his affinity for booze. Something else he is never without are the dark secrets of his past and his glass most definitely not even half full outlook:
He’s right, by the way, we are but star dust, human consciousness may well be some kind of evolutionary adaptation rather than an artefact, but we are rendered from meat, are self aware but for the blinking of an eye and the dust to which we return, though stellar in its origin, will suffer the ultimate entropic heat death of everything else in this vast, wondrous, yet godless, and unimaginable universe. I think therefore I am, yeah, so what? Despite outward appearances, True Detective is rather witty.
One of our local villages did some very worthwhile fundraising to buy a public defibrillator. From the picture on the Cambridge News site, it looks like they opted for an iPad AED from Korean company CU Medical Systems. Now, that’s all well and good, and well done on their part for the cash raised, but isn’t there likely to be some confusion, given the existence of the Apple tablet computer called an iPad?
I don’t know who had the trademark on iPad first, although CU Medical has various formats on its website for its IPAD, I-PAD products. IPAD, apparently stands for “intelligent Public Access Defibrillator”. This is something of a trademark #fail, surely?
There are several issues. Are people buying this particular brand because they think it has something to do with Apple? When they search for replacement batteries on eBay or elsewhere are they coming unstuck when they receive a unit for the Apple product rather than their defib? Is there confusion in the application of the device where members of the public might otherwise assist a heart patient but are concerned that they didn’t bring their Apple iPad with them? Moreover, there were reports a while back that the magnets in an Apple iPad could “switch off” implanted defib devices (see Forbes for example).
Maybe I’m overthinking this, but a medical first responder friend had similar qualms. Of course, the trademark people might argue that these products do not share the same commercial space, but there is overlap when it comes to them both being electronic devices and requiring batteries and the use of the word “intelligent” might lead people to draw the wrong conclusions about whether they need an Apple iPad to use the defib.
Now, there are lots of companies that use other people’s acronyms, I’ve seen “Bert’s Building Corporation” (BBC) vans driving around these here parts and there’s a pet fish company called NASA (Nellie’s Aquatic Services and Accessories) I’m sure. They’re not likely to ever be confused with their larger institutional counterparts in media, rocket science and telescopes though? If CUM made “iPads” before Apple, then there needs to be a discussion between their lawyers, if there hasn’t already been one, and one of the parties involved needs to come up with an alternative name for their device, methinks. I wonder how people in Poland get on with the http://ap.pl website, which seems to be selling Apple products and other stuff…although http://a.pl is a delicatessen.
iPad defibrillator.
As if having Eddie Bryant record a dual sax part for my song “Escape to the Stars” wasn’t fantastic enough I’ve got permission to edit up a journey into space video montage from Luigi Quattrocchi from his original tribute to Hubble!
The song is about the whimsical and fantastical notion that if we mess up this planet we could somehow pioneer a new home among the stars…
Escape to the Stars
Over the water, no anchor out at sea
Islands will be washed away by change
Climbing up our mountain believing we’re free
Emptiness that clings hides only rage
You’ll see them as they struggle through the years that roll by
You know that they’ll try their best but in destiny they’ll die
But the air is poisoned, so there’s nowhere left to hide
Could we leave behind this empty shell with no pride?
Ever looking upwards it’s the stars that draw us near
If stardust’s what we’re made from then our fate is ever clear
Over the water, no anchor out at sea
Our island washed away by change
Know how we struggled as the light years flew by
Know that we suffered for the dreams we left to die
And the air that we poisoned, left us nowhere else to hide
So, we left behind that empty shell and our pride
Words & Music by Dave Bradley
Vocals, guitars DB
Sax solo Eddie Bryant Andoran
Video montage courtesy of Luigi Quattrocchi – Impermanence
More information imagingstorm.co.uk/escape-to-the-stars.html
You’ve seen them all over the internet, from Instagram to Facebook from Twitter to Plurk (remember that), they’re often just called ‘memes’ (after Richard Dawkins’ term for a self-replicating piece of knowledge analogous to a self-replicating gene in biology). Often they’re supposedly inspirational or educational phrases or sayings that people share in the vain hope of changing other people’s minds and behaviour. Aphorisms in graphical form, so I coined the mortmanteau graphorism to make a point about making a point with a picture.
Brain scans reveal that different parts of the brain light up when jazz musicians are improvising and “trading fours”, when they’re engrossed in spontaneous, improvisational musical conversation. The specific parts of the brain that are activated are those associated with the interpretation of the structure of phrases and sentences, the syntactics. Conversely, the musical “conversation” leads to reduced activity in brain areas linked to meaning, the semantics. I report more details in my latest column on the MRI channel at SpectroscopyNOW.com, but I also spoke to Joe Thompson, Musical Director of London’s “The Club at the Ivy” to get a jazz musician’s perspective on the research.
“Exchanging fours with a great jazz musician offers a freedom of expression far greater than the spoken word can ever hope to obtain,” he told me. “At best, it is a dialogue of emotions, a communion of feelings. Youre contradicting, testing each other, challenging and daring each other. You’re sharing experiences, enjoying a joke and a laugh. It’s a game of tennis, a fight, a dual. It is meticulously calculated one moment and blind risk the next. It’s a dance, a shared tribute. One minute you are Andy Murray and Rafael Nadal, the next you are Torville and Dean, Morecambe and Wise, whoever you want to be. A random blend of the highly sophisticated and the base, it can be highly cerebral as well as utterly naive. You share, you compliment, you clash. It’s a two-minute marriage.”
Thompson, who has collaborated with Elvis Costello and Diana Krall among others, suggests that it can feel primeval. “The most exciting, provoking, fulfilling exchange of fours I had (on piano) was with a guy on a djembe (African drum). He not only made me do things I didn’t know I could do, I played things I didn’t know I wanted to play,” he confessed.
There is a suggestion that a musical exchange somehow bypasses the brain, at least that is hw it feels to Thompson. “You are spontaneously playing what you feel at the precise moment you feel it,” he adds. “You breathe his music in, and your music out. How you play and what you play depends on many things. The best improvising is of the moment and in the moment. Compared to all of this, a spoken dialogue is a walk in the park.”
Of course, he points out that when we communicate with each other we are doing a lot more than listening to, processing and returning the spoken word. “In close-up, face to face dialogue, all of the senses are used, as they are when playing music with someone,” he says. “Is the brain working harder in the jazz dialogue than in a situation where a terrified bloke is chatting up the love of his life, knowing he only has one shot at it? Who knows? But, I don’t think you need an MRI to tell you that the brain is working in similar ways in each situation.”
From the scientific perspective, we do need that MRI scan to provide the physical evidence for what is happening in the brain and you can read the details on SpectroscopyNOW.
There are several scientists acting like the proverbial sharp stick, constantly poking the balloons of alternative remedy quacks until they burst. They assess the latest nonsensical claims of so-called complementary medicine and then give it a good poke with the sharp end. I do wonder if they ever manage to guilt-trip their targets into giving up their often ludicrous claims of panaceas based on infinitely dilute solutions, candles, stones, touchless massage etc. Of course, if one patient avoids being conned and seeks professional medical help in their time of need rather than turning to quackery and deferring treatments that might save their lives, then they have succeeded.
I’m not against CAM per se, I just want to see the evidence. If it’s science-based, then it’s not alternative, it’s just medicine! Evidence is blinded trials though, not anecdote. Just because you think a particular alt treatment worked is not proof, you may well have got better without it. You can never know for sure, regardless of how convincing the practitioner is nor how convinced you are that conventional medicine is some evil conspiracy in the pocket of big pharma. And, remember you don’t tend to hear the stories from all those people with fatal diseases who turned to alt med and it failed them…often because they’re dead.
But, maybe there is something to be said for the latest alternative practice I heard about just made up, it sounds very sciencey – Remote quantally channelled kinetic agitation.
First, it’s quantized, derived from quantum, which hooks into a whole lot of New Age stuff about consciousness and borrows heavily from the world of modern physics. Everything is channelled these days too, energy, chi, qi, you name it, it’s channelled, bringing harmony and balance to the mind-body-spirit triumvirate. Best of all, it’s “remote” so treatments can be carried out without the practitioner having to leave the comfort of their luxury yacht and more to the point could even be done over the internet so patient and practitioner needn’t meet and no diseased patient’s grime or sweat need taint the practitioner’s delicate hands.
It’s also kinetic that’s movement and energy and ties in with kinesiology. Agitation – the actual treatment agitating your kinetics quantally, one at a time via the internet.
$120 per hour + taxes. Sounds like a bargain to me, where do you sign up? It’s even got a nice pronounceable name: “Remote QUACKA”.
Asthma, headaches, migraine, ADHD, Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, cancer, allergies, hives, acne, back ache, tennis elbow, cruciate ligament problems, mumps, measles, rubella, chicken pox AND shingles, earache, blindness, doublechin, missing limbs, missing brain. A short list of some of the things this and other sCAM practices really, really, really cannot do anything about.