David Gelernter, a pioneering computer scientist, foresaw the modern internet but thinks computers are still too hard to use
Jumping spiders, which hunt by pouncing on their prey, gauge distances to their unsuspecting meals in a way that appears to be unique in the animal kingdom, a new study finds. The superability boils down to seeing green. Scientists in Japan discovered that the arachnids accurately sense distances by comparing a blurry version of an…
The U.S-based Wildlife Conservation Society says Asian governments must take action to protect Asian species that are at a conservation crossroads. The species include the tiger, orangutans, Mekong giant catfish, Asian rhinos, Asian giant river turtles and Asian vultures, a release from the society’s New York headquarters said. The WCS is urging governments to follow…
A new neural analysis suggests that our social networking tendencies most likely have their neural roots in some of our early vertebrate ancestors. The findings were published online in the journal Science. “There is ancient circuitry that appears to be involved in social behavior across all vertebrates,” Hans Hofmann, an associate professor of integrative biology…
Scientists from the Univ. of Southampton have identified a repeating trigger for the largest explosive volcanic eruptions on Earth. The Las Cañadas volcanic caldera on Tenerife, in the Canary Islands, has generated at least eight major eruptions during the last 700,000 years. These catastrophic events have resulted in eruption columns of over 25km high and…
In a study published in the journal Neurology of almost 700 people born in 1936, researchers found physically active people showed fewer signs of brain shrinkage and other deterioration than those who got less exercise. At the same time, social and intellectual activities such as visiting family and friends, reading, playing intellectually stimulating games or…
Conservatives and liberals pay attention to their environments differently, meaning the two sides of the political spectrum quite literally don’t see eye-to-eye, a recent study found, suggesting conservatives pay more attention to negative stimuli compared with liberals. The findings could suggest a biological basis for political views “They’re essentially monitoring things that make them feel…