Category Archives: Education

Bonobo’s Using Language?

bonobo with a symbols board she uses to communicate

A Voluble Visit with Two Talking Apes by Jon Hamilton, NPR.

But linguists still weren’t satisfied. They pointed out that humans invent metaphors and figures of speech when literal meanings aren’t enough.

Savage-Rumbaugh says the bonobos pass this test, as well. For example, Panbanisha once used the symbol for “monster” when referring to a visitor who misbehaved.

Bill Fields, a researcher at the Great Ape Trust and a close friend of Kanzi, recalls another time when Kanzi used language creatively.

Fields says it was during a visit by a Swedish scientist named Par Segerdahl. Kanzi knew that Segerdahl was bringing bread. But Kanzi’s keyboard had no symbol for Segerdahl the scientist. So he got the attention of Savage-Rumbaugh’s sister, Liz, and began pointing to the symbols for “bread” and “pear,” the fruit.

“Liz got it immediately,” Fields says. “She says, ‘What do you mean Kanzi? Are you talking about Par or pears to eat?’ And he pointed over to Par.”

The site also includes more photos and video and audio webcasts.

Cash Awards for Engineering Innovation

This article discusses the recent explosion of cash awards to encourage development of engineering solutions. Want innovation? Offer cash (page deleted by external site – poor usability):

In the early 20th century, prizes in the aviation and automotive worlds were common. Sometimes they were awarded for incremental progress, other times for breakthroughs like the Lindbergh flight.

Open Access Article Advantage

Citation Advantage of Open Access Articles by Gunther Eysenbach:

While more work remains to be done to evaluate citation patterns over longer periods of time and in different fields and journals, this study provides evidence and new arguments for scientists and granting agencies to invest money into article processing fees to cover the costs of OA publishing. It also provides an incentive for publishers seeking to increase their impact factor to offer an OA option.

I agree with all of that. More study should be done. And scientists and sponsors that want the papers they wrote, or funded, to have maximum influence should invest in OA publishing now.

See previous: Britain’s Royal Society Experiments with Open Access

The Future of Science

Speculation on the Future of Science, summary of a Kevin Kelly speech by Stewart Brand (co-founder and co-chairman of The Long Now Foundation. He is the founder of the Whole Earth Catalog).

The articles notes steps along the path to the current state of science, including:

1590 — Controlled experiment (Roger Bacon)
1609 — Telescopes and microscopes
1665 — Repeatability (Robert Boyle)
1665 — Scholarly journals
1687 — Hypothesis/prediction (Isaac Newton)
1926 — Randomized design (Ronald Fisher)
1950 — Double blind experiment

Then he discusses 5 ideas for the next 100 years.

1) “There will be more change in the next 50 years of science than in the last 400 years.”
2) “This will be a century of biology.”
3) “Computers will keep leading to new ways of science.”
4) “New ways of knowing will emerge.”
5) “Science will create new levels of meaning.”

It is wonderful to see such interesting ideas online and easily accessible to over one billion people. Yes there is a great deal of worthless stuff avoid (and some worthless stuff to enjoy) to find all the wonderful stuff. But the amount of wonderful science and engineering material available online provides great hope for what the future will bring.

update: see Kevin Kelly present at Google – more Google Engineering talks.

China challenges dominance of USA, Europe and Japan

China challenges dominance of USA, Europe and Japan in scientific research according to UNESCO Science Report 2005

The report says that “the most remarkable trend is to be found in Asia, where gross expenditure on R&D has grown from a world share of 27.9% in 1997 to 31.5% in 2002”.

This hardly seems impressive compared to the growth of Google say. However the amounts of money for global R&D are huge and so changes as less dramatic than other areas. Still this is significant and seems likely to continue to move in this direction.
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The Brine Lake Beneath the Sea

octopus in the brine lake

This stunning octopod, Benthoctopus sp., seemed quite interested in ALVIN’s port manipulator arm. Image courtesy of Bruce Strickrott, Expedition to the Deep Slope – larger photo.

The Brine Lake by Harry Roberts:

As we took the sub into the brine lake, the pressure wave from the sub’s movement across the lake created waves on the interface between the brine and the overlying normal-density sea water.

We watched these waves break on the “beach” like storm waves approaching and breaking on a sandy coastline.

NOAA researchers include a video from the adventure. Also read more about the Expedition to the Deep Slope, in the Gulf of Mexico.

Toyota Robots

photo of Toyota partner robot

Toyota Announces Overview of “Toyota Partner Robot”

Toyota wants its partner robots to have human characteristics, such as being agile, warm and kind and also intelligent enough to skillfully operate a variety of devices in the areas of personal assistance, care for the elderly, manufacturing, and mobility. Furthermore, since each area requires a special set of skills, Toyota is promoting the development of three different types of partner robots (walking, rolling, and mountable), each with its own areas of expertise.

Read posts about the Toyota Productions System (TPS) on the Curious Cat Management Improvement Blog.

Others are making progress on human like robots including Sony and Honda. See Sony QRIO Robots in action in this flash video below:

And read more about Honda Robots: ASIMO and P3.

How to Win a Graduate Fellowship

How to Win a Graduate Fellowship by Michael Kiparsky

The odds may seem against you, but this is a worthwhile exercise. A month before submitting my NSF proposal, I was deeply distressed. Everyone else applying seemed so much more in control, confident, and focused. I came pretty close to chucking the whole thing. I’m glad I didn’t.

The reason I stuck with it was that I shifted my attitude from an all-or-nothing, win-or-lose mentality. I relaxed, accepted that my chances were slim (everybody’s are!), and approached the process as an opportunity to explore an idea that I actually wanted to pursue, without attachment to the notion of a big payoff.

The article provides some good advice. You must commit the time to do a good job, the competition is steep. At the same time the payoff is large and the process is a learning experience. He lists many fellowships, another one is the Science, Mathematics and Research for Transformation (SMART) Scholarship.
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Psychology Experiment

Not Your Average Summer Camp by Marisa Brook

They would be pitted against each other in a lengthy tournament of sports and other challenges; the winner would be awarded a medal and a pocketknife. The psychologists’ aim was to prompt each team to see the other as an ‘enemy’ of sorts, and test the second part of the hypothesis.
…
Overall, the experiment was seen as a success. Not only had both aspects of Sherif’s hypothesis been verified, but several further conclusions had been reached.