Bank Monkeys

Monkeys don't care about money, per se, but they do care about marshmallows." [Psychology Today, July 2008] No, there is no typo in this post's title. And I didn't lift this story from Weekly World News or some such tabloid. Yale professors are training monkeys to take over banking jobs. Er, not really, but these professors have devised experiments in which they teach the monkeys about resources and exchanges. "Why are they doing this?" you might ask. ("Why would anyone pay for this?" would be the foremost question on my mind, but whatever.) Apparantly, the professors are looking for clues as to how evolution paved the way for money in human society, and to gain a certain perspective on human decision making (a little WWMD -- What Would Monkeys Do?). Read the whole thing over at Psychology Today (The Evolution of Economic Rationality: Do Monkeys Understand Money?). And, if you dare, read this response and the punny comments from Gawker (Monkey Menace Reaches Terrifying New Level).

The Evolution of Economic Rationality: Do Monkeys Understand Money?

By Roy F. Baumeister on July 15, 2008 in Cultural Animal (This post was coauthored with Kathleen D. Vohs.)

Money is a powerful force in human life and affairs. Its very power gives pause to those who look to evolution for full explanations of human behavior, because money has not existed long enough to have influenced evolution. By some estimates, money only goes back a couple thousand years, which is too short even to have influenced human evolution... [read more]

David Brown Book Company: Book Sale!

If you are interested in topics related to Early Medieval Europe, then the David Brown Book Company has a sale for you. Click the link for a full list. Some of these sale prices are even better than the used book prices at amazon.com! David Brown Book Company - Sale Bargains - Early Medieval Europe

Think Again

I'm sure you think you made the decision to read this blog entry. But according to these neuroscientists, your brain knew you were going to read these words long before you even visited my blog. (But don't worry too much ... free will is still plausible, particularly for complicated decisions).

This Is Your Brain On ...

OK. First, we had performance enhancing drugs hit the world of professional athletes. And judging from all the hoopla and controversy (e.g., Roger Clemens, Floyd Landis, and Marion Jones, just to name a few), people seem to genuinely feel that it's no laughing matter. Then came the TV commercials for Southwest Airlines in which an office worker was accused of using "productivity enhancers." Ha ha. Funny, right? Now, here comes a slightly more serious story. According to an online poll, 20 Percent of Scientists Admit Using Brain-Enhancing Drugs (source Wired.com). And we're not talking about caffeine. A majority of the respondents are using Ritalin and Provigil to boost their brain performance. A smaller group has admitted that they take beta blockers like propranolol. What kind of sick society are we living in when people have gone beyond vitamins and minerals and good diet and have turned to pharmaceuticals to get an edge in their careers? Yes, I imbibe coffee once or twice a day. I also take vitamins because, frankly, I know this society's mega-manufactured food supply is lacking in many regards. But I cannot bring myself to see brain and blood doping as anything but tragic. It speaks to the serious disconnect our society has from natural cycles and our bodies. Comments? [Oh, and yes, this post's title is a blatant steal from the old "This is your brain on drugs" commercials.]

Very Metal: The Most Complicated Thing Ever Built

Avi Abrams of Dark Roasted Blend has an article about CERN's Large Hadron Collider. The LHC is a 17 mile monstrosity that crosses the border of two countries. Per the article, one superconducting solenoid (CMS) alone contains more iron than the Eiffel Tower (which weighs about 7,300 tons!). The most interesting aspect of this project? How about the suggested possibility of TIME TRAVEL! Granted, it's the particles that traverse time, but it's still a heady concept according to research published by CERN scientists Arefieva and Volovich. The article has several photos, which alone are worth a look. Sheer words do not do justice to the LHC. Abrams has exclusive permission of CERN to use the photos, so I will not post any here. But I strongly urge you to visit Dark Roasted Blend if only to view photos with the article. They help to give a sense of scale to the whole project.

Researching the Mystic

Scientists have long felt that religious feelings occur somewhere in the brain. Some have even speculated that these feelings can be traced to a specific place in the gray matter between our ears, but there has been little agreement on where exactly this place might be. Scientific American magazine reports this month on the latest attempts to map the neurological landscape of religious experience. Through the use of MRIs and brain scans, researchers are "attempting to pin down what happens in the brain when people experience mystical awakenings during prayer and meditation or during spontaneous utterances inspired by religious fervor." As an individual who performs a technical job, I can understand the desire to find the "God(s) spot" in the human brain. And as an exercise in better understanding human behavior and development, I can support such research. But I also walk the narrow line between the empirical and the ineffable. I firmly believe there is a spiritual dimension to human life. Andean mystics, for example, believe that all humans have a metaphysical body in addition to the physical. The metaphysical body mimics the physical, yet this "other" body is tied to energy in the way that the physical body is tied to food items. The spiritual stomach eats and processes forms of energy, instead of physical food, breaking it down for other spiritual entities to devour in a way that echoes our physical digestive system. So is there truly this direct a correlation between the spiritual realm and our physical anatomy? I don't know. But while I am interested in research that measures brain waves and records bio-electrical impulses during meditation, I do have my concerns. I am concerned that the actual intent that drives such research is a desire to prove that religious experience is no more real than a chemically fueled hallucination. If that is the case here, then there are no winners.

SEARCHING FOR GOD IN THE BRAIN by David Biello Researchers are unearthing the roots of religious feeling in the neural commotion that accompanies the spiritual epiphanies of nuns, Buddhists and other people of faith The doughnut-shaped machine swallows the nun, who is outfitted in a plain T-shirt and loose hospital pants rather than her usual brown habit and long veil. She wears earplugs and rests her head on foam cushions to dampen the device’s roar, as loud as a jet engine. Supercooled giant magnets generate intense fields around the nun’s head in a high-tech attempt to read her mind as she communes with her deity. The Carmelite nun and 14 of her Catholic sisters have left their cloistered lives temporarily for this claustrophobic blue tube that bears little resemblance to the wooden prayer stall or sparse room where such mystical experiences usually occur. Each of these nuns answered a call for volunteers “who have had an experience of intense union with God” and agreed to participate in an experiment devised by neuroscientist Mario Beauregard of the University of Montreal. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), Beauregard seeks to pinpoint the brain areas that are active while the nuns recall the most powerful religious epiphany of their lives, a time they experienced a profound connection with the divine. The question: Is there a God spot in the brain? ... [ Full Story ]

Yin & Yang Moon

Did you know that Saturn has a two-toned moon named Iapetus? The Cassini mission to Saturn scored hundreds of images during a Sept. 10 flyby of Iapetus. These pictures "show the moon's yin and yang -- a white hemisphere resembling snow, and the other as black as tar" (Spaceflight Now).

Credit: NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute Download larger image version here

More information:

• Spaceflight Now
• Cassini-Huygens - Latest Images
• NASA: Cassini-Huygens
• Wikipedia entry
• David Darling's Encyclopedia

Additions to the Blogroll

I added two links to the Blogroll today. Under FAITH, please welcome The Northern Path by Astrid, "a Heathen humanist living in the United States." The Northern Path features news and personal views of the indigenous European spiritual path invariably known as Asatru, Heathenry, the Northern Path, the Folkway, etc. Under THINK, you will see a link to Wotan's Musings by Andrew Higgins. Now, I know what you're thinking: "Hey Brainwise, why didn't you place Wotan's Musings under FAITH?" Well, I'm glad you asked because I have a very good reason for stamping this new addition with THINK. You see, Mr. Higgins' blog is all about linguistics and language and he blogs about [I'm sort of paraphrasing Higgins' own description here] his current studies into Tolkien's linguistic efforts and his explorations into the ancient and medieval languages of Europe. So, his blog fits very will with Blogroll neighbors such as The Cranky Professor and Dialogic. Welcome aboard, Astrid and Andrew! I doubt this new linkage will generate much traffic for you, but at least I'll be able to keep up with your musings more easily.

"Forty Strangers in a Virtual Room...

...talking about their faith." A story of Open Source Religion via Get Religion (Open Source Religion Reporting Works).

The Subtle Prime

Researchers at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver have been testing whether religion might encourage altruism. One theory is that the concept of "God" acts as some kind of policing agent over behavior. Seems that experiments showed that people who were primed with religious concepts (in a pre-text exercise) tended to give, on average, more than twice as much as people in the control group. However, people "who declared themselves religious before the study were no more generous than non-believers." Obviously, their tests only looked into believers of a Judeo-Christian kind of all-powerful and judging deity. But I wonder if there are implications for other spiritual paths.

FROST: Life & Culture of the Sámi

You have got to check out this cool (no pun intended) photo essay...

FROST: Life & Culture of the Sámi Norwegian Sámi photographer Fred Ivar Utsi Klemetsen’s photo essay “FROST” documents the life of those who still herd their reindeer the traditional way. The following is a selection of the photos from the exhibit which has been touring the U.S. Photo: Fred Ivar Utsi Klemetsen

Worst Jobs in Science

Popular Science Magazine takes a page from Dave Letterman and provides a Top Ten list of the worst jobs in science (bold emphasis added by yours truly):

10. Orangutan-Pee Collector 9. NASA Ballerina 8. Do-Gooder 7. Semen Washer 6. Volcanologist 5. Nuclear-Weapons Scientist 4. Extremophile Excavator 3. Kansas Biology Teacher 2. Manure Inspector 1. Human Lab Rat

According to Popular Science, these are all real jobs. As this was published in the October 2005 issue, I find the inclusion of Kansas Biology Teacher among the entries to be downright ... prescient. Perhaps they knew how this was going to turn out for these poor teachers who are "on the front lines of science's devolution." Do click the link so that you can read the description of each job. Some of them are humorous (for those of us who don't have to do them). But the same distance that makes some of the entries funny actually lends other jobs a more disturbing veneer. Update (8/14/2008): Popular Science moved, or removed, the page with the top ten list. But I found an archived copy via the Wayback Machine.