10% Brain Usage: is it True?

Humans only use 10% of their brain, so they say.

Photo from David Goehring’s flickr

The 10% brain usage is definitely a myth for the scientific community. Every region of the brain is performing, whether it is from the back’s occipital lobe that controls our vision or the frontal lobe that’s responsible for our cognitive functioning. Every region of the brain is almost working constantly to accommodate our activities; even those that we don’t have to think of doing, like breathing, are under the brain’s supervision.

100% of our brain is working hard; that’s why it demands so much energy to operate. Our brain “represents three percent of the body’s weight and uses 20 percent of the body’s energy”, said Johns Hopkins’ neurologist Barry Gordon.

Where the myth came from?

It may have started from William James’ words in The Energies of Men (1908), “we are making use of only a small part of our possible mental and physical resources”. Later on, Karl Lashley studied the brains of rats where he removed portions of cerebral cortex and the rats can perform specific tasks like nothing happened. So people would be thinking, we won’t need most of it.

The more interesting claim is human’s potential psychic abilities. It is indulging to believe that there’s even more we could do, perhaps have a super memory or heroic capabilities.

The more appropriate claim is we only know 10% of our brain. That 10% are neurons, and the rest of the brain is supporting glial cells. There is still a broad spread of exploration to know what glial cells are for.

But the science community is not backing off to know more. In a way, you could buy Einstein’s brain via an iPad app. $9.99 gives anyone access to images of the genius’ brain cut into 350 slides, hoping to spark another knowledge to his brain apart from knowing that his parietal lobe (processing of mathematics, language, and spatial understanding) is wider than normal.

Is this too much to take from the man who already contributed so much to our comprehension? The man who wished for his body to be cremated?

As long as the person is dead, it seems, his voice will not matter. Jacopo Annese of the University of California “predicts that there will be another Einstein, and when that individual dies, we’ll be prepared (we’re hanging on for that 3D-mapped interactive specimen)” (Wired UK).

Do you believe that nothing should hamper the search for knowledge?

Sources:
Do People Only Use 10 Percent Of Their Brains?; Scientific American
Do We Use Only 10% of Our Brains?; Washington.edu
Einstein’s Brain Goes Digital With iPad App; Wired UK

Future of Money: Papers and Coins will be Missed

Electronic money is replacing papers and coins.

Photo from mangpages’ flickr

We get more incentives when we use our debit/credit card to pay for our purchases. Points accumulate to discounts and even cash. It is more convenient as you only have to scan your card, no counting of paper money and no burden of the clinking coins. I don’t see why we won’t use this.

Apple is rumored to be developing “Near Field Communication” feature in their devices. When brought to fruition, people can use their iPhone and iPad to do the paying for them. The latest software of Apple though has Passbook. It has the all the coupons you need. Another coupon managing application that is more accessible to most smartphones is Groupon.

75% of the world’s population has mobile phones (Fitzpatrick, 2012). As smartphones increase in popularity, its functionality of being a wallet is emerging. You can now use PayPal for store transactions, a leap from their famous online paying platform. Google Wallet keeps the record of your debit and credit accounts for in-store and online use. All you need to do is tap your phone to pay.

Money has changed many times, and maybe we’re seeing another cycle right now. It is argued that the oldest form of money is cattle, around 9000 to 6000 B.C.. Then money, well, became easier to tame as people used the “most widely and longest used currency in history”, Cowrie shells. And through the course, it became bronze, copper, leather, paper and gold (NOVA, 1996).

It’s rather queer that the modern money is transitioning from tangible to abstract. The future of money is imaginary but still agreed money. People would have to believe that they’re working for money that will go directly to their bank and accessible via their phone. They won’t have to see them. Oh, I guess neither will we see our wallets.

Do you like the future’s electronic money?

Sources
The History of Money; Nova
Apple Plans Service That Lets IPhone Users Pay With Handsets; Bloomberg
75% of World Has Access to Mobile Phones; Mashable
Inspired by BennyBuzz’s Future of Money 

Alien Life: We Come In Peace?

“If aliens visit us, the outcome would be much as when Columbus landed in America, which didn’t turn out well for the Native Americans”.

British weapon, the Taranis and the sketch of sighted alien craft

Those are the wise words of Stephen Hawking commenting on how an alien discovery could bring more danger than good. And let’s face it, he has a point – after all, if we were to find an alien species with higher level of intelligence and understanding than us, how would parties on both sides react?

It seems like every other day there is another rover being sent to some distant planet on the edge of our solar system, looking for signs of life. More telescopes pointing towards the skies and everything from written messages to radio waves all in a desperate attempt to find life.

Add to that, more people looking to the skies with little more than the naked eye – claiming to have seen alien spaceships and UFO’s.

People today are obsessed with such a possibility and how it will change our understanding of science and the universe. More films are being released with various different scenarios revolving around the idea of discovering alien life and how us and them would react.

Ideas of invasion, death on a large scale and manipulation may all sound completely ludicrous and similar to that we may expect from a feature film. But nobody knows exactly what kind of danger lies within our universe and what we could potentially be dealing with.

On a more positive note we would come together as a race, as Ronald Reagan once stated: “I occasionally think how quickly we would set aside our difference if we faced some alien threat from the other side.”

Nick Pope, a former British Ministry of Defence UFO expert claims aliens have been around us for some time and can come in all shapes and sizes.

Possibly one of the most significant recorded alien sightings was in Rendlesham Forest in Suffolk, United Kingdom – not far from where I am currently based – where an alien space craft apparently landed between two defence bases.

Many people tried to cover up this case as much as they could, but what the people working at the defense base claimed to see is frightening to hear – especially when it seems Britain’s latest fighter craft – the Taranis – looks similar to that of the UFO claimed to have been seen near Rendlesham Forest.

It is also worth noting what some would call excessive defense systems in place during the London 2012 Olympic games, where missiles were placed on top of a number of blocks of flats across the city.

Is or was Britain preparing for an alien invasion? And if so, are they aware of certain alien activity across the planet that the rest of us are unaware of? Or is the Taranis just the latest unique addition to modern warfare?

As Nick Pope said in a recent interview regarding skeptics of the idea of alien contact: “The believers only have to be right once.”

Let’s just hope no one ever has to report on an alien takeover of planet earth.

Should we be taking a step back?

Sources:

The truth is out there… UFO expert Nick Pope talks about aliens; The Independent
Britain Has Alien-War Weapons, Says Former Government Adviser; Truth Alliance Network

Daniel Mayes Is A Recent Journalism Graduate With An Upper-Second. He Has Experience Working At BBC World Service, Sky News Online And Has Worked On Projects In Europe And Africa.  

You can read more articles from Daniel at: danmayes.wordpress.com

Blood Vs Oil

Both are necessary to do some work.
by Chris Demas

Photo from photoXpress

When it comes right down to it, part of the reason we invent new devices is to avoid having to do extra work. The phone is a tool used to connect two people together without having to make them travel to one another. If they need to travel we have the car that can move them long distances without making them walk or exert themselves. Are we making ourselves obsolete? Is that notion a bad thing?

After all, we created machines to help us with everyday tasks. And while sometimes this knocks a person out of a job it makes the people using the machine quite happy. Let’s look at the automatic teller machine or atm. It’s convenient and in many cases harder to rob. The atm is also capable of taking care of strings of people with their financial needs and doesn’t get tired. Also, while you may no have a personal emotional experience with it, the machine  will give you the same service it gave the last person.

On the other hand, machines make awful mistakes sometimes that a human could probably fix on the spot. Machines can’t give you that interaction that a friendly employee can. And having to deal with a machine when it comes to returns is the worst kind of hassle. Obviously machines aren’t perfect and can malfunction at the strangest times. But do occasional glitches matter when the machine for the most part is handling your light work?

I love human interaction and I’m sure you do too. There is a pleasant feeling when you go to the mall and can be directed around by the help desk and don’t have to memorize a map. It feels good in those rare times when you return a product and the staff is friendly with you while offering good service. It can be incredibly satisfying to hear “have a nice day” after purchasing!

Does human interaction outweigh the idea of mechanical convenience? Do I go to the cashier or the self-checkout? Will the people inside Bank of America be jealous that I gave their atm machine more attention than the human employees inside the bank? What do you think? Are we ourselves becoming more obsolete or do we just use machines for our light work?

More from Chris in ChrisDemas.com

Search Engines Industry Secrets

If not present in search engine results, the business has no business in the internet.

Photo from photoXpress

Google is a titan of the internet. It has been and still is. Bloggers and businesses have to abide by the guidelines of Google to be present in the web. Having more publicity accords higher ranking, more clicks, and more profits for most.

Not many will take time to know it, but it costs money to operate a search engine. These companies will have warehouses full of computers working as a system to fit the demands of worldwide searches, that is, 3 billion searches every day.

Searches can be optimized to rank on top. JCPenny, a retail store, took the “black hat” to be the earnest result when you searched for “jeans”, “furniture”, and other related products. This happened during the holiday season; and even if you typed in “Samsonite carry on luggage,” JCPenny will still be number one in results instead of Samsonite.com. Their online shopping sales spiked up.

The “black hat” is against the guidelines of Google. It is deceptive and is cheating. It is a monopoly and is unjust. Google has a robust preventing action against these modifications. Even overdoing SEO optimization, a legitimate way of increasing site rankings, can sink the site off the Google results. Google’s corrective action against Penny?

“On Wednesday evening, Google began what it calls a “manual action” against Penney, essentially demotions specifically aimed at the company. At 7 p.m. Eastern time on Wednesday, J. C. Penney was still the No. 1 result for “Samsonite carry on luggage.” Two hours later, it was at No. 71. At 7 p.m. on Wednesday, Penney was No. 1 in searches for “living room furniture.” By 9 p.m., it had sunk to No. 68.

In other words, one moment Penney was the most visible online destination for living room furniture in the country. The next it was essentially buried.” (Segal, 2011)

I say it’s too late. Millions of online shoppers visited and sales are already made. It only shouts embarrassment for the company. German company BMW was also caught bringing out the “black hat” and suffered the same fate in 2006.

Search engine keywords messes up with creative writing. Online writers and publishers are not free to use words they will. They have to ensure that people will find them, and keyword is the way. HuffingtonPost forced keywords in “What Time Does The Superbowl Start” and it rewarded them rankings. I don’t do this; I’m for the freedom of word choices. However,

“..until Google stops rewarding bad writing and various annoying tricks, they’ll proliferate on the Web. Because, if nobody is reading the page, it doesn’t matter that it’s actually better written and contains more useful content than the pages that the search engines are sending readers to.” (Joyner, 2011)

Everything is one search away – publicizing everything. You can search the map to peek at the Imrali Island, a military forbidden zone. Military grounds, air bases, and highly secured prisons in Japan, Germany, Turkey, USA, and anywhere on Earth is searchable.

And when you have an interview or a date, you can know everything about the other person by merely searching the name. The ease of instant information has questions of security and ownership.

How does this industry secret rank to you?

Sources:
Search Engine Optimization Dirty Secrets; Outside the Beltway
The Dirty Little Secrets of Search; The New York Times
Some Clear Facts About Google’s “Transparency” Report; RIAA