Technically this should be split into two threads but I don't want to flood too much so I shall put these two things together: (1) Brain imaging reveals the movies in our minds http://www.tgdaily.com/general-sciences-features/58630-brain-imaging-reveals-the-movies-in-our-minds This is pretty straight forward and really cool. I also have the link to the actual research paper if anyones interested. Of course this is the beginning of a new era of ethical discussion where things like thought-crime and mind reading begin to be part of the reality we live in... (2) [and this is closer to my interest] Particles found to break speed of light http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/09/22/us-science-light-idUSTRE78L4FH20110922 This is VERY cool. However I must advise caution since this has a very high probability of being an error of one kind or another. But if confirmed I am sure everyone realizes that this is big... As someone who goes by the internet nickname SubTachyon for most of his life I find the possible discovery of the first tachyon-like particle very close to my heart.
oh yes, because the lounge is in such a risk of being flooded The brain activity one is very nice. I would love to see my dreams tapes, especially since quite a bit of them were quite epic (at least the bits I remember). It also raises a different ethical concern: what about creepy peeps selling their wet dreams containing illegal material? Is it still illegal if no one is hurt? But the second one is really really awesome. Like holy ****. That's awesome. If it's true.
"It also raises a different ethical concern: what about creepy peeps selling their wet dreams containing illegal material? Is it still illegal if no one is hurt?" I think that's a non-issue since even today we have cartoons including pedophilia, necro/snuff and bestiality that is mostly legal. (and if it isn't legal somewhere, then it should be, yes I am looking at you Australia and your retarded sex laws)
Indeed australia has some silly laws. But more and more countries have laws against it, the first one springing to mind being Canada.
Well that's retarded. What more can I say. Unless there is some seriously good reasoning behind it that eludes me.
Intent afaik. Second one: Yes yes, and more yes. If this isn't an error, this pretty will pretty much redefine a ton we know about physics. I'm not so sci-fi that OMG TRAVEL THE STARS, but it will allow for crazy fast information transfer, and open up a whole new level of particle physics. And, yes, space travel.
AFAIK stands for "As Far As I Know" @Higgs: link me up; I'd gladly take a look at the research paper for the brain imaging thing. I've always found subjects of/relating to the human body to be pretty interesting. Physics? Meh, the scale can get a bit too big for me, if you know what I mean.
http://download.cell.com/current-biology/pdf/PIIS0960982211009377.pdf?intermediate=true (its not technically a research paper but...) and I know what afaik means but it still makes no sense to me. :S
Oh, I was referring to strict pornography laws. Some countries think that if there's easy access to racy materials, the amount of sex crimes goes up, and that there's a direct correlation between amount consumed vs propensity to commit said crime.
Interesting, higgs. I've already seen these two actually but havent looked indepth yet. question: do photons get slowed by electromagnetic fields?
Uh, no? Not to my knowledge. I am really betting on it being an experimental error though. They did such an amazing job at trying to eliminate all possible errors and still got the same result but there are so many more things that could have gone wrong in this extremely difficult and sensitive experiment that I am still left very skeptical. But again, let's do more of this stuff and get a better picture of what the truth is. I am sure the theoretical physicists are all lining up to claim this as a proof of their individual theories.
I hope mainstream media doesn't start sensationalizing till it's been corroborated by, let's say, 2 more sources. Then they can all they want, cause it'll be fairly sensational.
Well, the dutch and english news already started sensationalizing it. I've heard E=MC^2 mentioned at least 10 times last evening. Wait. Does E=MC^2 have to do anything with this discovery? That one was tested in multiple scenarios, and would merely become E=MC(0)^2, right?
E^2=m^2.c^2+p^2.c^4 <- there is no reason anything should change with that unless they measure the speed of light to be different and there is no evidence of that whatsoever. I used to dread the mainstream media for not including more science news, now I wish they would just shut up because of their amazing ability to misrepresent absolutely everything. Do they not have a single person who's science savvy enough to write accurate articles?
As always, I can only tell it from the perspective of the dutch, but here, it is pretty easy to follow how that happened. Nuclear reactions are really only explained in 5th and 6th grade physics, which means that only VWO students (about 10% of the total) get the full portion. Furthermore, past 4th grade, you get to choose between exact studies and social/historical/artistic courses. Most people in media probably went for the latter. Any country with optional courses later in high school probably have a similar situation, with few, if any, news people actually having had physics more advanced than simple total force calculations, electrical diagrams and spring equations.
Higgs it's not that the don't -- they probably do! It's called advertising and the ****ING SELF-DESTRUCTION OF THE ****ING RETARDED HUMAN RACE. i have a deep odium for humans.
