cafecuriosity

Fingerprints on History

 The electronic age is going to be hell for historians. Paper records have a reassuring physicality and a surprising ability to endure, despite damp, fire and dusty neglect. Nor are they subject to capricious changes in industry formatting standards. Barack Obama's battle with bureaucracy to retain his Blackberry is well known. He is America's first truly digital President. While his speeches may be recorded for posterity, and the commentariate's take on his policy may live on thanks to YouTube, the digital divide poses problems of its own.

Great Boot, Shame About the Grill!

OK, time for a confession. I'm one of those sad creatures who anthropomorphize their cars (and motor bikes for that matter). My much-loved Ducati SSD900 was the 'Beast'. He (it was definitely a he) was big, black, fast and bad! My Jaguar (The Boy) was a refined old gentleman, all refined leather and wood, while the Alfa Spider (The Toy) was all flash (and limited go). My current car a Chrysler 300C is all squat power - a 5.7l V8 will do that for you. I love its angry growl when i turn the ignition and the way it snaps my head back when I put my foot down on Sheik Z Road. I get when Now a team Florida State have established that car design imbues our vehicles with a discernible personality all of their own and in the process, proved once and for all that academics really do need to get out more. Now researchers have long asserted that we gain 90% of our information from faces. It seems evolution has configured our brains to examine faces to detect threats, assess social relationships and intuit emotions and personality traits. This explains why I always thought my Alfa Spider was 'hot'!   http://www.fsu.com/pages/2008/11/26/cars_have_personality.html   Image: 1. Alfa Spider, author, 2. Chrysler 300C, www.autoexpress.co.uk

Not So Virgin

There's a charming ad currently playing on what passes for cable television in Dubai featuring Isabelle Allende . The author talks about our love of storytelling, opining that we are hardwired for storytelling. One of the most powerful stories is the notion of the pristine wilderness, untouched by human hands, with all its romantic connotations. Few tracts of wilderness evoke this as provocatively as the Amazon. Ever since reading Charles C. Mann's '1491', I've been watching the evidence for pre-Columbian Amazonian occupation pile up. The latest contribution comes from the Universities of Florida and Brazil by way of the Kuikuro an indigenous Amazonian tribe. Their paper suggests that what was once mistaken for virgin tropical forest is in fact the creation of human hands - lots of them! The plan of these settlements took the form of a tapestry of walled villages, smaller hamlets, all clustered around a main plaza and date from 1250 through to 1650, when European diseases caused the local population numbers to crash. Fish farms lie dotted about the hamlets some of which are built on the 'black earth' fields built up by the early Indian inhabitants. Each settlement was dominated by a road running northeast to southeast, connecting to the central plaza and surrounded by defensive earthworks. It's a twist in a story that turning out to be more fairytale than reality TV. Plus, it's a bit of a bugger for conservationists trying to model unblemished biodiversity!   http://news.ufl.edu/2008/08/28/urban-amazon/   Image: 1. Aerial photo of a Kuikuro village in the Amazon, 2 - 4 Excavating an Amazonian settlement site, University of Florida

Triumph of Industry Over Priorities

Dubai has many charms. Yet beneath its cosmopolitan and very bling bling exterior and high energy development pace, its day-to-day priorities can be baffling. My wife and I live in an apartment in one of Dubai's major beachside developments as the accompanying picture shows. It resembles Batman's Gotham City at first glance. (and some of the cars rival the Batmobile in size!) The development comprises six or seven clusters of six towers dominating the beachside environment. As I stepped out of my lift entrance to the underground car park in my block, I saw two of the building's maintenance staff, each astride a ride-on mini street cleaner industriously washing the white painted arrows marking out the traffic flow direction on the car park floor! Given that Dubai relies on desalination for its water supply, this was a very expensive buff and polish. I hope the cleaners were using recycled water! Still, those white arrows were gleaming in the garage's fluorescent lights!

What's In A Label?

Two years ago was a time of loss for advocates of Pluto, as the International Astronomical Union (IAU) stripped Pluto of its planetary status. Last week the same IAU accepted the recommendation of the Committee on Small Body Nomenclature for a new label to be applied to transneptunian dwarf planets like Pluto and Erin. What was their undoubtedly inspired choice you ask? After due deliberation, the best they could come up with as 'plutoid' - yep, plutoid. I only hope the committee didn't pay good money for that insight into the bleeding obvious! Still, those quietly grieving for Pluto's ravaged status can take some small (transneptunian) solace!

http://www.iau.org/public_press/news/release/iau0804/   Image:Pluto and Erin, IAU, NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, H. Weaver (JHU/APL), A. Stern (SwRI), the HST Pluto Companion Search Team and M. Brown

More on the Clovis People

Last week we explored the durability of the theories surrounding the migration of people into North and South America (The Persistence of Belief).  This week, further research was presented by a University of Oregon anthropologist pointing to America being settled by people of Siberian or East Asian origin at least 1,200 hundred tears before the Clovis people hove into view. Ironically enough, the evidence comes from analysis of mitochondrial DNA removed from coprolites (dried out human excrement) found is a series of caves. These finds represent the oldest human DNA yet found in America.

Clovis true believers were further beseiged when anthropologists from Texas A&M published a study fusing archaeological evidence, skeletal remains and molecular genetic studies into current and ancient populations. The study concluded the migration from Alaska started 15,000 years ago.

PS. An amateur archaeologist uncovered 28 flint handaxes in sand and gravel dredged up from the North Sea together with bones and teeth. The axes date back 100,000 years ago to the Paleolithic.

http://pmr.uoregon.edu/science-and-innovation/uo-research-news/research-news-2008/april/researchers-led-by-uo-archaeologist-find-pre-clovis-human-dna   http://tamunews.tamu.edu/archives/article.php?articleid=5920&month=3&year=2008   http://news.wessexarch.co.uk/2008/03/09/evidence-of-ice-age-hunters-found-below-north-sea/   Image: 1. Denis Jenkins in his lab with artifacts found in the Paisley Caves, University of Oregon, 2. Paleolithic Handaxe, Wessex Archaeology, 3. Marine Dredging operation, Wessex Archaeology

The Perils of TV

I started on Ray Kurzweil's 'The Singularity Is Near' yesterday. It's an intriguing take on the humanity's future evolutionary direction - an era Kurzweil believes will challenge what it means to be human. Anyone doubting that our ability to exploit technology is changing our physiology need look no further than the way television has replaced our natural circadian rhythms dictated by the sun with its own broadcasting schedule. While 'prime time' TV is increasingly a relic as Internet powered TV on demand becomes more prevalent, the practice of staying up in order to catch our favourite program still results in changed sleep patterns. This is especially noticeable in places like Dubai, where you can catch the U.S. evening news while getting ready for work in the morning! A small step to be sure, but one which has already subtly removed us from the experiences and frames of understanding of our grandparents and great-grandparents.

PS. Given the above, it just doesn't seem right for us to be broadcasting the first ad into space. The gimmick assisted by University of Leicester space scientists will see a 30-second ad about what they see life on Earth to be streamed into space courtesy of Doritos and its 'You Make It, We Play It' promotion! (Can you have pollution in space?) The signal will be directed to prospective unsuspecting inhabitants located in the habitation zone around the star 47 Ursae Majoris in the Great Bear Constellation. No doubt they will thank Doritos for their contribution to inter-galactic relationships!

http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/action/showStoryContent?doi=10.1086%2F%2Fpr.2008.03.10.1330   http://www2.le.ac.uk/ebulletin/news/press-releases/2000-2009/2008/03/nparticle.2008-03-07.3969734412   Image: 1. The tyrrany of TV, iStockphoto, Sharon Dominick, 2. EISAT radar in Svalbard, University of Leicester

If An Iceberg Splits Does Dubai Notice?

A shift in geographical location can stimulate the oddest connections. Looking at the photo of the massive iceberg A53A breaking apart, my immediate reaction wasn't to reflect on the health of the Antarctic ice sheet or ponder the potential hazard to shipping posed by the numerous small iceberg bound to calve from the two parent bergs, it was, "I wonder what's going to happen to 'The Palm' (a massive man made island in Dubai) if sea levels rise?" How we make connections is one of the most intriguing aspects of the human brain. Our consciousness is shaped by our world view, subconscious values, life experiences and emotional drivers. What resonates with us drives the media and fashion industries and is constantly on the move like our iceberg. Incidentally, A53A calved from the Larsen Ice Shelf in 2005. Each remaining piece is around 30 km long.

PS. Ironically, the biggest hotel on 'The Palm' is 'Atlantis' - intuitively, that is either rich irony or prescience!

http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEMIZLM5NDF_index_0.html   Image: 1. Splitting iceberg snapped by Envisat, ESA, 2. Close up of fissure dividing A53A, ESA

Springing Into The Northern Hemisphere

I realised this week that in moving to Dubai I had switched hemispheres. That nugget of knowledge came to me when I added a gadget showing the current phases of the moon to my iGoogle home page. The gadget asked me to nominate my hemisphere - not something I'd thought about previously. The seasons are out of whack too. The shift in seasons still seems weird too (not that Dubai has actual seasons). The spring thing popped up when I came across a NASA/Goddard press release covering their THEMIS spacecraft. The THEMIS fleet of 5 spacecraft is purpose designed for studying auroras. Last year they observed an aurora cross the polar zone if sixty under seconds. Surprisingly, we don't know much about auroras except they're particularly frisky in the Northern Spring. According to researchers, THEMIS has found magnetic ropes linking our upper atmosphere to the Sun. It's the Sun's solar wind particles flowing down these magnetic ropes that power the auroras. Cool, but it still doesn't seem like spring!   http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/themis/auroras/aurora_live.html   Image:  1. Alaskan aurora, Jan Curtis, Geophysical Institute, University of Alaska, 2. Aurora over Wisconsin, Jeffrey R. Hapeman, 3. THEMIS spacecraft, NASA/Goddard Space Flight Centre's Conceptual Image Lab

Wrist Spin Delivers Another Hobbit Moment

For anyone familiar with the fracas over the 'Hobbit' fossils (Homo Floresiensis, a 3' tall, 18,000 year-old hominin skeleton discovered in a cave on Indonesia's Flores Island four years ago) the latest study by a team from the Smithsonian offers the potential for more fun! The team that discovered the 'Hobbit' firmly believed it was a new species of human. This claim was roundly refuted by many researchers who thought it much more likely that the unusual remains were due to either a growth deficiency or a skeletal pathology. Much unedifying and rancorous academic noise and posturing followed. The latest study starts with a different take on what defines us as human. Scientists tend to bang on about our big brains, use of language, skills with tools and even our complex social relationships. However, one facet of our anatomy which indisputably differentiates us from other apes and our early ancestors is our wrists! Wrist bones so I now know turn out to be complex bits of kit, making them quite useful in understanding the evolutionary relationships between living species and our fossil ancestors. Once again, it's a case of understanding that which unites us (modern humans and Neanderthals) and that which makes us different (early hominins, the great apes and Homo Floresiensis)! The 'Hobbit's' wrist is identical to those of African apes and early hominins and totally different to that of modern humans. The 'Hobbit' appears to be a new species of human as originally proposed, rather than a diseased individual as had been asserted. Over to the chorus of disbelievers!

Note: Analysing H. Floresiensis wrist structure depended on using advanced 3-D technology techniques developed only in the past few years at the Partnership for research in Spatial Modeling at Arizona State University (PRISM). The researchers who later analysed H. Floresiensis wrist structure happened to work there as graduate assistants where they learned to apply the technology.   http://uwnews.washington.edu/ni/article.asp?articleID=37120   Image: 1. Virtual comparison of wrist bones from a Chimpanzee, Hobbit and modern human, Human Origins Program, Smithsonian Institute/Matt Tocheri 2. Artists impression of H. Floresiensis,www.elbakin.net 3. Hobbit and modern human skulls, www.nationalgeographic.com