kerkko.fi

What could define god is thinking of god as the embodiment of the laws of nature. However, this is not what most people would think of that god. They made a human-like being with whom one can have a personal relationship. When you look at the vast size of the universe and how insignificant an accidental human life is in it, that seems most impossible. There is a fundamental difference between religion, which is based on authority, and science, which is based on observation and reason. Science will win because it works.

There is a simple explanation for the pleasure of grasping a new concept: The brain is getting its fix. The "click" of comprehension triggers a biochemical cascade that rewards the brain with a shot of natural opium-like substances, writes Irving Biederman, professor of neuroscience at the University of Southern California, in American Scientist. He hypothesized that knowledge addiction has strong evolutionary value because mate selection correlates closely with perceived intelligence. Only more pressing material needs, such as hunger, can suspend the quest for knowledge, Biederman added.

In fighting for science, we subscribe to a comforting illusion: that people can be swayed by the facts. The attack on climate scientists is now widening to an all-out war on science. Telegraph columnist Gerald Warner dismissed scientists as "white-coated prima donnas and narcissists, pointy-heads in lab coats [who] have reassumed the role of mad cranks. The public is no longer in awe of scientists. Like squabbling evangelical churches in the 19th century, they can form as many schismatic sects as they like, nobody is listening to them any more."

Views like this can be explained partly as the revenge of the humanities students. There is scarcely an editor or executive in any major media company -- and precious few journalists -- with a science degree, yet everyone knows that the anoraks are taking over the world. But the problem is compounded by complexity. Arthur C Clarke remarked that "any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." He might have added that any sufficiently advanced expertise is indistinguishable from gobbledegook.

Scientific specialisation is now so extreme that even people studying neighbouring subjects within the same discipline can no longer understand each other. The detail of modern science is incomprehensible to almost everyone; we have to take what scientists say on trust. Yet science tells us to trust nothing; to believe only what can be demonstrated. This contradiction is fatal to public confidence. The problem is not only that most scientists can speak no recognisable human language, but also the expectation that people are amenable to persuasion.

http://www.monbiot.com/archives/2010/03/08/the-unpersuadables/

Thanks to a new discovery, we may in the future be using solar energy during the day and hydrogen turbines or fuel cells during the night:

A new technique can convert 60% of sunlight energy absorbed by an electrode into hydrogen gas. Organic molecules have been used before to perform the same feat. But they are quickly bleached by the sunlight they are collecting, rendering them inefficient after a few weeks.

The inorganic materials used in the University of East Anglia's system are more resilient. Their first generation proof of concept is "a major breakthrough" thanks to its efficiency of over 60% and ability to survive sunlight for two weeks without any degradation of performance.

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn18511-sunpowered-water-splitter-makes-hydrogen-tirelessly.html

Spray-on liquid glass is transparent, non-toxic, and can protect virtually any surface from water, dirt, heat, and bacteria. The coating is flexible and breathable, which makes it suitable for use on an array of products. Liquid glass was invented in Turkey and the patent is held by Nanopool, a family-owned German company.

In the home, spray-on glass would eliminate the need for scrubbing and make most cleaning products obsolete. Since it is available in both water-based and alcohol-based solutions, it can be used in the oven, in bathrooms, tiles, sinks, and almost every other surface in the home, and one spray is said to last a year.

Liquid glass spray is perhaps the most important nanotechnology product to emerge to date. It will be available in stores soon, with prices starting at around EUR 5.70. However, supermarkets may be unwilling to stock the products because they make profits from cleaning products, which liquid glass would make obsolete.

http://www.physorg.com/news184310039.html

Scientists argue that power is corrupting because it leads to moral hypocrisy. Although we almost always know what the right thing to do is, power makes it easier to justify the wrongdoing, as we rationalize away our moral mistake.

The real question, of course, is what causes this blatant hypocrisy. One possibility is that power makes us less sensitive to the needs and feelings of others -- it silences our empathy -- and so we only think about our own motivations and needs.

Once we become socially isolated, we stop simulating the feelings of other people. Our sense of sympathy is squashed by selfishness. The UC Berkeley psychologist Dacher Keltner found that people with power are like patients with severe brain damage.

Our most powerful people are also the most isolated. They live in gated communities with private drivers. They skip the security lines at airports, before sitting at the front of the plane. We shouldn't be surprised that they're also assholes.

http://scienceblogs.com/cortex/2010/01/power.php