Without a guide humans walk in circles

Scientists have confirmed the popular belief that without anything to guide them humans really do walk in circles.

It suggests we shouldn’t trust our senses when lost.

The research, originally commissioned by a popular science TV program in Germany, is published in the journal Current Biology.

By Nicky Phillips (ABC Science)

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The Singularity Summit 2009

Suggested by Pocholo Peralta (Plato Online)

The Singularity Summit is the premier dialog on the Singularity.

The first Singularity Summit was held at Stanford in 2006 to further understanding and discussion about the Singularity concept and the future of human technological progress. It was founded as a venue for leading thinkers to explore the subject, whether scientist, enthusiast, or skeptic.

Since 2006, the scope of this dialog has expanded dramatically. In 2008, the Singularity entered mainstream consideration. IEEE Spectrum, a sober and mainstream technology publication, issued a special report on the Singularity, and Intel CTO Justin Rattner remarked that “we’re making steady progress toward the Singularity” during his keynote to 2,000 people at the Intel Developer Forum. What was once a relatively unknown concept is now being discussed in corporate board rooms.

We invite you to join our extraordinary group of visionaries in business, science, technology, design, and the arts, as our community explores this exciting topic. Your participation offers a world of powerful ideas, a unique networking opportunity, and access to an exclusive directory of your peers.

We hope you will join us October 3rd.

Find out more about the Summit here

How Much of Your Memory Is True?

These recent insights into memory are part of a larger about-face in neuroscience research. Until recently, long-term memories were thought to be physically etched into our brain, permanent and unchanging. Now it is becoming clear that memories are surprisingly vulnerable and highly dynamic. In the lab they can be flicked on or dimmed with a simple dose of drugs. “For a hundred years, people thought memory was wired into the brain,” Nader says. “Instead, we find it can be rewired—you can add false information to it, make it stronger, make it weaker, and possibly even make it disappear.” Nader and Brunet are not the only ones to make this observation. Other scientists probing different parts of the brain’s memory machinery are similarly finding that memory is inherently flexible.

By Kathleen McGowan (Discover Magazine)

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How brain controls perception of emotional events

What do emotions mean and how do we retain past events in the mind? Such questions have bugged people for long. Now, scientists have found key processes in the brain that control the emotional significance of experiences and how individuals form memories of them.

By Thaindian News

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Political views ‘all in the mind’

Scientists studying US voters say our political views may be an integral part of our physiological makeup.

Their research, published in the journal Science, indicates that people who are sensitive to fear or threat are likely to support a right wing agenda.

Those who perceived less danger in a series of images and sounds were more inclined to support liberal policies.

The authors believe their findings may help to explain why voters’ minds are so hard to change.

By Matt McGrath (BBC News)

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“Robot Scientist” Said to Equal Humans at Some Tasks

It looks nothing like C-3PO of Star Wars fame, but a team of British scientists have created a “robot” that can formulate hypotheses, design experiments, and interpret results on par with the best of their human counterparts.

By John Roach (National Geographic News)

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Mind, Nature, and Evolution: Is it Matter or Spirit?‎

What drives the evolution of life?‎

Most people associate mind and intelligence mainly with humans and only marginally with other highly evolved animals. We tend to regard humankind as separate from the rest of nature, a different order of being. In pre-modern times this was not so.

By Willie Maartens

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Humanoid Robot Helps Scientists Understand Intelligence

A humanoid robot newly acquired by Imperial College London will lead to a deeper understanding of human intelligence, says scientists. The College’s Departments of Computing and Electrical and Electronic Engineering believe that iCub, about the size of a three year old child, will further their research into cognition, the process of knowing that includes awareness, perception, reasoning and judgement.

By Science Daily

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Scientists Discover Their Sixth Sense

Psychic powers and extra-sensory perception (ESP) are among the most important unexplained phenomena today because belief in them is so prevalent. Scientists have examined people who claim to have psychic powers, but results under controlled laboratory conditions have until now remained unclear.

Most scientists and skeptics argue, “Belief in anything for which there is no empirical evidence is a sign of mental pathology and not normalcy.” But can skeptics really classify 90 percent of a nation’s entire population as schizophrenics without appearing to be patently anti-democratic or irrational themselves?

By Peter Fotis Kapnistos  (Mind Power News)

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Second thoughts on life, the universe and everything by world’s best brains

They are the intellectual elite, the brains the rest of us rely on to make sense of the universe and answer the big questions. But in a refreshing show of new year humility, the world’s best thinkers have admitted that from time to time even they are forced to change their minds.

When tackling subjects as diverse as human evolution, the laws of physics and sexual politics, scientists and philosophers, including Steven Pinker, Daniel Dennett, Paul Davies and Richard Wrangham, all confessed yesterday to a change of heart.

By James Randerson (guardian.co.uk)

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Watch what you think

Now neuroscientists in the United States are cataloguing brain patterns to match up with actual words, sentences and intentions. One researcher explains, “The new realization is that every thought is associated with a pattern of brain activity.”

Ultimately, scientists are working on remote monitoring of brain patterns using mobile infrared detectors connected to a headband to make easy use possible.

By Michael Johnson (International Herald Tribune)

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