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Comment Re:Anyone else having a hard time feeling sorry? (Score 3, Insightful) 550

by Dr Herbert West (#41675349) Attached to: Teen Suicide Tormentor Outed By Anonymous
I'm going to go out on a limb here and guess that it's been a while since you've been a teenage girl. At that age peer/parental/community pressure can seem like the most crushing, overwhelming burden to ever exist in the history of the planet. This is what makes what this guy (allegedly) did so repellent-- taking advantage of those who are more emotionally vulnerable, impulsive, and irrational than they ever will be in their lives.

Sure, "you own your own actions", etc, but for some of these kids the internet is their entire community or peer group, it is much more difficult to shrug off.

It's amazing what a few years out of high school will do to restore one's perspective-- don't kill yourselves, kids, it really does get better!

Submission + - Ideas for an "anachronistic tools" course 1

Submitted by Boawk
Boawk writes: Off and on I've thought about offering a small, workshop-style course on how to use anachronistic tools. The types of tools that immediately come to mind are abacus, slide rule, astrolabe, and sextant. It would be nice to have several of each of these which could be used by students. The course could also include discussions of ancient sites with astronomical significance, such as Stonehenge. What other anachronistic tools, sites, etc. are there that could provide fodder for such a course?
Advertising

Submission + - Nestle puts GPS Trackers in Kit Kats, Willy Wonka-golden ticket style (forbes.com)

Submitted by nonprofiteer
nonprofiteer writes: Last month, Nestlé-owned Kit Kat launched the “We’ll Find You” marketing campaign in the UK and Ireland. Over the next year, six lucky chocolate lovers will find a GPS-enabled device instead of a candy bar when they open their Kit Kat wrapper. A Nestle team will then hunt them down within 24 hours and hand over a check for £10,000 (12,000 Euros, $15,500 USD).

The bar's instructions say those under 18 need to get an adult to activate the device. They also warn: "Make sure that you’re ready to be found!"

Willy Wonka meets The Most Dangerous Game.
Android

Submission + - Google Play App history cannot be deleted (google.com)

Submitted by codguy
codguy writes: Your history of downloaded apps at the Google Play store is untouchable--you can't delete apps from your library/history list even if you are sure you will never want to install them again. While the idea of having an app library/history list is good (like for setting up a new device), the lack of basic functionality to remove unwanted apps/cruft also makes it somewhat useless, and also a privacy concern. Supposing you are a serial app tester, your app library/history list will grow and grow and grow with no way to trim it back. So when you actually need to load up a new device, you have to sort through hundreds to potentially thousands of apps, which makes this essentially useless. Others have mentioned privacy concerns--say you installed that silly fart app, or you were exploring apps that you would rather others like your spouse or children not know about. Sorry, no way to delete them from your history. While your app library/history list is not publicly available (please don't tell the big FB about that lest they try to "fix" it), nonetheless, it seems absolutely absurd that Google has not included basic functionality to manage it. This issue was reported back in mid April 2012, and there are some 1200 irate comments about it. Google has done nothing about it, nor have they announced that this policy will be changed. I call it "policy" because it is certainly not a technical limitation. Take a look at the issue report at http://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?id=28964.

Submission + - The history of "Correlation does not equal Causation" (slate.com) 1

Submitted by Dr Herbert West
Dr Herbert West writes: The phrase "correlation != causation" goes back to 1880 (according to Google Books). However, the use of the phrase has increased exponentially starting 1990's-200's, and is becoming a quick way to short-circuit certain kinds of arguments.

In the late 19th century the British statistician Karl Pearson introduced a powerful idea in math: that a relationship between two variables could be characterized according to its strength and expressed in numbers. An exciting concept, but it raised a new set of issues-- how to interpret the data in a way that is helpful, rather than misleading.

When we mistake correlation for causation, we find a cause that isn't there, which is a problem...however, as science grows more powerful and government more technocratic, the stakes of correlation—of counterfeit relationships and bogus findings—grow larger.
Government

Submission + - Security at nuclear Y-12 National Security Complex Nun Too good (thebulletin.org) 1

Submitted by Lasrick
Lasrick writes: Private security contractors strike again, this time at the Y-12 National Security Complex. How a nun, a gardener, and a housepainter cut through 3 security fences to find themselves 20 feet away from highly dangerous nuclear material. And of course, only 1 guard has been fired (the one who arguably acted the bravest and did the right thing). Contractors still have the contracts, etc.
Science

Submission + - Misconduct, not error, is the main cause of retractions (nature.com)

Submitted by
ananyo
ananyo writes: "One of the largest-ever studies of retractions has found that two-thirds of retracted life-sciences papers were stricken from the scientific record because of misconduct such as fraud or suspected fraud — and that journals sometimes soft-pedal the reason. The study contradicts the conventional view that most retractions of papers in scientific journals are triggered by unintentional errors.
The survey examined all 2,047 articles in the PubMed database that had been marked as retracted by 3 May this year. But rather than taking journals’ retraction notices at face value, as previous analyses have done, the study used secondary sources to pin down the reasons for retraction if the notices were incomplete or vague. he analysis revealed that fraud or suspected fraud was responsible for 43% of the retractions. Other types of misconduct — duplicate publication and plagiarism — accounted for 14% and 10% of retractions, respectively. Only 21% of the papers were retracted because of error (abstract)."
Your Rights Online

Submission + - Philippine Internet users protest against online libel law

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Internet users in the Philippines are protesting against a law that would make it a crime to post defamatory comments on social networking sites like Twitter and Facebook, ZDNet reports. Among the controversial provisions in the so-called "Cybercrime Prevention Act of 2012" is a clause on online libel, which it defines as libel "committed through a computer system or any other similar means which may be devised in the future". Ironically, the law, which takes effect Oct. 3 in Manila, imposes harsher penalties for this new category of crime than the penalties for libel in the print media, according to a AFP wire service report. Persons convicted of online libel may face a jail term of up to 12 years and a fine of up to $24,000.
Security

Submission + - Graphics Cards: The Future of Online Authentication? (threatpost.com)

Submitted by Gunkerty Jeb
Gunkerty Jeb writes: Researchers working on the "physically unclonable functions found in standard PC components (PUFFIN) project" announced last week that widely used graphics processors could be the next step in online authentication. The project seeks to find uniquely identifiable characteristics of hardware in common computers, mobile devices, laptops and consumer electronics.

The researchers realized that apparently identical graphics processors are actually different in subtle, unforgeable ways. A piece of software developed by the researchers is capable of discerning these fine differences. The order of magnitude of these differences is so minute, in fact, that manufacturing equipment is incapable of manipulating or replicating them. Thus, the fine-grained manufacturing differences can act as a sort of a key to reliably distinguish each of the processors from one another.

The implication of this discovery is that such differences can be used as physically unclonable features to securely link the graphics cards, and by extension, the computers in which they reside and the persons using them, to specific online accounts.
Education

Submission + - Art School's Expensive Art History Textbook Contains No Actual Art (salon.com)

Submitted by Dr Herbert West
Dr Herbert West writes: An art history book minus the art! Students at Ontario College of Art and Design were forced to buy a $180 textbook filled with blank squares. Instead of images of paintings and sculpture throughout history (that presumably would fall under fair-use) the textbook for ”Global Visual and Material Culture: Prehistory to 1800“ features placeholders with a link to an online image.

A letter from the school’s dean stated that had they decided to clear all the images for copyright to print, the book would have cost a whopping $800.

The screengrabs are pretty hilarious, or depressing, depending on your point of view.
Book Reviews

Submission + - Wonferful Life with the Elements book review

Submitted by MassDosage
MassDosage writes: Wonderful Life with the Elements Book Review By Mass Dosage

I’ve always found Chemistry interesting, particularly in high school when I had the good fortune of having a Chemistry teacher who was not only really good looking, but a great teacher too. I studied it for a year at University and then moved on and haven’t really given the periodic table and its elements much thought since. This changed when the Wonderful Life with the Elements was delivered to me two weeks ago. It’s one of those books that aims to make science fun and, unlike many other attempts which turn out to be pretty lame, this actually succeeds in presenting the periodic table in a fresh, original and interesting manner.

Wonderful Life with the Elements is the brainchild of a Japanese artist, Bunpei Yorifuji, who has published a few other books in Japan and created some adverts for the Tokyo metro (which you can find by doing an image search for his name and “Do it at home”). His animation style for these adverts features simple, clean cartoon characters drawn in yellow, black and white. In a Wonderful Life with the Elements he has taken this technique and applied it to the periodic table by drawing each element as a cartoon character where every detail has some scientific significance. Elements that were discovered a long time ago have beards while more recent discoveries have dummies (pacifiers for those in America) in their mouths. Heavy elements are fat. Elements with lots of industrial uses wear suits while those that are man-made look like robots. He also adds amusing little touches to each element and it is obvious he took a lot of time and care in doing this and researching and then presenting the details about each of them. It really feels like the elements have individual personalities which is quite an achievement for what is often presented as rather boring and dry subject matter.

This book isn’t merely a collection of cartoon drawings — information is also included covering when and how the elements were discovered, what they are (or were) used for and other interesting or amusing pieces of trivia. There are also the more traditional facts like atomic number, symbol, position in the periodic table, melting and boiling points and density. Some elements get more detail than others depending on how well known and/or useful they are. My only real criticism of the book is that the elements in period 7 only get small drawings and a cursory description each. I’m not sure why they were singled out for this treatment. Did the author get bored towards the end? Was there lack of budget? Did he run out of time? Does he have a personal grudge against period 7? Considering that this period includes rather famous elements such as Uranium and Plutonium and that they get the same low level of detail as relative unknowns like Ununseptium and Darmstadtium this feels like a rather odd omission.

The main stars of the Wonderful Life with the Elements are the elements themselves but the introductory and closing chapters are worth reading too. The book starts off with an overview of the elements and which ones are found most commonly on our planet and in our living rooms before moving on to the periodic table itself and an explanation of what the various details on the cartoon drawings of the elements mean. The closing sections describe which elements are an important part of a human diet and what the effects of eating too little or too much of each of them are before wrapping up with a warning about the possibility of us running out of certain elements and what the negative impact of this could be. This is all written in an informal, humorous style that makes all these facts appear really interesting and, dare I say it, fun to read.

Wonderful Life with the Elements is a very enjoyable book and the author has done a great job of injecting some colour and personality into what many people would view as a rather dull topic. If I had had a book like this in high-school I think I would have found Chemistry interesting, even without the attractive teacher. It is worth pointing out that is isn’t a replacement for a Chemistry text book — it only touches the surface of the large body of theory that underpins the elements and the periodic table. However I would still wholeheartedly recommend this to anyone with even just a casual interest in the subject. The original presentation of this material and the amusing personal touches are fantastic and turn this book into a fun, easy read which isn’t something one can say about most books that deal with Chemistry.

Full disclosure: I was given a copy of this book free of charge by the publisher for review purposes. They placed no restrictions on what I could say and left me to be as critical as I wanted so the above review is my own honest opinion.
Space

Submission + - B612 Sentinel Mission Gets New Funding

Submitted by
RocketAcademy
RocketAcademy writes: "The B612 Foundation’s privately funded deep-space mission, Sentinel, has received new major support from prominent members of the business and financial community.

The B612 Foundation, which is headed by former NASA astronaut and Google executive Ed Liu, plans to build, launch, and operate a space telescope to be placed in orbit around the Sun, ranging up to 170 million miles from Earth, for a mission of asteroid discovery and mapping. The telescope is expected to discover millions of asteroids. Sentinel will detect and track asteroids accurately enough to give warning of impending impacts decades in advance, allowing humanity to deflect threatening asteroids with existing technology."

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