Human origins: 'Little Foot' fossil's big journey out of Africa
"How the priceless skull of an ancient ancestor was brought to the UK from South Africa for study."
Source: bbc.com
Covid vaccines cut risk of serious illness by 80% in over-80s
"The UK will soon be in a "very different world", government scientists promise after the success of the jabs."
Source: bbc.com
The Namib Desert bears a scar from a meteorite impact.
"In the vastness of one of the world’s oldest deserts lies a relatively recent geologic feature: the Roter Kamm crater (“red comb” or “red crest/ridge” in German). An astronaut onboard the International Space Station photographed the crater while orbiting over the Namib Desert. It is approximately...
Source: nasa.gov
Covid: Bedfordshire counselling service sees rise in caseload
Demand for help from a youth counselling service will "continue to rise" during the pandemic.
Source: bbc.com
Cornish couple feel 'discriminated against' over wedding language
"Steph Norman and Aaron Willoughby cannot have their ceremony entirely in Cornish." Apparently they could conduct it English obviously but also in Welsh (which is close to Cornish) but it highlights the lack of legal formality to the Cornish language.
Source: bbc.com
Climate Change: Government may review road-building policy
It follows a legal challenge from campaigners, who argue the policy does not fit with climate targets.
Source: bbc.com
Ancient Northland swamp kauri solves 42,000 year old mystery
NZ Herald: Ancient Northland swamp kauri shows breakdown of Earth's magnetic field 42,000 years ago. "For the first time ever, we have been able to precisely date the timing and environmental impacts of the last magnetic pole switch," Chris Turney, a professor at UNSW Science and co-lead author of the...
Source: nzherald.co.nz
Google fires Margaret Mitchell, co-lead of its Ethical AI team
"Last December, Gebru was fired from Google after she tried to be outspoken about unethical AI. This prompted some 225 Google employees to club together to create a union, in the hope of preventing further unfair dismissal and protecting employee rights. Mitchell was a member of said union, but that...
Source: techspot.com
Eeek! or E484K mutation and the coronavirus pandemic
Rupert Beale · Eeek! · LRB 19 February 2021: "Uncontrolled spread – as we knew it would – led to an even greater wave of infections, hospitalisations and deaths than last spring. Children were sent to school for one day before the necessary ‘lockdown’ was reimposed. The impulse to keep schools...
Source: lrb.co.uk
AI uses "ugly duckling" technique to spot melanoma with high accuracy
"Artificial intelligence is starting to combine with smartphone technology in ways that could have profound impacts on the way we monitor health, from tracking blood volume changes in diabetics to detecting concussions by filming the eyes." "Using the technology to spot melanoma in its early stages is...
Source: newatlas.com
Using the right tools for the job
Since this blog has been up I've fiddled with some text analysis stuff by analysing the text and making recommendations for similar blog entries. Did it all in PHP and MySQL just to understand how the algorithms work. Eventually it started to take about 5 hours to: tokenise and stemming the textcalculate...
Dreadful user experience can be expensive.
"Citibank just got a $500 million lesson in the importance of UI design: Citibank was trying to make $7.8M in interest payments. It sent $900M instead." The screenshot is from court records where the judge ruled against Citibank who had wanted to get their money back. The lesson is to always include...
Source: arstechnica.com
WhatsApp to go ahead with changes despite backlash
The messaging app is making a second attempt to convince users to accept its new privacy policy.
Source: bbc.com
How Norway is offering drug-free treatment to people with psychosis
People with psychosis are usually given powerful medication - in Norway they can now choose to go drug-free.
Source: bbc.com
Feeding your cat a very meaty diet may mean it kills less wildlife
In a small trial in the UK, pet cats fed on an unusually meaty diet brought home 36 per cent fewer prey animals than cats given a typical diet. "Domestic cats seem to hunt less when their diets are richer in animal-sourced protein, suggesting that feeding cats more meat could help reduce their impact...
Source: newscientist.com
Nasa's Perseverance rover in 'great shape' after Mars landing
"Perseverance will now spend at least two years looking for evidence of past life on the Red Planet. The American space agency has successfully landed its Perseverance rover in a deep crater near the planet's equator called Jezero. "The good news is the spacecraft, I think, is in great shape," said Matt...
Source: bbc.com
Increasing Students Critical Thinking Skills and Learning Motivation Using Inquiry Mind Map
These researchers from Indonesia explore the use of inquiry-based models in encouraging critical thinking in medical students. "Critical thinking skills are very important to have for students given the rapid distribution of information. To promote the critical thinking skills of the student, it could...
Source: online-journals.org
Abydos beer factory: Ancient large-scale brewery discovered in Egypt.
"The archaeological find in the Abydos burial ground is thought to date back about 5,000 years." They brewed beer in batch sizes of about 220 hectolitres and I bet they got away without paying much beer duty. Wonder if we can work out some of the recipes.
Source: bbc.com
Abundant Rain Turns Namibia Green
The landscape has been transformed by the wettest rainy season since 2011. "January 2021 saw rainfall totals double to triple the norm in the northeastern, central, and southern parts of Namibia. According to a weather monitor in Windhoek, 228 millimeters (9 inches) of rain fell in January; the long-term...
Source: nasa.gov
'Concerning' rise in pre-teens self-injuring.
"The rate of hospital admissions for nine to 12-year-olds who self-injure has doubled in six years." "In 2019-20, before the coronavirus pandemic, there were 16 hospital admissions per 100,000 nine to 12-year-olds, up from eight in 2013-14. Self-injury admissions for girls in this age group were twice...
Source: bbc.com
RSS feed