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👁 :10
Astronomy
Catagory: History
Author:Agnes M. Clerke
Posted Date:12/27/2024
Posted By:utopia online

We can distinguish three kinds of astronomy, each with a different origin and history, but all mutually dependent, and composing, in their fundamental unity, one science. First in order of time came the art of observing the returns, and measuring the places, of the heavenly bodies. This was the sole astronomy of the Chinese and Chaldeans; but to it the vigorous Greek mind added a highly complex geometrical plan of their movements, for which Copernicus substituted a more harmonious system, without as yet any idea of a compelling cause. The planets revolved in circles because it was their nature to do so, just as laudanum sets to sleep because it possesses a virtus dormitiva. This first and oldest branch is known as "observational," or "practical astronomy." Its business is to note facts as accurately as possible; and it is essentially unconcerned with schemes for connecting those facts in a manner satisfactory to the reason. The second kind of astronomy was founded by Newton. Its nature is best indicated by the term "gravitational"; but it is also called "theoretical astronomy."[1] It is based on the idea of cause; and the whole of its elaborate structure is reared according to the dictates of a single law, simple in itself, but the tangled web of whose consequences can be unravelled only by the subtle agency of an elaborate calculus. The third and last division of celestial science may properly be termed "physical and descriptive astronomy." It seeks to know what the heavenly bodies are in themselves, leaving the How? and[Pg 2] the Wherefore? of their movements to be otherwise answered. Now, such inquiries became possible only through the invention of the telescope, so that Galileo was, in point of fact, their originator. But Herschel first gave them a prominence which the whole progress of science du ring the nineteenth century served to confirm and render more exclusive. Inquisitions begun with the telescope have been extended and made effective in unhoped-for directions by the aid of the spectroscope and photographic camera; and a large part of our attention in the present volume will be occupied with the brilliant results thus achieved. The unexpected development of this new physical-celestial science is the leading fact in recent astronomical history. It was out of the regular course of events. In the degree in which it has actually occurred it could certainly not have been foreseen. It was a seizing of the prize by a competitor who had hardly been thought qualified to enter the lists. Orthodox astronomers of the old school looked with a certain contempt upon observers who spent their nights in scrutinising the faces of the moon and planets rather than in timing their transits, or devoted daylight energies, not to reductions and computations, but to counting and measuring spots on the sun. They were regarded as irregular practitioners, to be tolerated perhaps, but certainly not encouraged. The advance of astronomy in the eighteenth century ran in general an even and logical course. The age succeeding Newton's had for its special task to demonstrate the universal validity, and trace the complex results, of the law of gravitation. The accomplishment of that task occupied just one hundred years. It was virtually brought to a close when Laplace explained to the French Academy, November 19, 1787, the cause of the moon's accelerated motion. As a mere machine, the solar system, so far as it was then known, was found to be complete and intelligible in all its parts; and in the Mécanique Céleste its mechanical perfections were displayed under a form of majestic unity which fitly commemorated the successive triumphs of analytical genius over problems amongst the most arduous ever dealt with by the mind of man. Theory, however, demands a practical test. All its data are derived from observation; and their insecurity becomes less tolerable as it advances nearer to perfection. Observation, on the other hand, is the pitiless critic of theory; it detects weak points, and provokes reforms which may be the beginnings of discovery. Thus, theory and observation mutually act and react, each alternately taking the lead in the endless race of improvement. Now, while in France Lagrange and Laplace were bringing the gravitational theory of the solar system to completion, work of[Pg 3] a very different kind, yet not less indispensable to the future welfare of astronomy, was being done in England. The Royal Observatory at Greenwich is one of the few useful institutions which date their origin from the reign of Charles II. The leading position which it still occupies in the science of celestial observation was, for near a century and a half after its foundation, an exclusive one. Delambre remarked that, had all other materials of the kind been destroyed, the Greenwich records alone would suffice for the restoration of astronomy. The establishment was indeed absolutely without a rival.[2] Systematic observations of sun, moon, stars, and planets were during the whole of the eighteenth century made only at Greenwich. Here materials were accumulated for the secure correction of theory, and here refinements were introduced by which the exquisite accuracy of modern practice in astronomy was eventually attained. The chief promoter of these improvements was James Bradley. Few men have possessed in an equal degree with him the power of seeing accurately, and reasoning on what they see. He let nothing pass. The slightest inconsistency between what appeared and what was to be expected roused his keenest attention; and he never relaxed his mental grip of a subject until it had yielded to his persistent inquisition. It was to these qualities that he owed his discoveries of the ab erration of light and the nutation of the earth's axis. The first was announced in 1729. What is meant by it is that, owing to the circumstance of light not being instantaneously transmitted, the heavenly bodies appear shifted from their true places by an amount depending upon the ratio which the velocity of light bears to the speed of the earth in its orbit. Because light travels with enormous rapidity, the shifting is very slight; and each star returns to its original position at the end of a year. Bradley's second great discovery was finally ascertained in 1748. Nutation is a real "nodding" of the terrestrial axis produced by the dragging of the moon at the terrestrial equatorial protuberance. From it results an apparent displacement of the stars, each of them describing a little ellipse about its true or "mean" position, in a period of nearly nineteen years. Now, an acquaintance with the fact and the laws of each of these minute irregularities is vital to the progress of observational astronomy; for without it the places of the heavenly bodies could never be accurately known or compared. So that Bradley, by their detection, at once raised the science to a higher grade of precision. Nor was this the whole of his work. Appointed Astronomer-Royal in 1742, he executed during the years 1750-62 a series of observations[Pg 4] which formed the real beginning of exact astronomy. Part of their superiority must, indeed, be attributed to the co-operation of John Bird, who provided Bradley in 1750 with a measuring instrument of till then unequalled excellence. For not only was the art of observing in the eighteenth century a peculiarly English art, but the means of observing were furnished almost exclusively by British artists. John Dollond, the son of a Spitalfields weaver, invented the achromatic lens in 1758, removing thereby the chief obstacle to the development of the powers of refracting telescopes; James Short, of Edinburgh, was without a rival in the construction of reflectors; the sectors, quadrants, and circles of Graham, Bird, Ramsden, and Cary were inimitable by Continental workmanship. Thus practical and theoretical astronomy advanced on parallel lines in England and France respectively, the improvement of their several tools—the telescope and the quadrant on the one side, and the calculus on the other—keeping pace. The whole future of the science seemed to be theirs. The cessation of interest through a too speedy attainment of the perfection towards which each spurred the other, appeared to be the only danger it held in store for them. When all at once, a rival stood by their side—not, indeed, menacing their progress, but threatening to absorb their popularity. The rise of Herschel was the one conspicuous anomaly in the astronomical history of the eighteenth century. It proved decisive of the course of events in the nineteenth. It was unexplained by anything that had gone before; yet all that came after hinged upon it. It gave a new direction to effort; it lent a fresh impulse to thought. It opened a channel for the widespread public interest which was gathering towards astronomical subjects to flow in. Much of this interest was due to the occurrence of events calculated to arrest the attention and excite the wonder of the uninitiated. The predicted return of Halley's comet in 1759 verified, after an unprecedented fashion, the computations of astronomers. It deprived such bodies for ever of their portentous character; it ranked them as denizens of the solar system. Again, the transits of Venus in 1761 and 1769 were the first occurrences of the kind since the awakening of science to their consequence. Imposing preparations, journeys to remote and hardly accessible regions, official expeditions, international communications, all for the purpose of observing them to the best advantage, brought their high significance vividly to the public consciousness; a result aided by the facile pen of Lalande, in rendering intelligible the means by which these elaborate arrangements were to issue in an[Pg 5] accurate knowledge of the sun's distance. Lastly, Herschel's discovery of Uranus, March 13, 1781, had the surprising effect of utter novelty. Since the human race had become acquainted with the company of the planets, no addition had been made to their number. The event thus broke with immemorial traditions, and seemed to show astronomy as still young and full of unlooked-for possibilities. Further popularity accrued to the science from the sequel of a career so strikingly opened. Herschel's huge telescopes, his detection by their means of two Saturnian and as many Uranian moons, his piercing scrutiny of the sun, picturesque theory of its constitution, and sagacious indication of the route pursued by it through space; his discovery of stellar revolving systems, his bold soundings of the universe, his grandiose ideas, and the elevated yet simple language in which they were conveyed—formed a combination powerfully effective to those least susceptible of new impressions. Nor was the evoked enthusiasm limited to the British Isles. In Germany, Schröter followed—longo intervallo—in Herschel's track. Von Zach set on foot from Gotha that general communication of ideas which gives life to a forward movement. Bode wrote much and well for unlearned readers. Lalande, by his popular lectures and treatises, helped to fo rm an audience which Laplace himself did not disdain to address in the Exposition du Système du Mo nde. This great accession of public interest gave the impulse to the extraordinarily rapid progress of astronomy in the nineteenth


Type:Science
👁 :218
Our Sun may once have had a twin.
Catagory:Reading
Author:Jonathan O'Callaghan
Posted Date:12/27/2024
Posted By:utopia online

Our Sun is a bit of an isolated nomad. Orbiting in one of the Milky Way's spiral arms, it takes us on a a journey around the galaxy roughly once every 230 million years on our lonesome. The nearest star to our Sun, Proxima Centauri, is 4.2 light-years away, so remote that it would take even the fastest spacecraft ever built more than 7,000 years to reach. Everywhere we look in our galaxy however, the star at the centre of our Solar System seems like more and more of an anomaly. Binary stars – stars that orbit the galaxy inexorably linked together as pairs – appear to be common. Recently astronomers have even spotted a pair orbiting in surprisingly close proximity to the supermassive black hole that sits at the heart of the Milky Way – a location that astrophysicists thought would cause the stars to be ripped apart from each other or squashed together by the intense gravity. In fact, discoveries of binary star systems are now so common that some scientists believe that perhaps all stars were once in binary relationships – born as pairs, each with a stellar sibling. That has led to an intriguing question: was our own Sun once a binary star too, its companion lost long ago? It's definitely a possibility, says Gongjie Li, an astronomer at the Georgia Institute of Technology in the US. "And it's very interesting." Fortunately for us, our Sun does not have a companion today. If it did, the gravitational pull of a solar sibling could have disrupted the orbit of the Earth and the other planets, condemning our home to lurches from extreme heat to terrible cold in a way that may have been too inhospitable for life. The closest binary stars to Earth, Alpha Centauri A and B, orbit each other at about 24 times the Earth-Sun distance, or 3.6 billion miles. Suggestions that our Sun could also have a faint companion circling our Solar System today – a hypothetical star often called Nemesis – have fallen out of favour since they were first proposed in 1984 after no such star was found in multiple surveys and studies. But when our Sun first formed 4.6 billion years ago, however, it may have been a different matter.Stars form when giant clouds of dust and gas tens of light-years across cool and clump together. The material inside these nebulae – as these cocoons of gas and dust are known – collapse together under gravity into ever growing lumps. As it does so, it begins to warm up over millions of years, eventually igniting nuclear fusion to create a protostar with a disk of remnant debris spinning around it, which forms planets. In 2017, Sarah Sadavoy, an astrophysicist at Queen's University in Canada, used data from a radio survey of the Perseus molecular cloud – a stellar nursery filled with young binary star systems – to conclude that the process of star formation might preferentially form protostars in pairs. Indeed, she and her colleagues found it was so likely that they suggested all stars might form in pairs or multi-star systems. "You get little density spikes within those cocoons, and those are able to collapse and form multiple stars, which we call a fragmentation process," says Sadavoy. "If they're very far away [from each other], they might never interact. But if they're much closer, gravity has a chance to keep them bound together." Sadavoy's work showed that it was possible that all stars once started as a binary, and while some remain bound together indefinitely, others would break apart rapidly within a million years. "Stars live for billions of years," she says. "It is a blip in the grand scheme of things. But so much happens in that blip." That raises the question of whether the same might have been true of our Sun. There's no reason to think it wasn't, says Sadavoy. But "if we did form with a companion, we lost it", she says. It is likely that any companion would now be lost among the sea of stars that we see in the night sky – Sarah Sadavoy There are some tantalising clues emerging our Sun was once part of a binary system. In 2020, Amir Siraj, an astrophysicist at Harvard University in the US, suggested that a region of icy comets that surrounds our Solar System far beyond Pluto, called the Oort Cloud, might contain an imprint of this companion star. This frigid shell of ice and rock is so far away that the most distant spacecraft ever launched by humankind – Voyager 1 – will not reach it for at least another 300 years. (Read more about what the Voyager missions are teaching us about the weird space on the outskirts of our Solar System.) If our Sun did have a companion, then it would have resulted in more dwarf planets like Pluto existing in this region, says Siraj. It might also have led to a larger planet ending up here, like the hypothesised Neptune-sized world Planet Nine that some astronomers believe remains undiscovered in our Sun's outer reaches. (Read more about the mystery of Planet Nine in this article by Zaria Gorvett.) "It's hard to produce quite as many objects in the furthest reaches of the Oort Cloud as we see" without a companion star, says Siraj, with billions or even trillions of objects orbiting in the Oort Cloud. If an additional planet like Planet Nine were to be found, explaining how such a planet ended up so far from the Sun is "really hard", says Siraj, unless we invoke the disrupting gravitational hand of a companion star. "It could boost the capture of comets and the chances of the Solar System capturing a planet," he says. Konstantin Batygin, a planetary scientist at the California Institute of Technology in the US who first proposed the existence of Planet Nine in 2016 based on the clustering of distant objects, isn't so sure about the idea. "A binary companion is by no means required to explain the Oort Cloud," says Batygin. "You can fully explain the existence of the Oort Cloud just by the fact that the Sun formed in a cluster of stars, and as Jupiter and Saturn grew to their present-day masses, they ejected a bunch of objects." Even Planet Nine can be explained just by "passing stars in the birth cluster", he says.However, in a recently published research paper, Batygin suggests that the inner edge of the Oort Cloud could be explained by a companion star. "What we found by doing computer simulations is that as objects get scattered out, they start to interact with the binary companion," says Batygin. "They can detach from the orbits of Jupiter and Saturn and get trapped in the inner Oort Cloud." It might be possible to confirm if this idea is true with a new telescope in Chile, called the Vera Rubin Observatory, set to switch on next year and perform the most detailed survey ever of the night sky over the following 10 years. "As Vera Rubin comes online and begins to really map out the structure of the Oort Cloud in greater detail, we can see if there's a clear thumbprint of the binary companion," says Batygin.Another possible signature of a binary companion's impact is that our Sun is tilted very slightly, by about seven degrees, to the plane of the Solar System. A possible explanation for this is the gravitational pull of another star, which tilted our Sun off balance. "I think the most natural explanation is the presence of a companion star early on," says Batygin, an effect that we see in other binary stars throughout the galaxy. But even if this early evidence does turn out to be correct, finding our Sun's missing twin may be a far more challenging prospect. It is likely that any companion would now be "lost among the sea of stars that we see in the night sky", says Sadavoy. However, stars born in the same region of space as our Sun might have a similar composition because they will have been forged from the same mix of gases and dust, making them all veritable siblings. In 2018, scientists identified one such a "twin" star of our Sun, with a similar size and chemical composition located less than 200 light-years away. Before we get too excited, however, it is worth remembering that the cloud of gas and dust in which our Sun was born also probably formed "hundreds or thousands of stars", says Sadavoy. All of these would have a similar composition, meaning there would be no way to know if any were our Sun's true companion. Even then, any companion of our Sun might not have been a similarly sized star. "It could have been a [smaller] red dwarf star, or a hotter, bluer star," says Sadavoy. While finding and identifying our Sun's possible companion seems daunting, the prospect that it was once a binary star raises interesting implications for planets around other stars, known as exoplanets. Most notably, it would demonstrate that in our Solar System, the existence of life and the survival of our planets was not diminished by the presence of another star. "There are many discovered exoplanetary systems that actually orbit stellar binaries," says Li. Some of those orbit one of the two stars, known as circumstellar systems, while others orbit both of the stars and have skies with two suns like the fictional planet Tatooine in Star Wars. These are called circumbinary systems. Sometimes we do see binary companions causing havoc with such systems, though. "It depends on how far away the star is," says Li. If the star is closer in, it can "kick the planetary orbits" and push them into eccentric, non-circular shapes. "In circumstellar systems, the planets could have a high eccentricity," says Li. "But this may not necessarily make them unstable." It can, however, cause the planet to experience large changes in temperature as it swings closer to and further from the star, he says. For our own planet, it seems that the possible existence of a binary companion to our Sun long ago did not hinder our own existence. And as scientists examine the furthest regions of our Solar System in ever more detail, they may well uncover more signs that it once did exist – a lasting signature waiting to be found. If it does exist it could be out there, somewhere, with a solar system all of its own. "It might not have trailed too far behind or ahead," says Sadavoy. "Or it could be on the other side of the galaxy and we would not know.


Type:Science
👁 :7
Two die in Sydney to Hobart yacht race
Catagory:News
Author:Kathryn Armstrong
Posted Date:12/27/2024
Posted By:utopia online

Two people taking part in Australia's annual Sydney to Hobart yacht race have died in separate incidents, according to police. Both crew members died in separate incidents after being hit by a boom - the large pole attached horizontally to the bottom of a sail. The event's organisers said the incidents happened on the Flying Fish Arctos and Bowline. The first boats are expected to arrive in the city of Hobart, in Tasmania, later on Friday or early on Saturday. Several have already retired due to bad weather.New South Wales (NSW) police said the first incident was reported to officers just before midnight on Thursday local time (12:50 GMT) by the Australian Maritime Safety Authority in the country's capital, Canberra. Just over two hours later, at 02:15 on Friday, NSW police were told that crew aboard the second boat were giving CPR to the second person, which also had not worked. Flying Fish Arctos had been sailing approximately 30 nautical miles east/south-east of the NSW town of Ulladulla, the organisers said. Bowline, meanwhile, was approximately 30 nautical miles east/north-east of the town of Batemans Bay, also in NSW. "Our thoughts are with the crews, family and friends of the deceased," the organisers said in a statement. "The Sydney to Hobart is an Australian tradition, and it is heart-breaking that two lives have been lost at what should be a time of joy," said Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese. The race, which began on Thursday, has continued. It is not the first time there have been fatalities during the race, which was first held in 1945. Six people, including British Olympic yachtsman Glyn Charles, died in 1998 after raging storms hit competitors.


Type:Social
👁 :173
Father Christmas
Catagory: History
Author:-
Posted Date:12/25/2024
Posted By:utopia online

The story behind Santa goes back to the third century during the time of St. Nicholas, a monk, even though some sources state that he was a bishop. Nicholas was born around 280 A.D. in Patara, in modern-day Turkey. Legend states that Nicholas had a giving spirit and traveled the countryside helping those less fortunate and the sick. Nicholas's parents were wealthy and left the bulk of their estate to Nicholas when they died. Nicholas, who always had the spirit of giving, took his inheritance and gave to those less fortunate and lived a life of humility. December 6 marks the anniversary of Nicholas's death. By the time of the Renaissance, St. Nicholas was the most popular saint in Europe. St. Nicholas was canonized by Pope Eugene IV on June 5, 1446 and became known as the patron saint for children and sailors. Waves of European immigrants brought St. Nicholas's holiday tradition to America. By the end of the 18th century, St. Nicholas was recognized by American culture. In December of 1773 and December of 1774, it was reported that groups of Dutch families in New York gathered to honor the anniversary of Nicholas's death. The name, Santa Claus, was stated to evolve from Nick's Dutch nickname, Sinter Klaas, a shortened form of Sint Nikolaas, which is translated as the Dutch name for St. Nicholas. The earliest origins of Santa Claus can be traced back to the 4th century Greek bishop from Myra, called St Nicholas. In fact, even today, Santa is sometimes referred to as ‘St Nick’ in a nod to this early Christian saint. According to Biblical texts St Nicholas performed a series of somewhat bizarre miracles, including resurrecting a series of boys who had been murdered and pickled by an innkeeper. In another story St Nicholas rescued three young girls bound for slavery, by throwing three bags of gold down their chimney which became their dowries for marriage. As legend has it, the gold landed in their stockings which were hung up to dry by the fire, prompting the later filled stockings idea. Stories of his gold-giving became popular throughout medieval Europe, and it became common practice for grown-ups to leave gifts for children on the night before the 6th of December, Saint Nicholas Day. The character of Sinterklaas emerged in the Netherlands as a benevolent and generous saint who could magically enter houses via locked doors or chimneys, leaving a trail of gifts for young children at winter time. Markets that celebrated Sinterklaas were popular in medieval Holland, with stalls selling related toys and treats, and impersonators dressed in long red robes appearing to entertain gathered audiences. Over time, the Sinterklaas narrative expanded to include a series of wicked characters who punished badly behaved children, including Krampus, Pere Fouettard, Ru-Klaus, Pelsnickel, and Knecht Rupert. Notions of ‘Father Christmas’ can be traced back to at least 15th century England, in a Christmas carol that describes how a character called ‘Sir Christemas’ spread the news of Christ’s birth. Meanwhile during Tudor and Stuart times, wealthy households would employ a ‘Lord of Misrule’ to entertain them during winter festivities, who they called ‘Captain Christmas,’ or ‘Prince Christmas.’ But it was the English playwright Ben Johnson who popularised the idea of an old man with a long white beard in his 1616 play, Christmas, His Masque. Johnson’s character, who called himself ‘Old Christmas,’ had a long, thin white beard, wore a floor length robe, and was accompanied by numerous sons and daughters. Reference https://www.sttammanylibrary.org/blogs/post/the-legend-of-santa-claus-part-1-the-origin-and-history-of-a-christmas-legend/ https://www.thecollector.com/what-are-the-origins-of-santa-claus/


Type:Social
👁 :72
An AI started 'tasting' colours and shapes
Catagory:News
Author:David Robson
Posted Date:12/24/2024
Posted By:utopia online

What is the flavour of a pink sphere? And what is the sound of a Sauvignon Blanc? Such questions may sound ridiculous, but a huge body of literature shows us that the human brain naturally merges sensory experiences. We may not be conscious of the phenomenon, but we associate different colours, shapes and sounds with different flavours in ways that can subtly shape our perceptual experience, for example. The colour of our glass, or music playing in the background of a bar, can determine how sweet or musky a wine tastes, for instance. "This cross talk between the senses is happening almost on an ongoing basis all the time," explains Carlos Velasco at the BI Norwegian Business School in Oslo, Norway. In extreme cases it can manifest in a blurred sensory experience for some people where words might trigger specific tastes or music produces a riot of colour – something known as synaesthesia. And while the idea that you can "taste" a colour or sound may seem absurd enough, Velasco's latest research suggests that generative artificial intelligence systems may also do this too. As with all AI algorithms, this is largely a reflection of biases in the data they were trained on, so they are perhaps just highlighting how common these associations may actually be. But Velasco and his colleagues hope to use this fact to find many other ways to hack human senses.Eating with the eyes First, a note on terminology. Scientists use the term "sensory modality" to describe the means that the body uses to encode information – through, for example, our taste buds, ear drums, the retina in our eyes or the "tactile corpuscles" in our skin. The associations that we tend to form between different sensory qualities are therefore known as "cross-modal correspondences".Experimental evidence for this phenomenon first emerged in the 1970s, with studies suggesting that red and pink hues are associated with sweetness, yellow or green with sourness, white with saltiness and brown or black with bitterness. These general patterns have now been replicated many times since, using multiple experimental methods. Participants may be asked for their subjective judgement of abstract questions such as: "On a scale from 1 to 10, with 10 being the most sweet, how sweet is the colour red?" From this, you can see that, on average, each colour has a unique flavour profile shared by large numbers of people across different cultures. A multinational collaboration, led by Xiaoang Wang at Tsinghua University in China, found similar cross-modal correspondences in Chinese, Indian, and Malaysian participants. Alternatively, participants may be given a particular food or drink presented in multiple colours, and asked to judge the taste of each one. Eriko Sugimori and Yayoi Kawasaki at Waseda University in Japan, for instance, have found that bitter chocolate tastes considerably sweeter when it is wrapped in pink, rather than black, packaging. AI v the Mind This article is part of AI v the Mind, a series that aims to explore the limits of cutting-edge AI, and learn a little about how our own brains work along the way. With some expert help, each article pits different AI tools against the human mind, asking probing questions designed to test the limits of intelligence. Can a machine write a better joke than a professional comedian, or unpick a moral conundrum more elegantly than a philosopher? We hope to find out.The shapes of food can have similar effects. We tend to associate rounder shapes with sweetness, while spikier shapes are considered to be more sour or bitter – with knock-on effects on people's perceptions of the foods. We eat with our eyes as well as our tongues. The origin of these associations is still a matter of debate. "The safest assumption is that we learn them all," says Charles Spence, the head of the cross-modal research laboratory at the University of Oxford. "They could be thought of as kind of the internalisation of the statistics of the environment. In nature, fruits go from green, when they are sour, to redder and warmer hues, when they are sweeter. If we internalise that statistic, associating reddish hues with sweeter taste, we know which trees to climb for the for the fruit that will sustain us." The associations between shape and taste are harder to explain. "It may be the emotions associated with or triggered by the stimuli," Spence says. We may associate sweetness with pleasure, for example, and we prefer round shapes since they are less likely to hurt us, compared to something sharp. As a result, we start to associate sweetness with curviness through this indirect association. Bitter substances, in contrast, are more likely to be poisonous – and so we might link them to sharp shapes that also have more potential to cause bodily harm. Associative AI The rapid rise of AI inspired Velasco, Spence, and their colleague Kosuke Motoki at the University of Tokyo to investigate whether generative AIs – trained on human data – would report the same associations. They asked the AI-powered chatbot ChatGPT to answer the same kinds of prompts that had previously been given to human participants. For example: "To what extent do you associate round shapes with sweet, sour, salty, bitter, and umami tastes? Please answer this question on a 7-point from 1 (not at all) to 7 (very much)."And… "Among the 11 colours listed (black, blue, brown, green, grey, orange, pink, purple, red, white, yellow), which colour do you think best goes well with sweet tastes?" Averaging their results across hundreds of chats in English, Spanish and Japanese, the researchers found that the AI did indeed reflect the patterns commonly found in human participants – though there were some differences between the versions of the AI they used. Overall, ChatGPT-4o more reliably reflected the human associations than ChatGPT-3.5. "The differences likely stem from variations in model architecture, such as the increased number of parameters in ChatGPT-4o, as well as a larger and more diverse training set," says Motoki. Of all our festive favourites, then, what tunes would go best with mulled wine and mince pies?Silicon brainstorming Intrigued, I decided to investigate whether other large language models (LLMs) such as Google's Gemini, might also reflect our sensory associations. When I asked it to say what colour is sweetest, it responded: "Many people associate pink with sweetness, likely due to its association with sugary treats like cotton candy and bubble gum." It also named green for sour, white for salty, and black for bitter. The match would seem almost uncanny – except, midway through its answer, Gemini pointed me towards one of Spence's previous research papers on these cross-modal associations, suggesting that it had drawn its response straight from the scientific literature. Spence had mentioned this possibility in our conversation. "Given that we tested the large language models on what is already known, and what is already hence published in literature, maybe it's just feeding back what it has read," he says. In the future, he hopes to investigate whether generative AIs can generate hypotheses for other cross-modal correspondences that have not yet been documented in the scientific literature, but which could then be tested on human subjects. "You could potentially use large language models and generative AI to discover the perfect correspondences to whichever dimensions you're interested in," he says. This approach might then be useful for marketeers who hope to design products or packaging that riff on our brain's existing associations. There are some caveats, of course. AIs can sometimes "hallucinate" – that is, make up misleading responses to questions. And even if their responses are reliable, they may lack the nuances or idiosyncrasies provided by our own brains that can add excitement or interest to designs. Sometimes, you may wish to riff on the intuitive associations between sensory qualities without necessarily copying them entirely. For this reason, any cross-modal correspondences identified by AI will need to be combined with human creativity, says Velasco. "It's inspiration, rather than a definite solution." Christmas accompaniments We will need more evidence before we place too much faith in AI's judgements, but writing this piece in the run-up to Christmas, I couldn't help but wonder whether ChatGPT could give me some advice for a drinks party. Spence has previously shown that people tend to agree on which pieces of music complement different types of wine. With its high tempo and pitch, Debussy's Jardin Sous la Pluie seems to go better with citrusy whites, while the piano and cello duet of Rachmaninoff's Vocalise tends to bring out the fuller-bodied flavours of reds. Of all our festive favourites, then, what tunes would go best with mulled wine and mince pies?"The complex flavour profile of mulled wine – rich with spices like cinnamon, clove, and star anise, combined with fruity and warming notes – calls for music that is equally layered, warm, and evocative," ChatGPT told me. "A perfect accompaniment could be Carol of the Bells performed with a lush orchestration. Its cascading, layered melodies evoke a sense of festive magic and warmth that mirrors the interplay of spices in mulled wine." I'm not sure that's quite the vibe I'm going for – you might recall that piece of music's use in a key tension building scene in the Christmas film Home Alone – so I ask for some pop or jazz alternatives. "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas performed by Ella Fitzgerald or Diana Krall. The sultry, smooth tones of jazz vocals and warm instrumentation echo the comforting and layered flavours of the mulled wine," it suggests. Other options include Underneath the Tree by Kelly Clarkson "emphasising the celebratory spirit while balancing the wine's depth with an energetic vibe" or Christmas Time is Here by the Vince Guaraldi Trio, "a mellow yet jazzy track with just the right amount of sophistication and charm to enhance a relaxed festive evening". We'll see if my guests agree. source: avid Robson is an award-winning science writer and author of The Intelligence Trap and The Expectation Effect. His latest book is The Laws of Connection: 13 Social Strategies That Will Transform Your Life, published by Canongate (UK) and Pegasus Books (USA & Canada) in June 2024. He is @davidarobson on Instagram and Threads.


Type:Technology
👁 :52
Spacecraft attempts closest-ever approach to Sun
Catagory:News
Author:Alison Francis Senior Science Journalist
Posted Date:12/24/2024
Posted By:utopia online

A Nasa spacecraft is attempting to make history with the closest-ever approach to the Sun. The Parker Solar Probe is plunging into our star's outer atmosphere, enduring brutal temperatures and extreme radiation. It's out of communication for several days during this burning hot fly-by and scientists will be waiting for a signal, expected on 27 December, to see if it has survived. The hope is the probe could help us to better understand how the Sun works.Parker Solar Probe launched in 2018, heading to the centre of our Solar System. It has already swept past the Sun 21 times, getting ever nearer, but the Christmas Eve visit is record-breaking. At its closest approach, the probe is 3.8 million miles (6.2 million km) from our star's surface. This might not sound that close, but Nasa's Nicola Fox puts it into perspective: "We are 93 million miles away from the Sun, so if I put the Sun and the Earth one metre apart, Parker Solar Probe is four centimetres from the Sun - so that's close." The probe will have to endure temperatures of 1,400C and radiation that could frazzle the onboard electronics. It's protected by a 11.5cm (4.5 inches) thick carbon-composite shield but the spacecraft's tactic is to get in and out fast. In fact, it will be moving faster than any human made object, hurtling at 430,000mph - the equivalent of flying from London to New York in less than 30 seconds.So why go to all this effort to "touch" the Sun? Scientists hope that as the spacecraft passes through our star's outer atmosphere - its corona - it will solve a long standing mystery. "The corona is really, really hot, and we have no idea why," explains Dr Jenifer MIllard, an astronomer at Fifth Star Labs. "The surface of the Sun is about 6,000C or so, but the corona, this tenuous outer atmosphere that you can see during solar eclipses, reaches millions of degrees - and that is further away from the Sun. So how is that atmosphere getting hotter?" The mission should also help scientists to better understand solar wind - the constant stream of charged particles bursting out from the corona. When these particles interact with the Earth's magnetic field the sky lights up with dazzling auroras. But this so called space weather can cause problems too, knocking out power-grids, electronics and communication systems. "Understanding the Sun, its activity, space weather, the solar wind, is so important to our everyday lives on Earth," says Dr Millard.Nasa scientists face an anxious wait over Christmas while the spacecraft is out of touch with Earth. Nicola Fox says that as soon as a signal is beamed back home, the team will text her a green heart to let her know the probe is OK. She admits she's nervous about the audacious attempt, but she has faith in the probe. "I will worry about the spacecraft. But we really have designed it to withstand all of these brutal, brutal conditions. It's a tough, tough little spacecraft."


Type:Technology
👁 :8
Gaetz, who resigned from the US House of Representatives
Catagory:News
Author:Lisa Lambert
Posted Date:12/24/2024
Posted By:utopia online

The House Ethics Committee report on Donald Trump ally Matt Gaetz released on Monday revealed fresh details about the former congressman's alleged behaviour, at least one new accusation and insights into the panel's investigation. From at least 2017 to 2020, the committee concluded that the former Florida congressman regularly paid women for "engaging in sexual activity", had sex with a 17-year-old girl, used or possessed illegal drugs, accepted gifts beyond House limits and helped a woman obtain a passport, according to the report. Gaetz, who resigned from the US House of Representatives in November - days before the report was scheduled to be made public and after Trump announced him as his pick for US attorney general - denied the committee's findings and has accused it of conducting an unfair investigation. Here are four parts of the much-anticipated report that stand out.A winding money trail House investigators said Gaetz paid more than $90,000 (£71,843) to women for sex and drugs, but created a complicated web of transactions that were hard to trace, according to the report. "The committee was unable to determine the full extent to which Representative Gaetz's payments to women were compensation for engaging in sexual activity with him," the report found. He allegedly used his friend Joel Greenberg, currently serving 11 years in prison for crimes he said he committed with Gaetz, as a frequent go-between and logged onto Greenberg's account on SeekingArrangement.com, which bills itself as a "luxury dating site", to interact with young women. Gaetz also paid women directly, sometimes through platforms such as Venmo, according to the report. But the committee said he often used another person's PayPal account or an account linked to an email address with a fake name. He also obscured payments, the panel wrote. In one example, he gave a college student a cheque made out to "cash" with "tuition reimbursement" in the memo line. The woman said she received it after a group encounter, which "could potentially be a form of coercion because I really needed the money". Gaetz has posted on social media that he gave money to women he was involved with as gifts, not payments. The committee found that two women, aged 27 and 25, did not consider their relationships transactional. Another woman who was considered his girlfriend invoked her Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination when asked if she was given money for sex or drugs, or to pay others. The committee attempted to prove Gaetz frequently paid for sex through a text message that described his inability to pay at one point. His then-girlfriend said in the message that he and Greenberg were "a little limited in their cash flow" and asked a group of women "if it can be more of a customer appreciation week". A few months later, according to the committee, she wrote: "Btw Matt also mentioned he is going to be a bit generous cause of the 'customer appreciation' thing last time." Sex, drugs, and a passport application The committee also said Gaetz bought illegal drugs or reimbursed people for them. It gives examples of his alleged cocaine and ecstasy/MDMA use, but focused on what appeared to be a heavy marijuana habit. He allegedly asked women to bring marijuana cartridges to meetings and events, and created the fake-name email account to buy marijuana. A trip he took to the Bahamas "was paid for by an associate of Representative Gaetz with connections to the medical marijuana industry, who allegedly also paid for female escorts to accompany them", according to the report. One woman felt the use of drugs and alcohol at parties had impaired her ability "to really know what was going on or fully consent". "Indeed, nearly every woman that the committee spoke with could not remember the details of at least one or more of the events they attended with Representative Gaetz and attributed that to drug or alcohol consumption," the report said. His then-girlfriend, who was 21 when they met and "was paid tens of thousands of dollars" during their two-year relationship", often participated in encounters with women and acted as an intermediary, according to the report. A woman told the committee she was 17 at the time she had sex with Gaetz twice at a party in 2017 - at least once in front of other people - while under the influence of ecstasy. The woman, who had just completed her junior year in high school, then received $400 from him. She also told the panel she did not tell Gaetz she was a minor and the committee did not find any evidence that the former congressman knew she was underage. In 2021, Greenberg pleaded guilty to sex trafficking the girl. Gaetz also allegedly directed his chief of staff to expedite a passport application for a woman he was sleeping with, whom he said was a voter in his district. He also allegedly gave her $1,000. Gaetz violated House rules that bar using his position for special favours, according to the committee, which wrote: "The woman was not his constituent, and the case was not handled in the same manner as similar passport assistance cases".Accusations of obstruction The committee dedicated a great deal of the report to detailing how Gaetz allegedly obstructed its investigation, including failing to produce evidence he said would "exonerate" him. The report concluded he "continuously sought to deflect, deter, or mislead the Committee in order to prevent his actions from being exposed". Gaetz, who has accused the committee of being "weaponised" against him and leaking information to the press, alleged the panel was working on behalf of former Speaker Kevin McCarthy, according to the report. Last year he helped lead an effort to oust then-Speaker McCarthy from his role. While Gaetz claimed he had "voluntarily produced tens of thousands of records," he gave the committee "only a couple hundred records, more than 90% of which was either irrelevant or publicly available," the report found. One sore point was a trip to the Bahamas, where the committee said he withheld information. Ultimately it concluded he violated rules on gifts because the trip was too high in value. The committee also cited the Justice Department's probe into the allegations against Gaetz as a reason for delays. Some witnesses asked the committee to use statements they had given to the department, but it refused to share them because they had not issued charges and because it said it could deter future witnesses in other cases from coming forward. Committee chairman dissents The report ends with a single-page statement from Ethics Committee Chairman Michael Guest "on behalf of dissenting committee members" who are not named. Those members do not challenge the committee's findings, but disagree with releasing the report after Gaetz resigned from the House, which has not happened since 2006, they write. It "breaks from the Committee's long-standing practice, opens the Committee to undue criticism, and will be viewed by some as an attempt to weaponise the Committee's process". source : https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c0mvpmnm9gno


Type:Technology
👁 :134
"The man who was a business man died"
Catagory:Reading
Author:Kenne Fant, translated by Marianne Ruuth
Posted Date:12/23/2024
Posted By:utopia online

Mr. Alfred Nobel has presented a weapon called redemption for the first time, the weapon he created is the reason for many people. The whole world is saddened by this act. Several of his friends advised him not to supply this disastrous material in the world market, he stopped him from giving it to his earners. Alfred Nobel who refused to accept the advice people gave him, as he became one of the biggest wealthy owners. In his old age - one day he sat in front of the door and started reading a magazine published that day. While reading this I saw something so terrible on the faces of dead people that he couldn't believe his eyes. "Alfired Nobel the dead trader is dead! "" I read the scripture that says. His picture was also posted as one of the dead. Nobel was so shocked by what I saw, he started thinking while sitting in great fear. "Will this world remember me like this if I die? Is it called a dead businessman? "I thought he was saying "" Then he asked for one very important question. "What can I do to change my story?" "This was the question that was the foundation for his life-changing history. Finally, the world's company of people decided to establish a generation of award after your death. It's today that you'll start making bad decisions to market that you'll remember. "Now he made a great decision to award the people who made a positive impact on the world." Nobel Prize founded organization. This organization still rewards people who do great things all over the world. The history of Alfred Nobelis is now remembered not with weapons, but with this famous award. Deciding to change your history in your old age is like this. As we can see from the above history, Alfred Nobel has contributed to the world's most important material. The death of many lives has also caused. He brought the world to make money. At the end of the day, he did an act that made the world forget his original history. Let me come back to you. What do you want to be remembered when you die? What generation do you want to name you after your death? What do you want your story to be read at your funeral? These questions are so important. Please take a moment to write their answers. The answer you give to this question is very useful. You start doing what generation will remember you after your death. You may have made any mistake yesterday. That was just yesterday. Yesterday's mistakes can't be corrected in any way. Why is it that the hell? Yesterday is gone; it will never come back. But it's worth learning from it. Yes, your past is a good teacher. Don't make other mistakes by learning from your mistakes, you can stand on today and fix what you need to fix. Just like Mr. Alfred Nobel, you can do a good job that makes generation forget today's mistakes. That is a great opportunity. An important question you have to ask yourself, "What can I do today that will be remembered after my death?" "It's the one that says" The answer to this question has a lot of meaning for you. Many people in this world are not for generation, they live for themselves. Since they don't have a mind that thinks for generation, they live by selfishness. This is a great loss, some of us are given the opportunity to live in this world, to make a positive impact on the lives of others. Our lives should be able to touch, change and help people's lives.


Type:Social
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