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Here's the Beef: Oldest Cut of Meat Found

By Claudine Zap
Fri, October 16, 2009, 4:55 pm PDT

The next time you're slicing up a ribeye to throw on the grill, cut carefully. Years from now, scientists may study the fossilized left-overs and make some hefty judgments about you. Homer Simpson, take note.

At least that's what's going on with a 200,000-year-old (yes, you read that right) cut of meat unearthed by archeologists. As reported by Science Daily, researchers are theorizing that in this pre-deli time, this meat-loving clan hired the first butcher. Knife skills, we're assuming, were a plus.

The reason this is such a huge find in Qesem Cave in Israel: Something different was happening here. This group had gone gourmet. Think of them as the oldest celebrity chefs, the Julia Child and Mario Batali of their time. The best cuts of meats were selected, cut up with a stone blade, and thrown on the fire to serve at their cave dinner parties. We assume with a dash of pride.

These ancient foodies are stumping scientists, who will be looking into this discovery for some time to come. Bon appétit!

Filed under: Science

Hurricane Hunters, Cloud Gazers and Weather Fiends

By Vera H-C Chan
Tue, August 18, 2009, 2:02 pm PDT

Twisters are getting off to a lackadaisical start this year, but no matter how late, a storm that works itself up into a hurricane frenzy will get attention. Of three Atlantic tempests knocking around, Bill's the one that fulfilled hurricane aspirations and may go beyond a Category 3.

Wild skies don't just kick people into disaster preparedness mode (witness lookups on Yahoo! for "storm doors," "hurricane shutters," and "hurricane supplies"). Nature's ferment also gets minds wondering and searches swelling about weather phenomena in general. An overview of some raging queries, below:

Getting up to (hurricane) speed
The Department of Atmospheric Services at University of Illinois explains the degrees of intensity. Thunderstorms hanging out together over warm ocean waters become a tropical depression, with winds swirling between 23-29 mph. They can gather oomph to become a tropical storm (39-73 mph) within a short period of time (a few hours to two days), then if conditions are right (or not right, depending on your perspective), the rainstorm graduates into a full-fledged hurricane.

Tracking the mighty hurricane hunter
These kinds of hunters may not shoot down and truss up their prey, but they court all kinds of danger by flying into the eye (center) of a raging hurricane. Amateur stormchasers exist, but the 53rd Weather Reconnaissance Squadron (which runs the Hurricane Hunters Association site) transmits data to the National Hurricane Center. Although the employees and their equipment (like the Lockheed-Martin WC-130J plane) belong to the Department of Defense, the Department of Commerce runs the program. For a profile on the first Hurricane Hunter, check here.

Alien ships and other cloudy questions
Some people love an overcast day. Figuring out all the different formations of suspended droplets number among the most popular online weather searches. Some water vapors in question now:
Billow Clouds are among the rarest, and look like ocean waves. The same winds that cause these clouds also cause a flag to flap.
Noctilucent Clouds, aka night-shining clouds, take on an "iridescent" glow because they reflect the setting summer sun, as seen in this NASA photo.
Lenticular Clouds has been likened to a "fleet of alien ships" or pancakes, and typically cling to hills and mountains. Avoided by pilots but sought out by gliders since they portend high winds, they're also attractive to photographers. Check out this cluster.
Cumulonimbus Clouds literally translate to puffy rainstorms, those familiar, darkly swelling, and foreboding vapors.

Filed under: Weather, Science, Hurricanes, Nature

Quest for a Map

By Claudine Zap
Wed, August 05, 2009, 4:42 pm PDT

It is officially not cool to call your partner who refuses directions a "cave man." The oldest map in Western Europe has been unearthed and decoded, and it's pretty good, too.

The etchings of a landscape on a hand-sized rock are 14,000 years old. Eat it, MapQuest. Archeologists were able to match the landmarks of the map to a region in Northern Spain where the portable guide was found. The carvings, which seem to point out reindeer, ibex, and a stag, led researchers to believe that it's the oldest hunting map to be discovered in Western Europe. Check out images of the ancient maps here.

Other scientists dispute the findings, announced in New Scientist, theorizing that it is typical of the art for that period. Or possibly, a spiritual map. Deep.

Still, the next time you take a drive, really, don't fear the GPS. Seems some people have been needing directions for years.

Filed under: Science, Maps

This Is Only a Test: Rorschach Blots Rocking the Web

By Claudine Zap and Vera H-C Chan
Wed, July 29, 2009, 3:14 pm PDT

Ever take the inkblot test—or at least see one administered on TV (like in any "Law & Order" episode)? If so, then you know that there are no right or wrong answers on a Rorschach test, but responses do provide insight to the test-taker's state of mind.
 
And yet, a controversy about the posting of 10 Rorschach inkblots on Wikipedia is rocking the scientific community, according to The New York Times. In addition to the blots themselves, the Wikipedia entry also includes the most common interpretations of what these blots look like—the old bison vs. butterfly vs. moth.

Taking the Test
The Rorschach test—a series of ink blots shown to patients, who are then asked to explain what they see—is named after Swiss psychologist Hermann Rorschach. Five of the blots are black-and-white, two are black, white, and red, and the last three are in pretty colors. (Or not pretty, depending on your view.)

The test-taker is evaluated on 100 variables, which will show what he/she truly feels deep inside—not just separating psychotic thinking from "normal" thought. One Rorschach FAQ site describes it as asking "How does someone view and organize the world around them?"

One nonprofit parenting site, SPARC, explains that it's not only what patients say in describing what they see, but also what "hand gestures and body movements" they make. (Interestingly, SPARC precedes its lengthy description of the whole process with a disclaimer, posted "after repeated letters from dozens of outraged psychologists and psychiatrists.")

Illuminating or Cheating?
Is the test's public availability stimulating free debate, or enabling test-takers to "cheat"? Depends on how you look at it:

• From the Wiki view: Supporters say it's informative—and searches on Yahoo! for "rorschach" have popped up 111% in the past week.

From the psychologists' view: These "cheats" could help test-takers game the system and get in the way of research. And if patients peek at the interpretations beforehand, they may get in the way of their own diagnoses.

From the test publishers' view: The test's publisher is "assessing legal steps" to have the images removed from Wikipedia, even though those images—created some 90 years ago—are in the public domain. Still, one spokesperson huffed that Wikipedia's position is "unbelievably reckless and even cynical" for recognizing concerned claims and posting the images anyhow.

But Does One See Results?
Despite the outrage over Wikipedia's posting, not all researchers believe in the test's validity. The method was severely criticized in the 1950s and revised in the 1970s. Scientific American revived its 2005 article that called Rorschach's test "frequently ineffective" as a mental health tool.

Ideally, at least two clinicians should be involved in the interpretation of the test's results, but often they may not agree. Even worse, according to the article "What's Wrong With This Picture?", research also "suggests" that the Rorschach can't really gauge violent tendencies, depression, sexual abuse in children, antisocial tendencies, and so on. Since the test is administered to all kinds of people, from convicts seeking parole to parents in custody battles, obviously a lot rides on the interpretation of the results.

By the way, the Wikipedia uproar erupted in June, when an emergency-room doctor added the remaining nine inkblots to the one Wikipedia already had. When The New York Times told the doctor about all the experts' complaints, he replied, "Show me the evidence." Preferably not in the form of an inkblot.

Filed under: Science, Internet, Psychology, Tests, Wikipedia

The Fairer Sex is Even Fairer...But is That Fair?

By Vera H-C Chan
Mon, July 27, 2009, 1:49 pm PDT

The upside: Women may be getting better-looking. The downside: Men, apparently, are not.

According to news reports, a University of Helsinki study looked at 40 years' worth of data for 1,244 women and 997 men, including their high school photographs. This study claims to bolster earlier research by evolutionary psychologist Satoshi Kanazawa that, as The London Times puts it, "evolution is driving women to become ever more beautiful, while men remain as aesthetically unappealing as their caveman ancestors."

Naturally, a premise like this raises many questions. Below, some ones that might pop up, and answers found in Forbes' dirty details:


Who comprised the beauteous sample pool? The scrutinized women were 1957 high-school graduates throughout Wisconsin.
Who decided on the lookers? Not the Finnish. In the scientific version of Hot or Not, Wisconsinites rated participants' yearbook photos on a scale of 1 to 11.
What's happening with the ladies? Helsinki researcher Marcus Jokela says their looks signal "fecundity" and good health, so they offer better breeding odds.
Why are guys still looking like their knuckle-grazing forefathers? Apparently females are less shallow.
How does the cycle continue? Women who are easy on the eyes have 16% more children. Curiously, good-looking gents beget more daughters than sons.
Out of places that conduct all the longitudinal studies, why the Badger State? Must be the cheese.

As much as the British and Aussie press have been tickled by the study, doubts remain about its premise. One skeptical science blog points out serious statistical problems in Kanazawa's previous studies (detailed in Journal of Theoretical Biology in 2007), and basically the whole concept of finding "correlations between beauty and mutational loads."

And really, judging a face by a high-school senior picture? That just isn't fair.

Filed under: Science, Beauty, Women

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