Spring is my favourite season in Batavia, watching peaks blossom in every distribution... A
comment by Lubos Motl (in the thread of a post of mine on Higgs searches in ZZ decay modes) alerted me of a
new result by the DZERO collaboration, where a significant (2.5 standard deviations) fluctuation of the data in the mass distribution of t-prime quarks makes its ephemeral appearance. Lubos already
covered it in his blog.
In 2003, Rollin McCraty, the Director of Research at the Institute of HeartMath in Boulder Creek, California, published an e-book called The Energetic Heart: Bioelectromagnetic Interactions Within and Between People. In it he explains his research on an electromagnetic field created by the heart that he believes communicates with the brain and the body simultaneously, and affects those around us. In one study, McCraty monitored six longtime married couples’ heartbeats while they slept alongside each other. Both heartbeats fell into harmony, beating in sync. Electrocardiogram printouts of each person were laid on top of one another, revealing practically identical heartbeats and rates converging in nearly perfect synchronization—two hearts, as it were, beating as one.
Queen's University researchers writing in the Journal of Preventative Medicine say there is a strong association between adolescent computer and Internet and multiple-risk behaviors (MRB), including illicit drug use, drunkenness and unprotected sex.
The researchers found that high computer use was associated with approximately 50 percent increased engagement with a cluster of six MRB, including smoking, drunkenness, non-use of seatbelts, cannabis and illicit drug use, and unprotected sex. High television use was also associated with a modestly increased engagement in these MRB.
The Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider at Brookhaven National Laboratory has detected the antimatter partner of the helium nucleus, antihelium-4. This new particle, also known as the anti-alpha, is the heaviest antinucleus ever detected, topping a discovery announced by the same collaboration just last year. The new record will likely stand far longer, the scientists say, because the next weightier antimatter nucleus that does not undergo radioactive decay is predicted to be a million times more rare - and out of reach of today's technology.
Why should there not be ‘stuff’, or ‘real things’ instead of weird quantum mechanics at some microscopic scale? In other words, how can we accept that direct realism is wrong without getting too ‘difficult’.
Accepting that the world is in some sense in our minds is not aimed at encouraging ‘spirituality’ or whatever the euphemism for religious craziness is nowadays. I have none of that! Not even any switching on of consciousness once we add a little quantum magic to a zombie’s brain. There is indeed a deep connection* between consciousness and quantum physics, but for this article here, let’s forget about that connection.
The Oldest Arctic Ice
The oldest non-glacial ice in the northern hemisphere is a small remnant of the former Ellesmere Ice Shelf which began forming about 5500 years ago. That remnant is breaking up. Where the ice shelf has vanished the fjords are free of perennial ice for the first time in 3000 to 5500 years. It seems likely that very soon the oldest non-glacial ice will be a mere 5 years old, or less.
Having examined PBS's Autism Now in an earlier posting and noting its overall negativity, I'd like to turn to a documentary on autism that I can recommend: Todd Drezner's Loving Lampposts.
