What I see in different shades of gray, from behind my reading glasses
Yes – but only if you are a male, discovers Martin Gardiner of Improbable Research, in this research paper –
“For the median CEO of the median sample firm, an interquartile decrease in voice pitch (22.1Hz) is associated with a $440 million increase in the size of the firm managed, and in turn, $187 thousand more in annual compensation.”
Ever post something to facebook (what, you have a facebook account??) & immediately (or a bit later) regretted it? A Qualitative Study of Regrets on Facebook – This must be the most entertaining research paper ever written! (pdf download).
..little is known about the problematic aspects of Facebook usage. Our research fills that gap by showing that regrettable postings are not unusual. We devised a detailed taxonomy of regrets and discovered that they are mainly centered around sensitive topics, emotional content, and unintended audience. Furthermore, our results agree with many news stories that report that regrettable postings on Facebook can yield serious ramifications for users.
The Indian Supreme Court’s decision to allow Indian makers of generic drugs to continue making copycat versions of the drug Gleevec (manufactured by Novartis) is lauded by Richard Stallman who has this to say:
Novartis responded to the decision by threatening to arbitrarily withhold other drugs from India, causing sick people there to die. Presumably these will be drugs which are in fact patented, drugs not affected by this decision. That shows this is not a self-protective reaction, but a murderous threat. In the absence of free exploitation treaties such as the WTO, India would respond to the threat by making those drugs locally. Novartis’ death threats are mere bluster, unless the WTO gives them force; and that reveals the murderous nature of the WTO. As for the pretense that the abuse of medical patents is “necessary” for the sake of research, we already know this is bogus. The big pharma companies spend more on advertising and corrupting doctors than on research, and little of their research goes into life-saving drugs anyway. Patents on drugs should be banned except in the wealthiest countries. There is a very simple solution: get rid of the WTO. It undermines democracy and it does harm to people in many other ways
I thought it was another joke about the ever shortening work-week, but no it isn’t. James W Vaupel, head of the new Danish Max Planck research center says the 40 hour week (for some of those lucky folk) is outdated. He proposes instead that we work only 25 hours a week, but work until we turn 80. Spreading out working hours over the full course of a person’s life, Vaupel argues, is both psychologically and physically beneficial at all stages of life.
Photographer / blogger Yunfan Tan chronicles the lifespan of plants of all sizes, & this article, referring to it, claims that Life is short for small creatures, longer in big ones. Not true, say the biologists who have commented on this blog post, & caution us against mistaking art for research. Interesting pictures, nonetheless.
Ever wondered what that stuff in your belly button is?
On the Occasion of My Belly Button Entering the Scientific Literature
No doubt that the internet has transformed the education business model, but, as Pew Internet’s research points out, teachers say the top priority in today’s classrooms should be teaching students “how to judge the quality of online information!”
This may have been rather difficult for the participants in the experiment, waking up every 10 minutes to record a dream, while their brain waves were simultaneously recorded using EEG. “Knowing more about the content of dreams and how it relates to brain activity may help us to understand the function of dreaming”