FieldNotes: Oliver Sacks, and irreproducible psychology

The Fully Immersive Mind of Oliver Sacks by Steve Silberman at Wired:

One night in 1940, a bomb tumbled out of the sky into a garden in North London, exploding into thousands of droplets of white-hot aluminum oxide, which cascaded over the lawn. The buckets of water that the inhabitants of the house at 37 Mapesbury Road—two Jewish doctors and their sons—poured on the fire only fed its chemical vehemence. Amazingly, no one was hurt, but the brilliance of the bomb left an indelible image in the mind of Oliver Sacks, who was 7 years old the night it fell.......

Is our desire for genetic answers cultural rather than scientific? by Simon Copland at Notes & Theories:

The last few decades have seen what some describe as a “genetic revolution”. Advances in genetic science have seen genes become all-encompassing in political and scientific discussion. Do a quick survey of recent stories, for example, and you will find research that claims “intelligence, creativity and bipolar disorder may share underlying genetics” and a much-reported story that found that Holocaust survivors may have passed ontrauma to their children through their genes. Genetics has come to explain almost everything about our identities, whether it is our weight, our sexuality, or even if we are likely to become a criminal. But is this based on sound science, or is it instead a cultural phenomenon using science to back it up? That is among the questions Professor Deborah Lynn Steinberg asks in her new book Genes and the Bioimaginary..........

Hang in There, Cousin! by Perrin Ireland at onEarth:

Counting chimpanzees is no small task: Getting to know and adding up who’s who is a long and involved process; tallying “nest” numbers can be inaccurate; and we haven’t quite gotten all the kinks out of video monitoring. So a group of researchers in Uganda have turned to poop for answers. After collecting 865 feces samples and analyzing the genetic material within them, they were able to identify at least 182 individuals. The scientists were then able to estimate that between 256 and 319 chimps live in the heavily developed area between the Budongo and Bugoma forest reserves.....

An Important But Rarely Discussed Lesson of the Stanford Prison Experiment by Scott Barry Kaufman at Beautiful Minds:

I recently watched the movie adaptation of the Stanford Prison Experiment. Like most reviewers, I found it harrowing. But as a psychologist, I also found it revealing. With my eyes glued to the screen in rapt attention, heart racing, I became obsessed with understanding what really was going on, and the lessons we can glean from such an experiment gone so horribly wrong. The standard story, given by the experimenter Phillip Zimbardo, is that the experiment is a lesson about how everyday people (and groups consisting of everyday people), when given too much power, can become sadistic tyrants. In a recent article for The New Yorker, Maria Konnikova casts some doubt on that conclusion, arguing that the real lesson is the power of institutions to shape behavior, and how people are shaped by those preexisting expectations. While this is certainly a valuable lesson, I believe there's another crucial variable at play that is rarely mentioned by commentators of the prison experiment or even in psychology textbooks is the person. Yes, power corrupts. But power does not corrupt everyone equally................

Why are there no fish in the deepest deep sea? by RR Helm at Deep Sea News:

Here’s a mystery: below 8,400 meters there are no fish. There are other creatures: sea cucumbers, anemones, tiny worms, but no one has ever seen a fish. At 8,370 meters? There are fish. But not below 8,400 meters. At its deepest the ocean reaches roughly 11,000 meters, so there is plenty of space. And right below 8,400 meters it’s equally cold, equally dark, equally middle-of-no-where as it is right above 8,400 meters. But there is some magic line at 8,400 meters, below which fish apparently cannot go. No one understands why this line exists. Or if perhaps one day we’ll find a fish that can, in fact, cross it. But for now, scientists do have some ideas...............

What creature defies science, carries your money, cleans the ocean, and produces buckets of slime? by Patrick Cooney at The Fisheries Blog:

.......Despite the clearly visible shortcomings of the hagfish, this creature is incredibly fascinating. It defies taxonomic science, carries your money, cleans the ocean, and produces such incredible amounts of mucus from threads so fine that you will probably one day where clothes made from its slime......

The Wild West of Marijuana Pesticides by Brooke Borel at The Atlantic:

Growing marijuana takes vigilance, even when it’s legal. Like any crop, cannabis plants are prone to pests and disease—from tiny leaf-sucking spider mites, which can spawn a new generation in less than a week, to powdery mildew, a fungus that forms a talcum-like coating on leaves and spreads rapidly through greenhouses. For every other agricultural product, there is a relatively clear solution: Find a pesticide labeled for the specific plant or setting, and apply it according to the instructions........

Falling in Love With the Dark by Todd Pitock at Nautilus:

If you see a car along that road,” Tyler Nordgren warned me, “don’t look at the headlights. It’ll ruin your night vision for 2 hours.” Nordgren and I had pitched our tents under the brow of Mount Whitney in the Alabama Hills, a field of boulders near Death Valley. We watched it get dark, and in the nighttime horizon, the sky was perforated by stars and streaked by the Milky Way. Or, to put it in approximate scientific terms, it was probably a 3 on the Bortle Scale, the 9-level numeric metric of night sky brightness. Even so, we could still see domes of hazy light from 200-odd miles south in Los Angeles and 250 miles east in Las Vegas. That encroaching urban glow was like highlighter calling attention to the issue that Nordgren, a prophet whose cause is light pollution, wanted to illustrate for me.......

Amazing New Insight about Tooth Growth in the Saber Teeth of Smilodon by Cienna Lyon at This View of Life :

Saber toothed tigers are some of the most famous and plentiful prehistoric fossils found today, yet little is known about how they actually lived. Sabers, also known by their scientific name Smilodon fatalis, are second only to the dire wolves as the most common animal found in the La Brea Tar pits in Los Angeles, California. Other species of saber toothed cats existed all over the world, but this particular species of the big cat prowled the southwestern United States until about 10,000 years ago. Smilodon and its relatives are most famous for their massive fangs that can stretch to a length exceeding 7 inches. A recent study in PLoS One investigated all ages of Smilodon skulls found in the tar pits, and has uncovered surprising data into the rate at which these big saber teeth grew. ......

If You See “Results,” What Else is There to Say? by Doctor Ramey at David Ramey, D.V.M.:

............Of course, the “I’ve seen it work” line of reasoning is incredibly convincing, especially to oneself. And that’s completely understandable. I mean, if you think that you’ve seen results with something, of course, you’re going to continue to do it, use it, whatever. In fact, it would be pretty irrational to do otherwise. If you’re convinced that something “works,” I would never suggest that you should do anything else. Really. That would be unsettling, even it it were more economical. Here’s the thing: I’m not here to tell you that you’re doing anything wrong, I’m just trying to open your eyes to the possibility that what you’re doing may not be necessary............

The Biggest Donation: Studying anatomy taught me that the human body is not magical; it’s beautifully mechanical. by Megan Cartwright at Slate:

When I was a biochemistry major at Ohio State University, I took a midlevel anatomy class with a cadaver lab. Studying human anatomy is lot of frickin’ work. Not quite the logic-and-problem-solving work involved in, say, organic chemistry and linear algebra. Instead, anatomy demands brute-force memorization of strange terms like cranial, caudal, brachial, inguinal. It’s worth it. And not just because you can go to the doctor and tell her that the distal phalanx of your hallux hurts like hell after you accidentally closed a door on your foot. (Note: It really hurts like hell.).............

The origin of eukaryotes and the ring of life by Larry Moran at Sandwalk:

..........The problem is that most people think the origin of eukaryotes was solved by Carl Woese when he published the Three Domain Hypothesis. According to the ribosomal RNA tree, eukaryotes and Archaea are sister groups that are distantly related to Eubacteria (see "a" below). The data doesn't support such a simple interpretation and that's why the Three Domain Hypothesis has been abandoned. We now know that only one-third of the ancient genes in eukaryotes are more closely related to Archaea than to Eubacteria (Bacteria). Most of the genes have closer homologues in Bacteria. That's because eukaryotes arose from a fusion of a primitive archaebacterium and a primitive eubacterium—the Endosymbiotic Hypothesis. The primitive eubacterium became mitochondria and transferred most of its genes to the archaebacterial genome, which became the nuclear genome. (In the beginning, you couldn't tell which genome was going to become the biggest.)........

More on Oliver Sacks and more on the Replication study:

Oliver Sacks, The Man Who Mistook Me for a New Yorker Writer by Steven Levy at Medium
Why Oliver Sacks was so remarkable, in 6 quotes by Julia Belluz at Vox
Bradley Voytek on Oliver Sacks’ “Soft Thinking” by Sarah Zhan at Wired



Three Popular Psychology Studies That Didn't Hold Up by BENEDICT CAREY and MICHAEL ROSTON at The New York Times
Psychology Is Not in Crisis by LISA FELDMAN BARRETT at NYTimes
Psychologists behaving badly by Rolf Degen at Google +
Most New Psychology Findings Can’t Be Replicated. So Now What? by Simon Oxenham at Neurobonkers
The Bayesian Reproducibility Project by Alex Etz at The Etz-Files

And if that is not enough, more readings for later this weekend:

Strip-Mining Coal in the Heart of Texas by Melissa C. Lott at Plugged In
Window Material Can Let in Sunshine While Blocking Heat by Melissa C. Lott at Plugged In
What is the “science of science communication”? by Dan Kahan at JCOM
Epigenetics and the Holocaust by Grant Jacobs at Code for life
Tea Party supporters distrust scientists not only on climate, but on vaccines — study by Chris Mooney at Washington Post
Murdered: Cecil the Lion, Blaze the Yellowstone Grizzly by David Ropeik at Risk: Reason and Reality
On live-tweeting at conferences by Ashutosh (Ash) Jogalekar at The Curious Wavefunction
People left behind when we talk about global warming and climate change by Jeremy Porter at Medium
Should Environmental Reporting Get the Peer-Review Treatment? by Nathan Collins at Pacific Standard
Pop Quiz: How Science-Literate Are We, Really? by Barbara J. King at 13.7: Cosmos And Culture



The Drought Isn’t Just a California Problem by Julia Lurie at Medium
Five ways to improve environmental reporting by Laura Dattaro at Columbia Journalism Review
Evolution in Action: Lizard Moving From Eggs to Live Birth by Brian Handwerk at National Geographic News
In Space, Every Goodbye Could Be Our Last by Nadia Drake at No Place Like Home
Eukaryotic genes come from alphaproteobacteria, cynaobacteria, and two groups of Archaea by Larry Moran at Sandwalk
Serotonin-Deprived Cleaner Fish Are Socially Withdrawn by Felicity Muth at Not bad science
Citizen Science Effort Highlights How Little We Know About Invisible Life in Our Own Homes by Matt Shipman at NC State News
The human genome takes shape and shifts over time by Sarah Schwartz at Science News



How cities can beat the heat by Hannah Hoag at Nature
In the race to save species, GMOs are coming to nature by Greg Breining at Ensia
Young People Should Support GMOs — They're All We'll Be Eating in 20 Years by Max Plenke at MIC
There’s a big change coming to how we power our homes — and it isn’t about solar or batteries by Chris Mooney at Washington Post
Sea Bass, Mutant or Otherwise by Christopher Taylor at Catalogue of Organisms
NASA and New Horizons team pick post-Pluto target … and serve up an awesome video by Alan Boyle at Universe Today
Intravenous Hyaluronan (Legend®) by Doctor Ramey at David Ramey, D.V.M.
Some Brands Are Labeling Products “GMO-free” Even if They Don’t Have Genes by Danny Lewis at Smithsonian



Math doesn’t get the media attention it deserves by Laura Dattaro at CJR
Global ecological challenges require large-scale scientific networks — reflections on ESA 100 by Pamela L Reynolds at PLOS Blogs Network
Timing of Childbirth Evolved to Match Women’s Energy Limits by Erin Wayman at Smithsonian
Changing the Plague-Flea Transmission Paradigm by Michelle Ziegler at Contagions
Gluten-free GM wheat can help celiac patients by Daniel Norero at Biology Fortified
Jurassic World fact check: can we clone dinosaurs? by Steven Salzberg at Genomics, Medicine, and Pseudoscience



Nuclear power and biofuel: The climate change debate we should be having by puffthemutantdragon at Puff the Mutant Dragon
Confessions of a Neurotic Extravert by Scott Barry Kaufman at Beautiful Minds
Invasive Fish Used to Feed Homeless (and Bears) by Felicity Muth at Not bad science
Could anyone with a credit card, a biology degree and access to the web produce a lethal biological weapon? by Gianluca Cerullo at pH7
Embracing Digital History: How Medicine Became Modern by Brandy L. Schillace at DITTRICK Museum Blog
Why We Fall for Bogus Research by Megan McArdle at Bloomberg View



Replacing Pesticides With Genetics by DEVIN POWELL at NYTimes
Senior citizens’ use of computers and mobile phones might shave 10 years off their mental age by Akshat Rathi at Quartz
Apophenia and making sense of loss on a Friday night by Pete Etchells at Head quarters
The zero meridian, or something like it by Eva Amsen at The Finch & Pea
The Difference between ExtrAversion and ExtrOversion by Scott Barry Kaufman at Beautiful Minds
Why foxes are more important than hedgehogs in drug discovery by Ashutosh Jogalekar at The Curious Wavefunction
Engineering debates on GMOs: How to change minds when emotions overrule science by Iida Ruishalme at Genetic Literacy Project
Copernicus, Darwin and Freud: A Tale of Science and Narcissism by John Horgan at Cross-Check
Hypno-Moss by Christopher Taylor at Catalogue of Organisms
Unlocking the Science of Social Jet Lag and Sleep: An Interview With Till Roenneberg by Margaux McGrath at The Huffington Post
Is Nuance Overrated? by Steve Kolowich at Chronicle of Higher Education
Arsenic-Eating Plants Could Clean Up the World’s Rice Fields by Stephanie M. McPherson at Meidum
I Asked 12 Scientists: What Is The One Fact Humanity Needs To Know? by Tom Chivers at BuzzFeed
In photos: Anatomy of a black mamba by Earth Touch at Earth Touch



New Study Finds Horse Meat in Ground Meat Products Sold in U.S. by John Wilkinson at Horse Collaborative
Diving with Godzilla: Meet the creature Darwin detested by Sarah Keartes at Earth Touch
Nematodes Use Slugs Like Buses ... and Maybe Cruise Ships by Jennifer Frazer at The Artful Amoeba
Living in a Post-Kahneman World by Sam McNerney at Sam McNerney blog
Not So Silent Spring? New App Promises to Help Identify Birdsong by Alice Bell at How we get to next
Powered by Sunshine, Funded by Everyone. by Alice Bell at Medium
What to Eat in Atlantis by Nevin Martell at Nautilus
Animals in their Seasons by Craig Childs at The Last Word On Nothing
2 September, 1806: The landslide of Goldau by David Bressan at History of Geology
Archaeologists Tracked Lewis and Clark by Following Their Trail of Laxatives by Esther Inglis-Arkell at io9


Previously in this series:

FieldNotes: a view to spotted horses in the morning
FieldNotes: The Word For World is Blue (or is it Gold?)
FieldNotes: Golden Mean, polite middle-ground, and optimal numbers of legs.
FieldNotes: speeding up and slowing down time
FieldNotes: from Captain Ahab to Jeff Goldblum, chasing the giants
FieldNotes: this is not your grandparents' neuroscience!
FieldNotes: Brontosaurus in, Food Babe out.
FieldNotes: Rogue Microwave Ovens Call Home
FieldNotes: Let the sleeping apes lie
FieldNotes: one thing leads to another leads to another
FieldNotes: Seductive Allure of Seductive Allure of Neuroscience Explanations
FieldNotes: do African horses do flehmen at the sight of Derby hats?
FieldNotes: How The Bird Got Its Beak
FieldNotes: When Snakes Had Legs...
FieldNotes: Only before the bicameral mind evolved could people fall for Bohannon's cheap stunts
FieldNotes: Water, fire, origin of life, origin of cooking.
FieldNotes: Jurassic World, and other strange animals...
FieldNotes: Honey Badger Don’t Care!
FieldNotes: Hallucigenia is back on its head again.
FieldNotes: Poisonous and grieving quail, reclusive rail, and giants!
FieldNotes: When Snark was a Boojum
FieldNotes: In a grip of the legs of a snake
FieldNotes: Cecil and grief
FieldNotes: Science Notes and high school start times
FieldNotes: Earthly Octopus Genome, and Elephant Tracking
FieldNotes: Amplituhedron and the dissection of cats


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