A new study suggests that Facebook users who haven’t worried about what other people might think about them might worry about what other people think about them. The study also suggests that this is more true of some people than of others. (Thanks to investigator Erwin Kompanje for bringing this to our attention.) The study is: “Awkward […]
Year: 2013
Planetary Tea, Relatively (the physics thereof)
British tea preparation now includes preparation for possible visits to other planets. This study presents some of the relevant calculations: “Tea Time in the Solar System,” Hannah Natasha Lerman, Benedict Irwin, and Peter Hicks, Physics Special Topics, vol. 12, no. 1, 2013. (Thanks to investigator Nigel Rawson for bringing this to our attention.) The authors, […]
To Is, and Not To Is
Where is that about On What There Is? There, by Greach. (HT @robertcottrell) BONUS: This is On What There Is BONUS: This is What There Is BONUS: What Is Is BONUS: What Is Is? BONUS: What Is, Is BONUS: What Is Ain’t BONUS: What-not, and ha-ha
‘Know-It-All’s Security Quiz’
When it comes to issues of national security and the handling of sensitive data, are you a ‘Know-It-All’? If that’s the way you would choose to describe yourself, the Research & Sponsored Programs department of Wright State University, Dayton, Ohio, US, has a publicly available online quiz, just for you (and anyone else who’s interested). […]
Professor Loving’s Research about Loving
Professor Timothy J. Loving of Purdue University specializes in research about loving. His web site explains: Biography Dr. Loving is primarily interested in the relationship support process. Specifically, he investigates the reasons for, and consequences of, romantically involved individuals’ conversations with their social network members about the romantic relationship. One of his fairly recent studies […]
Clothes are for climbing: Clothbot
Behold Clothbot, a small machine that climbs clothing: The inventors presented technical details: “System and Design of Clothbot: a Robot for Flexible Clothes Climbing,” Yuanyuan Liu, Xinyu Wu, Huihuan Qian, Duan Zheng, Jianquan Sun and Yangsheng Xu [Chinese Academy of Sciences and the Chinese University of Hong Kong], paper presented at 2012 IEEE International Conference on […]
Maybe no data? Maybe no problem? (statistics)
“Applied statisticians are often confronted with statistical inference problems dealing with situations in which there appear to be no data, or data of only limited usefulness.” An example of ‘Sparsity‘ – in which statisticians find themselves having to deal with datasets which are primarily populated with zeros. That’s to say, they’re ‘sparse’. In such cases, […]
Science news in Tottenhamtranslation: Scientists will remain liquid
The news site Tottenahmnews.org supplies science news of a sort, translated, sort of, from Turkish into English. (Thanks to investigators John Bradley and Peaco Todd for bringing it to our attention.) Here are some highlights. We suggest you read them aloud, especially if you are in a public place: Scientists discover massive lake of freshwater […]
Trickey and Hyde team up for the dark side
Trickey [pictured below] and Hyde [pictured below Trickey] have teamed up to explore the dark side. They produced this study, bolstering their not inconsiderable powers by enlisting the super-prolific Adrian Furnham as a co-author: “Do your Dark Side Traits Fit? Dysfunctional Personalities in Different Work Sectors,” Adrian Furnham, Gillian Hyde, Geoff Trickey, Applied Psychology, epub […]
“My husband quickly became exasperated and took the book away”
‘This is the kind of book that makes you want to read out snippets to whoever is near. I did this so often that my husband quickly became exasperated and took the book away from me. However, within 10 minutes of him starting to read it, he was doing exactly the same thing’. —So says reader […]