Punks and anarchists unite! [Pharyngula]

I’m a bit shell-shocked today — man, that was a long drive yesterday — and I stumbled into work today thinking this might be a really good day to bag it early and take a nap. And then I found something in my mailbox that perked me right up.

As a little background, I’ll summarize my talk in St Louis. I pointed out that there was more to evolution than natural selection. Natural selection answers the question of adaptedness — how do organisms get so good at what they do — but there’s another important question, about diversity and variation — why do organisms do so many things in so many different ways? And I made the point with stories about people like Spencer and Galton, who so emphasized optimality and how Nature, red in tooth and claw, ruthlessly culls the weak allowing the survival of only the fittest. Spencerian evolution is a very narrow and limited kind of biology, but unfortunately, it often seems to be the only kind of evolution the general public has in mind.

And then I contrasted it with Kropotkin’s ideas about Mutual Aid (pdf), and the greater importance of cooperation in survival.

Thus by an unprejudiced observation of the animal kingdom, we reach the conclusion that wherever society exists at all, this principle may be found: Treat others as you would like them to treat you under similar circumstances. And when we study closely the evolution of the animal world, we discover that the aforesaid principle, translated by the one word Solidarity, has played an infinitely larger part in the development of the animal kingdom than all the adaptations that have resulted from a struggle between individuals to acquire personal advantages.

Kropotkin is the anti-Spencer. His is a position that we need to acknowledge more. I’ve spoken about the importance of cooperative exuberance, as opposed to selective pruning, several times now, including at the IHEU a few years ago.

So what got me enthused this morning? My review copy of Greg Graffin’s new book, Population Wars: A New Perspective on Competition and Coexistence, was waiting for me in my mailbox. I think we might be on the same wavelength here, at least from the cover blurb.

From the very beginning, life on Earth has been defined by war. Today, those first wars continue to be fought around and literally inside us, influencing our individual behavior and that of civilization as a whole. War between populations-whether between different species or between rival groups of humans-is seen as an inevitable part of the evolutionary process. The popular concept of “the survival of the fittest” explains and often excuses these actions.

In Population Wars, Greg Graffin points to where the mainstream view of evolutionary theory has led us astray. That misunderstanding has allowed us to justify wars on every level, whether against bacterial colonies or human societies, even when other, less violent solutions may be available. Through tales of mass extinctions, developing immune systems, human warfare, the American industrial heartland, and our degrading modern environment, Graffin demonstrates how an oversimplified idea of war, with its victorious winners and vanquished losers, prevents us from responding to the real problems we face. Along the way, Graffin reveals a paradox: When we challenge conventional definitions of war, we are left with a new problem, how to define ourselves.

Population Wars is a paradigm-shifting book about why humans behave the way they do and the ancient history that explains that behavior. In reading it, you’ll see why we need to rethink the reasons for war, not only the human military kind but also Darwin’s “war of nature,” and find hope for a less violent future for mankind.

I don’t think a nap is imminent, but maybe a quiet afternoon curled up with a book would be a good restorative.

Also, when I talked to the publicist about getting a copy of this book a few weeks ago, she mentioned that Graffin was looking for Q&A/interview opportunities, that sort of thing. I suggested that maybe he could make an appearance on Pharyngula and answer questions. Would anyone else be interested in that? If nothing else, I could do an interview and post it here.

The book will be available to the general public on 15 September, so I might try to arrange for something around that time. One chapter is available for a free preview right now.

from ScienceBlogs http://ift.tt/1KMbvSt

I’m a bit shell-shocked today — man, that was a long drive yesterday — and I stumbled into work today thinking this might be a really good day to bag it early and take a nap. And then I found something in my mailbox that perked me right up.

As a little background, I’ll summarize my talk in St Louis. I pointed out that there was more to evolution than natural selection. Natural selection answers the question of adaptedness — how do organisms get so good at what they do — but there’s another important question, about diversity and variation — why do organisms do so many things in so many different ways? And I made the point with stories about people like Spencer and Galton, who so emphasized optimality and how Nature, red in tooth and claw, ruthlessly culls the weak allowing the survival of only the fittest. Spencerian evolution is a very narrow and limited kind of biology, but unfortunately, it often seems to be the only kind of evolution the general public has in mind.

And then I contrasted it with Kropotkin’s ideas about Mutual Aid (pdf), and the greater importance of cooperation in survival.

Thus by an unprejudiced observation of the animal kingdom, we reach the conclusion that wherever society exists at all, this principle may be found: Treat others as you would like them to treat you under similar circumstances. And when we study closely the evolution of the animal world, we discover that the aforesaid principle, translated by the one word Solidarity, has played an infinitely larger part in the development of the animal kingdom than all the adaptations that have resulted from a struggle between individuals to acquire personal advantages.

Kropotkin is the anti-Spencer. His is a position that we need to acknowledge more. I’ve spoken about the importance of cooperative exuberance, as opposed to selective pruning, several times now, including at the IHEU a few years ago.

So what got me enthused this morning? My review copy of Greg Graffin’s new book, Population Wars: A New Perspective on Competition and Coexistence, was waiting for me in my mailbox. I think we might be on the same wavelength here, at least from the cover blurb.

From the very beginning, life on Earth has been defined by war. Today, those first wars continue to be fought around and literally inside us, influencing our individual behavior and that of civilization as a whole. War between populations-whether between different species or between rival groups of humans-is seen as an inevitable part of the evolutionary process. The popular concept of “the survival of the fittest” explains and often excuses these actions.

In Population Wars, Greg Graffin points to where the mainstream view of evolutionary theory has led us astray. That misunderstanding has allowed us to justify wars on every level, whether against bacterial colonies or human societies, even when other, less violent solutions may be available. Through tales of mass extinctions, developing immune systems, human warfare, the American industrial heartland, and our degrading modern environment, Graffin demonstrates how an oversimplified idea of war, with its victorious winners and vanquished losers, prevents us from responding to the real problems we face. Along the way, Graffin reveals a paradox: When we challenge conventional definitions of war, we are left with a new problem, how to define ourselves.

Population Wars is a paradigm-shifting book about why humans behave the way they do and the ancient history that explains that behavior. In reading it, you’ll see why we need to rethink the reasons for war, not only the human military kind but also Darwin’s “war of nature,” and find hope for a less violent future for mankind.

I don’t think a nap is imminent, but maybe a quiet afternoon curled up with a book would be a good restorative.

Also, when I talked to the publicist about getting a copy of this book a few weeks ago, she mentioned that Graffin was looking for Q&A/interview opportunities, that sort of thing. I suggested that maybe he could make an appearance on Pharyngula and answer questions. Would anyone else be interested in that? If nothing else, I could do an interview and post it here.

The book will be available to the general public on 15 September, so I might try to arrange for something around that time. One chapter is available for a free preview right now.

from ScienceBlogs http://ift.tt/1KMbvSt

England’s new cancer strategy – what happens next?

Last month, the Independent Cancer Taskforce published its strategy for improving cancer outcomes in England over the next five years.

By making the changes suggested in its report the Taskforce estimates that, by 2020, the NHS could be saving 30,000 more lives each year.

Strategies like this are important. They set ambitions and dedicate resources in the right places across the NHS to improve things for patients – something that’s been recognised at the highest level: the World Health Organisation believes that all countries should have a plan for cancer. And over the years, there’s evidence that previous strategies have made a big impact.

That’s why, at Cancer Research UK, we campaign for each UK nation to have up-to-date cancer strategies.

Our chief executive, Harpal Kumar, chaired the Independent Taskforce and has already blogged about what’s in the strategy. To refresh your memory, the six priorities are:

1. A renewed focus on prevention and public health
2. A national ambition to achieve earlier diagnosis
3. Establishing patient experience as being on par with clinical effectiveness and safety
4. Transforming support for people living with and beyond cancer
5. Investing in modern high-quality services
6. Overhauling the way the NHS commissions and provides services

At Cancer Research UK, we’re strongly backing the strategy, particularly its focus on better prevention, swifter diagnosis and modernising the NHS to provide better access to treatments – all things we’ve also identified as priorities for the NHS.

But now it’s out, what happens next? What needs to be done to make sure the priorities put forward by the Taskforce become a reality?

There are a lot of challenges ahead, but there are two crucial things that need to happen.

First, the organisations that lead the health service need to develop clear, detailed plans for putting the Taskforce’s recommendations into practice.

And second, the Government needs to invest the money to make it happen.

Putting it into practice

We want to see clear plans for putting the strategy into action

The Taskforce was created by NHS England and six other organisations involved in running the different aspects of the health system – the Care Quality Commission, Health Education England, Monitor, Public Health England, NICE and the NHS Trust Development Authority.

It was deliberately established as an independent group so that it could take a critical look at the health service as a whole.

This made sense – achieving world-class cancer outcomes is a challenge that needs to be tackled on many fronts, so changes will be needed across each part of the health system, and this means cutting across the remits of each of those lead organisations. So for example, improving screening services will need to involve both Public Health England and NHS England, as well as some of the others.

But since the Taskforce was independent, there’s a catch – the strategy isn’t really ‘owned’ by the organisations that created it. So it’s now critical that these organisations now develop well-integrated plans for how they will put the recommendations into practice – and Harpal wrote to the chief executives of each organisation saying as much.

The good news is that each of them has come out in support of the strategy – for example, the NHS England board was vocal in its support at its meeting in July, and it says that it will provide regular updates on progress.

But it’s also vital that one of the first priorities should be setting up two new groups: a National Cancer Team that will work across all of these organisations to put the strategy into practice, and a National Cancer Advisory Board that will oversee progress. But until we see clear plans, we will be keeping up the pressure.

Making the investment

Money is the other crucial factor.

In November, the new Government will carry out a Spending Review – the process by which it decides its spending priorities up to 2020.

In their manifesto before the election, the Conservatives promised:

We will work with the NHS, charities and patient groups to deliver the new strategy recommended by NHS England’s Cancer Taskforce

And they have already said the Spending Review will also focus on investment for the NHS.

We also need to see government investment to make it happen Image via Flickr/howardlake via CC-BY-SA 2.0

The NHS spends about £6.7bn on NHS cancer services each year. But as we have said before, these services are in desperate need of more resources. The Taskforce estimates that, as the NHS has to cope with more people getting cancer – about 1 in 2 of us – and more people surviving for longer, cancer services could cost around £13bn by 2020.

But to put the recommendations in the strategy into practice, the Taskforce estimates it will cost around £400 million per year – a fraction of what the NHS spends on cancer already.

This money will be crucial to pay for some key items in the strategy that we believe are really important to make the improvements needed, such as:

• To help the NHS diagnose cancer more swiftly, a £125 million fund to upgrade equipment – like MRI and CT machines – and address shortages of staff in diagnostic services.
• £22.5 million to provide a national molecular diagnostic service so that suitable cancer patients can be offered tests to tailor treatment to their cancer.

On top of this, a one-off investment of £275 million is needed to urgently replace old radiotherapy machines and upgrade existing equipment, to ensure all patients have access to the latest evidence-based treatments for their cancer.

All of this might sound like a lot of money, but in the grand scheme of a health budget of over £100 billion, it’s not. And, crucially, this investment is expected to produce savings in the long run of around £380-£575 million per year.

Ultimately, investments such as these are needed to make the major improvements in cancer outcomes the strategy strives for.

So it’s vital the Chancellor, George Osborne, and the Treasury fulfil the manifesto promise and provide the money needed to see the strategy is properly supported.

Keeping an eye on progress

The Taskforce has laid the foundations by producing an ambitious strategy. But it’s now up to the NHS organisations to make it a reality, and for the Government to invest to ensure this can happen.

Through this strategy, we have a huge opportunity to reduce the number of people who get cancer, and improve the outcomes for the many thousands who do develop the disease each year in England.

At Cancer Research UK, we will be keeping a close eye on progress.

We’ll be working hard to ensure the work of the Taskforce is put into practice – so that ultimately we will all feel the benefits of the ambitions it sets out.

from Cancer Research UK - Science blog http://ift.tt/1M0K60J

Last month, the Independent Cancer Taskforce published its strategy for improving cancer outcomes in England over the next five years.

By making the changes suggested in its report the Taskforce estimates that, by 2020, the NHS could be saving 30,000 more lives each year.

Strategies like this are important. They set ambitions and dedicate resources in the right places across the NHS to improve things for patients – something that’s been recognised at the highest level: the World Health Organisation believes that all countries should have a plan for cancer. And over the years, there’s evidence that previous strategies have made a big impact.

That’s why, at Cancer Research UK, we campaign for each UK nation to have up-to-date cancer strategies.

Our chief executive, Harpal Kumar, chaired the Independent Taskforce and has already blogged about what’s in the strategy. To refresh your memory, the six priorities are:

1. A renewed focus on prevention and public health
2. A national ambition to achieve earlier diagnosis
3. Establishing patient experience as being on par with clinical effectiveness and safety
4. Transforming support for people living with and beyond cancer
5. Investing in modern high-quality services
6. Overhauling the way the NHS commissions and provides services

At Cancer Research UK, we’re strongly backing the strategy, particularly its focus on better prevention, swifter diagnosis and modernising the NHS to provide better access to treatments – all things we’ve also identified as priorities for the NHS.

But now it’s out, what happens next? What needs to be done to make sure the priorities put forward by the Taskforce become a reality?

There are a lot of challenges ahead, but there are two crucial things that need to happen.

First, the organisations that lead the health service need to develop clear, detailed plans for putting the Taskforce’s recommendations into practice.

And second, the Government needs to invest the money to make it happen.

Putting it into practice

We want to see clear plans for putting the strategy into action

The Taskforce was created by NHS England and six other organisations involved in running the different aspects of the health system – the Care Quality Commission, Health Education England, Monitor, Public Health England, NICE and the NHS Trust Development Authority.

It was deliberately established as an independent group so that it could take a critical look at the health service as a whole.

This made sense – achieving world-class cancer outcomes is a challenge that needs to be tackled on many fronts, so changes will be needed across each part of the health system, and this means cutting across the remits of each of those lead organisations. So for example, improving screening services will need to involve both Public Health England and NHS England, as well as some of the others.

But since the Taskforce was independent, there’s a catch – the strategy isn’t really ‘owned’ by the organisations that created it. So it’s now critical that these organisations now develop well-integrated plans for how they will put the recommendations into practice – and Harpal wrote to the chief executives of each organisation saying as much.

The good news is that each of them has come out in support of the strategy – for example, the NHS England board was vocal in its support at its meeting in July, and it says that it will provide regular updates on progress.

But it’s also vital that one of the first priorities should be setting up two new groups: a National Cancer Team that will work across all of these organisations to put the strategy into practice, and a National Cancer Advisory Board that will oversee progress. But until we see clear plans, we will be keeping up the pressure.

Making the investment

Money is the other crucial factor.

In November, the new Government will carry out a Spending Review – the process by which it decides its spending priorities up to 2020.

In their manifesto before the election, the Conservatives promised:

We will work with the NHS, charities and patient groups to deliver the new strategy recommended by NHS England’s Cancer Taskforce

And they have already said the Spending Review will also focus on investment for the NHS.

We also need to see government investment to make it happen Image via Flickr/howardlake via CC-BY-SA 2.0

The NHS spends about £6.7bn on NHS cancer services each year. But as we have said before, these services are in desperate need of more resources. The Taskforce estimates that, as the NHS has to cope with more people getting cancer – about 1 in 2 of us – and more people surviving for longer, cancer services could cost around £13bn by 2020.

But to put the recommendations in the strategy into practice, the Taskforce estimates it will cost around £400 million per year – a fraction of what the NHS spends on cancer already.

This money will be crucial to pay for some key items in the strategy that we believe are really important to make the improvements needed, such as:

• To help the NHS diagnose cancer more swiftly, a £125 million fund to upgrade equipment – like MRI and CT machines – and address shortages of staff in diagnostic services.
• £22.5 million to provide a national molecular diagnostic service so that suitable cancer patients can be offered tests to tailor treatment to their cancer.

On top of this, a one-off investment of £275 million is needed to urgently replace old radiotherapy machines and upgrade existing equipment, to ensure all patients have access to the latest evidence-based treatments for their cancer.

All of this might sound like a lot of money, but in the grand scheme of a health budget of over £100 billion, it’s not. And, crucially, this investment is expected to produce savings in the long run of around £380-£575 million per year.

Ultimately, investments such as these are needed to make the major improvements in cancer outcomes the strategy strives for.

So it’s vital the Chancellor, George Osborne, and the Treasury fulfil the manifesto promise and provide the money needed to see the strategy is properly supported.

Keeping an eye on progress

The Taskforce has laid the foundations by producing an ambitious strategy. But it’s now up to the NHS organisations to make it a reality, and for the Government to invest to ensure this can happen.

Through this strategy, we have a huge opportunity to reduce the number of people who get cancer, and improve the outcomes for the many thousands who do develop the disease each year in England.

At Cancer Research UK, we will be keeping a close eye on progress.

We’ll be working hard to ensure the work of the Taskforce is put into practice – so that ultimately we will all feel the benefits of the ambitions it sets out.

from Cancer Research UK - Science blog http://ift.tt/1M0K60J

Meet the Scientist: Dr. Valerie Rice

Dr. Valerie Rice, a researcher at the U.S. Army Research Laboratory, Human Research and Engineering Directorate

Meet the Scientists is an Armed with Science segment highlighting the men and women working in the government realms of science, technology, and research and development: the greatest minds working on the greatest developments of our time. If you know someone who should be featured, email us.

1. Tell me a little about your technology/science.

Our current research is focused on investigating the efficacy of Mindfulness-based Stress Reduction on individual resiliency, and asking the additional question of whether delivering the training in-person or through a virtual world makes a difference. Soldiers are exposed to high levels of stress, including high operational tempo, frequent deployments, family separations, and exposure to war. High levels of stress are associated with deleterious health effects, so our research is focusing on a technique found to be effective in mitigating stress among civilian populations, in order to determine if it is helpful for active duty service members and veterans.

2. What is your role in developing this technology/science.

MBSR is a program that was developed by J. Kabat-Zinn, so I have not developed the intervention itself. However, the program must be adapted to the target audience (service members and veterans). Using my experience as a former active duty Army officer, and working with colleagues who are also former service members, the adaptation of the teaching comes about rather naturally. Offering mindfulness teachings on the virtual world is unique and we have worked with the Institute of Creative Technology, as well as All These Worlds and the San Diego Center for Mindfulness to create an environment that is conducive to learning and teaching in the virtual world. For example, when in-person, an instructor can see when a participant would like to speak – they may raise their hand or gesture. In the virtual world, the instructor cannot see that, so participants were given the ability to change the color of their meditation cushion, thus indicating they have a question or would like say something.

3. What is the goal/mission of this technology/science and what do you hope it will achieve? The results of this study will provide information on: 1) the efficacy of training provided over a virtual world (i.e., Second Life) vs. in-person; 2) human factors issues associated with learning via a VW; and 3) the usefulness of Mindfulness-based Stress Reduction (meditation) training in decreasing negative symptoms associated with stress and improving resiliency and mental processing among Soldiers. While I’d hope that this technique helps our service members handle the stressors associated with military service, as a researcher I really want to know whether this is a path worth pursuing or not. If I can show that it helps, then others can make the decision to make this training available to our service members and their families. If we show that it does not help, then we can leave this technique and pursue other means for helping our troops.
4. In your own words, what is it about this technology/science that makes it so significant?Mindfulness and meditation appear to help an individual regulate their response to stress, by activating the parasympathetic nervous system (countering the ‘fight or flight’ reaction), thus they are more calm and composed.  This is significant in the way it puts the power into the hands of the individual, rather than relying on an outside stimuli or medication (both of which can also be of benefit, of course). The significance of using the virtual world is that such teaching can be offered to military and veterans who are in remote locations or places in which this type of intervention may not be available. In addition, for individuals who cannot easily attend an in-person training sessions, due to physical limitations, stigma associated with seeking care, feeling uncomfortable with in-person group settings, or time and distance restrictions, this may be the best alternative.
5. How could you use this technology/science to aid the military or help with military missions? Virtual world technology can be, and is being, used now for family members to meet and interact with one another, to have a place for active duty service members and veterans to find out about their benefits, and it could also be used to teach classes, set up virtual office spaces for teleworkers, or provide telehealth services.
6. What got you interested in this field of study? While on active duty, my military specialty was Occupational Therapy and I also have degrees in Health Care Administration and Human Factors Engineering. This research taps into all three of those sets of professional training: assisting individuals to function at the top of their abilities, making certain health care is available and affordable, and making certain the process, products, places, and procedures are designed to fit the intended audience.
7. Are you working on any other projects right now? Yes, this next year we will be continuing our investigations into personal resilience by investigating an intense 5-day mindfulness training program and comparing it with the traditional 8 week training program, opening mindfulness training to military spouses, investigating neuromodulation and its’ impact on learning mindfulness skills, and adding an active control group to the mindfulness study. We are also investigating the impact of neurotemporal training on marksmanship performance using the EST2000.
8. If you could go anywhere in time and space, where would you go and why? In my ideal world, I’d like to be in a collaborative, fun environment with resources to investigate all facets of a problem, with the problems I investigate being related to health and performance. I am in a collaborative, fun environment; I conduct research on human factors related to healthcare; and resources are always limited in some way – so I guess I’m in the best place. The only thing that could be better is if I were located near a beach.
9. Do you have anything else you’d like to add?

You have the quote on your emails from Einstein about being passionately curious. Why do you identify with that one?

There are a lot of people out there who are intelligence or genius but I’m very curious, that’s what I think it takes to do research. You don’t have to be the smartest person in the world, you have to be interested.

How did you discover within yourself the fulfilment you seem to get in helping other people? What school did you attend?

I knew my path early. In occupational therapy school at 22 or 23 years old I was working with patients who had injuries or illnesses. The therapy sessions I learned were intended to rehabilitate clients to their former – cognitive, physical, and emotional – self.

The methods I was taught seemed to work for rehabilitation but I had no theoretical basis that proved why, or whether they did at all. My focus gradually shifted to more broad human performance research as a result. Human performance is what we use to get people to their ideal self. I noticed the same methods that applied to occupational health also applied when it was not necessarily one traumatic event that led to therapy. It has been a theme throughout my life to help people get where they want to be in their life – functional, and happy.

EDUCATION:

Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (Virginia Tech), PhD, industrial engineering – specialty in human factors engineering/ergonomics

Baylor University, Master of Science, occupational therapy/therapist

from Armed with Science http://ift.tt/1IAmLNX

Dr. Valerie Rice, a researcher at the U.S. Army Research Laboratory, Human Research and Engineering Directorate

Meet the Scientists is an Armed with Science segment highlighting the men and women working in the government realms of science, technology, and research and development: the greatest minds working on the greatest developments of our time. If you know someone who should be featured, email us.

1. Tell me a little about your technology/science.

Our current research is focused on investigating the efficacy of Mindfulness-based Stress Reduction on individual resiliency, and asking the additional question of whether delivering the training in-person or through a virtual world makes a difference. Soldiers are exposed to high levels of stress, including high operational tempo, frequent deployments, family separations, and exposure to war. High levels of stress are associated with deleterious health effects, so our research is focusing on a technique found to be effective in mitigating stress among civilian populations, in order to determine if it is helpful for active duty service members and veterans.

2. What is your role in developing this technology/science.

MBSR is a program that was developed by J. Kabat-Zinn, so I have not developed the intervention itself. However, the program must be adapted to the target audience (service members and veterans). Using my experience as a former active duty Army officer, and working with colleagues who are also former service members, the adaptation of the teaching comes about rather naturally. Offering mindfulness teachings on the virtual world is unique and we have worked with the Institute of Creative Technology, as well as All These Worlds and the San Diego Center for Mindfulness to create an environment that is conducive to learning and teaching in the virtual world. For example, when in-person, an instructor can see when a participant would like to speak – they may raise their hand or gesture. In the virtual world, the instructor cannot see that, so participants were given the ability to change the color of their meditation cushion, thus indicating they have a question or would like say something.

3. What is the goal/mission of this technology/science and what do you hope it will achieve? The results of this study will provide information on: 1) the efficacy of training provided over a virtual world (i.e., Second Life) vs. in-person; 2) human factors issues associated with learning via a VW; and 3) the usefulness of Mindfulness-based Stress Reduction (meditation) training in decreasing negative symptoms associated with stress and improving resiliency and mental processing among Soldiers. While I’d hope that this technique helps our service members handle the stressors associated with military service, as a researcher I really want to know whether this is a path worth pursuing or not. If I can show that it helps, then others can make the decision to make this training available to our service members and their families. If we show that it does not help, then we can leave this technique and pursue other means for helping our troops.
4. In your own words, what is it about this technology/science that makes it so significant?Mindfulness and meditation appear to help an individual regulate their response to stress, by activating the parasympathetic nervous system (countering the ‘fight or flight’ reaction), thus they are more calm and composed.  This is significant in the way it puts the power into the hands of the individual, rather than relying on an outside stimuli or medication (both of which can also be of benefit, of course). The significance of using the virtual world is that such teaching can be offered to military and veterans who are in remote locations or places in which this type of intervention may not be available. In addition, for individuals who cannot easily attend an in-person training sessions, due to physical limitations, stigma associated with seeking care, feeling uncomfortable with in-person group settings, or time and distance restrictions, this may be the best alternative.
5. How could you use this technology/science to aid the military or help with military missions? Virtual world technology can be, and is being, used now for family members to meet and interact with one another, to have a place for active duty service members and veterans to find out about their benefits, and it could also be used to teach classes, set up virtual office spaces for teleworkers, or provide telehealth services.
6. What got you interested in this field of study? While on active duty, my military specialty was Occupational Therapy and I also have degrees in Health Care Administration and Human Factors Engineering. This research taps into all three of those sets of professional training: assisting individuals to function at the top of their abilities, making certain health care is available and affordable, and making certain the process, products, places, and procedures are designed to fit the intended audience.
7. Are you working on any other projects right now? Yes, this next year we will be continuing our investigations into personal resilience by investigating an intense 5-day mindfulness training program and comparing it with the traditional 8 week training program, opening mindfulness training to military spouses, investigating neuromodulation and its’ impact on learning mindfulness skills, and adding an active control group to the mindfulness study. We are also investigating the impact of neurotemporal training on marksmanship performance using the EST2000.
8. If you could go anywhere in time and space, where would you go and why? In my ideal world, I’d like to be in a collaborative, fun environment with resources to investigate all facets of a problem, with the problems I investigate being related to health and performance. I am in a collaborative, fun environment; I conduct research on human factors related to healthcare; and resources are always limited in some way – so I guess I’m in the best place. The only thing that could be better is if I were located near a beach.
9. Do you have anything else you’d like to add?

You have the quote on your emails from Einstein about being passionately curious. Why do you identify with that one?

There are a lot of people out there who are intelligence or genius but I’m very curious, that’s what I think it takes to do research. You don’t have to be the smartest person in the world, you have to be interested.

How did you discover within yourself the fulfilment you seem to get in helping other people? What school did you attend?

I knew my path early. In occupational therapy school at 22 or 23 years old I was working with patients who had injuries or illnesses. The therapy sessions I learned were intended to rehabilitate clients to their former – cognitive, physical, and emotional – self.

The methods I was taught seemed to work for rehabilitation but I had no theoretical basis that proved why, or whether they did at all. My focus gradually shifted to more broad human performance research as a result. Human performance is what we use to get people to their ideal self. I noticed the same methods that applied to occupational health also applied when it was not necessarily one traumatic event that led to therapy. It has been a theme throughout my life to help people get where they want to be in their life – functional, and happy.

EDUCATION:

Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (Virginia Tech), PhD, industrial engineering – specialty in human factors engineering/ergonomics

Baylor University, Master of Science, occupational therapy/therapist

from Armed with Science http://ift.tt/1IAmLNX

Mostly Mute Monday: The Galaxy’s Fireworks (Synopsis) [Starts With A Bang]

“That, then, is loveliness, we said,
Children in wonder watching the stars,
Is the aim and the end.

Being but men, we walked into the trees.” –Dylan Thomas

Yet when you look at the night sky, it isn’t watching the stars that reveals all of the Universe’s secrets, nor by looking with what you can see with your eyes. Looking beyond what visible light can teach us often reveals a whole Universe of wonder that we’d never see otherwise.

Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/WISE Team.

Looking in infrared light, NASA’s Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) reveals the intricate structure behind many objects that are entirely invisible to even the world’s most powerful visible light telescopes, showcasing the dynamics of the neutral, warm gas that’s invisible to optical instruments. WISE surveyed the entire sky, lasting a mere 13 months before running out of coolant, with the information showcased in this colossal mosaic covering less than 3% of what’s available.

Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/WISE Team.

Go view and learn about the entire thing, in (spectacular) pictures and words, on Mostly Mute Monday!

from ScienceBlogs http://ift.tt/1gEdPkx

“That, then, is loveliness, we said,
Children in wonder watching the stars,
Is the aim and the end.

Being but men, we walked into the trees.” –Dylan Thomas

Yet when you look at the night sky, it isn’t watching the stars that reveals all of the Universe’s secrets, nor by looking with what you can see with your eyes. Looking beyond what visible light can teach us often reveals a whole Universe of wonder that we’d never see otherwise.

Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/WISE Team.

Looking in infrared light, NASA’s Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) reveals the intricate structure behind many objects that are entirely invisible to even the world’s most powerful visible light telescopes, showcasing the dynamics of the neutral, warm gas that’s invisible to optical instruments. WISE surveyed the entire sky, lasting a mere 13 months before running out of coolant, with the information showcased in this colossal mosaic covering less than 3% of what’s available.

Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/WISE Team.

Go view and learn about the entire thing, in (spectacular) pictures and words, on Mostly Mute Monday!

from ScienceBlogs http://ift.tt/1gEdPkx

Math shines with the stars in 'The Man Who Knew Infinity'

By Carol Clark

Call it a math bromance. Cambridge mathematician G. H. Hardy’s collaboration with the obscure, self-taught Indian Srinivasa Ramanujan – during the height of British colonialism – changed math and science forever. The story is finally going mainstream through a major motion picture, “The Man Who Knew Infinity.”

“It’s the story of a man who overcame incredible obstacles to become one of the most important mathematicians of his day,” says Emory mathematician Ken Ono, who served as a consultant for the film. “It’s a great human story. It’s true. And I’m glad that the world is finally going to get to enjoy it.”

The Mathematical Association of America (MAA) will feature a sneak peak of “The Man Who Knew Infinity” on August 6, as part of its centennial celebration, MathFest 2015, in Washington D.C. Ono, a leading expert on Ramanujan’s theories, will lead a panel discussion at the screening event. Panelists will include Princeton mathematician Manjul Bhargava; Robert Kanigel, who wrote the 1991 book that the movie is based on; and Matt Brown, the screenwriter and director of the movie.

The movie’s world premier is set for September at the Toronto International Film Festival.

In 1913, Ramanujan wrote a letter to Hardy, including creative formulas that clearly showed his brilliance. Hardy invited Ramanujan to come to Cambridge to study and collaborate, a daring move during a time of deep prejudice.

“Together, they produced phenomenal results,” Ono says. “They changed mathematics and they changed the course of science.”

Ken Ono on the set with Jeremy Irons, who plays Cambridge mathematician G. H. Hardy. (Photo by Sam Pressman.)

A relatively unknown director, Matt Brown spent eight years trying to get the movie project off the ground. He eventually found backing from the producer Ed Pressman of Pressman Films.

“This is not your typical Hollywood film,” Brown says of the final product. “A lot of movies that deal with scientific subjects just mention the science and go straight to the human story. We wanted to honor the math in this film, so that mathematicians could appreciate it as well as other audience members. One way we tried to do that was to show the passion the characters have for the subject.”

When Brown called Ono out of the blue last August and asked him to help with the math on the film, Ono did not hesitate. He was soon on a plane from Atlanta to London to begin putting in 16-hour days on the set at Pinewood Studios with the cast and crew.

“I’ve never met anybody with more energy and enthusiasm for his work than Ken,” Brown says. “It was invaluable to me as a director to have him go over the script and make sure that the math was accurate. He was incredibly kind and patient. It gave me confidence.”

Ono also worked closely with the art department, to get details of the math visuals right, and coached the stars, Dev Patel and Jeremy Irons. “Ken helped the actors understand philosophically what was behind the mathematics,” Brown says. “He gave them a little window into it. That’s important because when an actor grasps the meaning of the lines, he can add nuance and subtext to a performance.”

Ultimately, the film is about the relationship between Hardy and Ramanujan, Brown says. “Hardy fought really hard to get Ramanujan honored and bring him into the elite of Trinity College at Cambridge. Hardy basically staked his career on him.”

It was especially risky since Ramanujan did not work like a traditional academic. He did not see the need of providing proofs for his fantastic formulas, and believed that they came to him as visions from a goddess.

“Ramanujan saw the world, and math, in a spiritual way,” Brown says. “It’s incredible that he wound up at Cambridge with Hardy, an atheist, as his mentor.”

Unfortunately, while Hardy proved a great academic mentor for Ramanujan, it took longer for their friendship to evolve. “This movie tells a story about the cost that comes when people wait out of fear to connect more deeply in their relationships,” Brown says.

Related:
Doing math with movie stars

from eScienceCommons http://ift.tt/1E4ot9h

By Carol Clark

Call it a math bromance. Cambridge mathematician G. H. Hardy’s collaboration with the obscure, self-taught Indian Srinivasa Ramanujan – during the height of British colonialism – changed math and science forever. The story is finally going mainstream through a major motion picture, “The Man Who Knew Infinity.”

“It’s the story of a man who overcame incredible obstacles to become one of the most important mathematicians of his day,” says Emory mathematician Ken Ono, who served as a consultant for the film. “It’s a great human story. It’s true. And I’m glad that the world is finally going to get to enjoy it.”

The Mathematical Association of America (MAA) will feature a sneak peak of “The Man Who Knew Infinity” on August 6, as part of its centennial celebration, MathFest 2015, in Washington D.C. Ono, a leading expert on Ramanujan’s theories, will lead a panel discussion at the screening event. Panelists will include Princeton mathematician Manjul Bhargava; Robert Kanigel, who wrote the 1991 book that the movie is based on; and Matt Brown, the screenwriter and director of the movie.

The movie’s world premier is set for September at the Toronto International Film Festival.

In 1913, Ramanujan wrote a letter to Hardy, including creative formulas that clearly showed his brilliance. Hardy invited Ramanujan to come to Cambridge to study and collaborate, a daring move during a time of deep prejudice.

“Together, they produced phenomenal results,” Ono says. “They changed mathematics and they changed the course of science.”

Ken Ono on the set with Jeremy Irons, who plays Cambridge mathematician G. H. Hardy. (Photo by Sam Pressman.)

A relatively unknown director, Matt Brown spent eight years trying to get the movie project off the ground. He eventually found backing from the producer Ed Pressman of Pressman Films.

“This is not your typical Hollywood film,” Brown says of the final product. “A lot of movies that deal with scientific subjects just mention the science and go straight to the human story. We wanted to honor the math in this film, so that mathematicians could appreciate it as well as other audience members. One way we tried to do that was to show the passion the characters have for the subject.”

When Brown called Ono out of the blue last August and asked him to help with the math on the film, Ono did not hesitate. He was soon on a plane from Atlanta to London to begin putting in 16-hour days on the set at Pinewood Studios with the cast and crew.

“I’ve never met anybody with more energy and enthusiasm for his work than Ken,” Brown says. “It was invaluable to me as a director to have him go over the script and make sure that the math was accurate. He was incredibly kind and patient. It gave me confidence.”

Ono also worked closely with the art department, to get details of the math visuals right, and coached the stars, Dev Patel and Jeremy Irons. “Ken helped the actors understand philosophically what was behind the mathematics,” Brown says. “He gave them a little window into it. That’s important because when an actor grasps the meaning of the lines, he can add nuance and subtext to a performance.”

Ultimately, the film is about the relationship between Hardy and Ramanujan, Brown says. “Hardy fought really hard to get Ramanujan honored and bring him into the elite of Trinity College at Cambridge. Hardy basically staked his career on him.”

It was especially risky since Ramanujan did not work like a traditional academic. He did not see the need of providing proofs for his fantastic formulas, and believed that they came to him as visions from a goddess.

“Ramanujan saw the world, and math, in a spiritual way,” Brown says. “It’s incredible that he wound up at Cambridge with Hardy, an atheist, as his mentor.”

Unfortunately, while Hardy proved a great academic mentor for Ramanujan, it took longer for their friendship to evolve. “This movie tells a story about the cost that comes when people wait out of fear to connect more deeply in their relationships,” Brown says.

Related:
Doing math with movie stars

from eScienceCommons http://ift.tt/1E4ot9h

Nigeria has gone one year without a reported polio case [The Pump Handle]

Last week, Nigeria met an important milestone: An entire year without a reported case of polio. If the WHO confirms the absence of the virus in samples taken from people in previously affected areas, Nigeria will no longer be on the list of countries where the disease is endemic. Another two years will have to pass without additional cases before the WHO can certify Nigeria — and possibly the entire continent of Africa — as polio-free.

India was in a similar position a few years ago: In 2012, it was removed from the list of polio-endemic countries, and the WHO declared it polio-free in 2014. In 2015, only Pakistan and Afghanistan had any reported polio cases.

TIME’s Jeffrey Kluger reports on how Nigeria came this far:

The victory in Nigeria did not come easy—and it almost didn’t happen at all. For more than a generation, it has been Rotary that has led the drive to eradicate polio, administering vaccinations to 2.5 billion children in 122 countries at a cost of $1.4 billion. With the help of UNICEF, the World Health Organization (WHO), the U.S. Centers for Disease Control, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and other groups, the effort paid off comparatively fast. As long ago as 2003, the virus had been chased out of all but six countries and the global caseload was down to just 732. There was talk of eradication by as early as 2005.

But Nigeria scuttled those plans. In the summer of 2003, Muslim clerics in the country’s northern regions halted all vaccinations, spreading the fiction that the vaccines contained HIV and were designed to sterilize Muslim girls. Quickly, the poliovirus did what all viruses do when they’re given that kind of running room: it spread, and fast. By 2005, cases consistent with the Nigeria strain were appearing in a 16-nation band that stretched as far away as Indonesia, before the outbreak could finally be contained.

… While the current victory in Nigeria was a huge milestone, things remained dicey right to the end—again due to politics—when Boko Haram fighters killed nine polio workers and abducted three others earlier this year. But the vaccine program was already too far along for the attacks to reverse things, and as the July 24 anniversary arrived, victory was at last declared—albeit tentatively.

Nigeria isn’t the only country where vaccination workers have been killed. The deaths of nine polio vaccinators in Pakistan in 2012 followed a 2011 report that the CIA had used a fictional vaccination campaign to gather intelligence on Osama Bin Laden. Since then, a total of 65 health workers have been killed in Pakistan.

Vaccination workers are risking their lives for a worthwile goal: eradication of a disease that once paralyzed hundreds of thousands of children each year. The world is drawing closer to this goal, but the BBC reminds us: “As long as a single child remains infected with polio, unvaccinated children in all countries are at risk.”

from ScienceBlogs http://ift.tt/1VWEM30

Last week, Nigeria met an important milestone: An entire year without a reported case of polio. If the WHO confirms the absence of the virus in samples taken from people in previously affected areas, Nigeria will no longer be on the list of countries where the disease is endemic. Another two years will have to pass without additional cases before the WHO can certify Nigeria — and possibly the entire continent of Africa — as polio-free.

India was in a similar position a few years ago: In 2012, it was removed from the list of polio-endemic countries, and the WHO declared it polio-free in 2014. In 2015, only Pakistan and Afghanistan had any reported polio cases.

TIME’s Jeffrey Kluger reports on how Nigeria came this far:

The victory in Nigeria did not come easy—and it almost didn’t happen at all. For more than a generation, it has been Rotary that has led the drive to eradicate polio, administering vaccinations to 2.5 billion children in 122 countries at a cost of $1.4 billion. With the help of UNICEF, the World Health Organization (WHO), the U.S. Centers for Disease Control, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and other groups, the effort paid off comparatively fast. As long ago as 2003, the virus had been chased out of all but six countries and the global caseload was down to just 732. There was talk of eradication by as early as 2005.

But Nigeria scuttled those plans. In the summer of 2003, Muslim clerics in the country’s northern regions halted all vaccinations, spreading the fiction that the vaccines contained HIV and were designed to sterilize Muslim girls. Quickly, the poliovirus did what all viruses do when they’re given that kind of running room: it spread, and fast. By 2005, cases consistent with the Nigeria strain were appearing in a 16-nation band that stretched as far away as Indonesia, before the outbreak could finally be contained.

… While the current victory in Nigeria was a huge milestone, things remained dicey right to the end—again due to politics—when Boko Haram fighters killed nine polio workers and abducted three others earlier this year. But the vaccine program was already too far along for the attacks to reverse things, and as the July 24 anniversary arrived, victory was at last declared—albeit tentatively.

Nigeria isn’t the only country where vaccination workers have been killed. The deaths of nine polio vaccinators in Pakistan in 2012 followed a 2011 report that the CIA had used a fictional vaccination campaign to gather intelligence on Osama Bin Laden. Since then, a total of 65 health workers have been killed in Pakistan.

Vaccination workers are risking their lives for a worthwile goal: eradication of a disease that once paralyzed hundreds of thousands of children each year. The world is drawing closer to this goal, but the BBC reminds us: “As long as a single child remains infected with polio, unvaccinated children in all countries are at risk.”

from ScienceBlogs http://ift.tt/1VWEM30

A third of Milky Way stars have changed orbit

This image shows two pairs of stars (marked as red and blue) in which each pair started in the same orbit, and then one star in the pair changed orbits. The star marked as red has completed its move into a new orbit, while the star marked in blue is still moving. Image credit: Dana Berry/SkyWorks Digital, Inc.; SDSS collaboration)

A team of scientists from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) has created a new map of the Milky Way that shows nearly a third of the stars have dramatically changed their obits. Their study is published in the July 29 issue of The Astrophysical Journal.

Michael Hayden, an astronomy graduate student at New Mexico State University, is lead author of the study. Hayden said:

In our modern world, many people move far away from their birthplaces, sometimes halfway around the world. Now we’re finding the same is true of stars in our galaxy – about 30 percent of the stars in our galaxy have traveled a long way from where they were born.

To build the new map of the Milky Way, scientists used a spectrograph on the SDSS Apache Point Observatory in New Mexico to observe 100,000 stars during a 4-year period.

The key to creating and interpreting this map of the galaxy is measuring the elements in the atmosphere of each star. Hayden said:

From the chemical composition of a star, we can learn its ancestry and life history.

The chemical information comes from spectra, which are detailed measurements of how much light the star gives off at different wavelengths. Spectra show prominent lines that correspond to elements and compounds. Astronomers can tell what a star is made of by reading these spectral lines.

The team mapped the relative amounts of 15 separate elements, including carbon, silicon, and iron for stars all over the galaxy. What they found surprised them – up to 30 percent of stars had compositions indicating that they were formed in parts of the galaxy far from their current positions.

When the team looked at the pattern of element abundances in detail, they found that much of the data could be explained by a model in which stars migrate radially, moving closer or farther from the galactic center with time.

These random in-and-out motions are referred to as “migration,” and are likely caused by irregularities in the galactic disk, such as the Milky Way’s famous spiral arms. Evidence of stellar migration had previously been seen in stars near the sun, but the new study is the first clear evidence that migration occurs throughout the galaxy.

Enjoying EarthSky? Sign up for our free daily newsletter today!

Bottom line: Scientists from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) have created a new map of the Milky Way that shows nearly a third of the stars in have dramatically changed their obits. Their study is published in the July 29 issue of The Astrophysical Journal.

Read more from New Mexico State University

from EarthSky http://ift.tt/1SVsmnP

This image shows two pairs of stars (marked as red and blue) in which each pair started in the same orbit, and then one star in the pair changed orbits. The star marked as red has completed its move into a new orbit, while the star marked in blue is still moving. Image credit: Dana Berry/SkyWorks Digital, Inc.; SDSS collaboration)

A team of scientists from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) has created a new map of the Milky Way that shows nearly a third of the stars have dramatically changed their obits. Their study is published in the July 29 issue of The Astrophysical Journal.

Michael Hayden, an astronomy graduate student at New Mexico State University, is lead author of the study. Hayden said:

In our modern world, many people move far away from their birthplaces, sometimes halfway around the world. Now we’re finding the same is true of stars in our galaxy – about 30 percent of the stars in our galaxy have traveled a long way from where they were born.

To build the new map of the Milky Way, scientists used a spectrograph on the SDSS Apache Point Observatory in New Mexico to observe 100,000 stars during a 4-year period.

The key to creating and interpreting this map of the galaxy is measuring the elements in the atmosphere of each star. Hayden said:

From the chemical composition of a star, we can learn its ancestry and life history.

The chemical information comes from spectra, which are detailed measurements of how much light the star gives off at different wavelengths. Spectra show prominent lines that correspond to elements and compounds. Astronomers can tell what a star is made of by reading these spectral lines.

The team mapped the relative amounts of 15 separate elements, including carbon, silicon, and iron for stars all over the galaxy. What they found surprised them – up to 30 percent of stars had compositions indicating that they were formed in parts of the galaxy far from their current positions.

When the team looked at the pattern of element abundances in detail, they found that much of the data could be explained by a model in which stars migrate radially, moving closer or farther from the galactic center with time.

These random in-and-out motions are referred to as “migration,” and are likely caused by irregularities in the galactic disk, such as the Milky Way’s famous spiral arms. Evidence of stellar migration had previously been seen in stars near the sun, but the new study is the first clear evidence that migration occurs throughout the galaxy.

Enjoying EarthSky? Sign up for our free daily newsletter today!

Bottom line: Scientists from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) have created a new map of the Milky Way that shows nearly a third of the stars in have dramatically changed their obits. Their study is published in the July 29 issue of The Astrophysical Journal.

Read more from New Mexico State University

from EarthSky http://ift.tt/1SVsmnP