ريتشارد دوكنز's Blog, page 582
January 20, 2016
Death Rate For Young White Americans Is Rising, Due To Opioid Overdoses
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The number of overdose deaths among white American males aged 25-34 has increased five-fold over the past 15 years. sirastock/Shutterstock
Throughout history, advancements in healthcare and technology have typically been accompanied by decreasing mortality rates, with this trend only halted by exceptional factors such as wars, natural disasters or disease epidemics.
Surgeon Claims He Has Performed A Successful Head Transplant On A Monkey
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This is the second documented head transplant procedure in a monkey. XiXinXing/ Shutterstock
Warning: This article contains graphic content.
We have been promised a head transplant by next year, and the main brain behind the highly controversial procedure shows no signs of retracting his wild claim. Quite the opposite, in fact, as the pioneering surgeon has now announced the procedure has been successfully carried out on a monkey.
These Were The 25 Most Popular Passwords In 2015
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Apparently, people are really unimaginative when it comes to passwords. JMiks/Shutterstock
Last year saw millions of people’s data hacked and stolen online, from T-Mobile customers to those signed up on Ashley Madison. While this is obviously bad news for those who have had their details jacked, the data posted online can be used to gain an interesting insight into how people protect themselves on the internet.
Deserts Made Hotter By Microbial Islands
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The stark effect microbial communities have on the color of deserts can be seen in this photograph from Chandler, Arizona. Ferran Garcia-Pichel, Arizona State University
Colonies of microbes create heat islands within deserts, areas hotter than their surroundings. These ecosystems help fight erosion and fertilize the limited soil, but they also play a neglected part in warming the planet.
Plastic In Oceans Will Outweigh Fish By 2050
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The equivalent of one garbage truck is dumped into the oceans every minute. Fotos593/Shutterstock
We know that the oceans are warming and becoming increasingly acidic as we continue to pump more and more CO2 into the atmosphere. But they also face another threat from mankind: plastic. Our modern lives are dominated by this ubiquitous material, from the packaging on the food we eat to the technology we use every day, there is no getting away from it.
January 19, 2016
Beyond Gaming: 10 Other Fascinating Uses for Virtual-Reality Tech
Photo credit: NASA
By Knvul Sheikh
Gamers and gadget hounds can now get their hands on the hotly anticipated Oculus Rift virtual-reality headset: The Facebook-owned company announced the commercial release of its virtual-reality device last week at CES in Las Vegas.
At a whopping $600, the Oculus Rift may seem expensive for a gaming device, but the technology has come a long way since the company first launched its Kickstarter campaign in 2012. Virtual-reality (VR) headsets are now being used in many industries as a way of training people or providing a new way to experience things.
Here are 10 ways virtual-reality technology is being used beyond gaming.
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Acupuncture no better for menopause than ‘fake’ method, says researchers
Photo credit: Jon Feingersh/Getty Images/Blend Images RR
By Australian Associated Press
Traditional Chinese acupuncture is no better than a fake version for treating menopause symptoms, says a new study.
But, after eight weeks of treatment, both led to a 40% improvement in the severity and frequency of hot flushes, which was sustained six months later.
The University of Melbourne study involved 327 Australian women aged over 40 who had at least seven moderate hot flushes a day.
Half were given 10 sessions of standard Chinese medicine acupuncture in which thin needles were inserted into the body at specific points.
The others had their skin stimulated with blunt-tipped needles, which has a milder effect without penetrating the skin.
Lead author Dr Carolyn Ee said both groups may have improved due to the placebo effect or because attending a clinic to talk about symptoms could help.
She also noted hot flushes tend to improve spontaneously with time.
“This was a large and rigorous study and we are confident there is no additional benefit from inserting needles compared with stimulation from pressuring the blunt needles without skin penetration for hot flushes,” she said.
“If women want to consider having acupuncture for hot flushes they should know that although previous studies show it is better than doing nothing, our study demonstrates that needling does not appear to make a difference.”
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Most threats to humans come from science and technology, warns Hawking
Photo credit: BBC/LAURENCE CENDROWICZ/Mentorn
By Ian Sample
The human race faces one its most dangerous centuries yet as progress in science and technology becomes an ever greater threat to our existence, Stephen Hawking warns.
The chances of disaster on planet Earth will rise to a near certainty in the next one to ten thousand years, the eminent cosmologist said, but it will take more than a century to set up colonies in space where human beings could live on among the stars.
“We will not establish self-sustaining colonies in space for at least the next hundred years, so we have to be very careful in this period,” Hawking said. His comments echo those of Lord Rees, the astronomer royal, who raised his own concerns about the risks of self-annihilation in his 2003 book Our Final Century.
Speaking to the Radio Times ahead of the BBC Reith Lecture, in which he will explain the science of black holes, Hawking said most of the threats humans now face come from advances in science and technology, such as nuclear weapons and genetically engineered viruses.
“We are not going to stop making progress, or reverse it, so we must recognise the dangers and control them,” he added.
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Islamic State to halve fighters’ salaries as cost of waging terror starts to bite
Photo credit: Reuters
By Agence-France Presse and Reuters
The Islamic State jihadist group has announced plans to halve the monthly salaries of its members in Syria and Iraq as the economic reality of waging war on several fronts takes its toll.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which relies on a network of activists, medics, and fighters across Syria for information on Isis, published what it said was an official statement from the militant group announcing the cuts.
“Because of the exceptional circumstances that the Islamic State is passing through, a decision was taken to cut the salaries of the mujahedeen in half,” the Arabic statement said.
“No one will be exempt from this decision no matter his position, but the distribution of food assistance will continue twice a month as usual,” it said.
Isis has declared a self-styled “caliphate” across swaths of territory in Iraq and Syria, imposing its harsh interpretation of Islamic law.
According to Observatory head Rami Abdel Rahman, the salary cuts meant Syrian Isis fighters would see their salaries drop to about $200 a month.
Foreign fighters, who were paid double the Syrian militants, would have their monthly income reduced to $400, Abdel Rahman told AFP.
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Why we’ve been hugely underestimating the overfishing of the oceans
Photo credit: AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti
By Chelsea Harvey
The state of the world’s fish stocks may be in worse shape than official reports indicate, according to new data — a possibility with worrying consequences for both international food security and marine ecosystems.
A study published Tuesday in the journal Nature Communications suggests that the national data many countries have submitted to the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) has not always accurately reflected the amount of fish actually caught over the past six decades. And the paper indicates that global fishing practices may have been even less sustainable over the past few decades than scientists previously thought.
The FAO’s official data report that global marine fisheries catches peaked in 1996 at 86 million metric tons and have since slightly declined. But a collaborative effort from more than 50 institutions around the world has produced data that tell a different story altogether. The new data suggest that global catches actually peaked at 130 metric tons in 1996 and have declined sharply — on average, by about 1.2 million metric tons every year — ever since.
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