07 NOV 2014 by ideonexus
Matrioshka Brain Simplified
"Take all the planets in a star system and dismantle them," she explains. "Turn them into dust – structured nanocomp, powered by heat exchangers, spread in concentric orbits around the central star. The inner orbitals run close to the melting point of iron, the outer ones are cold as liquid nitrogen, and each layer runs off the waste heat of the next shell in. It's like a Russian doll made out of Dyson spheres, shell enclosing shell enclosing shell, but it's not designed to support human li...Folksonomies: futurism transhumanism
Folksonomies: futurism transhumanism
1 21 APR 2014 by ideonexus
"Cosmos" Converts
I’ve met secular humanists who grew up in evangelical households, for whom Cosmos was their first exposure to a scientific way of viewing the world. Dad was a difference maker. He reached out to people. He took them by the awe and wonder we feel over the most important questions we can think to imagine. He pulled them away from blind faith, away from pseudoscience, toward a deeper, richer understanding of the universe.
And he did it with compassion. He didn’t berate people or make them f... 1 
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notesNick Sagan explains how his father's compassion and energy converted people to humanism.
28 MAR 2012 by ideonexus
Wonderful Factoids
1. If you condense the history of the universe to a single year, humans would appear on December 31st at 10:30 PM—99.98 percent of the history of the universe happened before humans even existed.
2. Look at a gold ring. As the core collapsed in a dying star, a gravity wave collapsed inward with it. As it did so, it slammed into the thundering sound wave heading out of the collapse. In that moment, as a star died, the gold in that ring was formed.
3. We are star material that knows it exis... 1 notes
notesTo instill in a child the sense of wonder.
28 MAR 2012 by ideonexus
The Virtue of Gratitude
We have no difficulty reminding the 4-year-old to “say thank you” when Grandma hands her an ice cream cone, but in other situations—especially when a religious turn-of-phrase is generally used—we often pass up the chance to teach our kids to express gratitude in naturalistic terms. Instead of thanking God for the food on your table, thank those who really put it there—the farmers, the truckers, the produce workers, and Mom or Dad or Aunt Millicent. They deserve it. Maybe you’d lik... 1 notes
notesWe have real people all around us to be thankful to.
28 MAR 2012 by ideonexus
Santa Clause and God
It’s hard to even consider the possibility that Santa isn’t real. Everyone seems to believe he is. As a kid, I heard his name in songs and stories and saw him in movies with very high production values. My mom and dad seemed to believe, batted down my doubts, told me he wanted me to be good and that he always knew if I wasn’t. And what wonderful gifts I received! Except when they were crappy, which I always figured was my fault somehow. All in all, despite the multiple incredible improb... 1 notes
notesOne is a myth meant to expire, the other is a myth meant to last a lifetime.
31 JUL 2011 by ideonexus
Parents Who Know Their Child's Emotions have Power Over T...
Why does this work? We know only a couple parts of the story. The first is that parents who possess emotional information gain the great power of behavioral prediction. Moms and dads become so acquainted with their children’s psychological interiors, they become pros at forecasting probable reactions to almost any situation. This results in an instinctive feel about what is most likely to be helpful, hurtful, or neutral to their child, and in a wide variety of circumstances. That’s abou... 1 notes
notesParents who pay attention to their children's emotional states can recognize the inner workings of their children and respond to them more effectively. Teach your children the names of the emotions they are experiencing to give them control over them.
28 JUL 2011 by ideonexus
The Baby's Brain is Interested in Surviving
Many well-meaning moms and dads think their child’s brain is interested in learning. That is not accurate. The brain is not interested in learning. The brain is interested in surviving. Every ability in our intellectual tool kit was engineered to escape extinction. Learning exists only to serve the requirements of this primal goal. It is a happy coincidence that our intellectual tools can do double duty in the classroom, conferring on us the ability to create spreadsheets and speak Fre... 1 notes
notesThis is an important thing to remember when trying to teach children: first provide them a safe environment.
24 JUL 2011 by ideonexus
The A not B Task
Emilie sits on her father's lap and excitedly stares at the shiny brass bell that the research assistant across the table is holding. Making sure Emilie is watching, the assistant places the bell into one of two matching wells in the table and then quickly covers both wells with identical cloths. Emilie is eager to grab the bell, as any eight-month-old would, but her father gently holds back her arms while the researcher distracts her with a funny face. After five seconds, Dad is signaled to ...Folksonomies: cognition child development
Folksonomies: cognition child development
1 notes
notesA number of complex cognitive tasks must come into play and coordinate properly for a child to recognize that an object has been moved from one hiding place to another.
02 JUN 2011 by ideonexus
Teens Share Their Parent's Political Preferences
Are the great generation-splitting debates that were characteristic of the 1960s and 1970s -- about everything from politics and religion to drugs and hair -- splitting today's generations? Not if the results of a new Gallup Youth Survey*, which asked teens to compare their social and political views with those of their parents, are any indication. While a fifth of U.S. teens (21%) say they are "more liberal" than their parents and 7% say "more conservative," 7 in 10 teens (71%) say their soc...So political ideology is mostly a matter of birth, not reason.
