07 MAR 2015 by ideonexus
The History of Cancer is Long
The battle of living things against cancer began so long ago that its origin is lost in time. But it must have begun, in a natural environment, in which whatever life inhabited the earth, was subjected, for good or ill, to influences that had their origin in sun and storm and the ancient nature of the earth. Some of the elements of this environment created hazards to which life had to adjust or perish. The ultraviolet radiation in sunlight could cause malignancy. So could radiations from cert... 1 
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notes24 JAN 2015 by ideonexus
Darwin and the Origins of Life
There is a curious parallelism between Darwin's twenty-year delay in publishing his theory of evolution and Newton's {102} twenty-year delay in publishing the Principia. And Newton's refusal to publish his cosmological speculations finds a parallel in Darwin's silence concerning the problem of the origin of life.
If we are to understand in general terms the place of life in the universe, we must also understand life's origin. Darwin explicitly excluded the origin of life from the scope of ... 1 notes
notes16 JAN 2015 by ideonexus
If Everyone is Altruistic
The day will come, says Spencer, when altruistic inclination will be so well embodied in our organism itself that people will compete for opportunities of self-sacrifice and immolation. When altruistic inclinations are implanted in everyone, how will opportunities arise to apply them? Either such a state presupposes the existence of persecutors, tormentors and tyrants, or else the general urge to sacrifice oneself will engender benefactors who will turn into tormentors and persecutors merel...
1 12 APR 2013 by ideonexus
The Origin of Chaos Theory
Lorenz and his team were working to develop a weather forecasting program on an early computer known as a Royal McBee LGP-30.21 They thought they were getting somewhere until the computer started spitting out erratic results. They began with what they thought was exactly the same data and ran what they thought was exactly the same code—but the program would forecast clear skies over Kansas in one run, and a thunderstorm in the next.
After spending weeks double-checking their hardware and t...Folksonomies: prediction chaos theory
Folksonomies: prediction chaos theory
1 Weather modeling produced two widely different results when a few thousandths of a decimal point went missing.
12 APR 2013 by ideonexus
Origin of the National Weather Service
The public at large became more interested in weather forecasting after the Schoolhouse Blizzard of January 1888. On January 12 that year, initially a relatively warm day in the Great Plains, the temperature dropped almost 30 degrees in a matter of a few hours and a blinding snowstorm came.26 Hundreds of children, leaving school and caught unaware as the blizzard hit, died of hypothermia on their way home. As crude as early weather forecasts were, it was hoped that they might at least be able... 1 notes
notesIn 1888 when a sudden snowstorm on a warm day killed hundreds of school children on their way home.
22 JUN 2012 by ideonexus
The Beauty of Being Ancestor to an Ape
Man is no new-begot child of the ape, bred of a struggle for existence upon brutish lines—nor should the belief that such is his origin, oft dinned into his ears by scientists, influence his conduct. Were he to regard himself as an extremely ancient type, distinguished chiefly by the qualities of his mind, and to look upon the existing Primates as the failures of his line, as his misguided and brutish collaterals, rather than as his ancestors, I think it would be something gained for the et... 1 notes
notesIs the ancient nature of our existence, and the ability to see ourselves as superior to other primates in mental function.
22 JUN 2012 by ideonexus
What Might Be VS What Is
It has hitherto been a serious impediment to the progress of knowledge, that is in investigating the origin or causes of natural productions, recourse has generally been had to the examination, both by experiment and reasoning, of what might be rather than what is. The laws or processes of nature we have every reason to believe invariable. Their results from time to time vary, according to the combinations of influential circumstances; but the process remains the same. Like the poet or the pa...Folksonomies: observation
Folksonomies: observation
1 notes
notesLooking for one is less productive than observing the other.
12 JUN 2012 by ideonexus
Journal Papers Don't Trigger Revolutions
It appears that the extremely important papers that trigger a revolution may not receive a proportionately large number of citations. The normal procedures of referencing are not used for folklore. A real scientific revolution, like any other revolution, is news. The Origin of Species sold out as fast as it could be printed and was denounced from the pulpit almost immediately. Sea-floor spreading has been explained, perhaps not well, in leading newspapers, magazines, books, and most recently ...Folksonomies: science popularization
Folksonomies: science popularization
1 notes
notesScience that makes the news does.
08 JUN 2012 by ideonexus
Wonder at the Age of the Earth
The great age of the earth will appear greater to man when he understands the origin of living organisms and the reasons for the gradual development and improvement of their organization. This antiquity will appear even greater when he realizes the length of time and the particular conditions which were necessary to bring all the living species into existence. This is particularly true since man is the latest result and present climax of this development, the ultimate limit of which, if it is...Folksonomies: evolution prescience
Folksonomies: evolution prescience
1 notes
notesLamarck believes we will marvel at the time it took us to get here, and wonder at the future apex we might reach.
05 JUN 2012 by ideonexus
Our Purpose is to Expand the Realm of the Known
The known is finite, the unknown infinite; intellectually we stand on an islet in the midst of an illimitable ocean of inexplicability. Our business in every generation is to reclaim a little more land, to add something to the extent and the solidity of our possessions. And even a cursory glance at the history of the biological sciences during the last quarter of a century is sufficient to justify the assertion, that the most potent instrument for the extension of the realm of natural knowled... 1 notes
notesJust a little bit in each generation.
