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An exploration of the serious/fun/ridiculous - past/present/future of the brain and the science that loves it.
The Omnibrain is a psychology graduate student at an online university. He hopes that the three weeks and $29.95 that he is spending on his Ph.D. will get him a job at a Tier 1 research university. Do online universities have postdocs? Ok...just kidding, The Omnibrain is a real graduate student at a real school somewhere in the continental United States - or maybe Europe.
October 13, 2009
Category: Animals • Stupid People • Weird
I am without words (ok .. clearly not).... but seriously this is the one and only time where I think PETA might make a worthwhile contribution to eliminating this silly behavior.
That dog really looks unhappy!
If you're really interested in torturing your pet here's the link to the costumes at spoiledrottondoggies.com (yes really).
Posted by The Omnibrain at 1:02 PM • 9 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
October 12, 2009
Category: Psychology • Stupid People
Seriously, a cat named George is a registered hypnotherapist with three professional organizations in Britain. The article not only presents these organizations as full of shit, it highlights the absolute stupidity of almost all applications of hypnosis.
Here's the details:
Chris Jackson, presenter of Inside Out in the North East and Cumbria, registered pet George with three industry bodies.Each one accepted a certificate from the non-existent Society of Certified Advanced Mind Therapists as proof of George's credentials.
It follows a similar investigation by an American clinical psychologist.
Dr Steve Eichel suspected industry bodies in the US were not running checks on their members.
He said: "I felt I'd test my hypothesis and I did that by getting my cat certified by a number of the most prominent lay hypnosis organisations in the United States. It was a frighteningly simple process."
In the UK, George was registered with the British Board of Neuro Linguistic Programming (BBNLP), the United Fellowship of Hypnotherapists (UFH) and the Professional Hypnotherapy Practitioner Association (PHPA).
Maybe I'll rant about hypnotherapy later if I can get this article resubmitted.
Posted by The Omnibrain at 8:05 PM • 6 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
October 9, 2009
Category:
Posted by The Omnibrain at 11:18 AM • 9 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
October 6, 2009
Category: Weird
juuuuust kidding.
But someone DID steal the Ig Nobel Prize. Bastards.... Be on the lookout for some funny looking dice mounted on a wooden thing.
Posted by The Omnibrain at 2:09 PM • 3 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Art • Psychology • Video • Vision • Weird
I've seen a lot of illusions... but this one is really f'n cool:
-via neatorama-
Posted by The Omnibrain at 9:55 AM • 3 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
October 5, 2009
Category: Physical Sciences • Popular Culture
I've previously explored Superman's X-Ray vision and its scientific basis. Now it seems that someone has FINALLY come up with a reasonable explanation of his flight. I'm pretty sure I could breed some Supermen now given the right lab space. Postdoc here I come!
Anyway, here's the abstract:
Since Time immemorial, man has sought to explain the powers of Kal-El, a.k.a. Superman. Siegel et al. Supposed that His mighty strength stems from His origin on another planet whose density and as a result, gravity, was much higher than our own. Natural selection on the planet of krypton would therefore endow Kal El with more e cient muscles and higher bone density; explaining, to rst order, Superman's extraordinary powers. Though concise, this theory has proved inaccurate. It is now clear that Superman is actually flying rather than just jumping really high; and His freeze-breath, x-ray vision, and heat vision also have no account in Seigel's theory. In this paper we propose a new uni ed theory for the source of Superman's powers; that is to say, all of Superman's extraordinary powers are manifestation of one supernatural ability, rather than a host. It is our opinion that all of Superman's recognized powers can be uni ed if His power is the ability to manipulate, from atomic to kilometer length scales, the inertia of His own and any matter with which He is in contact.
This is some serious science... look there's even some figures:
And some math!
Posted by The Omnibrain at 7:35 AM • 2 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Neuroscience • Popular Culture • Psychology • Vision
So how does Superman do it! He can see through buildings and clothing (he checks out Lois Lane's underwear in Superman 1 - more on this later). Many have attempted to answer this question of the ages yet few have explored this in as much depth as J.B. Pittenger who published a study in the journal Perception back in the stone ages (1983) entitled "On the plausibility of superman's x-ray vision"
But first, before we get into the meat of the paper, lets see what others around the InterWebs have said about Superman's amazing seeing through underwear powers.
In Correcting Misconceptions about Superman Lorenzo Vincent Aurelius says:
What of the other powers? Superman's X-ray vision is not truly x-ray vision. What do you think -- Superman's eyes emit x-rays, which he uses to see with? That's not how x-rays work. They require a source that aims the x-rays toward the receiving end, whether it be eyes or photographic film. No, Superman's vision involves sensing energy fields that have hitherto been unidentified by human science. These energy fields surround and pervade all forms of matter, varying by density and vibratory rate, according to the density and composition of the object. In other words, Superman is seeing the subtle energy fields involved in the inter-transformation of energy into matter. His ability to distinguish those fields depends upon the "signal-to-noise ratio" between any object he is sensing and any intervening objects. Lead, being dense, has a field so dense that less-dense fields behind it are hard to distinguish. Gold has the same effect. But since people do not commonly use gold as shielding, it has not been written about. So people think, "Lead blocks x-rays; lead blocks Superman's x-ray vision."
Ok so we need energy fields unidentified by human science. I'll go out on a limb and guess that the scientists of Superman's home planet have discovered this energy field but didn't include it in that weird crystal house/computer/whatever thing.
Answerbag.com has a number of great speculations as well:
Just like rods and cones in the human eye, Superman possibly has x-ray detecting crystals like Silicon or Cadmium-Telluride in his eye that detect x-rays passing through a special lens called Kumakhov polycapillary focusing x-ray lens implanted in his eye.The other possibility could be that x-rays get converted to normal light by a film of x-ray fluorescent material and then it is the normal work of the rods and cones like in case of the human eye.
and
Superman's eyes actually PROJECT X-rays; depending on how much is absorbed or reflected back at him allows him to see through solif objects.Back in the day, Superman's "heat vision" was actually just a creative use of his X-ray vision -- he would project enough X-Rays to actually melt or destroy an object.
and finally my favorite:
Posted by The Omnibrain at 7:11 AM • 11 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
October 2, 2009
Category: Brain Toys • Stupid People • Weird
Seriously... well not about the Zombie thing. Maybe if him and his family weren't such assholes people wouldn't do this kind of thing. Well, maybe people shouldn't do this to begin with. Here's the schtick from ESPN:
In "Frozen," Larry Johnson, a former executive at the Alcor Life Extension Foundation in Scottsdale, Ariz., writes that Williams' head, which had been severed and frozen for storage, was abused at the facility. Johnson claims a technician took baseball-like swings at Williams' frozen head with a monkey wrench.
Seriously... look what they did to his head!
Posted by The Omnibrain at 12:02 PM • 2 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
September 30, 2009
Category: Animals • Biology • Neuroart • Neuroscience • Weird
Wow, their brains are small. It all makes sense now - all they want to do is eat shit and kill their competitors.
Anyone want to translate the, what I'm assuming, is Japanese for me?
-Via Neatorama-
Posted by The Omnibrain at 1:39 PM • 3 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
