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A brief trip to the surface

Pardon the long silence. A couple of posts fell to tech issues. And I'd love to blame the hiatus on a vacation. But mostly I've been off-blog and, for social media purposes, offline, because I've been immersed in writing a long feature. It's a fun, meaty, juicy, really substantial story, one of two great assignments I've been working on this summer. And I'm greatly enjoying it, especially when it goes well. But as I've found before, the longer (and deeper) the feature, the more exclusively I seem to need to give it my attention. Thus the lack of blogging, and of tweets. I don't seem to mix…

Swine-flu roundup: Alternatives to panic-or-dismiss

Theme of the day (again, sort of): managing expectation, or Do I panic or just ignore this thing and scoff at those who express concern? Neither, of course. I'm personally provisionally encouraged at the aggregated news from yesterday -- meaning I was glad to see that though the virus is spreading, its pace doesn't seem to be wildly accelerating and, more important, there are some signs that it's not (at this point) horrifically virulent; some experts are saying it might not be much worse than a regular seasonal flu, and the warming weather is on our side. Same time, it makes sense to take…

Iraq, torture, and the chain of command

via Nicholson cartoons Veteran, author, and blogger Kelly Williams, who was there, ponders what torture does to the torturers: There have been lots of questions raised -- about the history and effectiveness of these techniques, the impact on those tortured, the larger foreign policy implications -- all of which are important considerations. There is, however, one aspect of the conversation that I believe has been neglected: What does this do to those committing the acts? [snip] Some of those who participated in the 1971 Stanford Prison Experiment (please check out that site -- it is totally…

This Week's Sci-Fi Worthy Parasite

Mind Control. Body-Snatchers. They sound like they're straight out of a science fiction novel, but the truth is parasites have been ahead of us in manipulatory technology for eons. They're the best of the best at making another species bend to their will. Here are some examples of some science facts that sound like they belong in science fiction - all courtesy of your everyday parasite. So, since I already have a weekly does of cute, I figure I'll balance it out with a weekly dose of something that's about as far from cute as I can find - a really awesome parasite. The most familiar example…

Mixed Results...

I try not to be overtly political, but I personally believe that America has made the right choice today in electing Barack Obama. I was rediculously tired tonight. I wanted nothing more than to go to bed at 9 PM. But I decided that I had to stay up to witness this historic event. Of course, there I was, waiting to hear how Florida's votes would go, and Obama won without them, as soon as Cali, Washington, and Oregon reported. Obama won by a landslide - I couldn't be more relieved. With this election, the US has taken one more step towards true equality and freedom. However, my joy is tainted…

Donate blood - and get laid!

If you're struggling to pick up chicks, perhaps you should change your strategy. Instead of hanging out at bars boasting how much you can bench press, you might spending a few hours with some cute nurses at a Bloodmobile. Why? Because women think that guys who are altruistic are hot. A new study published in the British Journal of Psychology by researchers at the University of Nottingham has found that being selfless can be sexually attractive, particularly for women. In studies of more than 1,000 people, researchers discovered that women place significantly greater importance on altruistic…

Ig Nobel Award Winners - Move over Darwin Awards!

For those of you who don't know, there are awards handed out every year to people who "do a service to humanity by removing themselves from the gene pool," lovingly named the Darwin Awards. Great stuff, if you want to get a good laugh at someone else's stupidity, but this is better. Every October real nobel laureates give out "Ig Nobel" awards to the best scientific research that makes you "laugh, then think." Organized by the Annals of Improbable Research, the Ig Nobel prizes are given in the same fields as the Nobel prizes, plus a few extra which vary year to year. The winners' research is…

A Question For The Ages : Does a beard keep you warmer in the cold?

I've always heard that a beard can keep you warmer during the winter months but how can you really know?! After all, if you start with a beard and then shave it off there might be some strange adaptation effect going on. And who knows the memory of cold might be completely inaccurate anyway. That's where Pete Hickey from Canada comes in (of course he lives in Canada). I had only one choice. Shave half of my beard. The experiment I shaved the right half of my beard. The result can be seen in the picture above. I then proceeded to perform my various outdoor activities. Weight I…

The Political Brain.... again...

Just about every election cycle and Superbowl Marco Iacoboni and his lab do some sort of neuroimaging study to determine what people are actually thinking about the political candidates or their teams. Every time these studies come out you can hear the popular press cheering and smiling while you can hear scientists and bloggers cringing in disgust. The most recent study, instead of being published in a peer review journal, was published in the NYTimes. Head over there to give it a read before you continue on. People cite many reasons to be doubtful of these studies, some complete nonsense…

The Real Mozart Effect and why we should support music education

Music education in the United States has typically been one of the first thing to be cut when it comes to balancing the budget. This is a horrible shame since music is one of those things (above any of the other arts) that has a wide ranging effect on peoples intellectual achievement. One of the holy grails in education and psychology is skill transference. Imagine being able to train one ability that positively affects the performance of many many other abilities. Sounds a bit ridiculous eh?! Well, music seem to be one of the only things that can have this effect. Psychologists have…

Baselines, Baselines, Baselines

Three shifting baselines to note today: 1) An article in today's New York Times by Andrew Revkin discusses how "scientists are setting baselines to gauge future effects on the seas." The article is a nice summary of some of the latest attempts to document the decline in ocean health even if it's not brimming with lots of new facts. This example Revkin cites is a perfect shifting baseline: In the 1970s, I worked summers for the Rhode Island marine fisheries agency. At one point, I was tagging lobsters as part of an effort to find ways to revive depleted populations. A crusty old custodian in…

Dirty Jobs, Hagfish, and...Hot Presenters?

I got a tip on a Discovery show called Dirty Jobs that aired tonight and explored the slimy hagfishery off the coast of Maine. I was interested to see it but (I'll expose a little of my technological incompetence) was unable to download the software and so went in search of reviews. People seem to love Dirty Jobs and the slime eel show sounds particularly enticing: Mike then heads to the coast of Maine to join forces with slime eel fishermen. Climbing around a hagfish boat, his first task is to separate buckets full of eels from their slime. Mike quickly learns why they're called "slime…

Zanzibar's Missing Fish

Tanzania used to be two countries. Now, Tanzania still has two sets of fisheries data and two options for reporting their fish catch: report it all (accurate) or report only half (inaccurate). Currently, only the mainland reports their fish internationally; Zanzibar's fish are missing from the statistics. Again, a brief history is useful: In the past, the mainland (called Tanganyika) and Zanzibar were separate countries. Both Tanganyika and Zanzibar fell under German colonial control in 1886 and then to the British in 1920, after WWI. Tanganyika gained independence in 1961 and Zanzibar…

My Eating Well Story on Wild Salmon -- and the Times' Story on Lost Wild Salmon

Suddenly it's salmon everywhere -- or in some cases, nowhere. My story on "The Wild Salmon Debate: A Fresh Look at Whether Eating Farmed Salmon is ... Well ... OK," was published a couple weeks ago in Eating Well. You can see the Eating Well web version here or download a pdf here. The story describes why I came to swear off eating farmed Atlantic salmon because of their impact on wild salmon fisheries, which have enough troubles as it is. I’m increasingly convinced that the larger issue of farmed versus wild salmon poses a similar choice. The withering array of injuries that salmon farms…

This Week's Sci-Fi Worthy Parasite: Mermithid Nematodes

There are a lot of parasites that cause strange changes in their hosts. Parasites turn hosts into zombiesgorge on the flesh of the host from the inside out, even assist a host's suicide. But one of the most interesting and extreme changes caused by a parasite is achieved by the mermithid nematode. Simply put: it makes dude mayflies look like ladies. You see, like many other nematodes, the adults of the species are free living. But their young enjoy all the comforts of living off the hard work of other species, specifically the mayfly. Mayflies are known for their peculiar life cycle - they…

In Honor Of The Holiday

I'm sure most of you are aware that today is a truly special holiday. It's a day where we can honor those who have come before and done a great service to us - one single remembrance of those who have fallen before their time and the contributions they've made to us all. Of course, I'm referring to Towel Day. I presume you all have carried a towel with pride today. If you haven't, you are missing out. As the Hitchhiker's guide explains: A towel, it says, is about the most massively useful thing an interstellar hitchhiker can have. Partly it has great practical value. You can wrap it around…

This Week's Sci-Fi Worthy Parasite

Ah, I know, I missed a parasite last week. I was on vacation. So sue me. Anyhow, this week's lovely parasite is worth the wait. Meet the Loa Loa worm. Loa Loa worms ( Loa Loa filaria) are a kind of filarial nematode which is spread by fly bite. Filarial nematodes are a lovely bunch of parasites, resposible for wonderful diseases like Elephantiasis - but I'll get into that one another day. They all have similar life cycles: first, as a lovely adult in the host of choice (like us), the male and female nematodes mate and produce lots of adorable little larvae called microfilariae. These take up…

Another study to file under the "duh" category...

Men see scantily clad women as objects according to new research. ...Anyone shocked? To be entirely scientific, the research, presented at the AAAS annual meeting , showed that the parts of the brain responsible for tool use and action lit up when Princeton college undergrads were shown images of women in bikinis (without their faces) for a fraction of a second. "This is just the first study which was focused on the idea that men of a certain age view sex as a highly desirable goal, and if you present them with a provocative woman, then that will tend to prime goal-related responses," said…

Happy Anniversary, Seneca Falls!

This weekend is the 160th anniversary of the first (US) women's rights convention at Seneca Falls, July 19 and 20, 1848. At Seneca Falls, Elizabeth Cady Stanton rewrote the Declaration of Independence as the Declaration of Women's Rights, beginning, of course, with "We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men and women are created equal..." And the Declaration included the shocking call for women's right to vote. It took 72 years till the right to vote was accomplished. The final resolution in the Declaration called "for the overthrowing of the monopoly of the pulpit, and for…

Dumbest Reason Ever for Not Supporting Paid Parental Leave

I was browsing the Women's Policy Inc. site, which is awesome, and ran across an item in the June 16, 2008 issue of The Source that just left me with my mouth hanging open. I can't find a permalink for this item; follow this link and scroll down to the fifth item, "House Approves Paid Parental Leave for Federal Employees". What's under discussion is a bill that would allow federal employees to be paid for four of the twelve weeks of parental leave to which they are entitled under the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) (P.L. 103-3). The legislation also would permit federal employees to…

SD '08 - The Candidates Have Been Invited!

Here's the word, from Sheril at The Intersection - and the word is exciting! For months everyone has been asking us, when will there be an invitation sent to candidates...a date... a venue... Well it's finally happened! It's official. Hillary Clinton, Mike Huckabee, John McCain, and Barack Obama have been invited to ScienceDebate2008. The location? Philadelphia's Franklin Institute, named after one of our nation's greatest scientists (and greatest patriots). The date? April 18, days before the Pennsylvania Primary. We're so close to seeing this through and now more than ever, we need you're…

Plant Anyway

So, it's Blog Action Day, and we're all supposed to post something related to the environment. Science Woman has a very hopeful post about how "having a daughter has brought the idea of intergenerational responsibility into much sharper focus" for her. What shall I tell you? I spent a good part of this afternoon clearing out a neglected, overgrown flower bed in the backyard. It was a beautiful day to be out working in the yard, warm and sunny. We're going to be in the low to mid-70s the rest of the week. That's 15 to 20 degrees warmer than average for this time of year. It was a very…

Let's All Have A Party!

SuzyQueue is a frequent commenter on this blog and usually has something interesting to say. I just had to promote one of her latest comments to a blog post: I have made it a point to celebrate each 'first' woman elected to membership in the engineering professional societies by ordering a cake and having a party in the student commons area. I read a short biography of the woman whose birthday we are celebrating. I do celebrate other birthdays and since I am buying the cake, I get to decide the event, whether it be a person's, building's, or event's birthday. I celebrate Chuck Yeager's…

No, it's not an ancestor either (probably)

In addition to the "missing link" trope that is being dished out about the new primate fossil, is another one, more subtle and insidious: it's the ancestor of all primates. How do they know that? Consider a biologically realistic scenario: at the time there were probably hundreds of species of small bodied mammals with tails and feet like that. One of these species may be the ancestor of all primates, but what are the odds that a specimen from that species is the one that was preserved? Just as all primates now look remarkably similar overall, but one may be the common ancestor of a group in…

The Role of Science in Politics: A Plea for Activism

Suppose that you are taking a walk through the hills above a town, and you reach the foot of a dam. There's a crack in the dam, and it's getting wider. You run back down to the town, and you knock on doors, and you yell and make a fuss, and you tell everyone that the dam is breaking. They thank you for the news, and go back to bed. What do you do next? Do you grab some tools and do what you can to fix the dam, or do you turn and walk away? Strangely, a number of people (including ScienceBlogger Matt Nisbet) seem to think that the role of the scientific community in those circumstances…

Disclosure and the Discovery Institute

The fine folks at the Discovery Institute aren't happy with tomorrow's PBS documentary on the Dover Intelligent Design case, and they're doing their best to make sure that everyone knows just how unhappy they are. They've been frantically tossing articles up on their Media Complaints Division Blog trying to make sure that their version of reality gets some exposure. I'm not going to bother going through all of their complaints right now. Most of their new material consists of a rehashing of discredited arguments from when the ruling came out. There's one post that caught my eye, though,…

Got Time?

Over the last few days, I've had a lot of conversations with scientists about what scientists can do to help change the way that the American public views science. The phrase, "what can I do?" has come up more than once in these conversations, but every time it has I've discovered that I was actually being asked a slightly different question: "what can I do that won't take up much time or cause me much inconvenience." It's a frustrating question, but a fair one. Scientists, like most other academics, tend to be overworked and underpaid - particularly in the university setting. Most of the…

Why knowing basic science is important in medicine.

According to media reports, the anti-impotence drug Viagra was recently used in the UK to save the life of a premature infant. Yes, you did read that right. This case was apparently an instance where necessity and desperation were the mothers of invention, and it shows us just why it is so important for doctors to learn the basics of human physiology, instead of just "cookbook" medicine. It also shows the scientific method at work, in a real-life situation. The problem was this: the baby, Lewis Goodfellow, was born extraordinarily prematurely, after only 24 weeks of gestation, and weighed in…

The Neoceratodus campaign

Hug a lungfish! I've had about 8 requests for further information on saving the Australian lungfish. That's a good start, and thanks to everyone who wrote in, but it's not enough. Look at that beautiful finny beast to the right; do you want them all to die? And seriously, look at those fins: aren't they spectacular? Don't you want to know how they develop and how they evolved? The Australian government is planning to dam the last rivers on which these spectacular vertebrates live, and that will be it for them. We'll be left with nothing but bones and tissue samples and few relics in aquaria…

The Procrastination Principle

I spent a lot of time not doing my thesis. I used to call all the internet articles, posts and latterly blogs Avoiding The Thingy (the thesis that dare not speak its name). Simultaneously, as a manager, I adhered to what I called Lazy Manager Theory - the guiding principle of which was that any manager who had to micromanage their staff (I had 9 staff) was doing it wrong. I worked on what I called the Bomb Crater Theory of Desk Organisation, following a news clipping I once saw. Any piece of paperwork that found its way to me (and I made it hard for that to happen), was placed in the…

PhotoShopping Science

A paper gets retracted in Cell because of image manipulation. Someone needs to tell scientists how not to use PhotoShop when preparing their images. I used to do precisely that to new researchers at the institute I worked at. Here are Wilkins' Rules of Scientific Image Manipulation: 1. If you have a blemish on your image, leave it there. Removing a blemish is like excising a word you don't like in a quoted piece of text. You may very well think it is irrelevant, but it may turn out to be the indicator of some artifact in your technique, so removing it looks like you are hiding something.…

Ten things about evolution

Razib at Gene Expression has called for a followup to the "evolution in ten words or less" post he previously had and which I responded to (linked in his post above) with a call for "ten assertions about evolution". So I just saw this, and of course I rise to the challenge... 1. All progress in evolution is local. Any longer term trends are either responses to long term environmental changes or stochastic. 2. Natural selection is not evolution (as Fisher said in his Genetical Theory in 1930. Evolution also covers taxonomic diversity, random processes, sexual selection, and so forth. 3.…

Update on my trip

So, some of you are wondering what's happened. Well, maybe one of you is. Hi mum. I went to the Philosophy of Microbiology conference at Exeter - somebody forgot to tell the English that it's supposed to be cold here. I got sunburned! An Australian getting sunburned in England! How embarrassment. I delivered my microbial species concept talk, and it generated a lot of discussion. Some thought it entirely unnecessary, while others (including many scientists) thought it had good points. We'll see. As it happens, I visited David Williams and the Natural History Museum in London today, and he…

Evolution in less than 10 words

Razib has proposed an interesting challenge: Define evolution in ten words or less. His definition is this: Differential fitness correlated with heritable variation results in evolution John Hawks' suggestion is this: No evolution means equal offspring for everyone! But both of these focus only on the genetic or selective aspect of evolution (including genetic drift under that rubric). There's a lot more happening in evolution that selection and drift. So here's my suggestion: Diversity changes through time at all levels of biology. Why do I not focus on heredity, variation, or selection?…

Home again

So I'm home from Ish, and the front part of my brain is giddy and tired while the rest has just shut down. I don't travel well, I'm afraid. One thing that I came back fired up over are the unfinished projects I have running. So I intend to finish them. They are, in no particular order: 1. Denying that genes have information [heresy #1] Status: Written and needing to be submitted. 2. Denying that functions in biology exist outside models [heresy #2] Status: Written but badly in need of a rewrite. 3. Denying that essentialism ever existed in biology [#3. Four more and I get a free auto…

It's All About Timing: The "Gnome" Piece

Timing is everything. That (I'm pretty sure) was the case of my first piece getting into Maisonneuve. And again, it is something that comes up with consistent frequency in my quest to publish. For instance, my gnome piece (shouldn't everyone have a gnome piece?), is another example of this notion, except that in this case, timing worked against me. Here, McSweeney's gave it the pass due to their having another "sentient gnome piece" published already. Which makes perfect sense because if there are too many, well, then a literary endeavour is bound to develop a reputation, a tradition even,…

The Smokin' Hot Enlightenment: In Reply to the Ask a Natural Philosophy Blogger Query of the Week

Having been asked as a Science Blogger the following: If you could have practiced science in any time and any place throughout history, which would it be, and why?... I say: Mid-Eighteenth Century France or Thereabouts (with Scottish and Swedish and American colleagues, sure) Diderot, D'Alembert, Condillac, Condorcet, Rousseau, Voltaire, Lavoisier, David Hume, Benjamin Franklin, Linnaeus, let's put him in there too. Just think about D & D's L'Encyclopedie alone: The tree of knowledge, great plates about everything (heads, mineralogy, artisan workshops), and it just goes on. That…

History of the Nobel

As the Nobel Prize announcements are due to come out soon, it would be good if you knew your Nobel history. Lawrence Altman for the NYTimes has an excellent article on it. Money quote: Yet in a little known story, the Nobel Prizes, the first of which will be announced on Monday, almost never came to be, largely because of the unsophisticated way Nobel drew up his will. It was flawed and legally deficient because he lived in many places and never established a legal residence. Nobel resided for many years in France, made intermittent visits to a home in Sweden and amassed assets in many…

Grammar wars in Queensland

I don't have a very positive experience of the State of Queensland's education system. Two children I brought here from Victoria when I took up my present position were doing well until they got here. Now both left before completing school amidst confusion and boredom to my great dismay. It's not that there aren't well intentioned teachers, or that Victoria was replete with Poet's Society-type teachers, but that Queensland insists on doing things its own way, meaning that the curriculum is impenetrable to an outsider. An example of this has come to light, as evidenced by a couple of…

The Friday Fermentable: Australian Shiraz recommendations from the WSJ

The Friday Fermentable has been the unfortunate victim of my aim to lose some weight by cutting alcohol out of my diet. Since mid-November, I have lost 14 pounds but am now permitting myself two glasses of wine on each weekend evening. Hence, I am choosing carefully. (I should note, for the record, that a dear cancer research colleague of mine remarked upon hearing of my new "diet," that "it is irrational for any scientist to intentionally remain sober, especially in this funding climate.) So, in easing back in, The Friday Fermentable shall be short and will derive from today's "Tastings"…

I have enraged some Canadians

And it is so cute and adorable. A while back, I laughed at the theocrats of Christian Governance. Apparently, the exposure stung, prompting one of them to write a whiny little rant. Here's how it begins: It has been very interesting engaging with atheists over the past couple of weeks. They came looking for us, finding our website, it seems, due to exposure by a PZ Myers, a biologist and associate professor at the University of Minnesota. Mr. Myers is brash about his own atheism, declaring that his website is about "Evolution, development, and random biological ejaculations from a godless…

Artificial intelligence may answer some key questions about insect flight

Anyone who has tried to capture a fly or other insect can't help but marvel at their aeronautic prowess. Their reflexes are lightning-fast, and they seem to avoid obstacles before they are even perceptible. The brain of a fly or a honey bee is as little as a millionth the size of a human brain, with as few as a hundred thousand neurons compared to our hundred billion. How can such small computing power lead to such effective flight? Yet flying insects also exhibit curious behavior. They land when flying into a headwind, and gain elevation with a tailwind. Some honey bees will land on the…

Pressworthy controversy and sour grapes

The New York Times has what I consider a skewed but also personally flattering summary of the Secular Humanist convention. Skewed, because it focuses rather more on the disagreements on tactics that were on display, but weren't really the focus of most of the discussions — it was actually an amicable meeting. Personally flattering, because it dwelt more on that firebrand Myers (my full remarks are on the record) than was actually deserved. It read as if I were flailing among the dissenters, smiting the impure atheists with the jawbone of an ass, when I was really one among many in diverse…

Our Massive Communication Failure on Climate Change

Perhaps only scientists could be such a bunch of media naifs that they would release a pivotally important report--one so significant that it only comes out once every five years--on a Friday. But that and other failings, combined with well-known pathologies of the media itself, collectively helped to ensure that the latest policymakers' summary from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (PDF) made only a minor blip on the public's radar screen. Matthew Nisbet now has the definitive take on how and why this massive communication breakdown occurred--a breakdown that is all the more…

IPCC on Hurricanes and Global Warming?

As Roger Pielke, Jr., has already noted, word has it that the new IPCC report will say that hurricanes have measurably intensified due to global warming. Roger warns that, if true, this will cause huge controversy. I would go even further and say that if true--and that's still a huge caveat at this point--this will be the most controversial part of the report. However, it's important to pay attention to the alleged details. According to the same media scoop (by the AP's Seth Borenstein), the IPCC's language will merely say that it's "more likely than not" that changes to hurricanes have…

Three Days To Go: Speak the Words

One of the rewarding things about publishing The Republican War on Science has been to sit back and watch as the book's title phrase has caught on. Now and then one finds bloggers using the words "Republican war on science" without any attribution--which is fine with me. Meanwhile, "war on science" panels are now popping up at conferences. The phrase hasn't exactly achieved the exalted status of other book titles-turned-expressions like "tipping point," of course. But it has taken on a modest life of its own. Politicians are using it too. For example, at the Yearly Kos science panel in Las…

NASA's Course Correction

This is a heady day. For the first time, perhaps, we can actually say that the Bush administration, charged with some type of interference with science, has responded by cleaning up its act, rather than by denying or ignoring that the problem exists. Alas, it's really only a small sliver of the administration that is behaving in such a constructive manner. Nevertheless, it's a start. The agency to be commended appears to be NASA, which is going to let its scientists speak freely (as long as they don't claim to represent the agency) and which is being praised by said scientists for doing so.…

Rick Piltz Website Launched

For those of you who don't know of him already, Rick Piltz is one of the many science whistleblowers to run screaming from the Bush administration. I've written about him here. Formerly of the Climate Change Science Program, Piltz famously drew attention to the editing of government climate reports by White House official Philip Cooney, who subsequently resigned and, as pretty much everyone now knows, went to work for ExxonMobil. Now Piltz has launched a website, entitled "Climate Science Watch," that's full of goodies like this. For one thing, he has exposed a troubling inquiry by Senator…

So Long, El Tejon

We hardly knew ya! In the long history of American monkey trials, your rather puny attempt to undermine evolution--the case was quickly settled in our favor once the inevitable legal threat came down--may be worthy of a footnote. Or maybe not. It really depends on whether or not other creationists try to adopt your strategy of packaging anti-evolutionism in the guise of a philosophy class, rather than a science class. Still, let's count down your errors. You made the same mistake that creationists always make: Wearing your religion on your sleeve. The teacher of your now-infamous course even…

Are artists vision experts?

Today's reading is "Artists as Experts in Visual Cognition," by Aaron Kozbelt of the University of Chicago (Visual Cognition, 2001). We need to incorporate many skills in order to make visual sense of the world. We must be able to discern objects even when we have incomplete visual information, pick out shapes from complex environments, and mentally rotate images to compare them with other images. All these phenomena have been measured by psychologists, and they have found that different individuals have varying degrees of skill at them. What kind of people are best at these visual skills?…