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Estonia to give DNA test and advice to citizens

Biology

Health and Medicine

Date: April, 2018

Source: New Scientist

Estonia plans to test the DNA structure of 100,000 residents and give advice regarding their predispositions to certain diseases so that they could adopt healthier lifestyles and take preventive measures.
“We want to invest in preventing or delaying the onset of common chronic diseases by using genetics to identify people at high risk,” says Jevgeni Ossinovski, Estonia’s minister of health and labour.
The country plans to do it eventually for the entire population.
Source: New Scientist, April 7-13, 2018
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Google with your Mind

Psychology

Technology

Date: April, 2018

Source: New Scientist

Two scientists at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology has developed a device that could detect what one is thinking, send Google queries and get replies from the Internet.

Arnav Kapur and Pattie Maes, the developers, called it AlterEgo, consisting of a headset that puts sensors in seven areas on the cheeks, jaw and chin, and which detects signals in these speech-related areas. In a demonstration with New Scientist writer Chelsea Whyte,  Kapur was asked several questions such as the population of Santiago, Chile, the square root of 360,005 and the product of two large numbers. Kapur just repeated the questions in his mind. The computer responded with the correct answers. In a test with eight people, AlterEgo could recognize words and numbers with 90% accuracy.
AlterEgo is just one of several artificial intelligence softwares being developed to read thoughts through brain waves or nerve signals. The implications can be alarming. The technology now is still in its infancy, but it seems only a matter of time before such devices can really read our thoughts with high accuracy.


Source: New Scientist, April 7-13, 2018
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Increased Cancer Rate in US Linked to Bad Environment

Health and Medicine

Date: May 13, 2017

Source: New Scientist

A study by Jyotsna Jagai and her colleagues at the University of Illinois compared data from the Environmental Quality Index from 2000 to 2005 with the incidence of cancer from 2006 to 2010.

Their findings reveal a correlation between increase in cancer incidence with the decrease in environmental quality, particularly in the case of prostate and breast cancer.

Source: New Scientist, May 13-19, 2017; https://www.newscientist.com/article/2130086-increased-cancer-rate-in-us-linked-to-bad-environment/

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/cncr.30709

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Why are Animals Altruistic?

Biology

Date: March, 2006

Source: Science Daily

Researchers at the Laboratoire d’Écologie at the University Pierre and Marie Curie (Ecole Normale Supérieure/CNRS) and the Royal Holloway College (London, United Kingdom) have just explained the evolution of altruistic behavior in animals.

In nature animals have been observed cooperating, and the detection of a genetic predisposition to this type of behavior contradicts Darwin’s theory of evolution which predicts a better survival rate for the most selfish animals. The use of mathematic modeling has provided a new explanation for the surprising persistence of this type of behavior which appears, at first sight, to be detrimental to the animal adopting it.

This work is published in Nature on 30 March 2006.

Source: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/04/060404201741.htm

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Pope Says Even Atheists Can Go to Heaven

Religion

Date: May 29, 2013

Source: National Public Radio (NPR); New York Daily News

Pope Francis stated that even atheists can go to Heaven so long as they are good people. The Pope stated this in a letter to La Reppublica as well as in a homily through Radio Vatican.

“The Lord has redeemed all of us, all of us, with the Blood of Christ: all of us, not just Catholics. Everyone! ‘Father, the atheists?’ Even the atheists. Everyone! . . .  And we all have a duty to do good. And this commandment for everyone to do good, I think, is a beautiful path towards peace. . . . We must meet one another doing good. ‘But I don’t believe, Father, I am an atheist!’ But do good: We will meet one another there.”

These statements have serious implications on whether people need to be converted to Catholicism before they are saved. The view of the Catholic Church for centuries was that “outside the Church there is no salvation.”

In a letter to La Reppublica, the Pope wrote: “God’s mercy has no limits, if you go to him with a sincere and repentant heart, the issue for those who do not believe in God is to obey their conscience.”

Sources: National Public Radio (NPR); https://www.npr.org/sections/parallels/2013/05/29/187009384/Pope-Francis-Even-Atheists-Can-Be-Redeemed

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/world/pope-francis-atheists-heaven-article-1.1354151

https://religionnews.com/2013/09/11/pope-francis-tells-atheists-to-obey-their-conscience/

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Pope Reported to Have Said that There is No Hell

Religion

Date: March 30 2018

Source: The Guardian; New York Times

The founder of Italian newspaper La Repubblica, Eugenio Scalfari, 93, wrote in an article that the Pope said during their conversation that hell does not exist. Unrepentant souls just disappear. The Vatican quickly clarified that the article was “the fruit of his reconstruction” and not “a faithful transcription of the Holy Father’s words”.

In the article, Scalfari wrote asked the Pope where “bad souls” go. The Pope, he said, replied: “They are not punished. Those who repent obtain God’s forgiveness and take their place among the ranks of those who contemplate him, but those who do not repent and cannot be forgiven disappear. A hell doesn’t exist, the disappearance of sinning souls exists.”

Such a view contradicts the standard doctrine of the Catholic Church that hell exists.

Sources: The Guardian, March 30, 2018; https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/mar/30/vatican-scrambles-to-clarify-popes-denial-that-hell-exists

New York Times, March 30, 2018; https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/30/world/europe/pope-francis-hell-scalfari.html

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Children’s Vocabulary Skills Linked to Family Income

Psychology

Education
Date: March, 2014
Source: NAEYC

Children’s vocabulary skills are linked to their economic backgrounds. A research by Stanford University shows that “by 3 years of age, there is a 30 million word gap between children from the wealthiest and poorest families. A recent study shows that the vocabulary gap is evident in toddlers. By 18 months, children in different socio-economic groups display dramatic differences in their vocabularies. By 2 years, the disparity in vocabulary development has grown significantly”.

Source: https://www.naeyc.org/resources/pubs/tyc/feb2014/the-word-gap

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Telekinetic Able to Lift Table

Parapsychology
Date: June, 2017
Source: Journal of Scientific Exploration

A research on a telekinetic subject in Brazil appeared to show that he was able to lift one side of a table by putting his palms on the surface of the table. The research was done between June 2014 and December 2015, with five video cameras recording the events. Measuring instruments were used to record physical, physiological, and environmental variables.

Sources: Journal of Scientific Exploration, Vol. 31, No. 2, pp. 159–186, 2017. https://www.scientificexploration.org/docs/31/jse_31_2_Gimeno.pdf

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Reincarnation Case Study in Japan Involving Suicide

Parapsychology
Date: December, 2016
Source: Journal of Scientific Exploration

This is a case study of a Japanese who remembers his past life where he committed suicide. In his previous life, he belonged to the same family and thus the claimed memories and the facts could be compared more easily. The subject was also able to describe memories of his life–between–life.

Source: Journal of Scientific Exploration, Vol. 30, No. 4, pp. 524–536, 2016; https://www.scientificexploration.org/docs/30/jse_30_4_Ohkado.pdf

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More Europeans Becoming Non-Religious

Religion
Date: March, 2018
Source: The Guardian

A recent report published by Prof. Stephen Bullivant Of St. Mary’s University in London showed that more and more Europeans consider themselves as without religion. “Christianity as a default, as a norm, is gone, and probably gone for good – or at least for the next 100 years,” Bullivant said. His report is based on a social survey in 2014-16 among European countries.

Czech Republic is the least religious country in Europe, with 91% of people ages 16-29 having no religious affiliation. The figures in Sweden, Netherlands and Estonia are between 80-90%. UK follows with 70%. The most religious country is Poland, but still with 17% of young adults considering themselves as non-religious.

Article on the Website

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Creativity Linked to Alpha Brain Waves

Psychology
Biology
Humanities
Education
Date: March 2018
Source: New Scientist

If you need to produce your best creative work, try boosting your alpha brainwaves.
Joel Lopata at the University of Western Ontario, Canada, and his colleagues have found that people with more synchronised alpha waves are more creative and produce work of higher quality.

Source: https://www.newscientist.com/article/2162646-very-creative-people-have-a-special-kind-of-brain-activity/

Creative People%u2019s Brain Activity

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Artificial Intelligence Can Interpret Brain Scans to Know What a Person Sees

Psychology
Technology
Date: March 2018
Source: New Scientist

Artificial Intelligence in Japan is now able to guess what a person sees by analyzing brain scans.

An article in New Scientist states that “the AI is given an image of a person’s brain, taken with an fMRI scanner. The fMRI scanner shows the surges in blood flow that correspond with activity, so the different parts of the brain involved in processing the image light up on the scan. From this, the AI then produces a caption based on what it thinks the person was viewing. For example, one caption it generated was ‘A dog is sitting on the floor in front of an open door,’ which correctly described the scene.”

Source: https://arxiv.org/pdf/1802.02210.pdf

New Scientist, March, 2018

 

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Why Big Bang May Not Be the Beginning

Space Sciences
Date: March, 2018
Source: New Scientist

A theory in modern cosmology is suggesting that the Big Bang may not be the beginning of the universe. The Big Bounce Theory propounded by a number of physicists state that prior to the Big Bang the universe underwent contraction due to pressure until it reached a point that it expanded again. They say that the universe may have been undergoing continuous contraction and expansion. Paul J. Steinhardt of Princeton University, one of the proponents of the Cyclic Theory, says that this theory attempts to resolve the “homogeneity, isotropy, and flatness of the universe,” among other things observed.

This view is similar to the Hindu view about the periodic manifestation and dissolution (manvantara and pralaya) of the universe, a view also adopted by the Secret Doctrine of H. P. Blavatsky.

Sources: New Scientist, March 14, 2018; https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg23731690-700-why-the-big-bang-was-not-the-beginning/

Why Big Bang was not the beginning