Science Notes (3/27/26)

It has been a minute or two since the last Science Notes — this subset of Friday Notes where I share bits and pieces of science news that have caught my eye.

In fact, the last of these was back in October, and the reason I didn’t post sooner was that not many articles have caught my eye since. In part because I’ve found myself skipping more and more articles due to lack of interest.

I fear it’s also in part because science has become so broken these days, so lost in fantastical speculation that I’ve begun skipping articles in which the word “might” or “could” plays a prominent role.

Which eliminates nearly all medical science articles, most archeology and anthropology articles, and articles speculating about space travel. I also skip articles on climate change because it’s clear the human race isn’t up to actually doing anything about it, so why bother.

It’s kind of down to articles about physics, chemistry, engineering, and other more factual, less speculative articles. (Though I have to be selective with physics articles because some of those are more science fiction than science. Will we ever accept that SUSY does not exist or that String Theory is a mistake?)

There are two types of people: those who think there are two types of people; and those who know better, who live in a more nuanced world. That said, we humans often do categorize ourselves in essentially binary ways when it comes to our beliefs. We divide, for instance, in our spiritual views as well as in our political and social views.

In last February’s edition of Friday Notes, I wrote:

Yet I’m also a long-time fan of Curt Jaimungal’s Theories of Everything YouTube channel, and a notable characteristic is his encompassing sympathy for theories I frankly tend to dismiss as not likely to be right.

I think in terms of outlook we divide into skeptics and the open-minded who believe some version of “anything is possible.” If it hasn’t been obvious in my writing, I’m definitely a skeptic. Have been all my life. I’ve never believed any version of “anything is possible” because I’ve always seen it as false.

Perhaps the division also has to do with those willing to take a stand on a position, willing to go on record. Which of course means possibly being wrong, and I wonder if some prevaricate not because their minds are so open but because they’re afraid to be wrong.

We humans do have a weird relationship with being wrong — some seem to find it intolerable.

Well, actually, I do, which is why I invest so much of myself in learning things. Being wrong stings, but that has a wonderful effect — if you can accept your wrongness with grace — in helping steer you back on path. Learning from our mistakes seems far more powerful to me than learning by received (but not directly experienced) knowledge. I remember much better the things I got wrong than I do the things I got right.

But I digress. The point is that my Science Notes file isn’t big despite it being almost six months since the last buffer flush. I find things have their season with me (or seasons sometimes). Back in the 1990s I was seriously into graphic novels, but that interest faded and never returned. Season. Back then I was also seriously into Japanese anime. That faded for a while then returned then faded again and most recently returned. Seasons.

I’ve been into computer programming since the 1970s. As the tagline on my programming blog says, “I can’t stop writing code!” The interest has had some ups and downs but has always remained fairly strong. On the other hand, my childhood stamp-collecting and coin-collecting seasons were very short and very far behind me. Rock collecting lasted a bit longer, and I still have some of those.

I think my interest in New Scientist magazine may be in its autumn. Each week I find myself skimming, or even skipping, more and more articles. What I’ve come to realize is that, to fill a weekly magazine, they have a fairly inclusive editorial policy. Lots of articles speculating what some minor discovery implies or might mean. Maybe it’s because I’m 70 (and childless) that speculation about the future doesn’t interest me much. It’s so often wrong, and even if it’s right, will I live to see it? (This is especially poignant for me with regard to interesting future space missions.)

Bottom line, it occurs to me it could be the last Science Notes post. (But that would be speculating about the future, which so often turns out to be wrong. Almost no science fiction authors predicted smartphones, and many thought faxes and printouts would still be a thing.)

Prisoner’s Dilemma

I’m not sure why I copied this part of the article:

Each player’s payoffs can be shown as the number of years they serve in prison. If both stay silent, the payoff for each is-1. If player A betrays player B, A gets 0 and B gets-3. Betray each other, and A and B get-2 each. How can a player maximise the payoff?

From a New Scientist article about … some aspect of the Prisoner’s Dilemma. But I don’t remember the article or what struck me about it. (I kinda wonder if I got distracted and forgot to come back and copy more of it. This little paragraph tells me nothing I haven’t known for ages.)

It might have been something about cooperation in humans? Something about game theory? (Which some think is a foundation for a moral structure.) Sorry, no clue.

Nothing’s certain

Speaking of binary division in politics:

WHEN it comes to understanding the ups and downs of liberal democracy, conventional research looks at drivers such as economics, emotions and education. But another area is just as crucial: neurology.

I read recently that one reason pollsters got the 2016, 2020, and 2024 elections so wrong is that their methodology (awful word: their method) didn’t factor in education. Another is that Presidential elections are notoriously hard to predict because there are so many influential factors. Such as education.

After all, liberal democracy challenges our brain in ways that other political systems don’t. Where dictatorships offer certainty about the future – just think of Adolf Hitler’s 1000-year time horizon – liberal democracy offers almost none, save certain election dates. It presents the future as an open space to be shaped by us and our choices, nothing more, nothing less.

I’d never really thought about that!

Politically, that is an achievement. Cognitively, it can be terrifying. Until the arrival of liberal democracy, the future was in the hands of a select few. […] Neurologically, the ambiguity and flexibility of the future that comes with liberal democracy can be a challenge because it brings with it uncertainty – something human minds abhor. Studies show that uncertainty is a neurological tension state more uncomfortable than the certainty of receiving an electric shock, […]

And as I posted about not long ago, many humans (predominately male) would rather receive electric shocks than be alone in their own heads. (Is it any real wonder I’m such a misanthrope?)

Where you fall on the tolerance-to-uncertainty spectrum depends on a number of things – such as culture, age and gender – but it is also to do with how your brain is wired. Political neuroscience shows that the brains of people with conservative views favour security and avoid open-ended solutions with no clear closure. They tend to have increased volume in their amygdala, the region responsible for threat signalling. This means they feel more discomfort in the face of novelty and surprise.

[Emphasis mine.] In contrast:

Liberal brains, in turn, have a higher tolerance for uncertainty and conflict, as they have more grey matter volume in a brain area implicated in the processing of ambiguity called the anterior cingulate cortex.

It seems that “liberal” brains are more suited to a modern world filled with uncertainty and conflict. A question the article waves at (see below) is whether education during mental development has any effect on this wiring. Fire together; wire together. Can we educate our young to handle a modern world?

But when uncertainty levels rise – say, because several future trajectories are unclear, from the environment to technology and social norms – certain brains might be pushed too far out of their comfort zone. To remedy this tension state, such people will be susceptible to illusions of certainty provided by populist, authoritarian political actors who promise decisionism and black-and-white world views.

As we have seen. And this makes a lot of sense to me. (But it accords with my worldview and intuition, so of course it makes sense.)

The article waves at a solution:

This doesn’t mean we are stuck with illiberal brains. Rather, liberal democracies need to communicate more honestly with their electorate that embracing liberalism might not come naturally. The strategies we need to adopt in education, public discourse and civil society should be based on insights into how to overcome illiberal mechanisms at the neurological level.

I’m not sure how effective it would be for liberal democracies (not that we actually have one of those) to tell conservatives that “embracing liberalism might not come naturally.”  Nor am I sure anyone can have much effect on “public discourse”. (Maybe we need a “B Ark”.)

The article ends:

We need to signal to our brains what can be won through cooperation across identity and interest groups, and how, ultimately, the big global challenges of our time can be overcome only by overcoming our brains’ vulnerabilities together.

I think there is a disconnect in much liberal thinking, an inability to comprehend how different is the thinking of conservatives. There’s a clip from a Marvel superhero movie where a superhero tells a politician, ‘You need to do better.’

So often it seems the liberal solution is that people just need to do better.

Well, of course, but the trick is accomplishing that.

I think it starts with taking education seriously. One of the more astonishing abject failures of society in my eyes is how poorly we educate our children. Why would we thoroughly stunt, or even disable, their futures? I have lots of teachers in my mom’s side of the family tree (including my mom and my sister). Nearly every teacher I’ve known is dedicated to their profession but so often badly hamstrung by policies, politics, and budget.

As an aside, I’ve read that teachers aren’t generally revered in Jewish culture because it’s seen as something anyone can do. Anyone can pass on their knowledge to children. Anyone can help children learn. And it’s true, but it requires educated adults (and if teachers aren’t revered in Jewish culture, education very much is — a lesson more Gentiles need to pick up on).

That said, there is more to teaching than passing on knowledge. We benefit from centuries of teaching our young, and teachers tap into this body of knowledge, but are too often limited by essentially non-education-related constraints.

Bottom line: humanity … is tricky. With 8+ billion of us, really tricky.

Sleep

This one fascinated me:

THE brain doesn’t gradually fall asleep. Instead, it reaches a tipping point at which it rapidly transitions from wakefulness to sleep – a discovery that could improve our treatment of sleep disorders.

I think most of us have experienced this. We don’t really “drift off to sleep” — we stumble into it like tripping over a thought. One moment you’re lying in bed and the next you’re opening your eyes to morning.

As I recall, the article was about how distinctly different awake and sleep states are (and there are many sub-states within both).

Beer

I’ll end with one of my favorite topics: beer! There is apparently much debate among anthropologists about what drove us to switch to farming from our former hunter-gatherer lifestyle. Part of the debate rages around whether bread or beer was a key driver.

To complicate things further, it turns out that these hunter-gatherers also appear to have brewed beer. Raqefet cave in Israel was a Natufian burial site, where about 30 bodies were interred. There, Liu, Wang and their colleagues found three stone mortars that had been packed with multiple wild plants, including wheat, barley and legumes, and then left to ferment, producing a porridge-like beer. The vessels dated from between 11,700 and 13,700 years ago – evidence that brewing also predates farming.

Some animals enjoy fruit that falls and ferments, and I can well imagine that our ancient ancestors may have noticed this and given it a try. This may have led to the realization that many food sources can ferment into something interesting.

The question of whether beer or bread came first remains unresolved. “We still don’t have hard evidence to answer that,” says Liu. It is similarly unclear whether beer or bread – or something else – was the main motivation for the farming revolution that would eventually provide the food and drink on your festive table.

A theory I’ve heard is that, when bringing back gathered food stuffs to their camp, seeds may have fallen and taken root. This may have introduced the idea of growing food closer to home. Which leads to more permanent settlements.

“I wouldn’t be surprised if both were the motivations,” says Wang. After all, history is never simple: why would prehistory be any different?

Yes, exactly. I think searching for a singular cause is bound to fail.

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Stay varied, my friends! Go forth and spread beauty and light.

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