A Science Pot Pourri

We'll be catching up on Fanny Holt Ames tomorrow. She's already toured Japan and Hong Kong. I want to compare her visit to one made by John LaFarge, the man who designed stained glass for Unity Church, and Henry Adams in the 19th century. We'll also be catching up with Easton's Civil War soldiers and Sailors very soon.

Here's a feel good story from Scientific American Ugandan Chimpanzees may be hunting Red Colobus Monkeys to extinction in a national park. Evidence points to a 89% decline of the endangered monkey due mainly to hunting. This is the first evidence that somebody other than us is screwing up the environment. Apparently, the "don't give a damn about the environment gene" is part of the 98% humans share with chimps.

An interesting little article also from Scientific American refines the Turing test. The Turing test suggests you can tell if a computer is conscious by holding an e-chat conversation with it. At some point the human will get an oddball response and realize it's not human. Even though Watson was programmed with zillions of Jeopardy answers, had a good knowledge of natural language and was able to beat the human champions, it eventually failed the Turing test. The article suggests another way to get a computer to flunk the test is to show it a picture with something odd in it-an elephant perched on top of the Eiffel Tour for example. Unless programmed with the idea that elephants don't belong on pointy structures computers and presumably Frenchmen with hangovers won't be able to tell you what's wrong.

The Toronto Star notes that China has an exploding watermelon problem as many farmers overdosed the plants with growth hormone. Just another example of why we should buy American? Well, the growth chemical is legal here for grapes and kiwi fruit. Probably an argument for only buying from an organic farm that you watch carefully.

Not strictly scientific, but perhaps an indication that some people might have more chimp genes than others is a New York Times blog summarizing the debate between Rick Santorum and John McCain on whether torture helped us bag bin Laden. Mr. Santorum apparently lacks the intelligence sources of Senator McCain and lacks the intelligence to remember that the Senator might know a thing or two about torture. I am still willing to try "enhanced interrogation methods" on Dick Cheney to find those weapons of mass destruction he says were in Iraq, but he's probably out hunting red colobus monkeys in Uganda.