The View from Everest

-
http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap080830.html

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Free Will versus the Programmed Brain

-
http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=free-will-vs-programmed-brain&sc=WR_20080826 People are starting to understand that a human being is just a collection of neurons. Things are determined. Humans are behaving as per how the brain works. Brain has 100 billion neurons and the complex connections help in the complex behaviour. Neurons are so big that there is no place for uncertainty principle or principles of quantum mechanics. Or could it be that the dendrites and axons are smaller than neurons that uncertainty principle may apply. I guess that even if that is true, it may not be the reason for the stable complex behaviour and free will. But overall I do believe that a human brain is a determined machine. Quantum uncertainty would not apply. At the same time, I would say that every human being is morally responsible for his own actions. Another way of saying this is that my brain is determined to say that "things are determined but I am morally responsible for my own actio...
Read more

The world's 23 toughest math questions

-
http://www.networkworld.com/community/node/33361 Following are the ones which Interest me... The Mathematics of the Brain: Develop a mathematical theory to build a functional model of the brain that is mathematically consistent and predictive rather than merely biologically inspired. Capture and Harness Stochasticity in Nature: Address Mumford's call for new mathematics for the 21st century . Develop methods that capture persistence in stochastic environments. Biological Quantum Field Theory: Quantum and statistical methods have had great success modeling virus evolution. Can such techniques be used to model more complex systems such as bacteria? Can these techniques be used to control pathogen evolution? The Mathematics of Quantum Computing, Algorithms, and Entanglement : In the last century we learned how quantum phenomena shape our world. In the coming century we need to develop the mathematics required to control the quantum world. An Information Theory for Virus Evolution: Ca...
Read more

Contentment

-
http://www.happinessclub.com/FairfieldCitizen/032206.htm " Happiness is now being defined in two ways. The first way is happiness as it relates to having good humor. The second is happiness as it relates to inner satisfaction. It is here under the second definition that contentment is properly defined." " Contentment is happiness with one's situation in life." "Until you make peace with who you are, you'll never be content with what you have." " Seeking approval from other people in order to feel satisfaction, creates many problems. We have all heard about people who try to become famous so they can be happy. They are trying to feel good about themselves through the approval of others. No matter how much approval or fame you receive, it will never be enough. The more you get, the more you think you need. So satisfaction is never found out there, or by the approval you receive from other people." " True happiness stems from a quality...
Read more