Links Roundup #1

IMPOSSIBLE FIGURES, GRIEF≠DEPRESSION, MATH+CHILDREN, REVERSE ENGINEERING, NUMBER HYGIENE, SPACEWALK & SPACE MUSIC.

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When we admire the artwork of M.C. Escher, or we see some impossibile figure like the Pensore triange, how does the brain processe impossible objects?

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“The DSM-5 Mood Disorders Work Group has proposed eliminating in DSM-5 the major depression criterion E, “bereavement exclusion” (BE), which recognizes that depressive symptoms are sometimes normal in recently bereaved individuals.”

The failing in recognizing the difference between a proportionate response to a devastating emotional event and a mental illness carry the risk to make a caricature of psychiatry. Psychiatrists must think better.

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“Children as young as three to five years of age have the potential to learn mathematics that is surprisingly complex and sophisticated”, and, more impressive, infants by two months understand that unsupported objects will fall, and that hidden objects still exist and by five months of age they expect non-cohesive substances like water and sand to pour. This suggests that babies born with a basic understanding of how things in their environment operate.

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Ray Kurzweil is convinced that ”[…] by 2020 we’ll have computers that are powerful enough to simulate the human brain […] By 2029 […] we will have completed the reverse engineering of the human brain.”

Mh. I’m not sure.

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The Royal Statistical Society proposes 12 rules of “number hygiene” for journalists to at least achieve a basic understanding of numbers, statistics, graphs and so on (all of which are far too loved by journalists).

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“An EVA is probably the most physically demanding task an astronaut can undertake.”How astronauts learn to “spacewalk”.

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The Sounds of Space.

“Musics in space is something very important for the moral of the crew and for the psychological support of the crew.”