Mokele

It's not actually a specific puzzle here, but a type of puzzle game I recently heard of that I suspect some here would enjoy (I know I have). Sudoku is a Japanese number-game that is evidently very popular over there and catching on in the UK. It's basically just a 9x9 matrix, subdivided into 9 3x3 matrices. There are "givens" scattered all over it. Using these givens and pure logic (no guessing is needed), you can find every value by utilizing 3 rules: 1) each 3x3 matrix contains only 1 instance of each digit from 1 to 9 2) each row contains only 1 instance of each digit from 1 to 9 3) each column contains only 1 instance of each digit from 1 to 9 Thus, any blank space can only have a value not already represented in its row, column or 3x3 area. Each puzzle has only one solution, which can be reached by logic alone. This site has an effectively limitless number of sudoku puzzles, and has consumed a ridiculous proportion of my time. Enjoy! Mokele

No, they thought they did, but it turned out to just be mineral deposits. Mokele

Actually, snakes don't use staring as a dominance ritual; they just can't blink. Their eyes are covered with a transparent "spectacle scale" rather than the eyelids of other species. Most snake dominance rituals I'm aware of involve "wrestling" in which the snakes twine around each other and attempt to force each other to submit and give up. Mokele

I've heard (and this may be wrong) that Cable is also easier to modify/expand (by the company), so if too many people in an area are on it, it can be upgraded so they don't slow you down as much. Mokele

Oh, of course, I was just postulate about some of the underlying reasons why they caught on, why they often seem to be associated with the "bad ass" image, etc. At the very least I'd get some cool photos.... Mokele

Oh, just musing and hypothesizing. Humans are only vaguely interesting, since they lack scales. Mokele

The first test that comes to my mind is to just have several guys (each of which may randomly be wearing or not wearing sunglasses, varied each trial) go up to people in a public space like a bust terminal or something and say "You're in my seat" and see how many move. Compare the results with and without sunglasses, see if there's a difference. Repeat across cultures if there is a difference. If you expand the sample size enough (across numerous individuals as both the victim and agressor, across cultures, locations, mode of dress, etc), and *still* get an effect that's independent of all those (the independence can be checked statistically), there's something to it. I just don't bother with hiding it behind sunglasses. Mokele

There is nothing of value in these posts, just disjointed ramblings. Stop wasting our time, you worthless troll, and stop pretending you have a more complex thought process than a jellyfish. Mokele

Actually, it's based on an even older Maxis title, Sim-life, and is being designed by the same guy. Mokele

As I was driving home with my groceries today, I noticed a biker-guy wearing sunglasses in the parking lot as I drove out. So that got me wondering why people wear sunglasses. I mean, aside from the transparently obvious "it's bright out", which could just as easily be solved by a hat. It occurred to me that, while eye-contact is a sign of confidence, staring is an agressive/dominance signal in many mammals, including primates. Ever notice how you always tend to assume people wearing sunglasses are looking at you, even if they aren't? Maybe it's because this simplified form of "false eyes" gets interpreted by our monkey brains as agressive/assertive/dominant staring, hence why people with sunglasses seem to automaticly seem more "bad-ass". Furthermore, when the body-language doesn't match the message we're seeing from the sunglasses, we become more aware of them as artifical on that person, and think they look out of place (in effect, a dominant look from a clearly subordinate individual). Of course, it's just a hypothesis that has yet to be tested. Perhaps it could be tested by seeing if random males are more likely to back down from agressive encounters or submit if the individual is wearing sunglasses, especially if that's true cross-culturally. And obviously some sunglasses have just become fashion accessories. But isn't it possible the initial popularity caught on due to the deep, instinctual reactions? It's kind of interesting to think of them as a set of "false eyes" for enhancing the appearance of dominance. And we laugh at the "ridiculous" dominance displays of other species... Mokele

I take it then that one of the tech-trees involves anal probes? ;-) Mokele

Word of mouth is not reliable in any way, shape or form. At every school in the south which either I or my sister went to, US history was required, both at the middle and high school levels. The only thing that even slightly resembled a "southern history" course was the "louisiana history" course I had to take (in addition to, not instead of US history), which also did not skimp of the civil war or times before then. Given that your quote is only tangentially related to your claim, no, it won't. I don't dispute that the history books (along with all the other books) in many schools are obsolete or inaccurate. But that's a *far* cry from the sort of willful and enforced ignorance you claim, based on nothing but word of mouth. First, I would like to see a *single* shred of proof that *any* southern public school does as you describe (relegating US history to elective status and requiring 'southern history', nothing less, since that was your claim). Secondly, contingent upon your fulfillment of the first point, I would like to see statistics showing what percentage of schools this is true of. Unless that second part is fulfilled and is over 50%, then your use of that bit of misinformation is nothing more than equal parts strawman fallacy and the very same regional elitism you are accused of. Not bad for someone educated in the inferior depths of the South, eh? Mokele

Not necessarily. They're helpful (and essential for some levels of biology), but aren't needed for all of biology. I vaguely recall something about a guy named Bacon in the 1500's who began "modern science", in the sense of the emphasis on predictions, testing hypotheses and experiments. But I have a very bad memory for current events (by which I mean anything since the mid-Pleistocene). Mokele

If I make a robot with video-camera eyes and image-recognition software, and put the whole thing in a metal box with only the eyes peeking out, can it still see? Yes. Why? Because the cameras, like the rod and cone cells in our eyes, are transducers: they convert optical data into electronic (or neural) data. Mokele

Darwin lacked a viable theory of inheritance, so he fell back on some of the popular theories of the day. In a bit of incredible irony, Mendel actually sent a copy of his results to Darwin, but Darwin never opened the letter. You're right about mutation and inheritance of mutated genes. This is why it's technically right to say that nobody is a "Darwinist" anymore: Advances in biology and genetics have resulted in a near-total re-write of the theory, though his central works (natural and sexual selection) are, of course, as true now as they have been for the past 3.5 billion years. Mokele

Well, I don't know enough about fish (or fishing) to say why (maybe a small drop stimulates airborne insects which can be caught at the water surface?), but how is either by means of their lateral line system, a system of fluid-filled tubes along the animal's sides to detect vibrations in the water and also pressure differences, or by means of sensory receptors in the swim bladder. Mokele

Just a few points I should interject, since my entire pre-college education was in the south: First, bud is right about the school funding. I would caution that funding =/= education in all cases (I got a higher quality education at a run-down inner-city school in Baton Rouge than I did at a suburban, well-funded and new school in Florida, and both were public), but the south's school system *is* awful and far behind that of the north. However, about the "reconstruction" thing, I'd like to see sources for that claim, because that certainly was not my experience. I took history in several incarnations as I moved up in grades in the southern public schools, and never once did such an omission occur, especially not in my AP US History class as bud suggested. This was not the experience of any of my friends in various other schools or cities, either. If this does happen, it is unusual and certainly not representative of the whole of southern education. Mokele

There's also recombination, the genetic shuffling of genes into new combinations. And, while there probably isn't a CS gene, there probably *are* genetic factors that influence certain personality and cognitive traits that can result in being good at computers and programming. Mokele

And, on a more annecdotal note, most of the profs I know whom I've talked politics with are definitely *not* conservative on many issues. Some are democrats, some green, some libertarian, but none I have yet met can stomach the current Republican party, mostly due to the influence of the Christian Right (as well as the Republican postion of "F*** the environment.") Mokele

A bile-like compound of unknown use, possible to deter predators by making the species distasteful. Mokele

I'm sorry, but I'm firmly with Jdurg on this, and to underscore, *I* would do the same thing if I were personally designing this game. If there's no user interface, there's no game. If the game is about evolution, you *MUST* give the player input and control, or it becomes a purely passive experience. That's not a game, that's TV. Might people take the wrong idea from it? Sure. They might also get the wrong idea from Grand Theft Auto. But just as game companies are not responsible for the moral decisions people make, they are likewise not responsible for remedying the deficiencies of the US educational system. If people draw the wrong conclusions, that's *not* the game's fault, and, rather than pointing the finger of blame to the game, we should work on actually making US HS diplomas worth more than used toilet paper so that people don't *make* those mistakes. Mokele

Well, if it works on animals, it should work on humans... Hey, reverse, wanna come live near the local Frat Row? The gene pool could use more chlorine than the current drunk driving rate is providing. Mokele

My two favorites so far have been Vertebrate Zoology lab and Invertebrate Zoology lab (both are upper-level bio courses). In fact, thanks to Inv. Zo. lab, I now have the unfortunate and expensive desire to set up an invert-only salt-water tank.... Mokele

Yes, in that it's an application of purely scientific/theoretical knowledge for practical ends. Much like building a chemical factory is chemical engineering. Mokele

You mammals and your diaphragms and divided body cavities....