CharonY

I have not checked whether the study was actually paid the indicated amount, though the paper indicates that it was NIH funded. I was mostly referring to Elite Engineer's speculation that it was somehow related to appease donors, since that is not how the system would work.

That is not how it works. It looks like it was funded by a NIH grant, i.e. they have submitted a proposal to the NIH, from where it was sent off to reviewers and apparently they found it convincing enough to finance it. A quick search indicates that there has been some work on the effects of strong magnetic fields on mammalian health. The effects range from beneficial effects in certain instances to potential harm. What is lacking is a cohesive theoretical framework to explain the observed outcomes (though there is some evidence that very strong fields could effect circulation to some degree). It is a pretty large jump from these observations to potential medical utility, though it is not pseudoscience in the common sense.

It is a rough layperson's description as from an outside observer it appears as if the patient is unable to distinguish real stimuli from something that is not there (i.e. hallucinations). I think my wording might be ambiguous in that regard.

I think that is what is confusing to me as it seems to shift dependent on what type of researcher you talk to. I have seen psychosis discussed as a syndrome, which makes sense as they are characterized as by different set of symptoms themselves. On the other hand, I have heard it referred to as a symptoms of certain conditions, including disorders, drug use etc. (i.e. what one could consider a higher level of classification), which are used as end-point classifiers. As a caveat, all I have learned is second-hand based on my medical collaboration partners, so there is also the possibility that I misunderstand things or that it is just lingo (e.g. they use symptom, when the accurate descriptor would be psychotic symptom perhaps?- I should ask next time).

I would think the opposite, actually. In much of Europe there is far more resistance against genetic modification of any organisms (not limited to humans).

That is how I organize it in head and in medical literature it is often referred to as a collection of symptoms (as it can manifest in different ways). However, there are parts which treat is as a condition (think brain state) which creates the various observable features that in conjunction we refer to as psychosis. It is not horribly different, but represents the various levels from which we could look at psychosis. I.e. the manifestation or symptom of some overarching disease/condition, or a condition itself that elicits some form of disjunction with reality.

Technically, an undergrad should learn how to learn (i.e. develop their own learning strategy). Many don't but that is probably beside the point. On the grad level, they do (or learn to) work independently, but their research is rarely truly independent. At minimum the advisor guides the project, though in many cases the involvement is much deeper (depending on the advisor as well as the student). What I expect other than the hard technical skills in no particular order : - deepen reading skills of scientific literature (at undergrad level it is already taught, but usually there is still quite a gap to fill) - become an expert within a small aspect in their field of research (i.e. knowing all the literature the particular aspect they work on) and be familiar (big picture) with related topics - learn to clearly communicate about their research and engage in scientific discussions (oral and written). This also includes documentation of lab work but also general communication skills - become proficient in scientific reasoning, interpretation of data etc. (could also be considered a technical skill) - be part of a collaborative and respectful (and diverse) work environment - become able to develop research question and approaches to address them, including experimental design - time management - self motivation

I think it is important to make a distinction between psychosis and schizophrenia. While I am not an expert in the precise definition, from what I understand psychosis is a condition when the patient has issue with identifying something as real or not. Psychosis can be a symptom of a mental illness, such as schizophrenia, but they have additional diagnostic symptoms. As such, psychotic episodes can be caused by a variety of sources, such as drugs or sleep deprivation. While under these episodes brain activity may be altered (which could be visible on MRIs) in these examples the brain is not damaged per se. However, conditions that can cause prolonged psychosis are a different matter. Schizophrenia, for example is associated with a reduction of grey matter and this loss appears to be progressive. As DrmDoc mentioned, the mechanism behind that is not clear. However, since psychosis can occur without damages, and are the result of altered activities (at leas in some cases), there is good reason to assume they are more likely the result. On the other hand, there was some evidence that early treatment of psychosis with antipsychotics may result in slower detoriation. It still unclear whether this is because prolonged psychosis can lead to additional damages, or whether antipsychotics deal with something that actually do the damage. As a whole it seems that the neurprotective hypothesis as well as the hypothesis that psychosis may result in neural damage does not have a lot of evidence to date.

I would like to add that evolutionary psychology is suffering from a number of issues, and is one a the forefront of the replication crisis. Many of these issues stem from ill-defined research questions (to which I would include OP). Originally, the premise was fascinating, and there have been successful studies. However, many aspects in human evolution in this field are based on extrapolation, which are often not based on solid evidence. As such, a lot of these studies may be just-so stories. As a result solid science is mixed with heavy storytelling and the latter unfortunately dilute the former.That is not to say that the field is useless, but rather it is still a field trying to figure itself out. The worst thing is probably the fact that the interest in these studies are not in line with the level of evidence they can provide. Pop culture often takes tentative studies as ultimate validation of some long-standing assumptions and stereotypes.

That looks weird. From what I understand you have a tissue strip of a fixed size (and therefore weight) and load it with ethanol at a given percentage. I do not understand why the Evolon (if that refers to the strip) then changes in weight. Intuitively I would have assumed that you would soak the tissue with 51% and 34%, ethanol, respectively. I can only speculate, but is it possible that the did just that and the weight difference is because the cut strips had the respective weight differences (i.e. 92 vs 87 mg) and they tried to account the total ethanol content for that (the numbers still seem a little bit off, maybe someone else has a better idea)?

Oh gosh, this thread really makes me want to pick that up as an hobby. But aside from time constraints, I just know I would fail. I have an easier time constructing things in the ~20 µm scale, but anything significantly larger I usually make a mess out of it (mostly because it becomes more freehand).

There are a couple of new promising targets which may assist in remyelination, which are involved in diseases such as multiple sclerosis. Of course, getting them to work in vivo in a targeted way is one challenge, another is to to avoid demyelination by ongoing inflammatory responses. Much of it is still preclinical, unfortunately. Also remyelination probably won't help once the neurons are already damaged.

Well depends i guess. For moving once properly packed and if it is no too sensitive I'd do the same. But either I pack it up or hire a technician from the company of more expensive instruments. But for home made stuff we'd do it our own, too.

Also depends on the type and bulk of equipment. But anything larger is generally handled by facility management or insured contractors. Stuff other than say glassware or other easy to carry things are usually too valuable to let students handle it.

Well, at least they still roughly know what the kids are talking about, cause I certainly don't.

That is certainly true and I wished folks would realize that. But of course students see it differently. And one of the most heartbreaking questions is: "is it going to be on the exam?" In a way a broad and varied teaching approach can help insofar that it increases the chance that someone finds a learning style that suits them. Whereas a rather rigorous approach implies that you have to learn a certain way.

Apparently a few universities decided to create funds as an acknowledgement of their ties to slavery: In addition, Georgetown intends to create fundraisers for similar purposes.

What you are referring to is about individual differences in learning, which is one of the big challenges of using a class as a teaching tool. And you should know that the way we teach subjects such as maths has been changing all the time with all types of methods being explored. The basic idea is often to address systemic issues, though I will also say that overall to me it seems that the variables are so vast (i.e. student background, teacher abilities, class composition, issues outside school etc.) are so vast that curricula and their application are only a small part in it. And it is important to note that there is certainly no perfect curriculum nor is the current one necessarily better or worse than the previous or future ones. They have always been changing to various degree and (at least to my knowledge) there are only few instances where objectively big advances. As mentioned, I still need to dissuade students from things they learned in highschool and issues that seem to increase (e.g. decreasing attention span) do not seem to be related to school but due to other distractions. That being said, one of the ideas of infusing ethnic studies is likely to address certain systemic gaps, especially in Hispanic and African American students (there are also gaps in Asian students , mostly in science rather than math, but they close rather rapidly and then overtake their white peers). While some studies have shown effectiveness in that approach, I am not sure whether it would work in broad implementation. There is also the discrepancy between what students and teachers want to do and what the effectiveness of it may be. For example, there is a big push in universities toward increased student engagement. There is recently a paper (and it aligns well with mine and my colleague's experience when trying it out) that shows that students really hate it. And for educators it is quite a bit of extra work all for getting worse student evaluations. The weird thing however, is that it actually seem to work (when applied well). Student scores go up, despite the fact that they hate the course more (our interpretation is that they simply hate to be forced to engage). So in other words, effective measures may actually be universally hated. It is upon the educator to figure out a good method that works well with them and having more options is generally a good thing. At the same time I do realize that there is no optimal method. Each big attempt (worldwide) to create a new teaching method at best has moderate success and I believe it is down to the huge number of variables involvement. In the US segregation in schools is still an issue and is associated with overall lower scores of all students, in Germany there were studies showing that students had lower math scores for exactly the same errors as their peers, when they had foreign names. This also illustrates that despite the fact that many like to put maths and science on a pedestal of objectivity, the actual engagement with it (be it teaching or research) is ultimately a human endeavor and all our follies and biases will be translated to them. At minimum, we should be aware of these issues, at best we should try (and probably fail) addressing those. In the end, education is not a finely tuned system. To, me it always looked more like a throw everything at the wall and see what sticks. In addition, there are challenges in the changing education landscape. The idea of higher education has changed massively from personal improvement to an almost vocational demand. And then we have inter-generational conflict (I could go on a rant on how things have changed within one or two decades, but won't) but this all just means that educators will have to get used to changing landscapes, and, eventually they will (at the latest, when the new generations of educators come up). Maybe soon everything we teach has to be 400 characters or less. Who knows.

Well, there is a non-zero chance that at some point we will have "there are good/bad dogs on both sides".

Hold on, I have been around but not for 15 years that would be ridiculous. Let's see, it is 2019 and I joined.... ... darnit.

Well, I tried the summon feature and next thing I know is that it is headed towards the sun.

Can I get one, too? My keychain just broke...

Your first mistake is applying logic to the speeches.

What I mean is that it is an accessory to the main curriculum that contextualizes core concepts rather than replace it. It does look experimental to me, but I am not well read on ideas in k12 education to judge whether it is going to be effective. As a whole I'd say that one has to be careful yo venerate existing templates in teaching. They often are more a reflection of what we are used to rather than what really works. Moreover within my time being s student to now I have seen massive shifts how students learn. For separate classes one arguments I could make is the high degree of compartmentalization of students. I found college students having huge issues in transferring knowledge from one class into another (much due the exam and done attitude) so we started to mix up concepts in class (e.g. talk about bioethics and related issues in basic courses). Fundamentally I think there is no clear ideal and there are times I wished I had a broader education. Too often students limit themselves too much based on highschool performance. Those not doing well in maths think that they cannot enter stem (or decide to go bio for crying out loud). Similar to the stereotype threat effect. As it turns out it can be that the teacher was using a method that just did not work well for them an they manage to perform well after catching up on college. If alternatives work, I am not going to complain. I do a lot of interdisciplinary work in my research and as a whole I do see the value of borrowing more concepts from other disciplines. I will note that many fancy attempts do not work in classroom settings, often because resources are limited and/or the teacher is overcomitted. So there is valid criticism in overloading a class. What sits well with me is the following part, though: I know someone personally who as a teen wanted to become a mathematician (with stellar scores in middleschool), but since they did not follow the method exactly (rather using an equivalent method getting the same result) they got failed exams, repeatedly told not to have brain for maths, and eventually decided to pursue a different career. Also the expanded inquiry into math as principle seems like a good idea, too often I hear the complaint of "what is it good for?". The issue, I believe is that because it includes ethnic studies, it automatically becomes an source of discomfort for the majority. This, in my mind, clashes a bit with the increasing diversity in the population. I believe we need a discussion about that at some point, as I do not think that we should see society as a zero-sum game. As a whole there is a big change in terms of inclusiveness and how we start to perceive our society. Up until recently there was one more or less a narrow lens of a reference culture (it was more prominent in Germany, somewhat more diffuse in NA). But looking at my own material, science (and biology) is kind of taught as an entirely European concept and as if no one else ever knew or learned anything about the natural world. That, is of course nonsense, but since the science we practice is so steeped in this tradition, we kind of learn (and teach) that to be true. Of course this does not mean that you need to know that to become a scientist, but I always found it important to me not to be narrow-minded. I do see your point of delegating it to a specific course. But briefly touched upon, there is the worrying tendency of students to be very narrowly focused in their learning. Quite a few STEM students are very dismissive of concepts outside of their perceived range, and would likely not benefit from the broader perspective such classed would bring.

Well, unfortunately that is almost a given. In highschool simplified narratives are used to convey concepts in an easy to understand manner. In university it is often necessary to disentangle that in order to be able to move on to more complex questions. It is not necessarily that they are wrong, but lacking details and/or context. These are often ingrained in students and when teaching the advanced concepts you see some resistance in taking up new information as the old one is so persistent. I am half agreeing, but I think there is value in showing that things that are seemingly value neutral can, in practice have rather severe consequence. That being said, if integrated into a Math curriculum, I cannot imagine it being more than a side note to illustrate things. The ethnics aspects specifically is seemingly based on the observation that minorities respond very well to it (based on reading some abstracts in ethnomathematics) so it does seem to have practical benefits (as a side note, apparently diverse class rooms are becoming a world-wide phenomenon and folks are still developing means to cope with it).