CharonY

In case you have missed it, the only conclusion that I have drawn is that potential bias against boys could be raised on the comics part. That part is pure speculation. The surveys are descriptive and as such do not need to rule out things. In fact, you are arguing your own strawman (girls like meatier literature) which is not part of the conclusion of the study, nor a claim that I made. They did observe that girls, on average, declared that they enjoyed reading more than boys. This is a data point that cannot be refuted by the anecdotes you present. As far as I can see you have not presented an alternative counterpoint to these observations. Yes you did, implicitly, how else is can you interpret: Other than claiming that girls actually prefer comics or are at least equally like it. Yet the data suggests otherwise. Your only counterpoint is so far your own observations. Of course, you could argue that girls are more likely to misrepresent their preferences than boys, but then you have no evidence to the contrary, either. As whole, this is a minor point and you have entirely missed the context in which it was presented (and instead went on arguing a point that seems to be quite prevalent in your mind). That is the big challenge. In many areas the data is not terribly conclusive and are highly dependent on study design (obviously). A main issue is of course that there is generally a large overlap and the difference may be just found in the outlier in each gender group.The effects are often not terribly large in actual measurements and can be skewed (for example gender gap in maths varies between -15 to +32 points, reading somewhere between +10 and +72 points). Learning has a huge effect on all aspects, making it even more difficult to spot potential biological gender effects and are then covered on top with cultural aspects. I do find it weird that in such a complex area where clearly much more research is needed people have such strong opinions.

So you are putting your own observations over multi-nation surveys? You misspelled "anecdote".

The study on children is based on OECD/PISA reports that includes UK children. But, if you think thatUK specific is more relevant, I direct you to the results of the National Literacy Trust data. Also, take a look at the articles published by the UK Department of Education which summarizes these findings. It is actually your interpretation that girls like meatier texts. What is a fact is that a) more boys declare that they do not enjoy reading than girls and b) comics are one area where boys have much higher preference than girls. As we were discussing bias, comics are one of the reading forms that are frowned upon and could therefore be a bias against reading by boys. It should be noted that the only other category where boys read more are newspapers (a 6% gap). However as it is generally seen as a positive thing, there is unlikely to be any repercussion. The bigger take-home-message is that boys are less likely to read than girls outside of school and generally seem to enjoy reading less. In fact accounting for reading enjoyment may explain as much as 50% of the observed gap. Which still means there is a sizeable portion due to other reasons. What I would like to stress is that a discussion should be rooted on data on not on assumptions based on what you see on newsstands, or individuals unless, of course, you actually have relevant data to present. And no, Shakespeare is not a good argument at all. Almost around the same time there was the celebration of 200th birthday of Charlotte Bronte, Which tells us basically nothing.

I am not sure about the relevance of the comment. The kids were questioned regarding their preferred type of reading. In the adult studies/polls the reading was limited to books or types of books. There are many statistics out there, but a Pew poll from 2013 showed that 69% of all males have read at least one book in 2013, whereas it was 82% for females.

As a general precaution I would like to add that depending on study size, significant difference can exist on negligible effect sizes, which is the case in some studies. That being said OECD-wide studies indicate often varying differences (both, between countries, as well as within countries overt time) in the gender differences in mathematical scores. In contrast, in reading performance in all countries girls outperform boys, with some of the smallest differences found e.g. Columbia, Chile, UK, USA, Netherlands. Australia with a gap slightly below OECD average and Germany above. Some of the largest were found in Finland, Jordan and Slovenia. There actually have been a number of investigations to figure out why it is the case. One analysis for example looked at enjoyment of reading and try to figure out if an increase in boy's enjoyment of reading also improves scores. While it seems to work for some countries (including Germany), reading scores increased in others without increase in enjoyment (e.g. USA) or actually decreased (France). OVerall, no positive correlation was found (OECD PISA data 2000-2009). Yet, in newer studies (OECD data 2012) in which the media usage (including video games) was taking into consideration it was consistently found that girls enjoy reading more (and boys played more video games). When talking about bias it may be due to the fact that the form of literature most enjoyed by boys, comics, may be discouraged by parents (girls prefer fiction). It has been noted that even comics is better than no reading at all for reading comprehension tests and that this may be part of why boys enjoy reading less. Independent of reading,another element that was found is that boys spend less time on homework, which explains a further gap in overall test scores. Likewise, attitude to school questions indicate that overall boys had a more negative attitude to school than girls which is also associated with a motivational gap. Overall, due to the universality and robustness of reading scores, it has been suggested that it may have a development sources, especially as the difference vanishes in adulthood and despite the fact that women remain the more avid readers. On the other hand, while the gap has been persistent, it has also diminished over time, indicating that a number of other effects play a role.

So far nanorobots have been little mire than advanced nanoparticles usually with a few functional elements. But far from what most would associate with actual robots. As such, the term is rather misleading (as posts even on this forum demonstrate). You can, in theory, add DNA to these nanoparticles to let them identify cognate DNA. However, I do not think that there are really advanced applications out there yet, and certainly not on the level of complex enzymatic systems such as CRISPR. In fact, pretty much nothing developed in the areas has approached the complexity, specificity and efficiency of enzymatic complexes, which is why we still use them for molecular biological research and applications.

The first time I heard it was by Evil: Also see swansont. Wouldn't be surprised if it originated elsewhere, though.

There is actually quite a body of evidence suggesting that sitting >3h is associated with overall higher morbidity. However, it is not trivial to separate the effects of sitting itself from confounding factors as sitting while watching TV was found to have stronger effect (>2.5h) than sitting at work, even adjusted for the same time. There are also (few) studies that do not see a benefit for longer standing. As such it is not possible to extrapolate whether the inverse (i.e. standing) will actually benefit longevity. For example, all benefits of children standing could be lost if they start becoming sedentary later in life. Or it may have no influence at all until a certain age (there is not a lot of data on children as the studies are still relatively new). Or a sedentary lifestyle may be associated with other unhealthy factors, although there are conflicting results on adults that sit a lot, but also work out. In short, the research is not complete enough to definitively answer OP's question. However, there is relatively new research that starts looking into the effects of standings in class rooms on academic performance, behaviour and overall physical activity. But again, health related data is still largely absent.

Hmm, let me know how it performs, I'd be interested in it, too.

As a general thing one should mention that the action antiseptics/antimicrobials on cells is usually very different to the mode of toxicity in more complex organisms. In the case of chloroxylenol it is generally assumed that due to the phenolic nature that it works on bacterial membranes. However, the actual molecular mechanisms was still unknown last time I read about it (ca. 2010). This is not unusual for many antiseptics, as in many cases only their efficacy has been tested. Even for compounds that have been used for a very long time there are only rough models of action, with little molecular information. As such I doubt that it is well known how chloroxylenol precisely works. However, a general mode of action that is suspected for this class of compounds is endocrine disruption. In cases of amphibians and fish the effects are often stronger than in mammals and other animals as they absorb it more efficiently. I.e. the overall body burden is higher when applied externally.

Except accuracy (the sum of true positives and true negatives divided by all cases) is not really informative if you want to make sure that you pass the test while being innocent. Assume 100 cases with two liars. Let's assume you characterize the two correct liars (FP) but also identify additional 50 non-liars as liars. This gives you a 50% accuracy (2FP, 48 FN) but a heck of people who are incorrectly accused as liars. Or take the calculations from the NRC publication. If we use a case where the accuracy of the test is 90% with a 80% sensitivity and that about 1% of the populations are liars, then for each liar caught, there would be 21 wrongly accused. These numbers changed significantly if the performance parameters are different. At an accuracy of 60%, they found 73 wrongly accused for each correctly identified ones. On the other hand, lowering the sensitivity (i.e. allowing for more liars to go undetected) would also improve the ratio to 7 wrongly accused one per real detection (at A=90%) or 54 (A=60%), respectively. The problem is that the CQT method is not very amenable to standardization so that if you enter a test, you will have not idea about how the performance is going to end up and how likely you are going to be wrongly accused. To ascertain that you will need a large reference population that can be asked the same question and will react in predictable patterns. And there is a whole body of evidence that the arousal markers are not uniformly applicable, either. As such, you are more likely to willingly undergo a test if it has either little or no repercussions or if you do not understand the issues with it.

I am not up to date about the latest development in this area, as my work is more on the molecular side of things. However, by now most diagnostic labs have adapted to PCR(and/or Sequencing)-based methods. One of the reason is that biotyping among Salmonella serotypes can be quite inaccurate. It is generally assumed that the more ancient strain has a broader metabolic capability with newer strains subsequently losing them, which gives rise to significant overlaps, which complicate diagnostics. There are Typhimurium as well as Enteridis strains that produce gas during maltose fermentation, for example. But there are also members that don't in either group.

Not only that, there are dozens of ways to conduct a polygraph test with variations in the parameters monitored, the type of questions asked, the order of those questions the way the data is scored. One huge issue is that there is no universally accepted theory on how the whole thing actually works. There are attempts of improving designs, but applying them in a reproducible manner has been found to be extremely difficult, especially outside of controlled lab conditions. The traditional method (Controlled Question Technique) has been readily dismissed due to many faults, yet is still the method used in most circumstances (a good read is the National Research Council 2003:"The Polygraph and Lie Detection. Committee to Review the Scientific Evidence on the Polygraph"). A better, but still quite fallible method called Guilty Knowledge Test has some promise (under controlled conditions). The paradigm here is that is based on exposing guilty knowledge. It is typically based on multiple choice were the correct answer is hidden within neutral ones. And it is assumed that if one possesses the knowledge of the correct answer, heightened arousal can be monitored. This does not work well with all types of questions, though. Also, studies found that even using this standardized approach, there are a lot of variances in the response, depending on the types of question, the mode of answer, the measure and even gender. There advanced approaches (including inducing cognitive load while presenting the questions), but they are used mostly in (current) psychological research and have not made the transition into the general area of polygraph tests like those described by OP. Thus, to characterize existing lie-detector test as accurate is quite misleading.

In Germany the whole thing is usually a bit more obscure. There is a general fear of getting ridiculed (it seems) and you will see relatively few definitive statements from politicians that could nail down their position very strongly. A bit goes for the scientists, too. They tend to be less politicized than what I have seen e.g. in the US. However, if there is a consensus in the scientific community, you will generally not see a politician openly doubting it. It does not mean that they will react to it, as in Germany many decisions are actually made in closed meeting and are not that heavily publicized. While this could also be said to US politics, in the US politicians are far more to comment on the whole stuff, where in Germany they are much evasive and profilless. Partially this is a consequence as for the most part the votes go to parties rather than individuals. Although there are also direct votes, few people actually no the people and they also hardly advertise. As such the politics is built around party consensus more than anything else.

You are a lady's man. Which often requires more thought.

It is called "leadership ability".

Well, looking at international polls there is quite a bit of spread, but Swede and France rank among the highest if comparing Western countries (China, Hong Kong and Japan are among the highest in non-Western). According to Gallup polls 2015 asking whether one is a convinced atheist (which could be a bit stricter than the census question), it is reported that Spain is is the least religious of the Western countries (20%). Worldwide the response is 63% say they are religious (a), 22% consider themselves non-religious (b) and 11% are convinced atheists ©. Looking at regions, as expected Western Europe and Oceania are the least religious (51% and 49% b and c combined). If combining b and c Sweden turns out to be one of the least religious ones (78%). Which is a bit of a change from the 2012 poll. About the age thing there is another interesting aspect looking at worldwide trends. Younger people (34 or less) were more religious (66% response) vs other age groups (~60%). Religious people, while much higher among the uneducated, still make up the majority on all education levels (worldwide). In contrast, higher income has a stronger association with non-religiosity or atheism.

Actually that kind of also happens in the US. Using voting sticks for example. https://j.gifs.com/1w9B4G.gif It is also mentioned in John Oliver's show (in the context of voter ID). Edit: That practice is not allowed in the US House of Representatives.

It also neglects that it is rare that one simple factor is the sole evolutionary drive. Various designs may have different advantages and disadvantages. For example, a very energy efficient flight model may be very slow. Thus, it may be possible that for objects with this design predation avoidance may become more important. Another one is faster, but much less energy efficient. Then other factors like improved foraging may be necessary to survive etc. That is one of the reasons organisms explore different niches instead of optimizing everything to one particular aspect of the environment.

Except that they are essentially functionalized particles with no ability to synthesize anything complex...

I think I vaguely recall that one. Or it is a false memory, considering how long it has been.

Depending on the drug it can affect all body hair (including e.g. eyelashes).

Bead plating is done by sideway agitation (i.e. not shaking up and down, obviously). Not my favorite method, but some prefer it.

So you are saying that you are only OK with price segmentation if at on point or another everyone can become eligible? So highschool student discounts are ok, but not college? And mortgages and credits should be the same for everyone? Also what about tax rates?

For the longest time his avatar was actually Sean Connery as Bond. His current choice is much more recent.