Men among prediluvian Beasts

“No subject has lately excited more curiosity and general interest among geologists and the public than the question of the Antiquity of the Human Race…[]” Lyell 1863

The debate over the age of the earth generated an even more intriguing question: how old is humankind? Written records date back some thousands of years, but geological evidence and the fossil record show us that earth must be millions of years old. Some authors tried to reconcile this discrepancy by assuming a succession of worlds, each destroyed by a global catastrophe. Therefore the “age or reptiles” could be very ancient, the ice age mammals more recent and the final catastrophe, creating the human world, happened probably only some thousands of years ago. This succession of worlds seemed to be in accordance both with the geological record as with the biblical chronology.

Was the story of Noah's Ark true? Archaeologist who found the Titanic claims Biblical flood DID happen 12,000 years ago

• Acclaimed oceanographer Robert Ballard says he has found evidence
• Claims massive flood happened in Black Sea region around 5600BC
• Waters cascaded down Turkey's Straits of Bospurus and into sea
• It is believed to have started story of Noah, which was then passed on

A flood of Biblical proportions just like in the story of Noah's Ark may have actually happened, according to the oceanographer who found the Titanic.

Acclaimed underwater archaeologist Robert Ballard claims his team of researchers have uncovered evidence that suggests The Great Flood described in the Bible was actually based on real events.

Potopul lui Noe - mit sau realitate

INTRODUCERE

„Domnul a zis lui Noe: ‚Intra in corabie, tu si toata casa ta; caci dupa sapte zile voi face sa ploaua pe pamant patruzeci de zile si patruzeci de nopti; si voi sterge astfel de pe fata pamantului toate fapturile pe care le-am facut.’ Dupa cele sapte zile, au venit apele potopului pe pamant” (Fac. 7, 1-4-10).

Российские учёные погрузились в соцсети

Как узнать, о чём думают пользователи социальных сетей? Какие темы обсуждает блогосфера, с какой скоростью по ней расходятся слухи, как выявить очаги распространения новостей и предсказать реакцию людей на то или иное событие? Портал «Социодинамика», разработанный сотрудниками Института наукоёмких компьютерных технологий НИУ ИТМО, даёт исследователям инструмент для поиска ответов на эти вопросы.

К Северному полушарию приблизилась яркая комета

Любители звездного неба могут насладиться редким зрелищем: с 8 марта в ночном небе над Северным полушарием можно увидеть яркую комету.

Сначала небесное тело C/2011 L4 Pan-Starrs будет видно лишь в телескоп или бинокль.

Россияне теряют интерес к науке

По данным ВЦИОМ, наукой сегодня интересуются несколько меньше, чем раньше. Самые популярные области знаний – медицина и техника.

Всероссийский центр изучения общественного мнения (ВЦИОМ) опубликовал данные о том, интересуются ли россияне наукой, какие открытия им наиболее интересны, а какие ученые – наиболее известны.

Provocările din cosmologie, la Trinitas TV

Am descoperit cu plăcută surprindere o emisiune difuzată de Trinitas TV, televiziunea Patriarhiei Române, un dialog pe teme inclusiv ştiinţifice. Vă invităm să urmăriţi în continuare o discuţie pe teme de cosmologie între diacon Sorin Mihalache şi fizician Andrei Dorobanţu.

Faptul că dialogul de mai jos, difuzat - lucru aparent paradoxal - de Trinitas TV, este un exemplu rarisim de discuţie televizată pe teme ştiinţifice, spune multe despre atenţia ori, mai bine zis, despre lipsa totală de interes de care se "bucură" popularizarea ştiinţei în mass-media vizuală autohtonă în prezent.

Прогноз погоды на ближайшие десять лет

Немецкие ученые обнаружили зависимость температуры воздуха в Центральной Европе от температуры воды в Северной Атлантике. Это открывает новые перспективы в прогнозировании погоды.

Не проходит и месяца, чтобы где-нибудь в мире не вошел в строй очередной суперкомпьютер. Эти сверхмощные вычислительные машины предназначены для выполнения наиболее сложных расчетов как в военной, так и в гражданской сферах. В частности, одна из самых трудных задач, требующая колоссальной вычислительной мощности, - это расчет климатических и метеорологических моделей.

The Mental Cost of Cognitive Enhancement

Noninvasive brain stimulation provides a potential tool for affecting brain functions in the typical and atypical brain and offers in several cases an alternative to pharmaceutical intervention. Some studies have suggested that transcranial electrical stimulation (TES), a form of noninvasive brain stimulation, can also be used to enhance cognitive performance. Critically, research so far has primarily focused on optimizing protocols for effective stimulation, or assessing potential physical side effects of TES while neglecting the possibility of cognitive side effects. We assessed this possibility by targeting the high-level cognitive abilities of learning and automaticity in the mathematical domain. Notably, learning and automaticity represent critical abilities for potential cognitive enhancement in typical and atypical populations. Over 6 d, healthy human adults underwent cognitive training on a new numerical notation while receiving TES to the posterior parietal cortex or the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex. Stimulation to the the posterior parietal cortex facilitated numerical learning, whereas automaticity for the learned material was impaired. In contrast, stimulation to the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex impaired the learning process, whereas automaticity for the learned material was enhanced. The observed double dissociation indicates that cognitive enhancement through TES can occur at the expense of other cognitive functions. These findings have important implications for the future use of enhancement technologies for neurointervention and performance improvement in healthy populations.

Mid-Pliocene warm-period deposits in the High Arctic yield insight into camel evolution

The mid-Pliocene was a global warm period, preceding the onset of Quaternary glaciations. Here we use cosmogenic nuclide dating to show that a fossiliferous terrestrial deposit that includes subfossil trees and the northern-most evidence of Pliocene ice wedge casts in Canada’s High Arctic (Ellesmere Island, Nunavut) was deposited during the mid-Pliocene warm period. The age estimates correspond to a general maximum in high latitude mean winter season insolation, consistent with the presence of a rich, boreal-type forest. Moreover, we report that these deposits have yielded the first evidence of a High Arctic camel, identified using collagen fingerprinting of a fragmentary fossil limb bone. Camels originated in North America and dispersed to Eurasia via the Bering Isthmus, an ephemeral land bridge linking Alaska and Russia. The results suggest that the evolutionary history of modern camels can be traced back to a lineage of giant camels that was well established in a forested Arctic.