Wednesday, October 19, 2011

Internet 'may be changing brains'

By Helen Briggs Health editor, BBC News website

More than 100 university students were studied

Social network sites may be changing people's brains as well as their social life, research suggests.

Brain scans show a direct link between the number of Facebook friends a person has and the size of certain parts of their brain.
It's not clear whether using social networks boosts grey matter or if those with certain brain structures are good at making friends, say researchers.
The regions involved have roles in social interaction, memory and autism.
The work, published in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B Biological Sciences, looked at 3-D brain scans of 125 university students from London.
Grey matter Researchers counted the number of Facebook friends each volunteer had, as well as assessing the size of their network of real friends.
A strong link was found between the number of Facebook friends a person had and the amount of grey matter in certain parts of their brain.

“Start Quote

We cannot escape the ubiquity of the internet and its impact on our lives, yet we understand little of its impact on the brain, which we know is plastic and can change over time”

Dr John Williams, Head of Neuroscience and Mental Health at the Wellcome Trust

The study also showed that the number of Facebook friends a person was in touch with was reflected in the number of "real-world" friends.

"We have found some interesting brain regions that seem to link to the number of friends we have - both 'real' and 'virtual'," said Dr Ryota Kanai, one of the researchers from University College London.
"The exciting question now is whether these structures change over time. This will help us answer the question of whether the internet is changing our brains."
One region involved is the amygdala, which is associated with memory and emotional responses.
Previous research has shown a link between the volume of grey matter in the amygdala and the size and complexity of real world social networks. Grey matter is the brain tissue where mental processing takes place.
Three other areas of the brain were linked with the size of someone's online social network but not their tally of real-world friends.
'Plastic' brain The right superior temporal sulcus has a role in perception and may be impaired in autism. The left middle temporal gyrus is associated with "reading" social cues, while the third - the right entorhinal complex - is thought to be important in memory and navigation.

The data

Volunteers were asked questions such as: How many friends are in your phonebook? How many friends have you kept from school and university? How many people would you invite to a party? How many friends do you have on Facebook?
These questions led to an estimation of someone's social network size

Professor Geraint Rees, from UCL, who led the research, said little is understood about the impact of social networks on the brain, which has led to speculation the internet is somehow bad for us.

"Our study will help us begin to understand how our interactions with the world are mediated through social networks," he said.
"This should allow us to start asking intelligent questions about the relationship between the internet and the brain - scientific questions, not political ones."
Cause and effect Facebook, the world's most popular social networking site, has more than 800 million active users around the world. The site allows people to keep in touch with friends, from a handful to a thousand or more.
Dr John Williams, Head of Neuroscience and Mental Health at the Wellcome Trust, which funded the study, said: "We cannot escape the ubiquity of the internet and its impact on our lives, yet we understand little of its impact on the brain, which we know is plastic and can change over time.
"This new study illustrates how well-designed investigations can help us begin to understand whether or not our brains are evolving as they adapt to the challenges posed by social media."
Although the study found a link between human brain structure and online social network size, it did not test cause and effect.
Dr Heidi Johansen-Berg, reader in Clinical Neurology at the University of Oxford's Centre for Functional MRI of the Brain, said the study found only a weak relationship between the number of Facebook friends and the number of friends in the real world.
"Perhaps the number of Facebook friends you have is more strongly related to how much time you spend on the internet, how old you are, or what mobile phone you have," she said.
"The study cannot tell us whether using the internet is good or bad for our brains."

On so-called scientific knowledge – VI

October 18, 2011, 6:28 pm

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By Nalin de Silva

However, Einstein came out with his Theory of Special Relativity in 1905 more than hundred years ago saying said that no communication is possible with velocities greater than of light. However, in Quantum Mechanics entangled particles have been communicating with each other with superluminal velocities at least theoretically since the latter part of twenties with Bohr and ‘experimentally’ since 1982 with the experiments carried out by Aspect. The recent ‘discovery’ that neutrinos travel with superluminal velocities may or may not be correct as there could be experimental errors but the western Physicists have no alternative but to question the wisdom of Einstein. Now what is the truth? Could the particles travel with superluminal velocities as Newton assumed or not as was the opinion of Einstein? If the western Physicists are in the process of going back to Newton where does Truth lie? Are we to say that Truth lies with lies? Or, that there is no difference between lies and Truth in an abstract way?

Western science, especially its role model western Physics, is more abstract than any other system of knowledge that I can think of. I do not claim to know all the systems of knowledge but it can be safely said that western system is the most abstract of the systems of knowledge known to most of us. The concepts such as absolute space, absolute time, inertial frame of reference, object, gravitation, electromagnetism, quantum waves, space time curvature, string in modern Physics, to name a few, are very abstract and an ordinary person would find it very difficult to grasp them.

Western knowledge in general, modelled after western Physics, is abstract trying to concentrate on general systems rather than individual concrete systems. This is something that can be found not only in western science but also in western art, western music, literature etc. There is an interaction between all these different disciplines and there are commonalities that can be found in western systems. For example, it is said that Dostoevsky was one of the most abstract novelists and this novels have influenced Einstein, who happened to have one of the most abstract minds that the world has ever seen.

A comment made by Martin Wickramesinghe, who was the most abstract Sinhala novelist, made on Kumaratunga Munidasa’s Piyasamara comes to mind. Wickramesinghe said that had Kumaratunga Munidasa tried to generalize the personal experience of the latter and created a work on the memory of a father in general Piyasamara would have become great poetry. The western novel, in general, creates generalized characters and in spite of Gamperaliya not representing the so-called transformation of a village in the south it attempts do so with Piyal, Nanda, Kaisaruwatte and others supposed to be representing generalized characters. Kumaratunga Munidasa’s Piyasamara, on the other hand, was on the memory of his father and he never attempted to generalize his experience to present us a ‘generalized’ father so to speak of. Gunadasa Amarasekera contrary to his writings in younger days is even more concrete in his nine volumes from Gamanaka Mula to Gamanaka Aga, and Piyadasa cannot be considered an abstract character generalizing the ‘middle class’ that the author would have liked to portray sticking to his ‘philosophy’ on novels. Piyadasa is not an abstract Piyal, and Amarsekera’s characters are more concrete than of Martin Wickremesinghe’s. In Amarasekera’s recent stories, it is not very difficult to identify the characters with those around us but in the case of Wickremesinghe it is not easy to do so. The Sinhala Buddhist tradition has been very much concrete, and in the Jathaka Kathas, the Buduhamuduruwo himself identifies the characters without giving them a semblance of abstractness. The Sinhala Buddhists are very concrete people and no wonder that we have not been able to produce a western abstract novelist who could be compared with Martin Wickremesinghe during the last fifty years or so. Wickremesinghe was the first and the last Sinhala author who could be considered a novelist who created somewhat abstract and generalized characters, though he was nowhere near a Dostoevsky.

In western Mathematics, the concepts are very abstract and even if some of the Sinhala Buddhists were able to grasp these it has become almost impossible for them to create or construct new western Mathematical concepts. Take the case of a supposed to be the simple concept of a straight line. A straight line in western Mathematics has no breadth or width and one cannot imagine such a line (geometrical object) if one tries to do so. One imagines in images (in pictures, sounds etc) of sensory perceptible objects and it is needless to say that there are no straight lines in the ‘external’ world for one to ‘see’ them. What we used to draw as straight lines in the schools are not straight lines in a western Mathematical sense and a straight line could be drawn not with a very sharp pencil as the teachers used to tell us but with pencils with no point at all either blunt or sharp. It is not difficult to obtain As and distinctions in western Mathematics at the GCE (O/L & A/L) examinations and also first classes and Ph. Ds in areas related to western Mathematics with not very refined Mathematical concepts but creating abstract concepts is a different kettle of fish all together.

The point about abstract concepts is that they cannot be ‘visualized’. On the other hand, one cannot generalize without resorting to abstract concepts, and western science has had to face this dilemma since inception. Western science is said to belong to the empirical tradition and it is assumed that knowledge of the so-called external world begins with sensory perceptions. Even if one assumes that there is an external world for the sake of argument, western science is interested in generalized knowledge and not in customized versions if I may use the jargon of computer people. The generalized versions of ‘nature’ assuming that such ‘nature’ exists independent observers as an objective reality cannot be ‘visualized’ or grasped as sensory perceptible objects and what one ‘sees’ is not a generalized abstract concept. Thus, testing deductions of abstract generalized theories with concrete phenomena can be compared with a no win situation and western knowledge, especially in western Physics, has almost reached the end of the road. The so-called empiricism in western science may start with observations in concrete situations, theorize in a general context in abstract concepts, deduce results from these abstract theories using dry abstract Aristotelian logic, which itself is a generalization of concrete situations and then compare the deduced results with concrete situations. This is one of the most contradictory processes of constructing knowledge that has been created and is bound to fail sooner than later. This way of constructing knowledge has been already dropped in Computer Science (it is not a western science though it is called a science) and they are interested in customizing knowledge rather than in constructing generalized knowledge.

Western knowledge is obsessed with something called Truth, which for the western knowledge workers—can we call the intellectuals knowledge workers the way that prostitutes have been called sex workers probably by knowledge workers? In any event, there is not much of a difference between knowledge workers and sex workers who are also working with an abstract man who can stand for Piyal, rather than with a concrete man like Piyadasa—has to be formulated in generalized abstract concepts. Western science is supposed to be moving towards this abstract truth but, unfortunately, there is no way of knowing that western science is approaching this truth. In order to know that western science is moving towards the Truth one should know what Truth is because without knowing Truth in advance it is not possible to assert that western science is approaching truth with a t or T. Newton was of the opinion that particles and objects could move with any velocity and there was no barrier for the speed of particles. However, Einstein came out with his Theory of Special Relativity in 1905 more than hundred years ago saying said that no communication is possible with velocities greater than of light. However, in Quantum Mechanics entangled particles have been communicating with each other with superluminal velocities at least theoretically since the latter part of twenties with Bohr and ‘experimentally’ since 1982 with the experiments carried out by Aspect. The recent ‘discovery’ that neutrinos travel with superluminal velocities may or may not be correct as there could be experimental errors but the western Physicists have no alternative but to question the wisdom of Einstein. Now what is the truth? Could the particles travel with superluminal velocities as Newton assumed or not as was the opinion of Einstein? If the western Physicists are in the process of going back to Newton where does Truth lie? Are we to say that Truth lies with lies? Or, that there is no difference between lies and Truth in an abstract way?

Defence and Urban Development Ministry gets lion’s share

Appropriation Bill presented to Parliament

October 18, 2011, 8:45 pm

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By Saman Indrajith

The Appropriation Bill for the year 2012, was presented to Parliament yesterday by Prime Minister D. M. Jayaratne.

The total estimated expenditure for 2012 is Rs 2,220 billion with recurrent expenditure up from Rs. 1,029 billion in 2011 to Rs. 1,109 in 2012 while capital expenditure will go up from Rs. 938 in 2011 to Rs 1,111 billion next year.

The new Ministry for Defence and Urban Development, coming under President Mahinda Rajapaksa, will get the highest allocation, Rs. 230 billion for 2012, up from Rs. 215 billion that was allocated to the Ministry of Defence in 2011.

The Urban Development Authority (UDA) previously functioned as a separate department under the Ministry of Defence with effect from November 2010.The Ministry of Economic Development headed by Minister Basil Rajapaksa will get more than Rs. 104 billion, up from 75 billion in 2011 while there is also a steep rise in the allocation made to the Ministry of Finance and Planning, which is also headed by President Rajapaksa. It will go up to Rs. 124 billion from the Rs. 72.5 allocated in 2011.

The Ports and Highways Ministry has got over Rs. 144 billion while in 2011, the Highways Ministry was given Rs. 102 billion and Ports and Aviation Rs. 28.6 billion.

Another sum of around Rs 6.1 billion has been allocated for the Office of the President, of which 2.85 is for recurrent expenditure while the rest is for operational and development activities.

There is also an increase in the allocations for both the health and education sectors with the Ministry of Health getting more than Rs. 73 billion, up from Rs. 62 billion in 2011 while the Education Ministry will get around Rs. 33 billion, up from Rs. 30.7 billion in 2011.

The Transport Ministry has been given Rs. 53 billion, up from Rs. 45 billion in 2011 while the allocations to the Ministry of External Affairs will increase marginally from the Rs 6.6 billion it was allocated in 2011.

The Ministry of sports will also have a slight increase in its allocations for 2012 – from Rs. 1.7 billion in 2011 to Rs. 2 billion. The allocation to the Ministry of Resettlement has recorded a sharp decline — Rs. 481 million. It received Rs. 2.4 billion in 2011.

The Secretariat for Special Functions (Senior Ministers) has been allocated Rs. 293 million, of which 253 million is recurrent expenditure.