] Why? It's an evolutionary mystery. The ability to regrow
] legs and eyes seems like a clear Darwinian advantage -
] one that surviving generations would have retained. But a
] paradox of regeneration is that the higher you move up
] the evolutionary chain, the less likely you'll have the
] ability to regrow limbs or organs. Keating's mission:
] figure out the cause of this paradox - and reverse it.

I wonder if giving the cells in a complex organism this kind of regenerative power makes them more likely to become cancerous, and so complex organisms with this feature died out from that.

U: This is what I get for not finishing the article before memeing... They discuss this possibility...

Regrow Your Own Broken heart? No problem. New liver? Coming right up. The road to regeneration starts here.

Laying a broad basis for possible future prescriptions, the President's Council on Bioethics yesterday issued an analysis of how biotechnology could lead toward unintended and destructive ends.

I must express some suspicion of this given that we already understand what the administration's perspective of this is. Is this a search for answers, or a hammer looking for a nail?

Some of the NYT's quotes reveal a mixed bag:

For example, this makes sense to me:
"By medicalizing key elements of our life through biotechnical interventions," the report says, "we may weaken our sense of responsibility and agency."

We already do this in many different ways.

On the other hand, I cannot imagine a more foolish luddism then this statement:

It concludes that "the human body and mind, highly complex and delicately balanced as a result of eons of gradual and exacting evolution, are almost certainly at risk from any ill-considered attempt at `improvement.' "

While the wording here is carefully chosen, the message is clear. Obviously there are risks. Everything has risks. It is important to understand risks and avoid them. But by waxing about the perfection of the human being and placing the word improvement in quotes, the author is not really referring to risk management. He stops short of arguing that all activity in this space would be counterproductive only because he can't prove that. He is saying that biotechnology is bad.

What this perspective ignores is that every single technological development in the history of man, from the first wooden spear to the space shuttle, has been an attempt to escape the boundaries of what nature has given us. That is, in fact, fundamentally what makes us human and what differs us from most other animals. We invent technologies which help us adapt to environmental pressures that other species cannot adapt to because they adapt at random and without will.

To claim that we have no reason to continue to expand the boundaries of our capabilities is the same sort of narcissistic bullshit that lead Fukuyama, who made large contributions to this paper, to conclude that we are at the end of political history. This perspective is absolutely ignorant of human nature.

Bush's Advisers on Biotechnology Express Concern on Its Use

] China's first piloted spacecraft has entered the outer
] space, and Lieutenant Colonel Yang Liwei is now the first
] Chinese astronaut in space in the world's 241st manned
] space mission.

] At around 9:10, Shenzhou-5 moved into the
] preset orbit, indicating success of China's endeavor to
] hurl a piloted space vehicle of its own into the orbit.

] In the meantime, The Yuanwang-1 measuring vessel has
] been monitoring the target over the Pacific Ocean; and
] the Beijing Space Command and Control Center ordered
] the craft to open up the solar panels.

Of course, it ain't over till the dude is back on the ground.

:: Xinhuanet - English :: China's first manned spacecraft in orbit

Theoretical conversation between mikhail simkin and his thesis advisor:

advisor: So how's your research going?

mikhail: Yeah I'm not really "motivated", I sorta want to just sit on my ass and surf the net.

advisor: You can't just waste time searching for useless crap on the internet, this is UCLA dept of Electrical Engineering. You'd better have a publishable paper the next time I see you.

mikhail: crap...

[cond-mat/0310049] Theory of Aces: Fame by chance or merit?

] As described in the 15th November, 2002, issue of the
] journal Science (Ferber, 2002), the current
] administration has engaged in political screening of
] appointees to peer review study sections that are charged
] with evaluating the scientific merits of research
] proposals on HF/E issues in the workplace.

Strong protest from workplace ergonomics community about political interference from the Republicans in their scientific workgroups.

[IP] Political interference with scientific committees

] Writing in the journal Science, Lieberman and Eisenberger
] said the brains of the volunteers lit up when they were
] rejected in virtually the same way as a person
] experiencing physical pain.
]
]
]
] "It would be odd if social pain looked like the exact
] same thing as someone-breaking-your-arm pain," Lieberman
] said. "What it does look like is visceral pain."
]
]
]
] In other words -- like being punched in the stomach.

Yahoo! News - Images Show a Snub Really Is Like Kick in the Gut

] Peter H. Diamandis, chairman and CEO of the X-Prize
] Foundation, said he expects that one of the two teams
] will launch within the next few months, using rockets and
] spacecraft that are already being tested and prepared for
] the daring venture.

CNN.com - Private space race nears finale - Sep. 29, 2003

Abstract: Diffie-Hellman key agreement protocol [21] implementations have been plagued by serious security flaws. The attacks can be very subtle and, more often than not, have not been taken into account by protocol designers. In this summary we discuss both theoretical attacks against the Die-Hellman key agreement protocol and attacks based on implementation details . It is hoped that computer security practitioners will obtain enough information to build and design secure and ecient versions of this classic key agreement protocol.

(This paper came in handy during a recent project...)

paper: Security Issues in the Diffie-Hellman Key Agreement Protocol

Global warming or local warming, it's still probably not too super...

CNN.com - Report: Giant Arctic ice shelf breaks up - Sep. 22, 2003

] WASHINGTON, Sept. 22 — All nine members of an expert panel
] established by Congress to advise NASA on safety resigned today,
] with several citing frustration over a lack of influence.

Whoa!

All 9 Members of a NASA Safety Panel Resign