Stressing output is the key to improving productivity, while looking to increase activity can result in just the opposite.
–Andrew S. Grove

Google+: View post on Google+

I will repeat this point again until I get hoarse: a mistake is not something to be determined after the fact, but in the light of the information until that point. —Nicholas Nassim Taleb

Google+: View post on Google+

Louis Science center has a pretty neat physical demonstration of a probability distribution.

Google+: Reshared 3 times
Google+: View post on Google+

Louis Science Center has entranced me since I was a child. 

The ball race at the St. Louis Science Center has entranced me since I was a child.

Google+: View post on Google+

I've found a good way to change my mind about something that I'm wrong about (but don't know I'm wrong about), is to write a detailed defense of my position.  It's not uncommon to argue myself out of a position.  Usually my wrongness stems from an assumption I didn't realize I was making.

Quality argumentation on the internet is a good way to increase the accuracy of your beliefs because you're forced to write arguments for your held position.  (Finding places to have quality arguments is another story.)

On a related point, you should allow your opponents a way to retreat from their held positions.  Ask yourself if you want to "win" an argument by having the last word or belittling your opponent to increase your ego and social standing or if you want to win an argument by changing your opponents mind.  If it's the latter, then present your arguments in a manner that, as much as possible, lessens the perceived ego and social standing hit your opponent will take by changing their mind.

Google+: Reshared 2 times
Google+: View post on Google+

 Think about that.  A heart that beats for over 500 years.

This study (http://www.contriving.net/link/du) examines the proteins in the heart of this species and finds…

Collectively, in extremely long-lived molluscs, maintenance of protein homeostasis likely contributes to the preservation of cardiac function.

Bivalve species are interesting to researchers examining aging because the different bivalve species exhibit a wide range of different lifespans.  As such, researchers can examine the differences between them to suss out factors leading to long life.

Embedded Link

Arctica islandica – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Longevity[edit]. These animals show exceptional longevity with a highest reported age of 507 years. In 1868 one specimen, collected alive near Iceland, was 374 years old. The study of its growth rate and the oxygen isotope data showed that it had a highly variable growth at the peak of the …

Google+: Reshared 1 times
Google+: View post on Google+

H/T Universe Today.

Saturn’s North Pole from Cassini.

H/T Universe Today.

Google+: Reshared 1 times
Google+: View post on Google+

There’s either a scapegoat or a silver bullet in almost every bestselling diet book.
— David Katz

Google+: View post on Google+

Google+: Reshared 11 times
Google+: View post on Google+

Theodotus, he is a barbarian, and thinks that the customs of his tribe and island are the laws of nature."
–George Bernard Shaw, Caesar and Cleopatra (1898)

Google+: Reshared 2 times
Google+: View post on Google+