Progress in Multidisciplinary Research - When Brain meets Rectum
Bowel Movement Activity Triggered by Viewing Printed Matter: A Case Study
Advanced Studies in Social Sciences
Why Do Chinese Like Red and Green?
Local investigation of color preferences in Chinese nation reveals hidden mysteries on a global scale...
News and Views: Neural Codes and Information
What is more important, signal or noise?
New findings and fresh thoughts by Alexander Nezhinsky
Report: Neuroscience
Principle Component Analysis of Optical Imaging Signals reveals Mental Images
New Trends in Human Evolution
The Defecating Apes: Defecation and the Origins of Human Behavior
Physics
The Uncertainty Principle Is Untenable
by Gong BingXin
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Bowel Movement Activity Triggered by Viewing Printed Matter: A Case Study
Abstract.
We
report here a case study on one human subject, who found to manifest a tight coupling
between excretion and reading activities. Although defecation process
is known to be controlled voluntarily by means of anal sphincters, the
intentional relaxation of these sphincters per se did not produce any visible
effect in the individual under study. Only when the subject was simultaneously
presented with sufficient amount of printed text of any kind, written in
Russian or English, the defecation process started. The extinguishing of the trigger stimulus
from the subject's visual field resulted in almost immediate suppression of
the defecation. We found no effect of text relevance, quality or informational
content on its stimulation efficiency. Moreover, if the text happened to be completed
before all fecal masses were evacuated, the same text could be used repeatedly
without any detectable decline in its stimulation efficiency. It was also
noted that a novel content may sometimes exert lesser
effect as compared with previously known texts of the same length. We suggest that a substantial
level of tonic inhibition, which originates in higher brain cortical structures,
suppresses neural centers that control sphincter relaxation, keeping them in the deactivated state.
The arrival of a specific visual input unlocks these centers, bringing their
activity above a threshold. Our findings demonstrate the existence of a tight
link between visual and excretion systems, which formerly were considered
to be largely independent.
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Why Do Chinese Like Red and Green?
Abstract.
It is well known that Chinese prefer red and green colors to all other
colors. Essentially all artifacts and manifestations of the original Chinese culture bear
signs of this particular inclination. However, it's unclear what is the origin of this apparent
color preference. We propose a very simple hypothesis that accounts
for these observations and helps to acquire a deeper insight into many
puzzling phenomena of Chinese culture.
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What is more important, signal or noise?
Abstract.
The long-held notion that signals are generally more relevant than
the background noise has been recently challenged. This notion has its
roots in the nearly
three centuries of the scientific practice. During this entire period
scientists and engineers
have been trying obsessively to identify, quantify and qualify various
signals separating
them from the so called "noise". A new advanced study seems to show that
the reverse
appears to be definitely right.
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Principle Component Analysis of Optical Imaging Signals reveals Mental Images
Abstract.
Recently principle component analysis (PCA) of intrinsic optical signal was applied
for the study of spatial organization in feline and primate striate visual cortex (V1). It
has been found that only first 50-100 principal components contained information
related to the visual response. In the current study we went further and
analyzed principle components of much higher order (up to 2000). In agreement with previous studies, higher principle components indeed did not contain any information related to a visual
stimulation. However, we found very strong correlation between these components
and higher cognitive processes in the brain. Here we report results from a study of 6
adult anesthetized and paralyzed monkeys (two Macaca Mulatta and four Macaca Fascicularis). In five monkeys distinctive mental
images representing the subject engaged in mating and feeding activities were observed, while in one (unusually aggressive)
monkey very clear picture of a violence directed toward experimenters has emerged.
These results demonstrate that higher cognitive functions already exist at early stages of visual processing and they can be detected in high-order principle components that previously have been considered as a mere noise. Moreover, the fact that mental representations were clearly referenced to the subject's self, and not to another or "abstract" monkey, suggests that macaques are self-aware - the quality previously attributed only to humans and apes.
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The Defecating Apes: Defecation and the Origins of Human Behavior
Abstract.
What made humans the most successful animal species inhabiting the Earth? Most scientists believe that the key is the size of our brain. In his recent provocative book (Graig B. Stanford (1999) The Hunting Apes: Meat Eating and the Origins of Human Behavior. Princeton: Princeton University Press), the anthropologist Craig Stanford presents original alternative to this question. According to Stanford, the answer to human uniqueness and evolutionary success is the hunting and sharing of meat. Based on behavior of apes and anthropological findings, Stanford is arguing that the origins of human intellegence are linked to the acquisition of meat through the cognitive capacities necessary for the strategic cooperation during the foraging and subsequent sharing of meat with group members.
In the present study, we propose yet another alternative hypothesis. We suggest that instead of meat, an increased role of defecation, accompanied by requirements for extrapersonal space and privacy, evoked individualistic traits in our ancestors, shaping minds and society of the early hominids. We show that studies of previously neglected but remarkable significance of defecation as an integral part of everyday activities may provide new insights to the origins of human behavior.
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The Uncertainty Principle Is Untenable
Abstract.
By re-analysing Heisenberg's Gamma-Ray Microscope experiment and the ideal experiment from which the uncertainty principle is derived, it is actually found that the uncertainty principle can not be obtained from them. It is therefore found to be untenable.
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