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"For the sciences, the way to change science's perception of things is to wait until all the old farts have died off."
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Don't read Cliff notes - eat Cliff.
Experiments with RNA have, in fact, demonstrated actual chemical memeory transfer. Michigan psychologist James McConnell has shown this with Planaria, or flatworms. He conditions them by electrical shock to contract when a light is flashed. Then he grinds the worms up and feeds them to untrained worms, who are then able to learn to contract twice as fast as their predecessors. What happens is that the first group of worms form new RNA which molds new proteins containing the message that light is a signal to contract. Then the second group, having consumed the memory proteins, don't need to manufacture so much of their own; they have swallowed memory, so to speak. The same kind of experiments have been performed with rats wherein they are taught to fear darkness, after which their brains are ground up and injected into mice, which then react to darkness the same way. RNA, therefore, chemically converts experiences into learning which can then be transfered to the cells of another creature. In 1964, Hyden and Egyhazi found that rats trained to use their nonpreferred paws to obtain food showed both higher amounts and different types of RNA in the brain region controlling that paw. Control animals who used their prefeoued paws (and hence required no new learning) showed no changes in RNA. Simply showing changes in RNA as the result of learning, however, does not explain whether the RNA molecules carry the memories, or if the changes in RNA are the result of other brain changes caused by memory formation.
All of which has lead McConnell to speculate whimsically: "Why should we waste all the knowledge a distinguished professor has accumulated simply because he's reached retirement age?" Instead, McConnell proposes, the students should eat the professor.
In 1970, Ungar reported the isolation of an extract obtained from the brains of mice that had learned to avoid shock by leaving a dark compartment. When injected into naive mice, it caused them to leave their normally preferred dark chambers, in the absence of experiences with aversive consequences. Ungar named this extract scotophobin (a Greek word meaning "fear of the dark"). Comment/Join this discussion ( 2 ) | RSS/XML | Blog This | Additional
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Science Fiction
Timeline
Brin's 1990 Novel Earth Still Full Of Predictions
'... making the point that their likenesses, every move they made, were being transmitted.'
Gaia - Why Stop With Just The Earth?
'But the stars are only atoms in larger space, and in that larger space the star-atoms could combine to form living matter, thinking matter, couldn't they?'
Microsoft VASA-1 Creates Personal Video From A Photo
'...to build up a video picture would require, say, ten million decisions every second. Mike, you're so fast I can't even think about it. But you aren't that fast.'
Splendid View Of Eclipse From Orbit Visualized And Repurposed By Arthur C. Clarke
'The area affected was five hundred kilometres across, and perfectly circular.'
Goldene - A Two-Dimensional Sheet Of Gold One Atom Thick
'Hasan always pitched a Gauzy - a one-molecule-layer tent, opaque, feather-light, and very tough.'
SpaceX Wants A Moonbase Alpha
'And he had been sent with troops, supplies and bombs to command Russia's most trusted post, the Moonbase.'
Vast Apartment Living Will Get Even More Vast
'What is your population', I asked. 'About eighty millions.'
NASA Wants Self-Driving Or Remote-Controlled Vehicles For Lunar Astronauts
'THE autobus turned silently down the wide street of Hydropole. Robot-guided, insulated from noise and cold...'
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