Loneliness is wired into the human brain. Here's what it looks like.
A large study shows changes in the brain scans of lonely people in the area involved in imagination, memory, and daydreaming.
- A study of 40,000 participants shows specific signatures in the brain scans of lonely people.
- Loneliness is linked to variations in grey matter volume and connections in the brain default network.
- This area of the brain is connected to the use of imagination, memory, future planning, and daydreaming.
Scientists show what loneliness looks like in the brain
<span style="display:block;position:relative;padding-top:56.25%;" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="63156dc0c87a36da00d48a02eab00822"><iframe type="lazy-iframe" data-runner-src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/wkWpqlfA_2Q?rel=0" width="100%" height="auto" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" style="position:absolute;top:0;left:0;width:100%;height:100%;"></iframe></span>Secretive agency uses AI, human 'forecasters' to predict the future
A U.S. government intelligence agency develops cutting-edge tech to predict future events.
- The Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity (IARPA), a research arm of the U.S. government intelligence community, is focused on predicting the future.
- The organization uses teams of human non-experts and AI machine learning to forecast future events.
- IARPA also conducts advanced research in numerous other fields, funding rotating programs.
"Minority report" pre-cog
Dreamworks/20th Century Fox
<p>In the interest of national security, IARPA wants to identify major world events before they happen, looking for terrorists, hackers or any perceived enemies of the United States. Wouldn't you rather stop a crime before it happens?</p><p>Of course, that's when we get into tricky political and sci-fi territory. Much of the research done by IARPA is actually out in the open, utilizing the public and experts in advancing technologies. It is available for "open solicitations," forecasting tournaments, and has <a href="https://www.iarpa.gov/index.php/working-with-iarpa/prize-challenges" target="_blank">prize challenges</a> for the public. You can pretty much <a href="https://www.iarpa.gov/index.php/working-with-iarpa/open-solicitations" target="_blank">send your idea in</a> right now. But what happens to the R&D once it leaves the lab is, of course, often for only the NSA and the CIA to know. </p><p><span style="background-color: initial;">The National Security Agency expert <strong>James Bamford</strong> wrote that the agency is ultimately looking to create a system where huge amounts of data about people's lives would be mined in real-time, for the purpose of preventing actions detrimental to the nation. In his <a href="https://www.post-gazette.com/opinion/2017/06/11/The-Department-of-Knowing-All-About-You/stories/201706110131" target="_blank">article for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette</a>, Bamford wrote that IARPA's goal is to create very powerful automated computer systems, managed through artificial intelligence, which would be "</span><span style="background-color: initial;">capable of cataloging the lives of everyone everywhere, 24/ 7." Such programs would be able to instantaneously access data streams belonging to citizens, whether from social media or anywhere else. As Bamford writes, being able to analyze "every Facebook post, tweet and YouTube video; every tollbooth tag number; every GPS download, web search and news feed; every street camera video; every restaurant reservation on Open Table — largely eliminates surprise from the intelligence equation." </span><span style="background-color: initial;"></span></p><p>Of course, one would suspect much of this is going on already. IARPA's <a href="https://www.iarpa.gov/index.php/research-programs/mercury" target="_blank">Mercury program,</a> for example, concentrates on data mining millions of private overseas communications that are gathered by the National Security Agency. While it can certainly be argued that such a program is a national security necessity, working to spot terrorists and elements that can lead to social unrest, the potential for misuse and infringement on privacy rights has alerted observers.</p>Top-secret U.S. space plane about to leave Earth for years
The Space Force will soon launch its X-37B spacecraft on a classified mission.
- The U.S. Air Force is preparing to launch its X-37B space drone made by Boeing.
- The spacecraft is like a mini-space shuttle and is used to test technologies.
- X-37B's missions are highly classified, leading to speculation about their purpose.
Boeing X-37B Space Plane - What You Need To Know
<span style="display:block;position:relative;padding-top:56.25%;" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="0b4a3e4ebd149f2611f514de66e8056e"><iframe type="lazy-iframe" data-runner-src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Xz0GihB_42Y?rel=0" width="100%" height="auto" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" style="position:absolute;top:0;left:0;width:100%;height:100%;"></iframe></span>First U.S. Space Force mission started with the launch of Atlas 5 rocket - 3/26/2020
<span style="display:block;position:relative;padding-top:56.25%;" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="a0ddb25d3f80ec1462cbc1b2da8bc9be"><iframe type="lazy-iframe" data-runner-src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/cCWSZyCUpRc?rel=0" width="100%" height="auto" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" style="position:absolute;top:0;left:0;width:100%;height:100%;"></iframe></span>Insightful ideas can trigger orgasmic brain signals, study finds
Research shows how "aha moments" affect the brain and cause the evolution of creativity.
- New psychology study shows that some people have increased brain sensitivity for "aha moments."
- The researchers scanned brains of participants and noticed orgasm-like signals during insights.
- The scientists think this evolutionary adaptation drives creation of science and culture.
Japanese scientists discover clue to erasing traumatic memories
Researchers make breakthrough in studying traumatic long-term memory in flies.
- Scientists in Japan find that light can affect long-term traumatic memories in flies.
- Keeping male flies in the dark helped them overcome negative mating memories.
- The researchers hope to use the finding to develop new treatments for PTSD and similar disorders.
Scientists found that flies kept in the dark did not keep long-term traumatic memories because the Protein-dispersing factor (Pdf) was not released. This resulted in the lack of production of the cAMP response element-binding protein (CREB) in the fly brain's memory center.
Credit: Tokyo Metropolitan University
