Sunset

Sun setting over the far ridge. Click to enlarge.

Curtailed Cognition—Part 1

The results of recent research by Yale University on a population of 20,000 Chinese people over the time span of 2010-2014 is very sobering, because the study is the first to demonstrate that air pollution reduces one's cognitive ability. We've known for decades that air pollution is physically damaging to our lungs, but now the physical damage to the brain has also been shown. Our intelligence is being threatened.

Some 95% of the world's population is known to breathe unsafe air. That problem is particularly acute in China, whose air pollution has been shown to be three times greater than the upper limits described by the UN's World Health Organization; which is why the Yale study was conducted there. The researchers demonstrated that air pollution caused a significant drop in test scores—particularly in language and math—creating the equivalent of a lost year in the average person's education.

So now we have further evidence of the health-damaging impact of air pollution. What do these results mean? How great is this threat? What should we do about it? Of course, the rational conclusion would be to take dramatic and immediate measures to reduce air pollution. Don't hold your breath, however (no intentional pun, here). Since most all forms of pollution and environmental degradation disproportionately impact the poor, we can't expect politicians—who owe so much to the rich—to do much of anything about the problem.

In related areas, very little has been done to slow global warming or the use of pesticides, so we can't expect much to be done about air pollution either. Politicians seem to be minimally concerned about the future, since the impact of their actions—harmful or helpful—often takes many years to bear fruit. Their attention is on the next quarter's bottom line, and their chances of getting reelected, not on distant events to come.

So what will the future bring, if air pollution persists? Are we doomed? Will we be getting increasingly dumber? What harm will we incur as a species, if we don't act? No one knows the answers to these questions.

Well, there's one thing that can be counted on: the pharmaceutical industry will swing into action by developing drugs to deal with the curtailed cognitive symptoms—especially if those drugs need to be taken for the rest of one's life (thereby ensuring continued income for big pharma). Our culture is good at treating symptoms—rather than root causes. We already know that citizens' lungs get messed up with air pollution, so big pharma has answered the call by developing inhalers. Similarly, we have medicines to treat diabetes and heart disease—all aimed at easing the pain and limitations of these problems, without the need to improve lifestyles. Drug companies make lots of money when industry makes people sick. 
 
So, will big pharma come up with medications to counter the brain damage caused by air pollution? It's a good bet that they will. We already have medications to treat the symptoms of Alzheimer's disease and other brain problems. We can count on the pharmaceutical industry to rescue us from having to do much about air pollution.

I am currently taking an online course on modern diseases and debilitation of old age, which makes another cogent point on this issue. The Dutch professor of my course, a physician, spent a few years in the emergency ward of a hospital, often treating the aftermath of accidents, such as when vehicles collide. He later went into family medicine and often found himself dealing with emergency situations brought on by heart attacks and strokes.

It occurred to him that he was repeatedly faced with health accidents that were brought on, not by a sudden automobile crash, but in the wake of a few decades of unhealthy living. In either case, he was dealing with a calamity—one that either happened in the ER from a crash a few hours earlier, or the other due to a gradual crash over decades. Are we creating a slow-motion crash of brain damage from air pollution—a crash that is as avoidable as heart attacks and diabetes, which could be dealt with by creating a healthy lifestyle?

More on dumbing down next time...

AI Goes to Mars

Six years ago NASA gently lowered the rover Curiosity into Mars' Gale Crater. It was a risky landing, that entailed lowering the rover onto the surface from a sky crane that slowly and tenderly deposited Curiosity, disconnected from it, and then flew off at a distance and crashed itself. Every NASA employee—as well as millions around the world—chewed their fingernails, until Curiosity radioed back that it was safely down.

Ever since that ground-breaking day, the rover has wandered about Gale Crater at the breakneck speed of 0.02 mph (0.03 kph), scooping up soil samples, drilling holes in rocks, and analyzing the compounds found. Its mission is to evaluate Mars' habitability, i.e., could the Red Planet ever have had conditions that would have allowed life to exist there? Can we detect the signs of those conditions today? I have blogged previously that NASA has learned from its 1970s Viking missions not to try to directly measure life on Mars (due to the ambiguity of the measurements), but to simply try to determine if Mars' climate ever was hospitable for life.

Three years ago NASA upgraded the software in Curiosity's computer to give it artificial intelligence (AI) capability, which is presently operable. Thus the rover now can function autonomously, similar to the self-driving cars and trucks currently being tested here on Earth. Prior to this upgrade, Curiosity had to wait for NASA scientists to order its every movement. Humans decided its targets, based on photos taken by the rover, ordered Curiosity to take certain actions, reviewed the results, and then sent the next commands. 
This procedure made for a lot of downtime, as the rover waited for further instructions.

Now with AI, Curiosity can act on its own, much faster and with greater accuracy than before. It gets occasional overall directions from Earth, but attends to all the details on its own. This is similar to the autonomy that self-driving Earth vehicles have, but without the worry that the rover will crash at high speed, or run over any people—as has happened on this planet with autonomous vehicles.

In NASA's typically cautious manner, the upgrade to AI capability was slowly and carefully tested, using an Earthbound twin to Curiosity, that scientists can play with, at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California. And true to NASA's propensity to generate creative acronyms, the new AI software is called AEGIS*, for Autonomous Exploration for Gathering Increased Science. It makes me wonder if NASA may also have an acronym-naming group, possibly called Group of Radical English-Adept Technicians for NASA Acronym Mission Epithets (GREATNAME)? May Curiosity roll on for many more years.

*Aegis is the name of the battle shield of Zeus, and usually refers to the supportive backing given a person or organization.

Shedding Shoes

Growing up in America's Midwest, my family did not have the custom of removing our shoes upon entering the house. My mom might scold me for not being mindful about wiping my shoes on the doormat, but we kept our foot apparel on indoors.

I've been exposed to other cultures' customs in my adult years—of shedding my shoes upon going into another's home, or into religious buildings. I have come to appreciate the ritual. Recently I was pondering this shoe removal routine and found myself wondering how it may have come about, or what the reasons for doing it may be.

We often follow our culture's customs without taking a deeper look into why we do so. Is it just because we've always done it that way, or are there good reasons? After some contemplation on the question and some internet research, I offer this list as grounds for shedding your shoes upon entering an interior space.

To begin with, it helps keep the place cleaner. By not tracking in outdoor contaminants—dirt, disease, and toxins—one's home is able to remain more tidy and healthy. We may love the outdoors, but do we really want to track in its dust and dog shit?

Many cultures—particularly in the East—have long had the habit of leaving footwear at the door. People in these cultures also are more likely to sit on the floor, so as in the first reason above, a clean floor is more inviting to sit on. It's a good idea to be sensitive to this convention and follow suit.

A third, similar reason is that it's an act of respect to remove one's shoes, before entering another's private space—especially if it happens to be a spiritual space. And shouldn't all homes be spiritual?

A fourth motivation is that it's more comfortable to have your shoes off. One can be more relaxed. It can even be healthier to patter around in bare feet or socks, rather than keeping on one's clunky and stiff shoes or boots.

A fifth reason is the reduction of wear and tear on rugs and furnishings. Japanese floors often are covered with tatami mats, which are not very durable. Additionally, if I have removed my my shoes and find myself sitting in a big, snug chair or couch, my legs seem to naturally fold up, as my feet come up and get cozy. I would never do that with boots on.

Finally, pausing to remove one's shoes before entering another's home or sanctuary, is a great way to mindfully think about what you will be engaging in next. Sometimes we arrive a little tense from the drive or slogging through inclement weather. Do we want to drag those stresses inside, or leave them at the door? By hesitating, taking a couple of deep breaths, greeting our host warmly and respectfully, as we sit to doff shoes, we offer ourselves a useful psychological separation between the outside (maybe a bit frenetic) world and the inside (hopefully peaceful) space. Hey, shedding shoes might lead to world peace!

Io

Jupiter's moon Io, showing a volcanic eruption of organic material from the surface. NASA. Click to enlarge.

Gentle Giants

Both whales and porpoises are intelligent mammals who, millions of years ago, decided to evolve from a land critter back to one of the sea. That was an interesting return to life's origins—the sea. All of life began in the oceans and for a few billion years resided solely there, until some fish-like creatures crawled up on land, over 350 million years ago, and took up residence as terrestrial animals. Over time, mammals and many other species of animals evolved from those primitive, limbless, cold-blooded vertebrates; and then even later some of them (whales and porpoises) decided to return to the seas.

Whales subsequently evolved to become the largest animals on the planet—especially the blue whale, which at some 110 feet (33 m) long and 150 tons (136,000 kg), is the largest critter ever. Porpoises and dolphins are related to whales—both of which are often defined as “small-toothed whales.” The porpoise has a blunt snout and the dolphin a beaklike snout. Whales, dolphins, and porpoises are also called cetaceans, which is derived from the Greek word ketos, “whale.”

What's more, these cetaceans are very intelligent creatures, whose languages are far more complex than our simple human communication. Yes, that's right... their language is much more intricate than ours. In fact, the density of the information in their songs is such that they can transmit up to 10 million bits of data every half hour. That's about the same amount of information contained in Homer's Odyssey. So, within a half hour, they sing to each other the same amount of data that takes us a few days to read. Pretty smart, eh?

It seems sadly paradoxical that we humans have hunted down and slaughtered millions of whales, over the centuries. We obviously don't take into consideration their intelligence or their sophisticated communication, when we kill them. We don't view them as bright creatures—just as food.

What I find fascinating is that whales, being so much larger and more powerful than humans, have not used their advanced communication and brainpower to revolt and declare war on us. Scuba divers swim around whales that are up to 20 times larger and outweigh them by tens of thousands of times—yet aren't harmed. One flip of that powerful whale tail and the human is extinguished. Yet when we are in the water with them, cetaceans are overwhelmingly friendly.

Why should they be so gentle? Given how badly we've treated them, I find it remarkable that they've not turned on us. Why do they not perceive us as their enemy? They must be able to comprehend all the harm we've done to them. If they had chosen to battle us, we long ago would either have made peace with them, or eliminated them entirely—which we've done with many large land mammals. It seems to me that we could use a few lessons in nonviolence from these gentle giants. Too bad we're not smart enough to understand their language. They'd probably have a few useful things to tell us.

Allokataplixis Awe

So what is that impressive six-syllable word in the title trying to say? It's a sure bet you won't find it in any dictionary you might have, as it's been recently coined by Professor Liam Heneghan of DePaul University in Chicago. Why did he invent such a clumsy moniker, and what does it mean? Professor Heneghan wanted to express the wonder that we experience, when we encounter novel things in a foreign land—things whose residents have long ago learned to ignore. Fresh eyes often see fascinating features that accustomed eyes don't.

The professor noticed this phenomenon when he began taking some of his college students on a visit to Ireland each year. Having been born and raised on the Emerald Isle himself, but a long-time resident of the US, his eyes were neither fresh nor any longer habituated to Irish peculiarities, such as the smell of the air, eccentric architecture, local expressions, and novel foods. But his students marveled at and delighted in these and many other small things they'd never before seen.

So he coined the word allokataplixis, which is a conjunction of two Greek words: allo, meaning “other,” and katapliktiko, meaning “wonder.” He feels that the word captures the amazement and fascination that his students expressed so many times during their visits to Ireland.

I immediately identified with and was struck by this idea, as it describes a feeling I've had, whenever visiting a place I've never been before. There are so many details that capture my attention—details I find myself photographing or listing in my travel journal, each night. I often later chuckle at how many of these features are really quite ordinary, and thus become rather invisible to me, after a few days.

Sure, the magnificent views that I hoped to experience in Italy and Ireland were indeed magnificent and awe inspiring, but on the way to that overlook or that charming village, many small objects caught my attention and demanded that I pause to enjoy them. That's the biggest reason why I always keep a loose and flexible schedule when I travel: it allows stopping and smelling the flowers along the way. Many of my fondest memories of visiting a foreign land are composed of those small delights, and how they often led me to a fascinating discovery that I'd otherwise have missed, had I a strict itinerary to adhere to.

Allokataplixis can happen closer to home as well. Several decades ago I moved to the woods of northern Virginia—just a handful of miles from the West Virginia border. I found myself one day crossing for the first time the state line on my motorcycle, riding into West Virginia, where I began noticing several small, different, and novel sights—thinking, “Wow! I'm in unfamiliar and interesting territory!” Now that I've traversed that same state line countless times, it's no longer novel—it's become my familiar, ordinary neighborhood.

Professor Heneghan had another thought in mind, when he invented the word allokataplixis: that a newcomer's fascination with novel details in a new place can be contagious for long-term residents. It can reignite in them an appreciation for their surroundings. It can wake up jaded denizens. In this way, allokataplixis can become a gift to the residents of a place where travelers visit. It can show residents that there is the marvelous in the everyday. Mindfulness can do the same thing, as it can draw us out of our inattentive state of mind, to put attention to special little things. If something—anything—causes us to pause and absorb the mundane, we can come to realize it too is a true wonder.