Japanimals

Sadistic Tokyo Metro beavers are amused at the thought of humans losing their fingers:



Easily offended Japanese pigeons are patronised by the offer of food:



But the deer in Nara are politeness itself - they bow their thanks when fed:

Kyoto and Nara:

I'll let the pictures do the talking:

Rokuon-Ji, Kyoto. The pavillion is covered in gold leaf:


The gardens at Rokuon-Ji:


Tea rooms on the river front in Kyoto:


Todai-Ji, Nara:


The Virocaba Buddha inside is almost 15m tall:


Nara, from a temple on the hillside:


A beautiful garden in the smallest of spaces


Kyomizu-Ji, (Clear Water Temple):


Modern technology meets an age old ritual. UV Lights disinfect the long handled cups used to collect the temple's holy spring water:


Osaka University International Guest House is in the middle of a peaceful expanse of bamboo:

Who says science isn't romantic?

xkcd is brilliant. See here.

Tales of the riverbank

Yesterday, Shinohara Sensei invited me to join his lab's Imonikai (芋に会) - which translates roughly as potato boiling party. This is a Tohoku regional tradition to usher in autumn (秋 'aki'), where people gather outside to make and share a Taro based stew. Two prefectures, Miyagi (where Sendai is) and Yamagata have competing recipes for this stew - Miyagi uses pork and carrots in a miso base where Yamagata uses beef in a soy base. Sake and beer are drunk in generous proportions.

The view from the river bank as the sun began to set:


Students cooking some 蝦 (ebi - prawns) drenched in sake:


A dish of Miyagi style stew being served up:


I also learnt the word オタク (otaku - geek). One sleeping student, passed out after too much stew and sake, had the most inventive facial graffiti administered that I've ever seen - among other things, his glasses were removed and eye balls drawn on his eyelids. His glasses were then replaced. There is a Japanese attention to detail that I really admired about this process. The end result, someone apparently passed out with their eyes wide open, was strangely disconcerting. But CS students are CS students wherever you go, it seems, and the penchant for alcohol and elaborate practical jokes knows few bounds.


The students also took me to Karaoke (usually written カラオケ - and literally means empty orche(stra)). I was worried that they were only doing so because Shinohara Sensei had asked them to, so when offered a short or long session I opted for short. That's 30 minutes, I thought, maybe an hour. No. When it comes to karaoke Japanese style, short apparently means two hours! Which was then extended by a further thirty minutes.

At the time, being suck in a little box with six male grad students singing some strange songs (more on that soon) didn't seem remotely odd, in much the same way that the induction into Scientology probably seems perfectly rational whilst you're going through it. Only as I was walking back to the hotel did it suddenly strike me that, wow, that was weird.

Karaoke in Japan is apparently not like Karaoke in Britain. For a start you do it sober, which was a shock. Secondly you do it in a small room with your friends, or even alone (hitokara - one person karaoke). Thirdly, everyone seems to volunteer quite eagerly - singing several times. Furthermore, nobody applauds. In fact there are very few outward signs of enjoyment, but it is somehow obvious that the evening is being enjoyed. Additionally, nobody's singing is mocked. Inability to remember a song might raise a chuckle - but most important seems to be the choice of song.

I was told that one of the students - your off-the-shelf, archetypal male CS student, plaid shirt, glasses and introverted even by the standers of his peer group - was well known for singing songs that were a little 'otaku'. These included "Cartoon Heroes" by Aqua (a very earnest rendition) and a song called "Butterfly".

I've been searching for a man
All across Japan
Just to find, to find my samurai
Someone who is strong
But still a little shy
Yes I need, I need my samurai

Ay, ay, ay, I'm your little butterfly
Green, black and blue,
Make the colors in the sky.

An inspired choice!

The last song was a Japanese hair-metal group - lots of fun. Everybody got to join in singing (shouting) the "YES!" and "GO!"s at the end of each line.

I opened with "Song for the Dumped" by Ben Folds Five (whose lyrics served to dispell any lingering impression that I should be treated as Sensei). I also did "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun" which I think was thought to be rude at first - though my "They just'a wanna, they justa wanaaaaas!" were enthusiastic enough to be met with nods of approval. Also "Call Me" - which was though to be not rude ("Cover me with kisses baby, cover me with love" was met with a heartfelt "ahhhhh" from the other participants). And these kids today don't know Blondie, so I got extra kudos for knowing an apparently new song!

I really wish we'd had some of these guys at the UCL christmas panto - I quite fancy the idea of a Kabuki version of "Murder on the Outlook Express", or a Noh rendition of "Array Pointer and the Finkelstone".

From Ginza to Ginga

Professor Shinohara had many engagements on Friday so I decided to leave a little early and spend some extra time in Tokyo. From this isde Tokyo station looks almost serene. Inside it's manic. It took me almost an hour to deposit my bags and find the right exit.


Find it I did, though. I opted to head for the Imperial Palace Park, an oasis of peace in a hot and busy city:



Not all of Tokyo is so tranquil - I decided to spend the evening in Ginza and Nihonbashi:



Eight way crossings: what fun!





At 11pm it was time to catch the Ginga ("Galaxy") night train to Osaka. There were several train fanciers on the station, waiting to photograph of one of the Grandes Dames of the Japanese railways.




The feeling of nostalgia extends to the interior, with the brass and porcelain washroom.





In standard class the beds are small but adequate, and laid out four to a bay. The curtain provides the only privacy. Night trains are definitely a relic of a time that was less concerned about safety.




The beds come with neatly folded bedding and a yukata robe. There are "indoor slippers" to be worn around the train too.





I fastened my curtains, changed into my robe, put in the iPod headphones and fell fast asleep by midnight. When I woke, the sun was rising and we were speeding through the outskirts of Kyoto. There's something very romantic about night trains.

On the rails

I've been travelling this weekend. It started with a Shinkansen to Tokyo, where I wandered for hours just getting as lost as possible. The Imperial Palace Gardens and a couple of parks form oases of tranquility, but otherwise Tokyo is a fairly hectic place. However the politeness and good manners of the people there make it much easier to cope with than some other cities of lesser size (I'm looking in your directions, Paris and London!)

The biggest excitement for me was actually leaving Tokyo - I caught the Ginga sleeper. I adore sleeper trains and, whilst it wasn't quite as comfortable as the capsule hotel, my little bunk/tent combo was very conducive to sleep. Waking up just after sunrise whilst travelling though the outskirts of Kyoto was fantastic - seeing the streets empty of cars and the station platforms all but deserted (apart for a few hardy Japanese trainspotters for whom a photo of the Ginga is much prized).

My colleague and friend Larissa and her daughter have been looking after me this weekend. They arrived in Osaka very late on Friday night, so my arrival at the crack of dawn on Saturday wasn't particularly well timed from their point of view! Nevertheless they've been the souls of hospitality. Larissa lived in Osaka for three years and her knowledge is invaluable - I've had to make hardly any effort at all - just follow where I'm led and some astonishing temples or heartbreakingly beautiful gardens or beautiful food is there in front of me.

Photos and videos will follow in a couple of days, with some more details about the temples and shrines that we've seen. I think I may be in love with Japan...

Around Asakusa and Ueno

Tokyo, days one and two - now with moving pictures.







Sunday morning shuttered shops in Asakusa. I'm guessing that vandalism isn't a major problem here.


Rough and ready video of the first couple of days. Best with sound:

Why I'm bad for my husband's health

Interesting study on health effects, as reported in MindHacks. I haven't read the full article, as it's behind a Paywall (for anyone with generous Athens access, it's can be found via PubMed) and it may well be an example of Texas Bullseye[1], but the abstract reports that:

After adjusting for age, systolic blood pressure, body mass index, cigarette smoking, diabetes, and total cholesterol/high density cholesterol, the married men compared with unmarried men were almost half as likely to die during follow-up (hazard ratio (HR) = 0.54; 95% confidence interval (CI): 0.34-0.83)... Men with wives who were upset by work were 2.7 times more likely to develop CHD (HR = 2.71; 95% CI: 1.22-6.03).

Hmm. C'mon funding propsal!


[1]The practice of shooting up a barn door with an automatic weapon, drawing a circle round the three closest hits and calling that the bullseye, post-hoc.

Shinshoji Temple, Tokyo

The Shinshoji temple is in Asakusa, so I couldn't leave Tokyo without a visit:





The temple gate.



Worshipers purify themselves in incense smoke before entering the temple.



Worshipers complete their devotions by clapping very loudly..








Shinshoji is surrounded by beautiful gardens, shrines and statuary.




But maintaining them can't be cheap. These new lanterns are sponsored by, and carry the logo of a credit card company.

Capuseru Hoteru Asukasa

(Or, カプセルホテル、浅草, if you have Japanese fonts installed!)

Thanks to an excellent bilingual map of Tokyo[1] I knew exactly where to find the capsule hotel, and even which exit to leave Asakusa metro station. Check in was a little more difficult - I'm not used to having to go to a vending machine to pay for my night's stay (I swear to you - an actual vending machine that actually vends an actual ticket that you actually take to the receptionist to exchange for a locker key).

I didn't go out much the first night - I mainly walked around Asakusa, trying to position myself so that David could find me on the webcam:


[Webcam on the cheap - I'm the orange splodge by the phone box!]

By 10 o clock I was attempting my first Japanese bath, and my word was it hot. 40 degrees C sounds quite warm, a few degrees above body temperature but copeable with. Until you try it for the first time. I didn't get in any further than my knees. I've jumped in post-sauna, ice-cold plunge pools with greater alacrity than this, and I don't particularly like the cold. To every lobster I've ever eaten - I'm sorry.

The panoramic baths were only available to men. For some reason, the women's bathing arrangement's didn't involve huge floor to ceiling windows :) There was a common balcony where tea and coffee were available. It made a nice perch to watch the city from.



The heat and journey by this point were enough to make me feel like some capsule time was in order. And that's why you're here, right - to see photos of those crazy capsules. Well wait no longer dear reader:

The women's floor bathroom. I may be wrong but I'm assuming the chaps don't get flowers and a hairdryer.

Women are assigned a single floor of the nine storey hotel. Not many capsule hotels cater for women at all, as they exist mainly for the convenience of salarymen who've missed the last train home after a night on the sake. Apparently they aren't great company.

On Saturday night, the women's floor was camaraderie personified. Japanese grandmothers visiting grandchildren whose apartments are too small to take guests and lone female travelers sharing stashes of sweets and being sweetly considerate about noise.

---

The capsules themselves were somewhat hivelike. I do think this is what the first spaceships to colonise other planets will look like. I've always thought that the living conditions on Red Dwarf were much more plausible than the ones on the Enterprise.



The capsule interior feels surprisingly spacious - there was room to sit and read, and to watch some Simpsons on the laptop. The radio unit doubles as a handy shelf and the dimmable light makes things very cosy indeed. Nothing about the experience felt in any way strange, and the capsule was easily big enough for someone of my height (5'10"). I've never slept so well on my first night anywhere.

The photos of the inside of the capsule don't do it any justice, but I have some video coming up that will show you a capsule in all its glory. I'm off to explore Sendai.


[1] Tokyo City Atlas: A Bilingual Guide, Kidansha International, 2004. ISBN-13: 978-4-7700-2503-6. I got mine from Stanfords.

Lost in Transition

It's 03:18 according to the clock on my iBook. It's 11:18 according to my watch. According to the inflight map we're over somewhere that could be Ulan Bator if I knew what the Japanese for Ulan Bator was. I'm aboard a something - Boeing I think - it has at least two 7s in the model number. Other than that, my grasp on the space/time continuum is pretty shaky.

I've woken up after a sleep only made possible thru the miracles of melatonin and extreme contortion. The cabin lights have not yet come back on line and neither, I think, has my brain.

I have decided, through the fug, that this trip is not going to be Lost in Translation. Lost in Translation was all 20th floor panoramic cocktail bars, taxis through Ginza and a glamorous, blonde American full of ennui. My version is more 7th floor panoramic bathrooms (more on that later I hope), taking the Ginza underground line and a Brit of indeterminate hair colour full of a rather tasty, for airline food, beef sweet and sour. I think I like my version better.

I also like JAL so far, despite the teeny tiny seats. They haven't caught up with the rest of the world as far as running a profitable (i.e. Spartan) airline. They still have toothbrush kits in the bathrooms and a help-yourself snack and drink bar open throughout the flight[1]. However, the flavours are taking some getting used to. So far there have been some mysterious crackers that looked like chocolate chip biscuits (did I mention that it's still dark in here?), smelt like Ritz crackers[2], and tasted like Ritz crackers. With chocolate chips in. I'm keeping the packaging to determine whether the Kanji reads "Joke cracker for Gaijin who didn't take the trouble to master Japanese -　はは (ha ha)". Thankfully, peanut M&Ms look like peanut M&Ms regardless of the language on the packaging. I usually don't eat anthropomorphic food, but I need to take away the taste of "Choco-Cheese - the snack for total masochists".

[1] I should point out to those unfamiliar with UK Academia that the travel policy is "Business Class? What Business Class?". Which is why i've had to learn to type on my knees with the laptop screen angled 45 degrees towards my knees. Bitter? But if course ladies and gentlemen!

[2] To my transatlantic chums - Ritz crackers are always regular cheese flavour in the UK.

Seeing things similarly

[Disclosure of interest - there's a certain author on this paper that is married to the author of this piece...]



Take a look at the figure on the left (click on it to make it bigger). It's taken from a paper by Corney and Lotto. The left hand column shows some optical illusions that you've probably seen before. In Box A for example, the corner lines look lighter than they actually are, and in Box D, there is a tendency to see light spots appearing in the intersections of the darker grey lines.

In the right hand column, the blue line on the graph shows the actual lightness (reflectance) of the stimuli - that is, how much light is really being returned to the eye by the points along the blue line (assuming the blue line wasn't there!). The red curve shows the perceived reflectance - that is, how light the stimulus appears to be, once the brain is done processing the image in the light of prior experience.

Graph A shows the brain overestimating lightness throughout, but particularly at the points of maximum lightness - the "bands" in the corner that we see as being lighter than they really are. Graph D - my favourite - shows an oscillation: an intersection between two dark grey lines is perceived as lighter than it is (causing the appearing and disappearing "blobs" that we see). At the points furthest from these intersections, the line actually appears to be darker than it is.

Now for the sting: the brain in question was an artificial neural network (ANN) that only ever existed inside a computer. It was trained to successfully perform on a lightness constancy task. Most excitingly, when trained to discern between overlapping layers, the ANN sees White's illusion (Box E). White's illusion has been problematic to model as the lightness perception goes "the other way" from the stimuli shown here. Thus, the by-product of learning to see lightness and depth is a susceptibility to these illuaions. This also tells us something about how animal brains, including our own, work.

For the full article see Plos, and for a writeup see New Scientist.

Oba Emma No Tabi*

So I'm off - in a few hours I'll be in the air and on my way to Japan. I've done everything I can to prepare except pack - and I've become an adept at packing due to my commuter lifestyle, so I refuse to freak out about that. The smart shoes are re-heeled, the various language aids packed, the iPod charged and the sleeping tablets handy in my "sleeping on a plane" kit.

I wasn't going to post yet, but once aging, PhD comics seems to be talking directly to me. See panel 3:



Ho hum. I just hope the fame doesn't go to his head!

*Travels with Auntie Emma

It's not every day...

...I get excited about an inaugural blog post about smart devices


(If you're confused as to why I'm squee-ing, grep for "not here to review the iPhone".)

What a Crockus

Dan Hodgins coordinates the the child development program at Mott Community College. He seems to have some sound advice to parents about developmental stages of children. What he doesn't seem to do so well is neurophysiology. Which is a worry - as he's using it to prescribe educational interventions based on differences between the brains of the sexes that are, for the most part, of dubious significance, some of which are of dubious reality and in once case, are totally made up.

Dan Hodgins has a theory about the "Crockus" which, Hodgins claims, is four times larger in girls than in boys. Apparently, among other ramifications of the difference in size is that "Girls see the details of experiences" whereas boys see the broad picture. He even provides an unlabeled slide showing the size of the Crockus in girls and the size of the Crockus in boys. Strangely however, his slides don't actually show the Crockus - instead using the pars opercularis and the motor cortex as examples of the scale of this structure.

So where is the Crockus? Apparently - nowhere. No literature search/Google search/"shout out" to the neuroanatomy community has managed to find it. Prof. Mark Liberman of Language Lab had a theory. Maybe Hodgins misheard/misremembered "Broca's" or even "Pars Opercularis" as Crockus? Not wishing to just, y'know, hypothesise baselessly, Liberman emailed Hodgins, who replied:

Thanks for asking....The Crockus was actually just recently named by Dr. Alfred Crockus. It is the detailed section of the brain, a part of the frontal lope. It is the detailed section of the brain. You are right, it is four times larger in females then males from birth. This part of the brain supports the Corpus Callosum (the part of the brain that connects the right and left hemisphere. The larger the crockus the more details are percieved by the two sides of the brain.

For boys, usually they only view and analyze the whole picture, not the sum of its details. Girls brains are wired to look at the details first, which then leads them to the whole picture.

Look at the work by Moir.

You think that Liberman would be happy with that explanation, no? It's in the "frontal lope" [sic] - case closed. Over to persnickity Professor Libermann:

This deepens the mystery, I think, because I can't find any likely-looking Alfred Crockus via Google Scholar or Wikipedia or even general web search. I think that the "Moir" he's referring to is the co-author of Anne Moir and David Jessel, Brainsex, 1992. But Amazon offers its "Search Inside" feature for that work, and a search for "Crockus" in it comes up empty.

I have to say - I did find one kind of Crockus - and I would be quite happy if mine was four times bigger than yours! [SFW]

"Has this complete knob-end saved American democracy? "

The tasering of Andrew Meyer, a participant in a college Q+A session with John Kerry at University of Florida, has me baffled. I don't get Campus Cops. They seem to operate outside of any kind of control, have no accountability and be worse than useless

But this?



At 1'44" the mic is cut and instantly the police are on Meyer. In my previous experience people give up talking out of embarrassment no more than about 30 seconds after a mic is cut, so the instant response seems like bad crowd management.

Around 2'50" you can kear Kerry talking in the background. He says "Let me just say [that?]... because it's a very important question". Evidently Kerry has a) no beef with the question per se, and b) no intention of talking to the "law enforcement" present.

At 3 minutes in, Meyer is on the floor with several police on top of him. He asks what he did, and begs not to be tasered. At this point he is vociferous but not actually moving anywhere. 3 bursts of taser fire can be heard being "discharged" into Meyer.

In all seriousness, I've seen far more obnoxious questioners than Meyer at academic conferences, and political events, before. Never seen any of them end up on the receiving end of a police action, violent or otherwise. Even this egregious overkill was at the hand of rentabrawns. I have to say, the tasered chap was up there for pomposity and pushiness, but that's not the point.

Guardian Unlimited Talk is leaning towards the POV of the taser-happy cops, surprisingly[1]. I think it's more because we brits find pompous windbags insufferable, and not because we think that free, all be it a bit whiny, speech is a taserable offence. Post 118 sums it up best:

"YusufAlBinDoonrapub - 05:27pm Sep 19, 2007 GMT (#188 of 202)

"Has this complete knob-end saved American democracy?"

[link whilst it lasts]

Totally brilliant: that comment sums up the masterly balance/total fence sitting for which Guardian readers are justly famed. Someone else suggests that he should have yelled "Now we see the violence inherent in the system".

UPDATE:

Bartlebooth - 07:54pm Sep 19, 2007 GMT (#264 of 314)
...What did he do that warranted being asked to leave? Dragging someone away for asking Kerry, of all people, a waffly, confused question seems like the acme of dramatic irony.

[1] The Guardian is the left leaning broadsheet in the UK. It's readers are known for being sandal wearing, muesli eating, bike riding liberals[2]. The Guardian Unlimited Talkboard (GUT) is divided into two factions - the Guardianistas, and the right wing reactionaries who hate everything the Guardian stands for. Sometimes, however, an extremely funny one slips through

[2] It may confuse visitors from the USA in particular, that the term "woolly liberal" is not tantamount to the term "baby eating satanist" over here. The Guardian likes to send up its own image and did so with a fantastic wallchart, by the talented Posy Simmons, featuring stereotypical Guardian readers. Done with TFIC, the chart was a straight up parody of the nature wallcharts that they introduced to the UK Newspaper market in 2006. Guardian readers are, usually, secure enough in their liberalism and even sometimes, (whisper it), socialism, to be able to self satirise. One of the many reasons why I find the Guardian very comforting in these insane, taser-ridden times.

5km today, 26.2 miles tomorrow[1]

I completed the Hydroactive Women's 5km in a pretty respactable (for me) 29 minutes dead on. The T-shirt was meant to inspire me by making me think of Lola. Instead, I ended up thinking about Simon Pegg. It did the job though - no need for spatulas - and raised over £300 for Cancer research.

[1]Where "tomorrow" = April 2008, if I get a place... Or April 2009. Or I may come to my senses...

My Kind of Science

From The Onion:
Scientists Isolate Area of Brain That Doesn't Like Poking.

Even The Onion's science stories are better than the guff spewed out by some "real" newspapers.

"I made this" [1]

Happy days...


[1] Mad props to the first person to correctly identify what production company used a small child saying this as their ident, and at the end of which programme it used to be.

Auntie Em is now mobile...

Using Kaywa's Feed2Mobile service, my blog now comes slimmed down for mobiles. The QR code on the right can be captured on a camera phone with Kaywa's QR-Reader or similar. QR codes are fun!

She's rational/he's a flake...

There seems to be a common point of view that women are more susceptible than men when it comes to new age woo-woo (and indeed old age woo-woo: horoscopes, homeopathy and the like). Men are the rational ones, we're more... "intuitive" (read: flakey, gullible, and prone to uncritically accept answers that "just feel right").

I've often wondered if this has any basis in fact. After all - for every Randi there's a Uri, and 66% of the very rich UK fortune tellers I can name, are men: Jonathan Cainer and Russel Grant for the guys, Mystic Meg for the gals. Maybe the "XY = rational, XX = addlebrained" divide is just the way the media plays it. Are all the loopy guys, and rational women, hiding?

Well, my suspicions were further piqued on receiving this email:

I am contacting you from [TV Channel]. We are producing a new programme called [Hopelessly Derivative Programme Name] and I was wondering if you might know someone who would like to take part. The premise of the show is opposites attract. We are looking to match people together who have different viewpoints so there will be interesting discussion and have them spend a long weekend together to see if romance [1] can take place over opposing views.

We are looking for a sceptic man in his 30’s and 40’s to be on the show.

Do you know any sceptical single men who might be interested? ...

Let me know if you need any more information

I look forward to hearing from you

Best wishes

[Researcher doomed to work for terminally unimaginative program execs][2]

Now I may be wrong - they may also be matching a new-agey man with a rational-chick (I'd volunteer but I'm off the market). Maybe they tried it the other way round, but smart women are much prized by smart partners, and we're all off the market by now. Perhaps the dumb bunnies are all that's left. But I have a sneaky feeling that they believe idea of matching, say, one of the Skepchicks with this guy[3] would be too much of a stretch for their viewers.


[1]For some reason I hear "romance" in scare quotes...
[2]My words, not the researchers - though I wonder if in her heart of hearts she wonders if this is what the masters in Elizabethan literature was for...
[3]Or heck, Randi and Uri - I'd Tivo that!

London by Leg

The last few days in London have been blighted by Tube strikes, due to the failure of cowboys PFI contractors Metronet. One of the presenters of Radio 4's Today Program was more than usually snippy about the notion of walking to work in London.

I guess if you have to arrive in time for a 6am broadcast you might never have walked to work - but there's something satisfying, and very pleasant about walking in, even when the Tube is running. It's certainly more fun than the mobile sardine-tin that is the Northern Line at peak hours. DH and I used to walk to and from work, in Bloomsbury, from our home in Elephant and Castle - a journey that more or less spans the whole of Zone One. It gave me time to ponder the day ahead/just gone and included a very pleasant five minutes (yes really, five whole minutes) crossing Waterloo Bridge. Even to this day DH tends to walk to work at Old Street.

It's free exercise, valuable thinking time and saves a lot of carbon compared to car or taxi. The charity Living Streets is trying to make walking as pleasant and easy as possible. As well as their own initiatives, they've linked to this alternative Tube map showing average walking times between Tube stations, created by students from Central Saint Martin's. For point-to-point walking maps, together with time, calories and carbon saving data, Walk It is also excellent.

Did you know?

• King's Cross to Bank - takes from 30 minutes, burns up to 173 calories and saves almost 10 kg of CO₂ a week compared to taxis.
  
• Paddington to Hyde Park Corner - takes from 22 minutes, burns up to 130 calories and 7.4kg CO₂ a week less than a taxi.
  
• Waterloo to Westminster - takes from 12 minutes, burns up to 72 calories and 4.1kg CO₂ a week less than a taxi.
  

The joys of Evo-Psy

At the GECCO debate (audio and video available here, Steve Jones described a little game he plays with his undergrads, in which they have to come up with an evolutionary hypothesis for a facet of human behaviour or biology beginning with every letter of the alphabet. His "hypothesis" for blushing is cleverly designed to make women blush, and his description of the evolutionary benefits of zoophilia would get me thrown out of Aberystwyth University (formerly the University of Wales, Aberystwyth). The point he was making was that these evolutionary fables are diverting and very plausible-sounding, but are ultimately untestable.

It seems that, whilst I was away, the bad science of evo-psy reared its head again, this time on the evolutionary basis of the "preference" for pink vs blue for girls vs boys. Let us turn once again to the acerbic Ben Goldacre who critiques the study. Read the article, and consider the sartorial choices of Alice, Cinders and Bo-Peep.


The Truth is worth more than an iPod.

Unleashing my incompetence

Professor Shinohara of Tohoku University, Japan, has kindly agreed to let me join his group for a long visit. This is exciting, and the opportunity of a lifetime, but it also throws up some uncomfortable facts about how I see myself and the things I do to cope with the limits of my competence.

Coming from a chaotic family background, competence has always been hugely important to me. I've not minimised its importance by choosing to work as a woman in a male dominated discipline. Jorge Cham sums up pretty much how I feel most of the time in this strip:



Ever since school reports I've been described as "dilligent", "studious", "competent" and "enterprising". Solver of problems. Learner of things. Nose in a book, head in the air, feet on the ground.

So working in Japan for a month is going to be a huge challenge for me on a personal as well as a practical level. Regular readers will have noticed that I'm already trying to prepare. I'm learning as much Japanese as I can, downloading street maps, buying city guides and pumping every Japanese person I meet for data.

It's starting to dawn on me that being able to control my environment by knowing everything about it will be impossible. At some point in the next four weeks this has to stop, as it's more than bordering on an obsession.

My drive for competence has - not for the first time - reached its limit. This time, however, I'm going to try something new. I'm going to try letting myself be incompetent. Get in the Onsen the wrong way? Embarrassing sure, but really the end of the world? Use "Taberu" not "Tabemasu"? No-one will be rendered catatonic by my breach of etiquette.

And yet the mere thought of these faux pas is enough to render me clammy handed and weak legged. The thought of being incompetent is bad enough. The though of being the incompetent representative of womankind is enough to give me the screaming abdabs. I'm sent rushing back to Google, the Rough Guide and the friendly waitress in the Japanese restaurant.

I forever miss the moment because I've rehearsed it so many times, in order not to get it wrong. If I could unleash my incompetence, how liberating would it feel?


scientiae-carnival

Learning Japanese: 見せしめ 四

(Miseshime Shi/Lesson Four)

Last night David and I went to Hazuki Japanese restaurant.

I tried とんかつ　(tonkatsu - deep fried beef), which was nice. But my favourite were the (considerably healthier!) nigiri (にぎり). Nigiri sushi are the little "bricks" of vinegared rice with a small fillet of raw fish laid on top.

Our incredibly helpful waitress supplied the Japanese names and the Kanji of the two fish that I ate. She helpfully explained that the names for most of the fish are rarely written out in Kanji, as they all contain the Kanji for fish (魚) and thus get quite complicated quite quickly. Salmon is an exception - the kanji is 鮭, and is said 'sake'.

The two nigiri I particularly enjoyed were the 'horse mackerel' and the 'eel'.

Horse mackerel: Aji - あじ - 鯵
Eel: Unagi - うなぎ　-　鰻

Hazuki's menu helpfully lists all the names of the dishes in katakana/kanki as well as english. I'll be printing this out to take with me - and I may have a few more "practice runs" there before we go. I take my research very seriously you know...

Needles(s) activity

I decided to teach myself how to knit - relying heavily on the people at Knitting Help to find out how to cast on nicely. The reason? Innocent's Big Knit in aid of Age Concern. It's amazing - I've gone from never having touched a pair of knitting needles (or at least not since the jumbo sized ones you're made to play with in infant school "craft" lessons) to knocking up 2 small hats per evening.

Here are a few of my creations so far (now in blurryvision!):



But it's time to move on to bigger projects. I've already knitted myself an i-Pod Nano case in fetching lilac and purple. But David is now asking for something he saw over at Aphra Benn's place:

How to knit a Moebius scarf from the middle to the edge.

I'll start that when I've decided I've done enough hats.

And after that, brains..?

Learning Japanese Part 3

Part 2 of this series of my notes on learning Japanese introduced verbs and the formal and informal present tense inflections. I've also been learning the past tense.

Remember that all uninflected verbs end in a u:
書 to write Kaku (かく)
考 to think Kangaeru (かんげる)
来 to come Kuru (くる)

There are three "forms" of verbs.

1) Irregulars: of which there are only two: 来 and する (suru - to do)
2) All others ending in "ru": 考
3) All the rest: 書

Here's how to make the past participle of these verbs:
1) Formal: 来 becomes 来ました ("kimashita"); する becomes しました
1) Informal: 来 becomes 来た ("kita"); する becomes した ("shita")

2) Formal: -ru, +mashita: 考 becomes 考えました ("kangaemashita")
2) Informal: -ru, +ta: 考 becomes 考えた ("kangaeta")

3) Formal: -u, +imashita: 書 becomes 書きました ("kakimashita")
3) Informal: Now it gets trickier.

3i) if the verb ends in "ku", -ku, +ita (書 becomes 書いた - "kaita")

3ii) if the verb ends in "gu", -gu, +ida :
急 (いそぐ　"isogu", hurry) becomes 急いだ ("isoida")

3iii)if the verb ends in [nu|bu|mu], -[nu,bu,mu], +nda
学 (まなぶ 　”manabu"、learn) becomes 学んだ ("mananda")

3iv) if the verb ends in "su", -su, +shita
試 (ためす　”tamesu”, to experiment) becomes 試した（"tameshita")

3v) all other "u" and "tsu", -[u|tsu], +tta
立っ (たつ "tatsu", stand) becomes 立った ("tatta"). Note that the つ ("tsu")　character in the uninflected verb is not removed - it becomes the first "t" in った ("tta").

These forms are the same for all "persons" - that is, "I have written" is is "kaita" or "kakimashita". But "you have written" is also "kaita" or "kakimashita"

Learning Japanese, I really think so - part 2

Hurrah - it's official. Professor Shinohara of Tohoku University has kindly agreed to let me come for an academic exchange visit in October. I will join is group for a few weeks, which is an exciting, if somewhat terrifying, prospect. Rob seemed to enjoy the perplexity of the whole experience. Learning a little Japanese would, it seems, be essential.

So today let's look at verbs and versions of the present tense. It seems that things are a lot more straightforward than I'd feared.

All uninflected verbs end in a "u":

飲 to drink Nomu (のむ)
食 to eat Taberu (たべる)
来 to come Kuru (くる)

There are three "forms" of verbs.

1) Irregulars: of which there are only two: 来 and する (suru - to do)
2) All others ending in "ru": 食
3) All the rest: 飲

Among "informal' company, the present tense is simply the uninflected form of the verb. In more polite situation, the verb ending changes according to one of the following rules:

Type 1: These become "kimasu" (来ます) and "shimasu" (します) respectively
Type 2: Drop the "ru" and add add "masu": 食ます = tabemasu: I eat - politely ^-^ )
Type 3: Drop the "u" and add "imasu": 飲います = nomimasu: I drink, politely)


Next up - the past tense: in which we learn that there are seven rules for informal speech and only three for formal speech. This leads to a shaky hypothesis about why the Japanese tend to politeness.

Thanks to Amanda (アマンダ) and this webpage by Namiko Abe.

Writing in Japanese fonts on OSX

In an earlier post I talked about the three Japanese character systems. Writing in Hiragana and Katakana is good practice for learning the sounds and vocabulary of Japanese. Here's how to do it on OSX:

• Go to system preferences: international: input menu
  
• Tick the Kotoeri check box, and the "show input menu in menu bar" box
  
• You'll see a little flag or icon in the menu bar - clicking on this brings up the list of available input types
  
• Select "Hiragana" or "Katakana". Each time you type a valid phoneme ("ka", "ta", "e","ni"...) it is automatically changed to the Hiragana or Katakana character.
  

So my name, in Katakana, is: エマ

The Knights who say "Ni" are the Knights who say　ニ

And so on...

With love from アンチエム

Kilometre-stone

I'm measuring my runs in kilometres cause it feels so much, well, more than in miles, and today, after 68 runs, my Nike+ dohickey gave me the following

A pretty 250 KM certificate.

Still time to sponsor my 5k run for Cancer Research. Thanks to fantastic friends and family I'm now at 122% of my target, but the more we can raise for Cancer Research the better, so don't let that put you off.

Learning Japanese - I really think so

I am trying to learn Japanese (there's a reason - I'll explain some other time). I know the "Romaji" (romanised spelling) of some common Japanese words ("konnichiwa", "domo arigato mister roboto", that kind of thing). But a ma-hoosive impediment to getting any further is not understanding any of the several written forms of Japanese. So I'm teaching myself the Hiragana - the phonetic "alphabet" for anything other than common names (which have a different alphabet of their own).

Note that these symbols are not related to the Chinese derived "Kanji", which my reading tells me have, usually, at least two readings - a Chinese derived pronunciation (or pronunciations) called "On'yomi" and a reading derived from the original pronunciation of that word in Japanese called "Kun'yomi". The different readings are given in Hiragana in dictionaries, so knowing Hiragana is a huge advantage to learning what the Kanji mean, or at least how they are said.

Hiragana are also used for the "grammar" of Japanese, so I'm told. So learning these, and some basic vocab, is my first task.

Thankfully there are a small number of Hiragana and each maps to a Japanese phoneme. This is the first bit of good news I've had since deciding to learn some Japanese!

Here are today's words and the relevant Hiragana:

---

ありがとうございます (arigato gozaimasu: "thank you" from this online dictionary)

あ a
り ri
が ga
と to
う u
ご go
ざ za
い i
ま ma
す su

---

こんにちは (konnichiwa - written konnichiha: "hello". Literally means "today is".

こ ko
ん n
に ni
ち chi
は ha

---

ごくろさまでした (gokurosama deshita: "Thank you for your help" (lit: it must have been a toil))

ご go (note the "Daku-ten" accent (looks like a ") that turns "ko" into "go")
く ku
ろ ru
さ sa
ま ma
で de (another daku-ten - changes "te" to "de")
し shi
た ta

ごくろさま (gokurosama = it is a toil)
でした (deshita = past participle)

---

じゃまた (ja mata: see you later (from these useful lessons))

じゃ ja (the Hiragana for ji (じ) - which is in turn a shi (し) and a ", and a little version of the Hiragana for ya (や))
ま ma
た ta

---

せんせい (sensei: teacher or other highly placed professional - literally "one who lived before". From Wiktionary

せ se
ん n
せ se
い i

---

I still don't know how to punctuate or capitalise. Do such things exist? Any help appreciated!

'Til next time, ありがとうございます and じゃまた

"I for one welcome our new robot overlords" *

But Charlie Brooker doesn't.

*

From now on, every post comes with onion rings

At work I keep getting emails about this allegedly amazing new programming language called Ruby. "Try it", they say, "All the cool kids are doing it". But I worry, is it a gateway language? Will I be scripting Perl in a chichi little cybercafe in Hoxton by autumn? Will winter see my slow decline as I'm turning tricks in VB? <shudder>

And then I found The Poignant Guide to Ruby. And I was seduced. To the dark side or to the light I know not - I haven't actually learnt any Ruby yet... but the first three chapters hasve made me laugh out loud a coupla times. More than I can say for, "C++: the Core Language*".

Instead of Hello World we begin with:

"Like when you meet Somebody in college and they look like somebody who used to hit you in the face with paintbrushes when you were a kid. And so, impulsively, you conclude that this new Somebody is likely a non-friend. You wince at their hair. You hang up phones loudly during crucial moments in their anecdotes. You use your pogo stick right there where they are trying to walk!"

(C++ the Core... erm, no wait... The Poignant Guide to Ruby)

Or you could learn LOLCode. That rocks too.

*Srsly - the O'Reilly books rock. Buy them if you want to live.

UK PLC - Your R&D department needs help.

On the day that Alistair Darling proclaims that UK PLC is open for business, the Today program (Real Audio) reports that, for the want of investment that was promised in 2005, the UK lead in stem cell therapies is slipping.

To summarise: the unfavourable political climate in the US has lead to an influx of overseas researchers to the UK. However, the startup investment in this research promised two years ago by the UK government has not been delivered. Meanwhile, US Biotech companies are gearing up to take advantage of the expected softening in the stance on stem cell research in the US that will come after the 2008 presidential elections. It looks like the lucrative technologies resulting from this research will eventually be patented not by UK researchers, but by US private companies. Regardless of one's position on a) stem cell therapies and b) patents, and intellectual property in general, it's poor business practice on the part of UK PLC to surrender its competitive advantage in this field without a fight. Yet short sighted cuts in the science budget show just how little UK PLC values its R&D department.

Little Bro still in one piece...

People who know me probably know that my kid brother is working on the St Pancras renovation. Just spoken to him and he promises me that this was not his fault! AFAHK everyone is fine, and a few people are likely to be in for a bit of double bubble to patch up the mess.