Newmark's Door

Scientists may be getting closer to understanding why calorie restriction seems to extend life

It has to do with "block[ing] production of the S6 Kinase 1 (S6K1) protein".

Two on physics

"Roger Penrose Says Physics Is Wrong, From String Theory to Quantum Mechanics".

"Is the Physics Nobel Prize Also Becoming a Joke?"

At the very limits of the known universe . . .

 . . ."A huge swath of galactic clusters seem to be heading to a cosmic hotspot and nobody knows why."

Make your own joke.

"Disrupt emergency exits to boost evacuation rates"

Counter-intuitive, yes?

Need to evacuate people quickly through a narrow opening? Put something in their way.

Physicists timed a crowd of 50 women as they exited as fast as possible through a door, and then repeated the experiment with a 20-centimetre-wide pillar placed 65 centimetres in front of the exit to the left-hand side.

The obstacle improved the exit rate by an extra seven people per minute – from 2.8 people to 2.92 people per second.   

More stuff I didn't make up

"Duke study: McCain loss to Obama hit supporters in testes".

Male supporters of presidential candidates John McCain and Bob Barr took news of their candidates’ loss to Barack Obama hard, almost like a kick in the crotch, a new study from Duke University and the University of Michigan concludes.

Young men who voted for either McCain or Barr suffered immediate drops in their testosterone levels after the election results were announced, while Obama supporters suffered no change. Females also suffered no change, according to the study, which will be published in the journal PLOS One on Wednesday.

The researchers are going to follow up by studying fans attending a Duke-UNC basketball game.

"What happened to global warming?"

A balanced story by BBC News (10/9).

The conclusion seems to be that it's still coming. But we might not see it for, oh, twenty years or so.

Related: Ross McKitrick is still doing yeoman's work trying to get the data straight, and public.

Also related: "Media Redemption in Unmasking Global Warming Scam?"

"A complete list of things caused by global warming"

With links.

(Acne was a new one for me.)

"13 more things that don't make sense"

From New Scientist (and with a link to the original "13 things that do not make sense".)

A huge solar magnetic storm

"On Sept. 2, 1859, at the telegraph office at No. 31 State Street in Boston at 9:30 a.m., the operators' lines were overflowing with current, so they unplugged the batteries connected to their machines, and kept working using just the electricity coursing through the air."

"Surface Area Required to Power the World With Solar Panels Alone"

Of course the signifcant costs and other problems of distribution are not discussed or depicted.

But it's still rather amazing.