Find out about black holes and what happens if you fall into one.
Author: Saima Baig
What is Google’s BERT update?
- BERT stands for Bidirectional Encoder Representations from Transformers.
- In October 2019, Google announced their most important update in five years.
- The latest search algorithm to better understand natural language, BERT is Google’s neural network-based technique for natural language processing (NLP) pre-training.
- According to Google, it will affect context dependent search queries.
The Story of Coffee
Blog with pictures of the story of that magic bean: coffee
Comets, Asteroids and Meteors — What’s the difference?
Comets, Asteroids and Meteors visit us often but What’s the difference between these visitors often seen in the nightsky.
Mother Goddess— When Women were Worshiped
In September of 2008, a team of archaeologists working in the Hohle Fels cave in Germany uncovered a remarkable find: a figurine made of mammoth ivory dated to between 40,000 and 35,000 years ago. Now known as the Venus of Hohle Fels, this figurine is the oldest known representation of the human form. The exaggerated anatomy and massive breasts are a powerful depiction of being female — symbolizing the fertility goddess’ characteristics of sex and reproduction.
Covid19 and the Conspiracy Theorists
The late polemicist Christopher Hitchens once described conspiracy theories as the “exhaust fumes of democracy: the unavoidable result of a large amount of information circulating among a large number of people.”
The current pandemic has brought out conspiracy theorists in droves and their theories are as outlandish as ever. Our disassociation with science and fascination with celebrities means that at times like these people will risk their lives but will still not believe scientific fact. A study conducted by researchers at the Reuters Institute at Oxford University, found that social media posts by politicians, celebrities and influencers were the most common means of engagement with coronavirus falsehoods.
Here is a cool info-graphic I found (the provenance of which I am not aware), that in my opinion kind of explains conspiracy theories:
Conspiracy theories resonate with us because they serve as a defense mechanism against scary and inexplicable events. In the age of social media they have become a cultural phenomenon, establishing communities within one’s platform of choice — communities that are comforting, and from which it is difficult to separate.
Education does play an important part in inoculating us against unverified information but often — due to a lack of critical and analytical thinking in teaching— limited knowledge leads people to find attractive those ideas that highlight some kind of political agenda or a dangerous “other”. It becomes about what “they” don’t want you to know. And “they” are always those sinister people outside of your own clique, or those segments of society that you neither like nor trust. Belief in conspiracy theories, therefore, becomes a matter of faith rather than evidence. People rationalize their beliefs even if reality tells them otherwise, often relying on circular reasoning, i.e evidence against the conspiracy and an absence of evidence for it, are both regarded as evidence that the conspiracy is true.
This has inevitably continued during these unprecedented and stressful times. Our unusual circumstances in the face of Covid-19 have meant that in trying to understand the world in this moment, conspiracy theorists have embraced some very bizarre ideas. The world has suddenly become more confusing than it ever was before and this is one way to understand what no one can completely explain…yet. And the most appealing method of doing so is by dividing the world into us and them; them being those who have instigated this situation for their own ends — the agents of evil — whom the “brainwashed masses” are listening to. A random and unpredictable event has created a sense of powerlessness and therefore it is explained through suspicious socio-political forces instigating the event. In any case, humans are conditioned to believe repeated, easy to process information, especially when it supports our world view, so the rampant absorption of Covid-19 conspiracies is because they align with people’s pre-existing ideologies and opinions. Undoubtedly, this gives their anxiety an outlet on which to focus. Like Professor Colin Klien from the Australian National University explains: “conspiracy theories offer an emotionally satisfying narrative, even if it not a true narrative”.
I’m certainly not going to go through any of the prevalent conspiracy theories. Suffice it to say they are all beyond the realms of fact. It is however important to note that believing in a cover-up around Covid-19 is potentially dangerous to the overall health of the community, if it stops people from taking appropriate precautions to prevent the spread of the virus. Additionally, it can provide a breeding ground for acts of racism, vandalism and the promotion of dangerous cures.
Now that the vaccine for Covid-19 has been rolled out, conspiracy theories around it have also started to abound. Lack of knowledge of pharmaceutical laboratory and regulatory processes means people are once again willing to pay heed to half-truths and pseudoscience, when it is so easy to look up the fact that we have been working on similar vaccines for decades. Regulatory processes, especially in developed countries like the UK, are extensive. This time too the same processes have been followed, just more quickly than before. But why look for factual information, when a story that feeds our fears is easier to accept?
The only thing rational human beings can do is to look for information from reliable and evidence based sources and try to promote those sources as much as possible. A famous singer or a YouTube influencer are not the people to rely on for accurate information during these fraught times.
The Berlin Wall
The Berlin Wall was a literal symbol of the iron curtain and the cold war, which divided east and west Germany. It was built in 1961 and fell in 1989.
New Visitors to Mars
We may have been deprived of social interaction and been stuck in our homes for the last few months, but science and exploration has continued. Launches of orbiters and rovers to the fourth rock from the Sun has definitely made 2020 the year of Mars.
The Mystery of the Voynich Manuscript
The Voynich Manuscript is a mysterious book that has puzzled experts as to its true purpose. Its writing and illustration have not been deciphered.
Take A Trip to Mercury!
Let’s take a trip to the planet Mercury. Use your cursor to check out its surface inside! The European and Japanese spacecraft Bepi Colombi is on its way to orbit the planet in 2025 & took amazing images.