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Discoblog

NCBI ROFL: Your rug is so ugly it makes me sick. Literally.

The sickening rug: a repeating static pattern that leads to motion-sickness-like symptoms.

“The nauseogenic properties of a patterned rug that reputedly caused motion-sickness-like symptoms in those who viewed it was the topic of this study. Naive observers viewed a 1:1 scale image of the black-and-white patterned rug and a homogeneous gray region of equivalent luminance in a counterbalanced within-subjects design. Read the rest of this entry »

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January 26th, 2012 7:07 PM by ncbi rofl in NCBI ROFL, rated G | 1 Comment

NCBI ROFL: Does it take one to know one? Endorsement of conspiracy theories is influenced by personal willingness to conspire.

“We advance a new account of why people endorse conspiracy theories, arguing that individuals use the social-cognitive tool of projection when making social judgements about others. In two studies, we found that individuals were more likely to endorse conspiracy theories if they thought they would be willing, personally, to participate in the alleged conspiracies. Read the rest of this entry »

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January 25th, 2012 7:07 PM by ncbi rofl in NCBI ROFL, rated G, reinforcing stereotypes, told you so | 1 Comment

To Thwart Hackers, New Security Software Makes Hacking Tedious

mykonosMykonos’s motto is two-fold.

When you think of protecting a website from hackers, the first thing that comes to mind is probably blocking them out. But what if you just let them on a wild-goose chase, feeding them nuggets of false information and leading them down dead-ends until they get fed up and go do something else?

That’s the strategy behind Mykonos Software‘s security program, which takes a “step right in, let me fetch you a cup of tea and bore you to tears” approach to protection. The tool identifies individuals who are running common searches for security weaknesses on a site, logs their information, and continues to play them for suckers by dribbling out a breadcrumb trail that appears to yield passwords and other tasty vulnerabilities, but ultimately leads nowhere. CEO David Koretz explained to Tom Simonite at Tech Review the various ways in which the software plays with attackers:

A scan that might usually take five hours could take 30, Koretz says. Other tactics include offering up dummy password files, which can help track an attacker when he or she tries to use them. “We’ll let them break the encryption and present a false login page. We have the ability to hack the hacker,” says Koretz.

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January 25th, 2012 1:06 PM Tags: behavioral economics, hackers, internet security, Mykonos Software, security
by Veronique Greenwood in Technology Attacks! | 3 Comments

NCBI ROFL: The effect of women’s suggestive clothing on men’s behavior and judgment: a field study.

“Numerous studies have shown that men overestimate the sexual intent of women based on their clothing style; however, this hypothesis has not been assessed empirically in a natural setting. This small field study measured the time it took for men to approach two female confederates sitting in a tavern, one wearing suggestive clothes and one wearing more conservative clothes. Read the rest of this entry »

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January 24th, 2012 8:44 PM by ncbi rofl in duh, NCBI ROFL, scientist...or perv? | 5 Comments

Portland’s Tips for Making Public Potties That Last

potty
Breezy and exposed! That’s the secret to bathrooms no one, not even street people, wants to live in.

Many cities have had epic, expensive public toilet fails. Seattle, we’re looking at you and your $5 million self-cleaning toilets that wound up trashed.

But over at The Atlantic’s Cities site, John Metcalfe has a piece detailing why Portland’s public potties have survived the aggressions (and heavy use) of the citizens. Here are Portland’s tips for defecation success.

1. Make it open to the elements: we’re talking bathroom stall, sans the bathroom. People walking by on the sidewalk should be able to see the peer’s feet and hear every little splish, splash, and sploosh in that potty. A comfortable, enclosed public bathroom is a bum’s living room, but an open-air crapper is just an open-air crapper.

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January 24th, 2012 1:03 PM Tags: civil planning, design, Portland Loo, public bathrooms, toilets
by Veronique Greenwood in Scat-egory | 4 Comments

NCBI ROFL: Science brings hope for your ugly baby.

You must have been a beautiful baby: ratings of infant facial attractiveness fail to predict ratings of adult attractiveness.

“Facial attractiveness has been studied extensively, but little research has examined the stability of facial attractiveness of individuals across different stages of development. We conducted a study examining the relationship between facial attractiveness in infants (age 24 months and under) and the same individuals as young adults (age 16-18 years)using infant and adult photographs from high school yearbooks. Read the rest of this entry »

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January 23rd, 2012 6:51 PM by ncbi rofl in how is babby formed?, NCBI ROFL, rated G | No comments

NCBI ROFL: The best men are (not always) already taken: female preference for single versus attached males depends on conception risk.

“Because men of higher genetic quality tend to be poorer partners and parents than men of lower genetic quality, women may profit from securing a stable investment from the latter, while obtaining good genes via extrapair mating with the former. Only if conception occurs, however, do the evolutionary benefits of such a strategy overcome its costs. Accordingly, we predicted that (a) partnered women should prefer attached men, because such men are more likely than single men to have pair-bonding qualities, and hence to be good replacement partners, and (b) this inclination should reverse when fertility rises, because attached men are less available for impromptu sex than single men. Read the rest of this entry »

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January 20th, 2012 7:22 PM by ncbi rofl in NCBI ROFL, penis friday, reinforcing stereotypes, scientist...or perv? | 5 Comments

NCBI ROFL: Apparently, jumping with a weighted vest or springs attached to your shoes is hard.

Effects of loading on maximum vertical jumps: Selective effects of weight and inertia.

“A novel loading method was applied to explore selective effects of externally added weight (W), weight and inertia (W+I), and inertia (I) on maximum counter-movement jumps (CMJ) performed with arm swing. Externally applied extended rubber bands and/or loaded vest added W, W+I, and I corresponding to 10-40% of subjects’ body mass. As expected, an increase in magnitude of all types of load was associated with an increase in ground reaction forces (GRF), as well as with a decrease in both the jumping performance and power output. Read the rest of this entry »

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January 19th, 2012 7:12 PM by ncbi rofl in duh, NCBI ROFL, rated G | No comments

NCBI ROFL: And the January “no sh*t, Sherlock” award goes to…

Effects of heated seats in vehicles on thermal comfort during the initial warm-up period.

“Eight subjects participated in a subjective experiment of eight conditions to investigate the effects of heated seats in vehicles on skin temperature, thermal sensation and thermal comfort during the initial warm-up period. The experimental conditions were designed as a combination of air temperature in the test room (5, 10, 15, or 20 °C) and heated seat (on/off). Read the rest of this entry »

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January 18th, 2012 6:35 PM by ncbi rofl in duh, NCBI ROFL | No comments

Go Ahead and Gossip—Science Says It’s the Right Thing to Do


He did what? Innnnteresting…

Thorough scientific study has revealed that lots of supposed vices can have surprising upsides: alcohol, sex, caffeine. Thanks to UC Berkeley researchers, we can now add another so-bad-but-oh-so-good habit to the list: Gossip, their new study suggests, can be a selfless act of public service.

Surreptitiously passing along the news that someone has behaved badly—what’s technically called “prosocial gossip”—can relieve stress, as well as warn others to regard the rule-breaker with a wary eye, the researchers say. (The study didn’t look directly at other forms of gossip—rumormongering, telling lies, anything said to a confessional cam on reality TV—so make of that what you will.)

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January 18th, 2012 1:58 PM Tags: altruism, cheating, gossip, social psychology
by Valerie Ross in Crime & Punishment, What’s Inside Your Brain? | 2 Comments

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    • About the Blog

      DiscoBlog is DISCOVER's compendium of quirky, funny, and surprising science news from the edge of the known universe. It's written by Veronique Greenwood and Valerie Ross. Email tips and suggestions to vgreenwood [at] discovermagazine [dot] com.

      Discoblog also includes the daily feature NCBI ROFL, in which two prone-to-distraction grad students post real scientific articles with funny subjects. Email your tips to ncbirofl [at] gmail.com. Follow the ROFL feed here.

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