Derren Brown's Blog, page 8

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You've heard of our super-close relatives the Neanderthals, of course. But did you know there are far more species of humans that went extinct, like the tiny Floresiensis ("Hobbits")? There are 14 known species of human being that are no longer with us. These were all out-competed, possibly even murdered by homo sapiens (us!) and other human speciesor in some cases driven to extinction by rapidly changing climate conditions (hint, hint, we're changing the climate today faster than ever before!).

The newest addition to the group of known extinct humans are the Denisovans, who last lived approximately 30.000 years ago, at the same time as Neanderthal and modern humans roamed a similar region of Russia. Their remains (well, read on…) were found in a cave (Denisova Cave) around 10 years ago, even though they were not recognized as a new race of humans until 2010. Only a short while ago a group of German scientists has mapped the complete genome (DNA sequence) of these extinct human beings. Guess what they needed to do that? Just a bone fragment from a little piece of finger, which was, together with a wisdom tooth, the only found remains of the Denisovans in the cave.

With the full DNA sequence of Denisova Hominin, we can determine when and where our evolutionary lineages diverted and possible see what these extinct humans were like. Read more about this remarkable achievement on Nature.com. Some Denisovian genes probably live on through interbreeding with modern humans, since it looks like modern-day Melanesians and Australian Aboriginals have some Denisovian left in them. Fascinating stuff. More research is being done on a toe bone discovered in 2011.

So no worries, all you have to leave is a toe or a finger in a convenient, yet protected, location and perhaps future humans can bring you back to life! Your genes anyway.

Discussing complicated intellectual subjects with others often involves area's of knowledge in which we feel uncertain or inadequate. You and I would not be the only one to have a sense of not belonging when caught in such a situation, even when we are in fact experts in that particular field. This feeling of being found out as an impostor who talks nonsense despite the fact that we are well schooled on the subject, is a widespread phenomenon called The Impostor Syndrome. Although a rather benign sort of mental aberration, it can severely hamper our confidence. The Cambridge professor of physics Athene Donald has broached the subject eloquently in a blog post, discussing her experience of the phenomenon in the world of academia. She noted that it seems mainly an issue woman seem to talk about openly, but she has now followed up with a second article showing there are also plenty of men experiencing these feelings, although they seem less inclined to identify them as genuine instances of Impostor Syndrome.

If you share the feeling of inadequacy in the presence of peers or when speaking as an authority in academic or other capacity, it may pay off to read the articles and realize that this is pretty common. It's not unlike the notion of feeling our looks, smells or physical behaviour is inadequate compared to others. Whilst in most cases, others share these feelings, probably at the same time.

The spiritual opposite of the Impostor Syndrome is called The Dunning-Kruger effect. This effect comes down to an obliviousness to our inabilities, causing those with minor to no skill to be unable to detect their lack of competence and hence value their ability much higher than it in practice is. If you and your colleagues all wonder how how that supremely incompetent and dislikeable manager got that position in the fist place, it may simply be the Dunner-Kruger effect in action. The person may lack the self-consciousness and skill to realize his or her capacities are minor and hence prances around with the confidence of kings, which can translate eventually to promotion over more skilled, but far less confident, collegues.

In short, the Impostor Syndrome shows us that even the most competent of people, academics of fair repute, experts in their field, can constantly have the nagging feeling they are inadequate compared to others. Which brings us to a wonderful quote from the great British philosopher Bertrand Russell:

"The trouble with the world is that the stupid are cocksure and the intelligent are full of doubt."

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Painting of Bertrand Russell by Derren Brown (More artwork available in the Portraits art book)

We all like to gossip about others, but abhor to hear there has been gossiping about our own selves. Generally we therefore tend to think gossiping is always bad, but forget it right at those moment some juicy gossips are flowing from our own silky lips. Luckily there is a a science of gossip to be found in psychological studies and it shows that actually some sorts of gossip are not bad at all.

It seems pro-social gossip plays a vital role in what we call social control, a form of peer pressure. Unwanted behaviour will be gossiped about, making bad actors reflect on their deeds and potentially curb their negative behaviour in fear of social exclusion. In a sense gossiping gives people the opportunity to prepare or avoid a nasty experience with someone else, making selfish behaviour less rewarding and therefore less common. Secondly, pro-social gossip relieves stress. When expressing your feelings over a frustrating situation or your perspective on a stressing drama, that just feels good. You are being heard by your altruistic peers, who may even help you out beyond just hearing your lament.

Of course the anti-social forms of gossiping, out of envy or revenge while throwing a little lie in the mix to sauce things up, will actually get you gossiped about and can lower your social standing with the other gossipers of fair repute.

Read more on medicalxpress.com about the benefits of gossip. If this is your kind of science, then don't miss out on a whole book on the subject of reputation (therefore also gossip) by John Whitfield, called People Will Talk.

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Spotted this on the BBC News this morning:

In a land of faith and flag, Justin Griffith is challenging the US military to abandon its religious ties.

When Justin Griffith was a child growing up in Plano, Texas – a place he describes as the "oversized, goofy buckle on the Bible belt" – he would bring his bible to science class and debate his teachers on the finer points of evolution.

"In my head, I won every time," says Mr Griffith, now 29.

But somewhere along the way, his penchant for picking ideological fights with the non-religious got him in trouble. He found it harder and harder to argue with the points they were making. At 13, he suffered a crisis of faith.

"It was so painful. I lost my religion before I lost my first girlfriend. Nothing that big had ever happened to me, and I didn't have any coping skills," he says.

Mr Griffith found peace with his atheism, but he is not done sparring with the opposite team.

As an active-duty sergeant in the US Army, he's leading the charge to get atheists more respect in the armed forces. In the process he is earning attention, both positive and negative, from around the world.

You can, of course, read the full article here.

I was surprised to learn, from reading this article, that the US Army introduced a mandatory Spiritual Fitness Test last year. Any thoughts on that?

When someone else falls on their buttocks in a spectacular display of flailing limbs, or another spills some soup on a pristine white shirt at a fancy office party, aren't these the moments that make life worth it? Commonly enough, most of us will have to suppress a naughty chuckle at the misfortune of others. Is this bad? Not per se. A little article found on MSN.com details research in the field of schadenfreude by the University of Nijmegen. It tells us that the act of feeling good at another's misfortune is a simple mechanism of self-affirmation. Depending on a person's levels of self-esteem, he or she may need a little ego-boost saying "I'm not so bad after all, look at that dolt! I can eat soup better than him/her any day!".

In a study conducted on students who were asked to appraise their level of schadenfreude after reading about a high performing student failing to get a great job, it became clear that the level of mirth at the misfortune of others is heavily dependent on our own levels of confidence. The more threatened or envious one is of another person, because we often assess our own positions to be inferior, the more enjoyment the failure of this person brings. Sounds like stating the obvious, but this information can be used in our daily lives to recognize that often these feelings of glee at the tribulations of others stem from our own hidden feelings of inadequacy. Living with this understanding enables us to feel more empathy for others and to face or address our own failings, which will enable us to grow into more confident people. Nothing wrong with a little chuckle though!

Thanks to Shaun B for the tip, read the whole article here.

Try these books if these kinds of studies and the subject of self-esteem and happiness interest you;

Stumbling Upon Happiness – Daniel Gilbert

The Happiness Hypothesis – Jonathan Haidt

59 Seconds – Richard Wiseman

Yes, scientists can now scan your mind and record what you're hearing. How long before they can scan your mind and know what you're thinking?

Read a whole article on this fascinating find on the Scientific American site and watch a video of the technology in action below:

Further reading also available at BBC News

"Skin cells have been converted directly into cells which develop into the main components of the brain, by researchers studying mice in California.

The experiment, reported in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, skipped the middle "stem cell" stage in the process.

The researchers said they were "thrilled" at the potential medical uses.

Far more tests are needed before the technique could be used on human skin.

Stem cells, which can become any other specialist type of cell from brain to bone, are thought to have huge promise in a range of treatments. Many trials are taking place, such as in stroke patients or specific forms of blindness.

One of the big questions for the field is where to get the cells from. There are ethical concerns around embryonic stem cells and patients would need to take immunosuppressant drugs as any stem cell tissue would not match their own.

An alternative method has been to take skin cells and reprogram them into "induced" stem cells. These could be made from a patient's own cells and then turned into the cell type required, however, the process results in cancer-causing genes being activated.

The research group, at the Stanford University School of Medicine in California, is looking at another option – converting a person's own skin cells into specialist cells, without creating "induced" stem cells. It has already transformed skin cells directly into neurons."

Read more at BBC News

"Scientists and doctors have been studying placebos for more than half a century. These inert "sugar pills" remain highly controversial, yet they are widely used in clinical treatment today—especially in the area of pain management. So-called "placebo analgesia" has been observed again and again not only in the pain clinic, but also in the neuroscience lab, where scientists have documented a placebo response in the brain's pain pathways.

Despite this evidence, nobody really understands the psychological processes involved in placebo analgesia. Presumably the power of these inert substances has something to do with the expectation of relief, but how do expectations translate into basic cognitive processes, like attention and thought? One possibility is that when sufferers expect relief, they are able to redirect their attention away from their pain, creating an analgesic effect. If that's the case, then expectation itself might actually act as an agent of cognitive control, and the mind's executive powers might be the link between expectation and relief. Imaging studies have revealed placebo-related activity in a brain region involved in executive function—bolstering this theory.

But this brain imaging evidence is merely suggestive, and the theory has never been tested directly. A team of psychological scientists, headed up by Jason Buhle of Columbia University, decided to investigate this explanation for placebo analgesia. The brain has a limited supply of cognitive power, so if indeed placebo analgesia requires executive attention, then performance on a demanding cognitive task should interfere with pain relief from a placebo, and vice versa. One kind of executive power is working memory, and in previous work Buhle and colleagues have shown that performing a difficult working memory task itself reduces pain, presumably by distracting sufferers. So in a new experiment, they tested whether this same cognitive task interferes with the relief offered by a placebo drug, as one would expect if they are using the same cognitive mechanisms. If not, then the evidence would suggest that sugar pills and distraction have independent analgesic effects."

Read more at Psychological Science (Thanks Annette)

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A fun article at livescience.com poses an interesting question; "What happens if we all become twice as smart?"

This is not a strange thought since human IQ has been steadily rising since measurements began. This is called the Flynn effect and social scientists are not sure what caused it, though improved nutrition, education and social complexity in the media age are all pinned as being factors in the increase.

Interestingly, not as much would change as you think, says Richard Haier, a neuroscientist at the University of California, Irvine. Although we would be able to learn faster and remember more (since our IQ's would effectively be equivalent to that of rare crazy genius Isaac Newton) society is unlikely to suddenly turn into a futuristics utopia of like minded pacifists.

We would certainly be healthier, probably more physically attractive and less superstitious as these all correlate with increased intelligence, but the same personal defects (arrogance, anti-social behaviour, selfishness, etc.) would plague a civilisation of geniuses like they do today. Some of us would be able to devise brilliant new technological solutions to complex problems we face today, but similarly, those with nefarious purposes would be able to turn great new inventions towards destructive new ways of profit at the cost of others, or if we are really unlucky, new and apocalyptic weapons of war.

Certainly an entertaining thought. Be sure to read the article and post in the comments what you would think is most likely to change when we all have an average IQ of 200.

This will probably be the most amazing thing you'll see for a while. But if you think we're referring to an encounter with the Derrenite dynasty of Clan Brown, you'll be sorely disappointed (or not, depends?). What you'll see below, and we do urge you to watch, is footage of a troop of wild mountain gorillas in Uganda, marching through a tourist camp as if they own the place, sitting down for a snack next to a stunned tourist before moving on. These are our second closest living relatives after the chimpanzee, since our common ancestors with the gorillas diverged about 7 million years ago and about 5 million for chimps. We share 95-99% of the same DNA.

Now, we say wild, but these gorillas in Uganda are exposed to human tourists all year long. With only about 750 of the heavily endangered mountain gorillas left, tourism is the only way to pay for the rangers needed to protect the animals from encroaching urban interference and the witchdoctors or poachers that sell the gorilla body parts for use in "magical" potions. It was also common to eat the great apes, before conservationists were able to end this practice.

The gorillas in the video are called the Rushegura troop and consist of a harem of females (the moderate sized black apes), a ton of toddlers of various sizes and one giant male silverback (you will know him when you see him, trust us). As you'll notice, the silverback is perhaps three-or four times the size of the females! "Why?", a male visitor might ask in a trembling, thin voice so his 7ft tall 280lbs silverback wife won't hear him from the couch. Well, as you suspect the males have to fight for domination of the harems. Hence evolution has favoured an ongoing arms-race between males that resulted in them growing steadily bigger. The rationale being that randomly born larger males won more fights, had more sex and hence their own male offspring also got the genes for being larger. Whilst females, not encumbered with this tiresome competitive boasting, could stay nice and small so they in theory could still catcha cab to a theatre in Britain to see Derren's awesome Svengali show (hint, hint).

As a result, a silverback gorilla in his prime, as the specimen in the video certainly seems to be, is not only huge, but also has the estimated strength of around 10 to 20 strong human men! Don't believe us? Look at the video and pay special attention to the mass of muscles on the silverback. These amazing animals have been observed casually snapping giant bamboo stalks, equivalent to the strength of two inch steel bars, like twigs. Imagine what it could do to your parents in law? Luckily (for your parents in law) these are rather meek non-violent creatures, and if you treat them with respect, no looking in the eyes, stay low, still and submissive, you'll be absolutely fine as the video will show you.

What a wonderful and terrifying experience this must have been. To have those little gorillas crawl all over you, kissing your face (sublime!) whilst their dad, a massive silverback 50 times your strength (the guy is kinda feeble, OK?) is having a little rest right behind you, keeping a protective eye on his brood and you…

For a somewhat higher quality video visit the Whyevolutionistrue blog of biologist and author Jerry Coyne, who wrote an amazing book on evolution called "Why Evolution is True".