# brain: a unique patterns of activations during processing narratives

<< English, Farsi and Mandarin readers use the same parts of the brain to decode the deeper meaning of what they're reading >>

<< Even given these fundamental differences in language, which can be read in a different direction or contain a completely different alphabet altogether, there is something universal about what occurs in the brain at the point when we are processing narratives >> Morteza Dehghani.

<< In the case of each language, reading each story resulted in unique patterns of activations in the "default mode network" of the brain. This network engages interconnected brain regions such as the medial prefrontal cortex, the posterior cingulate cortex, the inferior parietal lobe, the lateral temporal cortex and hippocampal formation >>

<< One of the biggest mysteries of neuroscience is how we create meaning out of the world. Stories are deep-rooted in the core of our nature and help us create this meaning >> Jonas Kaplan.

University of Southern California. Something universal occurs in the brain when it processes stories, regardless of language.  ScienceDaily. Oct 5, 2017.

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/10/171005141710.htm

Morteza Dehghani, Reihane Boghrati, et al.  Decoding the neural representation of story meanings across languages. Human Brain Mapping. 2017 doi: 10.1002/hbm.23814

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/resolve/doi?DOI=10.1002/hbm.23814

# evol: an ultra-rare survivor, the Malagasy striped whirligig beetle H. milloti

<< a whirligig beetle species, Heterogyrus milloti, inhabiting forest streams in southeastern Madagascar is the last survivor of a once dominant and widespread Mesozoic group. With a Late Triassic to Early Jurassic origin (226–187 Ma) it is the hitherto oldest dated endemic lineage of animal or plant on Madagascar >>

Grey T. Gustafson, Alexander A. Prokin, et al. Tip-dated phylogeny of whirligig beetles reveals ancient lineage surviving on Madagascar. Scientific Reports 2017; 7 (8619) doi: 10.1038/s41598-017-08403-1

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-017-08403-1

<< Even today, the ageless striped whirligig beetle keeps its own company, preferring to skitter atop the surface of out-of-the-way forest streams in southeastern Madagascar—not mixing with latecomers of the subfamily Gyrininae who have become the dominant whirligig beetles on Madagascar and abroad >>

Meet Madagascar's oldest animal lineage, a whirligig beetle with 206-million-year-old origins. Oct 4, 2017

https://m.phys.org/news/2017-10-madagascar-oldest-animal-lineage-whirligig.html

# behav: innovations among wild capuchin monkeys (Cebus capucinus)

<< understanding what makes some individuals more likely to innovate and/or transmit new behaviors is critical for creating realistic models of culture change >>

<< Older, more social monkeys were more likely to invent new forms of social interaction, whereas younger monkeys were more likely to innovate in other behavioral domains (foraging, investigative, and self-directed behaviors). Sex and rank had little effect on innovative tendencies. Relative to apes, capuchins devote more of their innovations repertoire to investigative behaviors and social bonding behaviors and less to foraging and comfort behaviors >>

Susan E. Perry, Brendan J. Barrett, Irene Godoy. Older, sociable capuchins (Cebus capucinus) invent more social behaviors, but younger monkeys innovate more in other contexts. PNAS. 2017; 114 (30): 7806–7813

http://m.pnas.org/content/114/30/7806

Research reveals how new behaviors appear and spread among capuchin monkeys. Aug 24, 2017

https://m.phys.org/news/2017-08-reveals-behaviors-capuchin-monkeys.html

# behav: the oddity about the highly inactive ants (Temnothorax rugatulus)

<< Social insect colonies are highly successful, self-organized complex systems. Surprisingly however, most social insect colonies contain large numbers of highly inactive workers. Although this may seem inefficient, it may be that inactive workers actually contribute to colony function >>

Daniel Charbonneau, Takao Sasaki, Anna Dornhaus. Who needs ‘lazy’ workers? Inactive workers act as a ‘reserve’ labor force replacing active workers, but inactive workers are not replaced when they are removed. PLOS ONE 12(9): e0184074. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0184074 Sep 6, 2017

http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0184074

<< Analyzing the video recordings revealed that a colony breaks down into four main demographics [..]: inactive, lazy ants; so-called walkers that spend most of their time just wandering around the nest; foragers that take care of outside tasks such as foraging and building protective walls from tiny rocks; and nurses in charge of rearing the brood >>

Lazy ants make themselves useful in unexpected ways. Sep 8, 2017

https://m.phys.org/news/2017-09-lazy-ants-unexpected-ways.html

# behav: spreading conflicts through monkey societies

<< How does conflict spread through a society? One way to think of conflict spreading is to picture an epidemic, with aggressive individuals "infecting" others and causing them to join the fight >>

<< It appears that it is not individuals who control the length of fights, but the relationships between pairs of individuals >>

AA << found evidence for a more complicated structure behind >>

AA << found evidence that conflict duration is strongly affected by the first interaction, which sets the tone for the fight. If the first interaction is brief, then following episodes are likely to be just as brief. A long drawn out initial brawl, however, will be followed by similarly difficult episodes. This, Flack [Jessica Flack] says, "is a signature of collective memory," meaning "the duration of the conflict is not just determined by individuals independently deciding whether to continue fighting or drop out, but through their joint memory for the past and subsequent collective decision-making." >>

How conflicts spread through monkey societies. Sep 7, 2017

https://m.phys.org/news/2017-09-conflicts-monkey-societies.html

Edward D. Lee, Bryan C. Daniels, et al.  Collective memory in primate conflict implied by temporal scaling collapse. Journal of the Royal Society Interface. doi: 10.1098/rsif.2017.0223 Sep 6 2017.

http://rsif.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/14/134/20170223

# poetry: apropos di ritmiche: "sul dilatare a spiroide dei lembi segugi ..."

<< N. sul dilatare a spiroide dei lembi segugi //

venati a trapunte //

di slento flusso probante che slitta //

(...)

2135 - strappati dal punto stabile. Jun 04, 2007

http://inkpi.blogspot.it/2007/06/2135-strappati-dal-punto-stabile.html

# acad: cinnamon buns, pretzels and bagels to explain unusual phases or states of matter, by Thors

<< What do a pretzel, a lock of hair and a scream have in common? >>

<< Thors Hans Hansson, a member of the Nobel physics committee, uses a cinnamon bun, a pretzel and a bagel to explain the field of topology, a highly specialised mathematics field studying unusual phases or states of matter >>

<< Referring to the two holes in the pretzel, the one hole in the bagel, and the shape of a bun, Hansson demonstrated that topology explains how a material's shape can be completely deformed into a new one without losing its core properties >>

Ilgin Karlidag. Bagels, pretzels, Boo! How to explain science Nobels. Oct 1, 2017

https://m.phys.org/news/2017-10-bagels-pretzels-boo-science-nobels.html