If I may digress a moment, how many of you were actually taught in school that glass was a liquid? Anybody? I sure wasn’t. My father told me the old window thing and I was promptly laughed at when I brought it up in school. While I love a good old myth-busting, I feel like the whole “liquid glass, saggy window” myth isn’t something the average person encounters in their daily life. I’d be curious to know how prevalent it is outside of trivia circles. Moving on…

In the paper, Jing Zhao, Sindee L. Simon, and Gregory B. McKenna subjected a 20 million year-old piece of amber to tests in order to determine if it had settled into an equilibrium  or if it was still flowing. Now, you may be wondering what ancient amber has to do with glass, and this is where the misleading headlines do injustice to the research. Amber and glass belong to the same category of matter called, well, glasses. They’re also called amorphous solids. They’re similar to foams, pastes, concrete, and other non-newtonian fluids in that they do not have the rigid, crystal structures found in metals and other solids, but nor do their molecules flow freely like in a liquid. The researchers wanted to show that amber could be used as viable experimental model.

The issue was never whether glass is a solid or a liquid, because it never fit into the 3rd-grade holy trinity of matter.

What the team at Texas Tech found was that while the amber did settle to equilibrium over the course of 20 million years, it did not change over the few weeks it was experimented on—nor is it likely to have changed over a mere 400 years. With any luck, archaeologists 20 million years in the future will dig up some cathedrals and finally put the matter…..at rest**.

Hey, if you can’t get enough complex fluids, check out one of the longest running experiments ever: The pitch drop. Pitch is a resin formerly used to seal boats and drop on invading armies. When cooled, it is hard and can be shattered with a hammer, but it actually flows over a measurable time period. Thomas Parnell, an physics professor at the University of Queensland started the experiment in 1927, and since then the pitch had dripped 8 times. D. Eric Franks on the comments mentioned that the 9th drop is due to fall anytime now. So if you have nothing better to do, you can watch the live feed and perhaps even make history: For in the 86 years it has been going, nobody has actually caught a drop in action.

Special thanks to Redditor N8CCRG, who provided the best explanation I had seen regarding glasses, non-newtonian fluids, and long range order. I wanted to feature them as the third puppet in the comic, but did not receive a response in time.

*In the defense of the other articles, they actually reported the science right, but the sensationalized headlines didn’t do the research justice.
**Oh c’mon, I had to sneak another one in there.

Boom goes the Strip Search! Thanks, Obama.

Today we begin a journey into the wild world of material sciences, and tackle an age-old mystery in the process. The other week, science news was abuzz over a paper than purportedly slammed the lid shut on the notion that glass flows slowly over the years. The original myth was supported by window glass in really old houses or cathedrals being thicker on the bottom than at the top—as if gravity had slowly been pulling it down. In reality, this is much more likely due to glassmaking techniques at the time.

Before factories were churning out perfectly flat sheets of glass, it had to be made the same way as you would make anything else, by blowing it. Blowers would spin the glass out into a flat disc (or roundel), from which rectangular sheets were cut out. I was a coldworker in a glass studio for 3 years, and during that time, I saw a lot of roundels. For a variety of reasons (both practical and otherwise), they take on a slight UFO shape, being thicker in thThee center than on the edges. With proper technique, you can spin a pretty flat disc, but it will always be slightly thicker in the center. I’ve included an illustration below.

A glass roundel on the pipe and illustration showing how a rectangular sheet would be cut from it.

For stability reasons, the sheet would then be installed thicker side down. Case closed, right?

Well… not really. In the next parts we’ll look at what the scientists found when studying a really ancient glass, and how the answer is not as solid as you may think. By that I mean the explanation is pretty amorphous. Know what I’m saying? Newton would be perplexed by the conclusion. Ok, stopping now.

BAM. Strip Search!

In a headline straight out of The Dark Crystal, stem cell biologist Amy Wagers and cardiologist Richard Lee were able to reverse the aging process for a specific heart condition by infusing an old mouse with blooooood from a young mouse. Awesome.

As the heart ages, the muscles grow thicker (hypertrophy), and eventually the heart is unable to properly pump blood. Diastolic heart failure previously had no treatment, but a technique first devised in the 19th century to study nutrient transfer between circulatory systems seems to have shed new light on how to rejuvenate ailing hearts. In heterochronic parabiosis, two animals are joined together so that they share a circulatory system. In this case, a five-year-old mouse was paired with a two-month-old mouse. The scientists discovered that something in the new blood was causing the older mouse’s heart muscles to thin out to normal levels—much like the younger mouse.

I say “something” because as of publication, the team is not 100% sure what is causing it. But most signs point to a regulatory protein called growth differentiation factor 11. GDF-11 is produced in abundance until old age, where it regulates  the growth of spinal and smell receptors. As part of the aging process, production of GDF-11 drops off, which made it a likely option to explore. Other experiments have also shown promise that this is the mechanism Wagers and Lee are looking for. If they can pinpoint the cause, they could revolutionize the treatment of this stubborn heart ailment, and put the blood of the innocent back on the market. nya ha ha ha ha….

Hey! New Strip Search is up

Even in public schools, it can be difficult for nonreligious students to form common interest groups based on their secular values. At worst, they may be met with outright resistance. In these cases, the SSA works on behalf of the students to make sure their rights are upheld. But today’s comic is based on a much more uplifting story.

Students in the Secular Student Alliance of Smithson Valley High School in Bulverde, Texas wanted to celebrate Darwin day at their conservative school. They enlisted the help of other clubs in their school to organize Science Awareness Week, bringing the student body together to celebrate science and reason. It’s a wonderful story, as schools have historically polarized in these instances, but in this case, the Smithson Valley SSA was able to become a uniting force in their school. Kudos!

There’s still time before SSA week ends, consider supporting them in making sure all voices are heard and that students can meet regardless of their beliefs.

Since first appearing on Strip Search, my beard has garnered a fair amount of fan attention—perhaps even more than myself. Always one to play along, I have since drawn a few comics* related to my distinctive facial hair. Now I’m done playing, and I’m dropping the learn hammer on you. Ah, well, not really. These are all still pretty fun. Shall we?

Microbiological Laboratory Hazard of Bearded Men by Manuel S. Barbeito, Charles T. Mathews, and Larry A. Taylor. This paper, while almost half a century old, is well worth the read for the images alone.

Beards Augment Perceptions of Men’s Age, Social Status, and Aggressiveness, but Not Attractiveness by Barnaby J. Dixson and Paul L. Vasey. This article jumped out at me not for the subject matter, but for it’s co-author, Paul Vasey. He’s a behavioral neuroscientist who along with studying beards, conducted some fascinating research in the Samoas. In Samoan culture, there are three genders: male, female, and a group called Fa’afafine (“In the manner of a woman”). They are boys who are recognized at an early age as being different and brought up as girls with a specific role in assisting their siblings in child rearing. In this WSF video, Vasey describes how homosexual genes are passed on through kin selection rather than direct reproduction.

The Role of Facial Hair in Women’s Perceptions of Men’s Attractiveness, Health, Masculinity and Parenting Abilities by Barnaby J. Dixson and Robert C. Brooks. Who comes up with these titles? You probably saw this article in the news recently. Dixson and Brooks discovered that women and men across the board found men with heavy stubble more attractive than men with full beards or no beards. But what most sources didn’t report was that men with beards achieved higher scores in masculinity and perceived parenting ability.

Dosimetric Investigation of the Solar Erythemal UV Radiation Protection Provided by Beards and Moustaches by A.V. Parisi, D. J. Turnbull, N. Downs, and D. Smith. The conclusion is simple. Beards block UV light from hitting your face. The researchers placed mannequin heads out in the hot Australian sun and measured their UV exposure. For the sake of your skin, I recommend growing a beard immediately.

If you hate beards and would rather get skin cancer, know that the most exposed area was found to be the upper lip, so you could always just get a math teacher mustache or something.

But just in case you’re not convinced. I’ll leave you with The Beards, who have something important to tell you.

Hello new people! The other day both the Richard Dawkins Foundation and I Fucking Love Science shared the Red Flags of Quackery comic I drew way back. While there is one admittedly problematic panel in the piece, I’ve never seen so many people who fucking love science get their jimmies rustled when their pet belief was confronted. It’s been a while since I’ve drawn a comic directly related to skepticism, so it felt really good to get angry letters from chiropractors again. All I have to say is, “U mad?”

Many thanks to Sean and Elise respectively. Particularly Sean, who was super cool in the face of my initial ire over not being properly credited on the piece. Mea culpa.

If you liked the Red Flags and want to help promote promote the ideals of scientific and critical inquiry, democracy, secularism, and human-based ethics where they are needed most, the Secular Student Alliance is celebrating the hard work of student organizations across the US this week. The SSA is a non-profit that works in schools to help non-theistic students set up clubs and support groups. They also work to defend the rights of these groups in cases where they are met with resistance. To learn more about SSA week, and how you can help out. Click the image below. Thanks!

TONIGHT! A bunch of NYC Strip Search fans are meeting at Peculier Pub in an impromptu meetup of sorts. Come on down if you can. The shindig starts at 7, and I will probably be there a little later depending on work. I’ve gathered up a bunch of Pineapple Maki drink recipes that people have concocted, and I plan to try as many as I can before I die of alcohol poisoning. See you there!

*Not that this is the first time beards have made an appearance here. A while back, Nadir presented a cautionary tale of sorts.

The headline: A survey conducted in the UK and published in PLOS One, found that up to 97% of family doctors had used placebos to treat their patients.

Now, before we get too much further, there are some issues with how a placebo is defined in the survey. Only 1% of practitioners reported administering ”pure” placebos: saline injections, sugar pills, etc. Were we to take only the textbook definition of a placebo into account, we’d have a much less exciting headline. But the researchers also included what they call “impure” placebos, which they define as,

“…interventions with clear efficacy for certain conditions but are prescribed for ailments where their efficacy is unknown, such as antibiotics for suspected viral infections.”

Based on their example alone, I’m beginning to get uneasy, and Scott Gavura over at Science-Based Medicine has a great in-depth look at how their definition of a placebo could skew the results. Read it here.

I’ll defer to him on the subtleties around how a placebo is defined and how it affects the study results. In the meantime, I’d like to call attention to the problematic nature of some of these so-called impure placebos. Starting with their example in the definition, prescribing antibiotics willy-nilly is a big problem in medicine. Many types of bacteria are now resistant to penicillin, and  superbugs like MRSA and tuberculosis are a huge problem for hospitals.

That isn’t all. Check out their list of what they considered impure placebos:

(Click to enlarge, and pay special mind to the frequency in which they were administered and whether the survey taker considered it a placebo at all.)

If you look at the list, it includes complementary and alternative medicine, “whose effectiveness is not evidence-based” and “nutritional supplements for conditions unlikely to benefit from this therapy (such as vitamin C for cancer)”.

Holy. Shit.*

C’mon, guys. You’ll never get the public to realize that CAM treatments don’t work and vitamin C won’t cure your cold you treat it like they will. Granted, the use of CAM as a placebo isn’t exactly rampant, but from a public education perspective, this is kind of a big deal. Instead of administering homeopathy or unnecessary chest x-rays in a bid to ease the mind of a patient, we need to educate them on why antibiotics aren’t going to help their flu symptoms or why getting x-rayed all the time isn’t a good idea.

I understand, doctors are busy. Which is why I feel even worse for missing the mark today: I went for the yuk-yuks instead of dropping a learn-hammer on you all, and I’ll be on the lookout for further research around this topic to give it the treatment it deserves. Because this was the comic you probably wanted, but not the one you need.

*I’m not even going to get started on “non-essential technical examinations”

Note: Before you jump on this, know that I plan to reopen my etsy store in order to sell higher quality, signed prints. So if that’s something you’d be interested in, don’t throw any money my way quite yet.

Cheers!

Oh, hey! Strip Search episode 17.

My absence is not without fruits though. Are you in the NYC area and want to check out some great science programming? Behold
You can use promo code WSFPC during this exclusive presale period to purchase tickets before they open up to the general audience.  So have at it.

Today’s comic happened over the weekend when I was looking for images of bowhead whale surface displays. Despite the unintended learning experience, I really was genuinely annoyed that I had to sort through photos of butts to find a display of a different, more wholesome nature. First nerd problems, am I right?

New Strip Search Today.
If you’re not caught up, and you’re on Team Maki. Uh…might want to catch up.

Please do not post spoilers here. Go to the Strip Search page. Thanks!

Things here at the Festival have been heating up, with ticket sales and program announcements just around the corner. This means that I’m frantically banging on my keyboard to make sure everything is up on the website in time. It feels dirty to not be updating on schedule—which is great news for me and you.

It means I still have the hunger, and that I’ll only come back from this chock full of ideas.

H/T to Reed Black ‏(@reedicule) for planting the mind seed that grew into this comic.

Check out this PAX East Loading Ready Run recap! It includes a lesson in how to dance The Kraken, the sexiest dance in the world. I can confirm that the science is sound, and that it has been thoroughly peer reviewed. (Watch to the end!)

The team used chimpanzees trained in communicating with a series of symbols, and had them perform a series of tasks in which they had to identify what type of food had been hidden. If they guessed correctly, they received the reward. When presented with too little information to guess, the chimps would investigate to try and discern what food was hidden.

This “thinking about thinking”, is a vital problem solving tool, as it allows us to take stock in what we do or do not know, and act accordingly. Instead of acting directly on stimuli (“object” mode), metacognition prompts strategy and information gathering. Most of all, you do it all the time without even realizing it.

Any time you scrutinize your own memory or skills, you’re utilizing this cognitive process. These are the sort of inward-facing thought processes that are crucial for problem solving, and are one of the many components of sapience. Now, some of our closest relatives join the ranks of those that think about thinking, and it is not far-fetched that any animal capable of advanced problem solving and deductive reasoning, could also be utilizing metacognition. Only time and research will tell.

Strip Search Day! Go watch, and after you watch, read the spoiler block below.

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SPOILERS!! Pineapple Maki shirts are now available in the swag store in mens, ladies, and different color variants. In the future, stylistic variants like the “spray” version below will also be available for purchase—I just wanted to test it out before putting it up for sale. Proceeds from the shirt sales will be split between the creative team, so buy them in threes!

Special thanks to Graham for reminding us that this episode was coming up, and most of all thanks to NY Comic Con. It will be a pleasure being in you.

Design by Mac Schubert, Katie Rice, and Maki Naro