Björn Brembs - Likes

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I cleaned off my desk. Clearly my appetite for reading papers exceeds my capacity to do it.

The poor trees. :-( Have you considered moving to a digital system for reading papers? For example, I use Zotero with HTML snapshots and highlighting and annotation notes, and Andrew Warren uses PDFs with Foxit Reader for annotation and highlighting. - Chris Lasher

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I know, I know, don't think I don't feel guilty about that. Most of those papers are from 3+ years ago. Mostly done converting to mendeley, but still haven't found a good way to scribble in the margins. Will have to look at Zotero's annotation notes, thanks... - Andrew Su

Hi Andrew - does the annotation/highlighting in Mendeley's PDF viewer not meet your needs for scribbling in the margins? Would be great if you could let us know what's missing, either at support@mendeley.com or http://feedback.mendeley.com. Thanks! - Victor / Mendeley Team

what?!, Mendeley has a PDF scribbler? Perhaps it's been too long since I updated, or perhaps this is a feature that I just missed. Downloading latest now... - Andrew Su

Yes, Andrew :-) You can open a PDF in the internal viewer by double-clicking the document, then add Sticky Notes and highlights. By the 1.0 version, these will also be synced to your Mendeley account, and thus shareable with collaborators. Merry Christmas! - Victor / Mendeley Team from iPhone

Jonathan Eisen

Story Behind the Nature Paper on 'A phylogeny driven genomic encyclopedia of bacteria & archaea' #genomics #evolution - http://phylogenomics.blogspot.com/2009...

yesterday from The Tree of Life - Comment - Like - Share

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The Life Scientists: Jon

The Impactometer™ - http://www.lrb.co.uk/blog...

yesterday - Comment - Like - Share

Dave Lunt, Björn Brembs and Cameron Neylon liked this

6. On startup the Impactometer™ will consequently first calculate its own Impact™. Our engineers estimate the Research Impact Projection for the Impactometer™ will be in the order of 14.93 gigapacts™.[2] - Jon

Robert Scoble

Prediction for 2010: FriendFeed is going to see a resurgence.

Tuesday from Twitter - Comment - Like - Share

Flavio, ElijahBailey-Zu of FF <0,, 拓 | wavesand and 78 other people liked this

What's the rationale? - Pavan

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Really?! - Michael Liss

I hope this prediction turns to be 100% true. - ashish from iPhone

I think this prediction's outcome might fall into the hands of Facebook. We'll see what they do with the property this year. - Andrew Dobrow

Funny that this comes from Twitter. =D - Junebug (aka Sarah Jill)

ROFL. - Derrick

So is RSS if we're going to follow Robert's logic. - Jimminy Fuller

HOW TO SPOT COMMENT BAIT IN 100 EASY STEPS — STEP 1: DID IT COME FROM ROBERT SCOBLE? STEPS 2-100: REPEAT STEP 1. - Akiva Moskovitz

already happening, yo - Josh Haley

it started surging (again) after ppl let the knowledge of fb purchase fall into the bits of history pages - chaz2b

Lets cross our fingers - polou/indigo_bow

This is SO an experiment on Scoble's part. - Jeremy (on vacation)

WTF is FriendFeed? - David Cohn

Rational, Twitter usage is flattening, people are finally figuring out that Twitter sucks for having a conversation. People though Friendfeed was hard to use, try having to install several software 'crutches' to be able to use Twitter productively without even half the functionality as Freindfeed. - Jeff P. Henderson

if you say so... - MobilAdam

Either this is tounge in cheek or Robert really hasn't gotten over our breakup... Robert, I hope we can still be friends but we have to move on and grow... FriendFeed will always love you, but we need some 'us' time to find out who 'we' are... *cues The Bodygaurd soundtrack*... *walks out into the rain, adjusts collar, walks off down the road*... *fade to black, credits* - Johnny Worthington from iPhone

LOL Johnny! - Jeff P. Henderson

Best Christmas present ever! - Jemm

Comment bait. Even Robert can't generate interest these days. - Russellreno

I agree. Friendfeed is for those who need more from a 2d interface. Until there spatial interface is there, Friendfeed is on top of the pyramid (especially when one knows how to use it best). - Kirill Bolgarov

Up - Luca Perugini from iPhone

*slow-mo head shake* - Micah Wittman from iPhone

Too funny! Johnny and Akiva -- you guys crack me up. - Mathew A. Koeneker

I would agree with a few here and say that FriendFeed is already resurging, Robert. #friendfeed - Kol Tregaskes

AMEN! - zʍıɔ

The stats don't agree though: http://thenextweb.com/2009... - Kol Tregaskes

it's like drunk dialing an ex-girlfriend... - Aron Michalski from BuddyFeed

i guess so too.. - Daniele - Viralavatar

so too :) - ★ Soner Gönül

Agreed wholeheartedly Robert - Roberto Bonini

Akiva: lol, Kol: that article only looks at unique visitors, and doesn't consider user hours. - Mike Chelen

:) @ Aron - sums it up perfectly... - 1x29

Lets hope so ... Miss some of my old peeps :) - Charlie Anzman

I'm surprised Robert made this statement but I find it very interesting in the change of view and wonder what has changed his mind or if he knows more info. - manielse (Mark Nielsen)

The unpredictably erratic Scobot is at it again... - Ciro

Well, after glancing at his Twitter timeline, he's just making a bunch of joke predictions. I'd like to think that there's some truth in this one though... - manielse (Mark Nielsen)

Sniffs... Do you smell that? It's what we used to call a troll. Robert is getting dangerously close to becoming irrelevent. - Jason Williams from iPhone

Robert is waiting until 2010 to respond to this thread. :) - Louis Gray

I told you so - Jesse Stay

Kol: the *stat* doesn't agree (note the singular) - Jesse Stay

Well, since I'm ready organizing the elections for the best Dutch blogs I can say the resurgence already started last week. ;-) - Ton Zijp

Kol: Here are many more stats that imply the contrary: http://staynalive.com/article... - Jesse Stay

Excellent idea. - Richard A. from FreshFeed

Scoble - I disagree ONLY because I think that FriendFeed activity is already migrating to Facebook via deeper integration over there but I'm wiling to hear you out (as are the other 40+ people commenting here). Do share why you think this is true? - Aaron Strout

I wrote this tweet for Twitter, not for FriendFeed. But nice to see you all! :-) - Robert Scoble

Jason: I'm definitely irrelevant if the people calling me irrelevant don't even have 1,000 subscribers. Sigh. - Robert Scoble

I actually see FriendFeed growing instead of slowing and there will also be new enhancements. A testing ground for Facebook. Just to expand, Robert's still the man! - amarquart

Akiva wins the internets with this mathematical formula for spotting comment bait. - Nicholas Kreidberg

You think we're fighting, I think we're finally talking! -all in one page - Tim Jones

Funny, when I write, I write for everyone, everywhere - Johnny Worthington

Beat ya to it Robert: http://friendfeed.com/jhuebel... And the resurgence is already happening. - Jason Huebel

@Jason Williams, wow that's the pot calling the kettle black, doncha think? Robert's not a troll. - Jason Huebel

@Kol, somebody mentioned that those stats often only consider US visitors (why that would be, I don't know). FF's non-US contingent has grown tremendously, so that graph may not show the whole picture. - Jason Huebel

Akiva wins the thread. - Mark Davidson from BuddyFeed

let's hope so - I love the darn thing - Arthur Coleman

I'm finding that FriendFeed is fiendishly sticky. On Twitter lists do help, they make twitter better and all but but but-but I think a lot of users are getting more sophisticated in their web usage faster than Twitter can evolve their tech. Louis Grey recently postulated that even if there is no interaction on FriendFeed it makes complete sense to stay riding this horse. That got me... more... - JSLeFanu

Dude..... I totally hope you're right, but not too sure about this! LOL Explain your rationale please :) - Susan Beebe

i agree with the original prediction. by the way, what's a resurgence? is it different than insurgents? :-) - Morgan Haley

Morgan - the insurgents never left ... ;-p - Robyn Hawk

Jason, OK. Good. :-) - Kol Tregaskes

I'll stay one faithful user, for those "outside the US" stats. Still feature plenty, still enjoyable. Still effective. Thanks for rallying the troops again Robert. Bring the hopes, and forget the ropes! 8) - ElijahBailey-Zu of FF <0,

like Elijah - maxilprof

Ian Simpson

Heavy snow in Edinburgh, probably not the only one working from home today.

Wednesday from Twitter - Comment - Like - Share

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Christopher Harris

having to resist writing a blog post about free will, how ironic

December 6 from Twitter - Comment - Like - Share

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As you said the other day, it's not science. Or do you have a philosophy blog? - Alexander Kruel

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My blog is a little bit of everything but nevermind, the point is that free will IS entering the scientific language. It's not the free will we're used to (it's not necessarily conscious, it's fully brain based etc) but it's certainly getting in: on the brain science podcast just the other day they embraced it, and a paper I read this weekend is full of intentional concepts despite... more... - Christopher Harris

Yeah, it IS entering the scientific language. But wait, it's not what you think it is. It's really banana juice. Sorry people for the deception. Well, I'm not going to read it. Up next: the reintroduction of evil into the legal system. Again, not what you think, it's just free people doing bad things. Phew... - Alexander Kruel

I think I know why you're so adamant about this. I was raised Christian too and the stress of spending many young years realizing how much of what I'd been told was false and irrational still to this day predisposes me to attack anything that smells like scientifically naive, wishful thinking. Free will used to be a prime target of this anger and frustration as late as a few years ago.... more... - Christopher Harris

Seriously, scientists are also just humans. I've been amazed lately of how dumb educated people can be. Ever heard of Nassim Taleb? What a crank. Anyway, it's really sad to hear this. Free will is the creationism of neuroscience. And if it's true what you're saying, then woo is winning in that field. It's also not ignorance not to read some mathematical musings you may provide underpinning your notion of free will. I don't do it for the same reasons that I don't read papers by Jehovah's Witnesses. - Alexander Kruel

It's not just religious opposition. I'm saying the same when it comes to all the bullshit about consciousness. Or take Roger Penrose, I'd tell him he's making up bs there any time. It's dancing around rainbows end. You don't need expertise for this stuff. It's just flawed reasoning. An oxymoron. Of course, that there is something rather than nothing is a problem that also conflicts with... more... - Alexander Kruel

Well, sometimes there ARE reasons to assume things. For instance we don't know that other people are conscious but the way they talk and act make us assume they are. With recent advances in brain imaging we're starting to be able to distinguish conscious from unconscious brain states which gives us more reason to assume other people are conscious, even though the evidence is not... more... - Christopher Harris

What I meant about bs regarding consciousness is the opinion of some that we cannot tackle this concept with science. The sacrosanct of subjectivity and the first-person perspective. I've written something on topic here: http://friendfeed.com/minds... - Alexander Kruel

"If I cut my throat I may disover that I was dreaming or that I have been playing some advanced virtual reality game all along. Everything is possible. But right now there are safer and more promising options of gaining knowledge. How can I be sure? I can't, but there is evidence which proved to be reliable so far. I have to suspect that it will continue to be reliable based on... more... - Alexander Kruel

Assume free will? No reason. It's a concept that should at best be examined by psychology or the social sciences. It's a cultural idea. - Alexander Kruel

Hey don't despair about free will being studied by scientists, consider this: Even if science truly incorporates free will, such that there are centers for The Neuroscientific Study of Free Will popping up everywhere the way they do around consciousness studies at the moment, then we may still get to a point were we understand the operation of free will in human brains so thoroughly as to be able to predict free decisions. At that point science will truly have killed any traditional notions of free will. - Christopher Harris

I don't despair. I'm just worried about the underlying reasons people have to introduce it in the first place. Suspicious. And it may slow down discovery. It highlights a fundamental error in reasoning in that field. That is bad. At the very least, it will always act as a semantic obfuscation for calling randomness, unpredictability and spontaneous behaviour 'free will' when there obviously exist other, more descriptive terms. - Alexander Kruel

blah..."for calling" not not ;-) - Alexander Kruel

We can't know whether there "obviously exist other, more descriptive terms" until we know more about the phenomenon we're naming. 'Random' doesn't cut it, that was the point of Brembs' 2008 paper. 'Spontaneous' doesn't cut it because behaviour is spontaneous even in disease states where autonomous agency is impaired. This is why I want to write a blog post, to list the similarities and... more... - Christopher Harris

Well, nobody can stake a claim to natural language. If you actually want to create your own definition of 'free will', I'll refer to "'free will' as defined by Harris" (or "Free Harris") thenceforward. But what do you say isn't 'cutting it'? What phenomenon? I know that randomness is poriferous. Spontaneous is fatuitous. I commited the mistake to name those terms for the ease of not... more... - Alexander Kruel

Oh no no, I've gone along with trying to articulate and defend the new free will here but I haven't yet decided what I really think about it and it's certainly not my idea. - Christopher Harris

The phenomenon is the generation of will and behaviour by nervous systems - Christopher Harris

I think you're confusing a naive mind over matter attitude with a dynamical systems attitude where emergent properties are important - Christopher Harris

Just forget what I said. Was maybe all bs. A blog post on emergent properties would be cool. Sorry. Thanks. - Alexander Kruel

I think you should write a blog post about free will after all. I'd like you to unravel the following points: 1. To what does the word 'free' in 'free will' apply? 2. What would be the difference between a being (i.e. fruit fly) which posses free will and one that doesn't? 3. Does free will apply to a certain entity or behavior? 4. Is there a borderline between free and not free? 5. How... more... - Alexander Kruel

well I'll have to so something, just got this comment on my 'What is dopamine?' video: "i love this video. i too think that we're just one big chemical machine with no free will. just the playing out of molecules in a bigger scale." - Christopher Harris

those are good questions though, hope I can address some of them when i'm done reading (still going through the papers Bjorn Brems recommended.. this Vladimir Brezina guy is vicious on the maths, hard to keep up) - Christopher Harris

Well, that's completely obvious to me since I first thought about it when being much younger. That's why I'm commenting here and elsewhere. Out of sheer incredulity that anybody in his right mind could contemplate about free will for long. I don't want to be derogatory here. I could be wrong, I could suffer some neurological deficit. As I said above, I can't wrap my mind around the... more... - Alexander Kruel

And about math, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki... - Alexander Kruel

You can show all kind of stuff with math. Just take string theory. If you want to prove 'free will' with math, simple answer: 'Not even wrong' - Alexander Kruel

On the other hand: http://www.marginalrevolution.com/margina... - That would rock, I'd love that to be the case. - Alexander Kruel

I don't actually care about the philosophical/semantic arguments around free will all that much. what matters to me are the cases where free will most obviously breaks down. how can we learn to control ourselves better? that's my real concern. - Christopher Harris

Where 'free will' breaks down is really when volition breaks down. Anyway, self-control is the enemy of diversity. I'm here, doing this for a lack of control. If I had enough control I'd still be religious today, ignoring everything that might shatter my desire to believe. -- Always reminds of this quote: “If we could deliberately seize control of our pleasure systems, we could... more... - Alexander Kruel

This is just in: When Situations Not Personality Dictate Our Behaviour - http://www.spring.org.uk/2009... "Contrary to our instincts, however, studies such as this one demonstrate that it is frequently the situation that controls our actions more strongly than personality." - Alexander Kruel

Full list of publications by Vladimir Brezina http://146.203.52.26/Neurosc... - Alexander Kruel

That's something for you: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki... - Alexander Kruel

Just Exactly What Is Determinism? http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog... / Forget free will and get on with empirical psychology. http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog... / Free will is not a question for science. http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog... - Alexander Kruel

Good question: "The will is thought to be free if a person manages to overcome a short-term temptation for the sake of a greater, but later, value. Self-regulation raises a final asymmetry. Suppose you have a choice between slapping a misbehaving child and patiently discussing her behavior. Will you get free-will credit only for patient self-regulation?" - Alexander Kruel

How would one differentiate between a system with "genuine" free-will, and a deterministic system whose future states can not be predicted/calculated short of running the system? - Christopher A Carr

@Christopher: What's 'genuine' free will? The last serious thinkers to take dualism seriously probably were Popper and Eccles in the 1970s. Since then, dualism has been dead. I don't see any professional neuroscientist claiming that anything other than the brain is everything we are, as people, identities, self. So apart from a ghost in our heads, what's 'genuine' free will? - Björn Brembs

@Christopher You'd better ask him if a fruit fly without spontaneous variations in its behavior would be in any meaningful way different, from one which possess a spontaneous variation generator, regarding the notion of free will. To me it is a laughable resurrection of a obsolete concept by twisting its meaning beyond recognition. In other words, a "free will of the gaps" approach.... more... - Alexander Kruel

By the way, Brembs' paper is very good and important work. Something I admire. I'm just calling bullshit on its interpretation. Just so that is clear, some people are easily upset :-) - Alexander Kruel

The brain as system that 'transforms sensory input into motor output' is a working defintion but has nothing to do with the reality of physical interactions. It cannot be used to call willful action free contrary to deliberate acts that are purely deterministic. In no meaningful way, regarding the concept of free will, are internal interactions within a brain different from interactions... more... - Alexander Kruel

Possibility and Could-ness http://lesswrong.com/lw... - "The statement, "I could jump off the cliff, if I chose to" is entirely compatible with "It is physically impossible that I will jump off that cliff". It need only be physically impossible for you to choose to jump off a cliff - not physically impossible for any simple reason, perhaps, just a complex fact about what your brain will and will not choose." - Alexander Kruel

Didn't know about this: http://wiki.lesswrong.com/wiki... - Alexander Kruel

One of the easiest hard questions, as millennia-old philosophical dilemmas go. Though this impossible question is fully and completely dissolved on Less Wrong... http://wiki.lesswrong.com/wiki... - Alexander Kruel

@Christopher many chaotic systems in nature (e.g. the weather) are deterministic systems whose future states cannot (as far as we know) be predicted/calculated short of running the system, but we don't think of them as having will; we don't think of them as agents. even a willful agent might not be considered capable of free will however if his/her/its will expresses itself merely as... more... - Christopher Harris

@Alex "The notion of free will has a lot to do with choice and control, neither of which can be used to describe how your brain processes its decisions." This is simply incorrect: choice and control are the subjects of countless rigorous investigations, the terms are used in the neuroscientific litterature every day. Stop saying these things cannot be studied scientifically, they can,... more... - Christopher Harris

OK, Christopher, let me rephrase that: How would one differentiate between a brain with "genuine" free-will, and a deterministic brain whose future states can not be predicted/calculated short of running the system? - Christopher A Carr

Björn: Indeed. So why is the term "free-will" used? - Christopher A Carr

@Christopher (awesome name by the way) I'm not sure what you mean by "genuine", people have always struggled with the definiotion of free will, from Hume's compatibilism to Kant's transcendental freedom. I'm interested in this new intepretation of free will because it may finally give us something more solid to work with, something I can study in the lab and do statistics on. I think... more... - Christopher Harris

I only use the term "genuine" (and in quotes) to note that one can't tell the difference between the two cases I offered, at least as I understand the meaning of "free-will." I guess I'm with Alex in not comprehending why you bother with the term at all. - Christopher A Carr

What is your definition of Free Will, Christopher A. Carr? Apart from any philosopher's interpretation, what do you say it is or rather, what would you like it to be? - Melanie Reed

Melanie: You would be the only one in the thread now to define it as that thing which is beamed into heads by Yahweh, the Semitic mountain deity. Your inclusion in the discussion can only effect a hijacking of the thread. - Christopher A Carr

That is not for you to judge. I asked a question. It is pertinent to the subject matter. It is your choice (free will) to answer it. - Melanie Reed

Christopher, my reason for considering using that term is that most people have an experience of free will, and it may be that the process underlying that experience is very interesting and important. I'd like to understand the workings of that process in a small neural network and maybe one day reproduce it computationally. Also, people stress about free will with regards to the iPlant and dopamine in general, so this re-intepretation may be fruitful to that side of what I do too. - Christopher Harris

Melanie: Actually, I think it would have to be accounted for by some metaphysical woo-woo along those lines, which is why I think it's nonsense. Were we to talk about the subject, it would devolve into the omniscient creator, pre-determination/self-determination paradox, which is not the subject of this thread. - Christopher A Carr

Christopher: How would the subjective experience differ between those two options I offered? - Christopher A Carr

Thou mayest, Christopher. Not a microbe. Not quark. Thou. - Melanie Reed

Christopher Carr: I think you're right, you can't really tell if we actually have free will, or if it's just an illusion due to the underlying mechanisms of consciousness. But, the sensation of free-will--the feeling that we have to make choices--is surely something we've all experienced, and if it's something we experience, then the underlying mechanisms can be elucidated. - Victor Ganata

Victor: I agree. I'm all for the study of neural correlates of the sensation of free-will, or however you might want to phrase that... - Christopher A Carr

Melanie: "Thou" is a second person singular pronoun. So? Appealing to those texts you worship cuts no ice with me. - Christopher A Carr

Christopher: It comes from a very famous quote out of John Steinbeck's novel East of Eden. The main character of the Chinese Housekeeper, Lee, who despite his position is a meticulous researcher of language. He explains to Cal at the end the fruit of his lifetime research which covers the main theme of Steinbeck's novel: Choice: “Don’t you see? . . . The American Standard translation... more... - Melanie Reed

Melanie: Is any of that supposed to constitute evidence of anything? - Christopher A Carr

Christopher: Prove to me that you love someone. Show me some evidence. - Melanie Reed

Yeah, I saw _Contact_ too. - Eph Zero

Melanie: In fact -- and Christopher H could speak to this -- I bet it's possible to recognize romantic love in patterns of activity shown via fMRI. - Christopher A Carr

Ah, I get it now. The discussion regarding the existence of free will is just another insult to you, Melanie. It took me a few minutes to understand your presence in this thread. - Eivind

Christopher: How then did people recognize love before there was MRI? How could they be sure? There was no evidence, if evidence is only obtained from technology. Can you name anything that is self-evident? - Melanie Reed

Not at all, Elvind. I just want to make sure you have been given the opportunity to consider all the evidence. We can become "prisoners of one idea." The concept of Free Will was not originated from the scientific field. - Melanie Reed

Melanie: Having a sense of self doesn't mean that the brain is not a deterministic system. ...as to your reply to Eivind, since when are you concerned with "evidence?" - Christopher A Carr

"We hold these truths to be self-evident..." - Melanie Reed

Melanie: I suggest that if you would like to contribute to this thread, go back through and read it all in order to understand what it is that's being discussed. If you would like to talk about something else, feel free to start your own thread. - Christopher A Carr

Christopher, If you want to study something that did not come from your field, I agree with the originator of this thread that it is helpful to listen to those who espouse what you are trying to gain knowledge about. There is a connective tissue, indeed, a fabric that is essential to your pursuit. - Melanie Reed

If someone said they loved me but didn't show me "evidence" of such (e.g., treating me well, showing affection, etc.), the word itself would be meaningless. In fact, it's a very vague term to begin with. What exactly do you mean by it, anyway? - Eph Zero

Wait, no need to answer that and go further off-topic. - Eph Zero

Determinism in the fundamental sense has ceased to be a viable concept with the discovery of the Heisenberg uncertainty principle. Determinism in the sense of predictability has ceased to be a viable concept since our understanding of deterministic chaos started happening. Dualism (aka 'genuine' free will, magic-man-done-it, or ghost in my head) has ceased to be a viable concept since... more... - Björn Brembs

Our sense of free will, the personal experience of it - much of this is usually referred to as agency - is an entirely different matter, although there is some tentative evidence that the brain functions subserving both may overlap. - Björn Brembs

@Christopher Harris You are incorrect. You don't control how you think or when you are thinking. I don't know how you understood what I said, but it's a simple fact backed by such rigorous proves as Gödel's incompleteness theorems. - Alexander Kruel

Brembs doesn't get that just by adding complexity and uncertainty you do not verify freedom :-( - Alexander Kruel

As I said above (nobody replied), endogenous processes generating behavioral variability and thus non-linearity are working-definitions. This has nothing to do with the overall physical reality of causal chains. At no point the freedom of a system, in itself or from the environment in which it is embedded, can be derived from any conclusion that was attained in reference to that... more... - Alexander Kruel

I might have to clarify what exactly I mean by 'working definitions'. Every system and its boundaries are arbitrary or biased definitions. You can extent the variables of any open system beyond its defined boundaries. Thus it is just unreasonable to talk about freedom in open systems. Endogenous actions are ultimately depend on outside factors. And talking about the freedom of a closed... more... - Alexander Kruel

Christopher: I don't know how to discuss that difference if by "genuine" free will you mean a dualistic, magical power endowed to the souls of men by God Almighty. Like Bjorn said, no scientist would argue for the kind of dualistic, supracausal free will you and Alex seem to be refering to. If however you're asking about the subjective difference between a person with free will and a... more... - Christopher Harris

As regards abulia, free-will is merely the ability to initiate a behavior? Free-will is that which exist in agents who aren't suffering from particular sorts of DDM? - Christopher A Carr

Aboulia is characterized by a lack of will, not a lack of free will. And it is not an ability to 'initiate' action. This would imply that you perceive your ability to 'initiate' action but not the initiative itself, which would mean that your thoughts are perceived as non-actions. That's where the free in free will collides with reality. We do not perceive freedom of choice, we think about options on an intellectual level and confuse ability with possiblity. - Alexander Kruel

Christopher: Something like that. Patrick Haggardd writes an excellent review of the distinct brain systems that mediate volontary and non-volontary behaviour http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed... and then there's the controlled variability, the adaptivity, the intentionality and the relative independence from environmental stimuli. - Christopher Harris

What is it that does possess free will then, the entity or the 'distinct brain systems that mediate volontary and non-volontary behaviour'? That's exactly the point, relative independence from the environment is as good as no independence when it comes to freedom. It ignores the fact that we are part of the environment, an environment that includes other supposedly free agents that are... more... - Alexander Kruel

Alex: no one here argues for a free will that implies that things 'could have been otherwise' or that the causal chain stretching back to the Big Bang can be subverted. the claim here is simply that the processes by which the brain makes different decisions in the same situation can be thought of as free will. - Christopher Harris

Making different decisions in similar situations is the difference between 'mechanical' and intelligent systems. It is the difference between static systems and the flexibility of adaptive systems due to feedback and learning that allows for situational variability. I argue that it is not reasonable to use free will to describe anything physical as long as you are not willing to... more... - Alexander Kruel

Given that the Many Worlds Interpretation of quantum mechanics is a valid interpretation of reality, I don't think the idea of choice has been completely ruled out. The equations really do allow other events than what have already occurred. But I also realize this doesn't necessarily require free-will either. - Victor Ganata

"This universe is constantly splitting into a stupendous number of branches, all resulting from the measurementlike interactions between its myriads of components. Moreover, every quantum transition taking place on every star, in every galaxy, in every corner of the universe is splitting our local world into myriads of copies of itself." (Bryce De Witt, 1970) - Alexander Kruel

Even if that was the case. "Doing everything", or a Permutation City approach, does not account for free will. Although I guess we'll be a bit closer to something you could call freedom... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki... / http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki... - Alexander Kruel

@cristophder carr; if we grant for a moment that it is not possible to distinguish between a system with 'genuine' free will and a deterministic system whose future states can not be predicted/calculated short of running the system, why is making the difference important? If suppose that subjectively we cannot conclude either way, that is no proof in support of wither way too. So that... more... - Sandeep Gautam

@Alexender human or animal agents that are believed to have free will are not closed systems. all living beings are open systems and thus by your own admission can be free and have free will. Free will is important when thinking about agents and living things and a whole theory of mind or folk psychology module that is different from mechansistic or folk physics module has evolved in... more... - Sandeep Gautam

"Maybe the sum total of universe is not free or has a free will or a will at all; but a single organism (an open system) definetly has will, moreover will that is not tightly constrained, but relatively free and endowing with choice and control." +++ Sandeep Gautam This is a closer explication of what can be stated from other disciplines, if you will, couched in terms other than scientific ones, yet saying the same thing. In these areas it takes cross-discipline understanding, - Melanie Reed

For example take Sandeep's first posit: "Maybe the sum total of universe is not free or has a free will or a will at all;" keeping in mind the following statement allows for the exception to it "..but a single organism (an open system) definetly has will,.." This is exactly what this statement is referring to: "Many are the plans in a man's heart, but it is the Lord's purpose [will] that prevails." Proverbs 19:21 It allows for what Sandeep's possiblity has hit upon: a lesser will within a larger context. - Melanie Reed

@Sandeep Gautam: Huh? When have I said that? I said it doesn't matter, either way there is no free will. - Alexander Kruel

Is there no concept that a greater will can set up deterministic systems (for safety purposes) that allow for the fluidity of lesser free wills in which to act? - Melanie Reed

You're not going to get a hearing here for your "Yahweh did it" hypothesis, Melanie. - Christopher A Carr

Then with all due respect to you Christopher, you're not being very scientific. You cannot disprove it and so you must allow for it. There is a danger in not allowing for thinking and possibilities that are beyond our measure of intelligence. We will go round in circles or continue to arrive at imperfect destinations. A good scientist listens and is open to possibilities. - Melanie Reed

@Melanie Reed: Sandeep Gautam already made that point, sadly it's false. Read up on falsifiability and Occam's razor. Maybe some Wittgenstein would be good too. - Alexander Kruel

To take the analogy with open systems further, everyone knows the second law of thermodynamics that the entropy increases as time flies theorem; but that is applicable to closed systems. One cannot argue that open systems like living beings would not exist that sort of defy the entropy principle (move towards more organization) as long as they live. Living beings , that are open... more... - Sandeep Gautam

"You cannot disprove it and so you must allow for it." That is not at all correct. I can't disprove that free-will derives from an invisible pixie dust-farting homunculus in my head. Supernatural explanations are methodologically excluded... - Christopher A Carr

Alex: In Melanie's case, entertaining contrary beliefs is a slippery slope to a firey pit. ...it's the genius of the memeplex. - Christopher A Carr

@xixidiu @cristopher that is what Melaine is saying that if you cannot prove it , allow it; that is not my position. My position is that given two non-falsifiable/non-provable alternatives, believe in one that is good for everyone. - Sandeep Gautam

One can't (at least I can't) simply choose to believe the more implausible of two explanations. - Christopher A Carr

@crsitopher you are on slippery grounds here...to most of people free will is intuitive and not implausible...of course intuitiveness and folk concepts doesn't count as scientific proof,; but it is pertinent to what is plausible to believe and what is not. - Sandeep Gautam

At any rate, Christopher H's definition of free-will just sounds like "intelligence" to me. I continue to fail to see what's useful about employing a term with so much philosophical baggage. @Sandeep From whence derives this "freedom?" I can't figure that out, hence it seems implausible. - Christopher A Carr

No Christopher. I started not believing. I simply arrived (and I did not get there by one dull and morbid route) at the discovery that there was no other alternative. "I continue to fail to see what's useful about employing a term with so much philosophical baggage", Because Christopher, you are more than what you think you are. Connect the dots. They are there. - Melanie Reed

well freedom from immediate environmental influences or past learning history. room for behavior variability (bot operant behavior and conditioned behavior) - Sandeep Gautam

All interpretations of quantum mechanics describe an indeterministic universe, though. Again, this doesn't prove free-will, but arguing for a deterministic universe defies our current understanding of reality. - Victor Ganata

Victor: You aren't suggesting that the brain taps into that foundational indeterminacy via quantum computing in the microtubules? :-) - Christopher A Carr

Melanie: You're the only one here who is trying to talk about Jesus. And just making vague assertions ("you are more than what you think you are"..."connect the dots...they are there") is not even remotely persuasive. - Christopher A Carr

Christopher: heh, I'll leave that to a certain renowned physicist to argue. But once you remove determinism from the discussion, I think it does become useful to examine the phenomenon of free-will. Sure, it's not the same thing as what we intuit free-will to be, and it doesn't meet the classical philosophical definitions, but there's still something there to study. - Victor Ganata

Christopher, I wasn't hoping that you would make the connection today. ;) First, the anger must go. But I think one day you will. And on that day, the click of machinery will be one of relief. - Melanie Reed

Victor: I can think of one renowned physicist/cosmologist who argues persuasively against the possibility, or perhaps that's what you meant. - Christopher A Carr

Melanie: People with agendas as constant as yours are not pleasant people to interact with, particularly when the agenda is to infect others with a memeplex as nasty as Christianity. You might as well be chasing me around with a syringe full of smallpox. - Christopher A Carr

Melanie: What do you think I'm angry at? - Christopher A Carr

I think the term "free-will" is nothing more than short-hand for an ill-defined phenomenon that we all have some vague intuition about, but which appears distinct from sentience, and perhaps even from consciousness. I think it's unnecessarily confusing to just fold it into other neurological phenomenon. As Christopher H points out, the phenomenon of volition is something that has... more... - Victor Ganata

And what of the evidence for the preparation of decisions prior to one becoming conscious of the decision? - Christopher A Carr

@Christopher yea this new free will isn't necessarily conscious, big change from the traditional version - Christopher Harris

@cristopher I concur, the new free will need not be conscious; it can , and most probably is to a large extent unconscious. - Sandeep Gautam

Christopher, I have no agenda where you (or anyone else) are/is concerned that is in the least bit as violent as your metaphor proposes. :) Quite the opposite. It is and will always be your choice to act upon it or not. I am not a virus nor is what I am telling you a virus or memplex. Indeed, if you want to pursue that thinking, you might as well turn it around and ask yourself if... more... - Melanie Reed

Melanie: Pascal's wager is bullshit. - Christopher A Carr

Consciousness seems to me a necessary condition. Without it, what does the "free" mean in "free-will?" - Christopher A Carr

I don't think the evidence that some decisions are made before your consciousness perceives them necessarily precludes free-will, though. I'd like to see them test other scenarios other than just giving a volunteer an instruction, and watching how the brain processes that instruction. - Victor Ganata

If we're thinking of the same study, it just shows that there's a lot of unconscious activity when an instruction from another person gets processed by your brain. There's no indication that the consciousness can or can't override the unconscious activity. That leaves room for another experiment. - Victor Ganata

@christopher I have already answered that. freedom from immediacy. freedom from histrory - Sandeep Gautam

After all, it at least appears we can temporarily override certain otherwise involuntary functions of the body. - Victor Ganata

Would a p-zombie have free will? - Christopher A Carr

yes, if it (p-zombie) was acting as an agent showing behavioral flexibility and variability, our minds would model it as an agent and grant it free will . It might not be conscious but is both willful and without being sentient free in the sense that its unconscious could still have chosen otherwise - Sandeep Gautam

Sandeep: Wait, one's theory of mind bequeaths to other ostensible agents free-will? - Christopher A Carr

to elaborate on p-zombie, supposing that intoxication (inhaling alcohol) makes you a p-zombie momentarily, you would still be held accountable in thtis real world as the prior decision to take alcohol was perhaps mistaken and lead to the outcome. To use analogy of Jon Haidt, if you train your unconscious (elephant) incorrectly your conscious (the rider/trainer / mahout) is also equally... more... - Sandeep Gautam

People on a black-out drunk have free-will? - Christopher A Carr

not on a black out, but supposing that their conscious is overtaken by unconscious and they cannot remember what they are doing, law and I would still hold them accountable and having free will (as they had freely decided to enter into that state) - Sandeep Gautam

Legality is a separate issue. - Christopher A Carr

to take further the case of drunkenness, a drunken person does not just react, he/.she acts by loosening of inhibitions, free rein of impulses ..and acts freely - Sandeep Gautam

Impulsivity is an increase in free-will? - Christopher A Carr

I guess free will has two parts...impulsivity contributes to freeness...freedom from history or immediacy...wilfulnness comes from ability to keep impulsivity in check. - Sandeep Gautam

ok to better rephrase it ...impulsivity - freedom from immediacy....impluses not driven by stimulus necessarily; willfulness - freedom from history- actions not governed by past operant rewards necessarily. - Sandeep Gautam

Regarding "could have," does Google Voice's speech-to-text algorithm have free-will? ...well, I guess Google Voice uses lots of statistical analysis. Suppose you have a speech-to-text algorithm that attempts to assign phonemes to acoustic data segments. If a section is ambiguous between a /p/ and a /b/, and the algorithm assigns /b/, do we say it "could have" assigned /p/? - Christopher A Carr

"could have" is not my position. counterfactuls do not prove the point of free will in my opinion. I think more of given the same conditions different responses at different times that are goal-directed, spontaneous, exhibit choice of form and timing and procedure; google algo doesn't choose when to substitute /ba/ as /pa/; whether to substitue or not and if so when to substitute and why? It doesn't pass the volition test - Sandeep Gautam

Christopher: Your last emphatic vulgarism answered your own question about anger. I may persuade with my arguments. I may plead with my heart. But getting angry undermines your stand. What is left is that marvel for something that to many appears a standard of intelligence and perception to which they must attain. You want the answer couched only in the terms which you have defined. Your stance would lock out the very thing you claim to pursue. Even Richard Feynman didn't do that. - Melanie Reed

Sandeep: I'm hearing something like Ben Goertzel's definition of intelligence. Is free-will necessary to effect "..the ability to achieve complex goals in complex environments?" - Christopher A Carr

Melanie: Feynman also thought that Pascal's Wager was bullshit. - Christopher A Carr

to take the google voice algo example further, if the algo had hidden urges that would spontaneously and in unambiguous situations too, tweak the translation so as to favor /ba/ over /da/ sometimes and /da/ over /ba/ other times, then I would grant it willfulness or some freedom (it is not constrained by the text, but can decide on its own to translate a given text to sound; if it... more... - Sandeep Gautam

We're talking sound-to-text here. Text-to-speech is becoming trivial, except for things like prosody. - Christopher A Carr

ok whatever, you get the idea... - Sandeep Gautam

basically if after hearing ba correctly, if google algo still mischeveiously decidedtro code it as p or d, I owuld grant it some freedom. - Sandeep Gautam

Melanie: "I may plead with my heart." You would be better off pleading with your information processing organ. - Christopher A Carr

actually our folk notions may be appropriate here...we do attribute intentionality to products like google voice when they consistently f**k up in a particular way...we say what an idiot that application is and grant it sort of agency and purpose. - Sandeep Gautam

Sandeep: Indeed. Humans suffer from hyperactive agency detection, Melanie being a case in point. :-) - Christopher A Carr

Christopher: You're right. I am a very poor example of a robot. I am to the depth, to the last, human. - Melanie Reed

Melanie: High levels of rationality do not make one a "robot," in the sense of the word you're using. - Christopher A Carr

Ben's definition of intelligence (on a cursory read) to me seems wide ranging ...his 'task independent pragmatic understanding of itself and the world' borders on sentience, so not surprised if he takes volition also in its stride. BTW, its 3 am in morning india, time to signoff. will continue discussion tomorrow:-) - Sandeep Gautam

Been lovely conversing with you Sandeep. Good evening. - Christopher A Carr

my pleasure too! - Sandeep Gautam

Christopher: No, they make one increasingly intolerant of the sum of what you are. You are dissatisfied. Your path to satisfaction has one route and it is always to run round in that circle. But do you plan to arrive anywhere? Or is it to find pleasure in the game of the circular? If so, I can understand that. But it still doesn't solve the problem of dissatisfaction. It is just a higher level of pleasurable distraction. - Melanie Reed

Melanie: With what do you suppose I'm dissatisfied? - Christopher A Carr

Christopher: You want to know rather just believe.If you are presented with a situation requiring belief in the gap where knowledge leaves off, that makes you dissatisfied. I can understand that. We all have that. It's what we do with that space that makes all the difference in the world - Melanie Reed

"There is no god but Allah and Mohammed is his prophet." <--- Why do you not believe that? - Christopher A Carr

With respect, Mohammed did not come to come to make dead people live. He did not come to die for their sins and make a way out for them so that their relationship with God could be restored to what it was. Only Jesus did this. And I am grateful for what He did. - Melanie Reed

"Only Jesus did this." No he didn't. - Christopher A Carr

Tell me, had you been born in Saudi Arabia, to what religion do you suppose you would adhere? That you are a Christian is an arbitrary matter of having been born in a predominately Christian part of the world. - Christopher A Carr

Christopher: Again, with respect, it is not arbitrary. I have brothers and sisters ( in Christ) who are in Saudi Arabia, indeed, in every part of the world. I have brothers (in Christ) who grew up in SA and later through a chain of events moved elsewhere and then became Christians. - Melanie Reed

Suppose you were born in a small tribe in the Amazon basin which has yet to interact with missionaries. You think you would be Christian? - Christopher A Carr

Christopher: Christ is there, too. Though some of our brothers have given their lives in that mission. Of recent note (in this century) with the Waodani tribe.One tribe member in particular killed 4 missionaries, but later became our brother. - Melanie Reed

You've no ethical qualms with destroying these cultures? None at all? - Christopher A Carr

Of course you avoided the question. - Christopher A Carr

That culture still exists, Christopher. They only difference is that they exist knowing the promise of Christ. - Melanie Reed

These cultures are surely doomed anyway, but it strikes me as a despicable that you're so happy to be the executioner. - Christopher A Carr

I agree with you that as globalization progress (through technology and big business) many cultures and lives will be uprooted. But it is not Christ who is destroying people. It is people and their greed who are doing these things to each other. - Melanie Reed

I also wanted to make clear in case there was confusion: the missionaries were attacked by the tribe and 4 were killed. The missionaries did not fight back. They allowed themselves to be killed. It was this that made an impression on the tribe member and he later became a Christian - Melanie Reed

We should move it over here so Christopher can clean up this thread: http://friendfeed.com/cacarr... - Christopher A Carr

I'd be interested to know how you would describe the reason for your participation in this discussion: 1. "I came across this debate and felt compelled to respond..." 2. "Of several competing actions/options I have deliberately chosen to respond to this thread..." 3. "I never consciously decided to take part in this debate for a special reason, it just happened / I just did..." 4. "Because of / God / made me do it..." - Alexander Kruel

@Sandeep Gautam: If you define free will as freedom from immediacy, how does one achieve this? Every stimulus must be processed immediately. You don't have the option to ignore it. To restrain an urge is as much a response to stimulus as motor output. Influence is always reciprocal. Non-actions do not exist. Besides, how many people would be happy to define free will as the unconscious... more... - Alexander Kruel

Alexander, I made an assumption that you might be addressing me since you invoked God in your question. This thread is in a "public" room. It infers general participation by that alone. The concept of Free Will, regardless of what it has come to mean or might come to mean, within the scientific discipline originated as concept with God and therefore has been the immediate concern of... more... - Melanie Reed

@Melanie Reed: Seen me arguing against your participation in this discussion? I actually agree with you in one point. It's a theological concept. Sadly some people don't get it, or try to sneak it into neuroscience. - Alexander Kruel

@Alexander Kruel My apologies for misunderstanding who your comment was aimed at. I do understand the desire to pursue the concept from the scientific discipline. Strangely, (as it might seem to some of the participants on this thread) others have wanted to look through this lens but from a different direction: this is what we know. Now how does it work from here. Curiosity is only... more... - Melanie Reed

Do you think your god possess free will given its omniscience and thus prior knowledge of its own actions? Just curious :-) - Alexander Kruel

One seemingly innocuous passage declares that "His thinking is higher" meaning that He is not constrained by the same constraints that we experience within our lesser wills of choice. But here is the kicker: He chooses to work within the constraints He asks of us. In short: he "obeys" His own moral laws but allows for a stepping outside the natural (what we perceive as scientific) law... more... - Melanie Reed

Seen that coming. You can't win a theological debate. Never mind, just trying to fathom if it is worth talking about this topic with you any further. I would, but I don't have the time. - Alexander Kruel

I wasn't debating. :) And I don't mind at all appearing foolish. I thank you for listening. - Melanie Reed

I don't mind appearing foolish either. Otherwise I wouldn't comment on such topics at all. But I have nothing to lose, contrary to some educated scientists that should know better. Anyway, if you haven't been debating, what then, preaching? I consider that as spam. - Alexander Kruel

I have told you the truth. Spam, when I began in technology, was defined as repeatedly sending the same email message to a recipients mailbox, flooding it so that nothing else could be sent out or received. Thus, it was incapacitating the recipient's ability to communicate. That hasn't happened here. That definition hasn't changed that I know of and I have been in the tech field for a... more... - Melanie Reed

It was an analogy. Unsolicited advertisement for something I'm not interested in. I wasn't writing a scientific paper and thought a lack of preciseness in my word choice would be permitted. Nevertheless, I grant you a points win on this one. P.S. I'm off for today... - Alexander Kruel

Just to clarify a few points in this meandering thread. Determinism, even macroscopically, is about as antiquated as that of what people in this thread call 'genuine' free will. Of course, anybody is entitled to their opinions, but of course anybody is free to ridicule flat-earthers, too. Free will is composed of two things. If we get too free (e.g. by drugs), we question the will. If... more... - Björn Brembs

I've had Tourette syndrome/impulse control disorder for many years during my childhood. I still suffer from other psychological disorders/problems, such as medical anxiety or having feelings/perceptions of things being venomed. I've never been able to focus myself on certain tasks. I also grew up in a very religious surrounding where people believe into libertarian free will. Thus I'm... more... - Alexander Kruel

@Xixidu not every stimulus is processed ; if that was the case we would get mad; be paralyzed analyzing the incoming stimulations. A lot of the stimulus is ignored and never reaches consciousness, so it is wrong to say every stimulus is attended to. Most are ignored and ignoring a stimulus need not be a conscious decisions; it can be an unconscious decisions. to say that ignoring a stimulus is also responding to it is clearly twisting definitions. . - Sandeep Gautam

A decision is a decision. No need to twist definitions here. If you come up with loaded and loose concepts such as free will, what do you expect? Your volition is the sum of all stimulus, internal and external, conscious and ignored. Where is the freedom? The word surely needs to have some meaning beyond the fuzziness of unpredictability? If not, why do you introduce it, what is its use in science? How does it enrich our comprehension of natural phenomena? - Alexander Kruel

why do you keep harping on unpredictability. Free will is not about unpredictability. Its not about randomness either. It si about freedom (from immediacy, from history). for eg, If I resolve not to reply to your posts in ana acrimonous manner , no matter how acrimonous you become, than though by stating it explicitly, I become highly predictable; I am still exercising my free will,... more... - Sandeep Gautam

Why are we attracted to Andromeda? Because every bit of matter attracts one another. The infinitesimals forces of nature exert their pull infinitely. I'm not arguing against libertarian free will here, although I know you believe into it. I'm arguing against the term in general. If you propose the existence of a will that is free, as implied by the combinatorial term free will, then what is the nature of will? Do people either act deliberately or genuine deliberate? Show me why you need to add free to will. - Alexander Kruel

+++ Sandeep Gautam - Melanie Reed

let me get this straight. you believe that 'will' exists but is not 'free' and we create an oxymoron by adding free; can you define what your 'will' is? - Sandeep Gautam

Because the gravity between people and the gravity between celestial bodies are not the same thing. It seems that there is a blurring between what you are saying (influenced by experience from your condition as a variable) and what Sandeep is saying. Needs sorting out - Melanie Reed

You can express gravity between people as that of emotional attraction or repulsion based on characteristics not the force between galaxies - Melanie Reed

Yes I can: My will is the unfolding of a highly complex process, a sub-system of the universe, as defined by this system itself, into actions perceived to be shaped by itself. I tried to define free will here: http://xixidu.tumblr.com/post... - Just remove free and you got my definition of 'volition'... - Alexander Kruel

ah, the western mind - Gregory Lent

Gregory, I never figured if you believe that something like free will exist or not? - Alexander Kruel

Oh no, Lent joins the thread, expect more spiritual woo woo ;) Alex, let's take a specific example. The feeding system of the snail Lymnaea contains 500 neurons in two connected ganglia, but nevertheless has rudimentary free will under this new definition. The neurons in the two ganglia generate a complicated pattern of thousands of sequential and parallel spikes, which, in the intact... more... - Christopher Harris

Let's just say I can accept free will to be defined as 'nonlinear, endogenous behavior', output over input. I now think it might be adequate after all. -- It's just really hard for me to perceive freedom 'from within'. Much of my perception is actually influenced from within, as for example that I perceive things to be dangerous for no apparent environmental cues. Or that I... more... - Alexander Kruel

no free will ... nice discussion above of what that statement could mean/imply/ ... biggest takeway from this thread is about the limits of english and its close cousin science in being able to get close to understanding subtleties of mind and consciousness. it is lacking so many necessary concepts. - Gregory Lent

Nevertheless, I think there is another problem. Although this problem matters when it comes to the new definition of free will and my definition of volition I held all along. So this is not just a critique of what you, Brembs or others propose but also of my own idea of will. Namely, of what importance is consciousness regarding volition? Can we really talk about deliberate actions without explicit awareness of what we want to do ahead of the action? - Alexander Kruel

Well, sure, even the inflexible behaviours of OCD or addiction emerge from inside the nervous system despite being in some sense un-free. The assumption there is that the normal mechanisms of will and variation have been corrupted, and this too has been studied in the molluscan feeding system http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed... - Christopher Harris

Re consciousness: I think important decisions in the healthy human brain will typically be conscious, even if the mechanisms by which the contents and conclusions of consciousness are generated are only vaguely understood. This is important I think, to identify with your ENTIRE brain, not just those processes that are accessible to consciousness. People tend to get this wrong about... more... - Christopher Harris

Do people get it wrong or may they simply have a different idea of what free will is supposed to mean? Even if I agree to this new definition of free will now, being wrong before, I still doubt most people would accept that definition any time soon. - Alexander Kruel

I think people get it wrong in the same way people who reject brain-death as the proper way to determine when a person is dead are wrong. I think brain-based notions of identity will get increasingly prevalent and increasingly useful as we learn more about the brain. This will require however that there is loads of engaging, easy-to-understand-and-interact-with material available that deals with the findings of neuroscience, hence my youtube channel and website :) - Christopher Harris

If you could control your iPlant brain implant using a external computer, or use a time-based job scheduler on a external machine to execute some script, would it cease to be external and integrate with your free will/identity and thus become part of you? - Alexander Kruel

conditional rewarding brain stimulation (the main function iPlants would enable in humans) always requires an external computer to determine when a required task has been performed and deliver the rewarding electrical pulse. the question is who programs it. if the implant is used to reward behaviours that the user has chosen - behaviours he or she wants to be able to perform but which... more... - Christopher Harris

charcoal artists talking about how to draw rainbows :-) - Gregory Lent

Lent has found the way and the light, none of this search for logic and science, truth is found in the humble leaf, and in the morning wind. - Christopher Harris

ah, the qualitative makes an appearance in Mr. Harris words .. nice beginning - Gregory Lent

I try to mix the qualitative and the quantitative in my novel, check it out sometime http://www.iplant.eu/fiction... - Christopher Harris

I'm glad you have a sense of humor, Christopher. Me, not so much. Did you have something to add, Gregory? - Christopher A Carr

hello, mr carr, just drawn to the subject of the original post, enjoyed the thread, my two rupees worth is to imply that there are larger, and perhaps more accurate, understandings of these great questions available in other parts of the world, in other systems of inquiry, in other languanges. the western mind can be amusing. - Gregory Lent

For Christopher: (I'll come back to the Sapir-Whorfian Lent in a moment). This is difficult to express. Where brains generate minds that contain models of themselves that are sort of recursively referenced, the thing referenced is not the *brain*... so I continue to fail to see where there is a thing that could be described as "will" acting in a way that can be described as "free."... more... - Christopher A Carr

Mr. Lent: Are you really a strong linguistic relativist? If so, you are wrong. - Christopher A Carr

I think you might get some kind of abstract freedom once you arbitrarily define a system and can prove that the complexity of transformation by which this system shapes the outside environment, in which it is embedded, does trump the specific effectiveness of the environmental influence on the defined system. In other words, mind over matter. You are able to shape reality more effectively and goal-oriented and thus, in a way, overcome its crude influence it exerts on you. - Alexander Kruel

Alex: That's just intelligence, so far as I understand what you're on about. - Christopher A Carr

When I say "the thing referenced is not the *brain*," I mean that brains didn't evolve to solve problems in brain-habitats -- rather, brains process information in a way that organisms can accomplish procreation in the presence of trees and grass and so forth. We didn't evolve in a brain landscape. "We" don't *decide* to initiate neural activity. Neural activity initiates us... - Christopher A Carr

Yes, as far as I understood, the new definition of free will that Christopher Harris and other people are talking about here, does to a certain extent equalize free will with control and thus, I assume, intelligence. For example, children and some mentally handicapped people are not responsible in same the way as healthy adults. They can not give consent or enter into legally binding... more... - Alexander Kruel

You are right, this new definition of free will only works once you arbitrarily define a system to be an entity within an environment contrary to being the environment. Thus the neural activity, being either consciously aware and controled by the system itself, or not, is no valid argument within this framework. Of course, in a strong philosophical sense this definition fails to address... more... - Alexander Kruel

Alexander: We might be close now to being able to write this whole thread off as a semantic quibble. - Christopher A Carr

It was very interesting, nonetheless... :-) "quibble" might be not a good word as it connotes pettiness. And this discussion wasn't petty. - Christopher A Carr

if you did neuorscience research on "mind" in sanskrit, instead of english, you would do very different experiments .. five very different words for aspects of mind that the single english word clumps together .. is that relativism? dunno. i see it as an obvious limitation of "science" - Gregory Lent

Greenland natives have many, many words for snow. In no sense does that imply that english-speaking research into snow would be limited. Snow is still snow. Your mind betrays you Gregory ;-) - Nils Reinton

nils, you would never say that sentence, or have that thought, were you a native greenland speaker - Gregory Lent

Nils is from Norway, close enough I say! - Christopher Harris

Gregory, http://scottaaronson.com/blog... - "This is a mystery that could not even have been formulated within the nineteenth-century mathematical universe of Hermann Weyl." - There is some conclusiveness in what you are saying, but in reality it never comes down to the difference of popular concepts within natural languages but rather mathematical formulations. Colloquial or scientific terminology is being conceived afterwards as, for example, it happened within String theory and other modern concepts. - Alexander Kruel

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki... - Christopher Harris

Gregory. My point is that having many words for something does not mean you understand it better. I have very diverse experiences with snow, but in describing snow in a particular setting I would use adjectives or build whole sentences around the word "snow". This is similar to studying the mind - where you seek to understand the object "mind" and then describe what you learn, - not by... more... - Nils Reinton

This thread and the Asian nipple licking thread (http://ff.im/1hqgl) are the two threads I can always count on being present in my feed :) - Eivind

Mental models and counterfactual thoughts about what might have been: http://bit.ly/7pUOBK -- "Counterfactual thoughts about what might have been (‘if only…’) are pervasive in everyday life. They are related to causal thoughts, they help people learn from experience and they influence diverse cognitive activities, from creativity to probability judgements. They give rise to emotions and... more... - Alexander Kruel

Michael Nielsen

Median age of NIH grantholders - http://dl.dropbox.com/u...

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Rafael Sidi, Brian Haugen, Steve Koch and 11 other people liked this

Stunning graph: the median age has increased by nearly half a year per year for the past 35 years. - Michael Nielsen

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I guess librarianship isn't the only field eating its young. - D0r0th34

It's a horrible graph. If I hadn't heard other facts consistent with this, I'm not sure I'd even believe it. It does suggest that the NIH granting system is badly broken, at least if creating a new generation of researchers is anywhere on their agenda. It also suggests a great topic for a PhD - figuring out a good explanation for what's going on. I imagine someone with an interest in... more... - Michael Nielsen

Incidentally, there is more background here, including links to the original data: http://metamodern.com/2009... - Michael Nielsen

I would like to see this plotted against tenure-track line numbers in the relevant disciplines. I don't necessarily think it'll be a gluelike correlation because NIH research goes on in industry, but it *might* be. - D0r0th34

If this trend continues, by 2072 the median age will exceed life expectancy in the U.S.... - Adam Ratner

Similar story in Australia. Head here - http://www.arc.gov.au/ncgp... - scroll down to the ECR (early career researchers) section and weep. - Neil Saunders

Dislike. :-( - Ruchira S. Datta

Um. I don't know what I'm talking about of course, but if grantholder's keep their grants for more than a year wouldn't you expect to see some increase? Isn't this graph just showing that grantholders tend to get their grants renewed? - Nick Lothian

in a healthy ecosystem, young people would be filtering in as older people retired. doesn't seem to be happening. - D0r0th34

actually, now that I think about it, other things to graph against this are time-to-degree and number/length of postdoc positions - D0r0th34

Mr. Gunn to Mr.'s feed, The Life Scientists, LSW, Article-level metrics

A draft letter to the OSTP on behalf of Friendfeed Life Scientists: http://etherpad.com/AXtmx352T4

December 18 - Comment - Like - Share

Piotr Byzia, Richard Akerman, joergkurtwegner and 9 other people liked this

please add your comments re: benefits, problems, timing of deposit, locus of deposit, etc. - Mr. Gunn

15 more comments

'on behalf of Friendfeed Life Scientists' not sure I understand, what do you mean? - Attila Csordas

The idea is for everyone or anyone who has interest to contribute to the document, thereby making it "from us". - Mr. Gunn

I have some ideas, but others might have relevant citations at hand they could easily add. - Mr. Gunn

"Every day, scientists are denied access to publications because they or their institution cannot afford to subscribe to the journal in which the paper is published" An argument against this is that academic scientists can get most if not all of the publications through interlibrary loan. Perhaps it would be useful to mute this argument and point out that a) delivery can take a long... more... - Kubke

Among benefits, I think that adding access outside of academic instituions (that dont have inerlibrary loan) (e.g., policy advisors), ability to access published data when evaluating a grant proposal or a grant report (where deadlines are not compatible with the timelenght of trying to find access to the paper elsewhere). I (personally) see OA also an issue of accountability through transparency. - Kubke

There is also a reduction in cost in not having to pay for permission to use/reuse data in educational material, public talks, books chapters etc. Being able to use the original images (rather than a rehashed version to avoid copyright charges) enhances proper attribution of the author. - Kubke

The big point about saving costs is that most of these costs are hidden and (at least in the US case) almost all of them are borne by the taxpayer. There are new direct costs that arise from OA and there is some argument that these could actually be higher than existing ones - e.g. marginal costs of making author payments depends on the efficiency of finance provision by academic... more... - Cameron Neylon

There are also direct costs that widespread OA removes: the need to build complicated and expensive firewalls, the costs of negotiating licenses, etc. It can be hard to argue about these, however, because they persist as long as TA does. - D0r0th34

One of the most useful features of OA as an author is that you retain copyright - so you can republish in other formats without needing permission. For example you could republish a chemistry paper on ChemSpider Journal, with the benefit of semantic markup by ChemMantis. We have also republished our JoVE paper as an application note for Mettler-Toledo. A related benefit is many OA... more... - Jean-Claude Bradley

since this is in response to http://blog.ostp.gov/2009... is the deadline tomorrow or jan 7? - Mike Chelen

Trying to think of how to mute arguments against OA mandate. TA journals could argue that nothing is preventing the researchers from making the data itself available (as opposed to the published paper). It might be good to run through why alternatives are man-hour costly and as cameron says are ultimately paid for by taxpayers (inerlibrary loan, emailing the authors, buildign a second set of data figures, etc). - Kubke

And, OA helps overcome social inequalities that come with the copyright issues. If a public talk cannot be put online because of copyright costs, only public in large cities have access to the public talk. Small state colleges, universities with less $ for subscription puts a higher demand on the researchers trying to access the data providing an unfair advantage to 'rich' universities... more... - Kubke

As for the mandate itself from NIH it has forced some publishers to go the green route despite a heavy opposition. For example the American Chemical Society allows their authors to self-archive 12 months after publication if they can show that their work was funded by the NIH. - Jean-Claude Bradley

Yes. There is also a sort of demilitarization effect among researchers, assuaging their concerns about OA because after all, everybody has to do it. It's practically impossible for anyone except a major funder to create such an incentive. Institutions can't act jointly, and nobody else has that kind of power. - D0r0th34

The deadline for comments about the first phase of the OSTP Policy Forum is today (Dec. 20). My own contribution to the first phase is available via http://ff.im/da45f - Jim Till

Phase 2 was launched on Dec.21: http://blog.ostp.gov/2009... - Jim Till

Article-level metrics

PLoS ONE Review of 2009 « everyONE – the PLoS ONE community blog - http://everyone.plos.org/2009...

Tuesday from "article-level metrics" -... - Comment - Like - Share

Björn Brembs, Peter Binfield and Graham Steel liked this

September was also the month that saw our Article-Level Metrics program expand in a significant way, by displaying usage data on every article in the PLoS corpus. In December, we also added data from ResearchBlogging.org to the program. ...

Jan Wessnitzer

When robots get out of control!

Tuesday - Comment - Like - Share

Björn Brembs and Jo Young liked this

Steve Koch

Invited to be a PLoS ONE Academic Editor; stoked!

Monday - Comment - Like - Share

Jason Winget, Anna Croft, Cameron Neylon and 13 other people liked this

Welcome aboard! - Adam Ratner

Congrats! - Mickey Schafer

Thanks! I'm reading through some of the guidelines for editors and learning a lot. One good thing is that I learned that post-publication comments by the academic editor of the paper is encouraged. I wasn't sure of this, because for the papers I've read on PLoS, I don't think I've ever seen this. - Steve Koch

GrrlScientist

This Is For All My German Friends: Speak Better English - http://scienceblogs.com/grrlsci...

Tuesday from Living the Scientific Life... - Comment - Like - Share

Thomas Brox Røst, Jo Young, Marcos de Carvalho and Björn Brembs liked this

Sein English ist doch besser als mein Deutsch! - Bill Hooker

Marcos de Carvalho

Transposons 1 - http://www.youtube.com/watch...

Tuesday from YouTube favorites - Comment - Like - Share

Björn Brembs liked this

Michael Kuhn to Michael's feed, The Life Scientists

Wired on unexpected outcomes from experiments, neuroscience, and scientific progress - http://www.wired.com/magazin...

Tuesday from Bookmarklet - Comment - Like - Share

Steve Koch, Björn Brembs, Cameron Neylon and 3 other people liked this

pullquote: "[...] even after scientists had generated their “error” multiple times — it was a consistent inconsistency — they might fail to follow it up." - Michael Kuhn from Bookmarklet

pullquote: "Dunbar found that most new scientific ideas emerged from lab meetings, those weekly sessions in which people publicly present their data. Interestingly, the most important element of the lab meeting wasn’t the presentation — it was the debate that followed." - Michael Kuhn

quite a few gems on how to set up a lab. hold regular group meetings (even if the PI is not there). have people from many different backgrounds. - Michael Kuhn

Bob O'Hara

RT: @NatureNews: Rage against the paywall: Nature, set your news free http://www.finestructure.com/2009... & facebk grp http://www.facebook.com/group...

Tuesday from Twitter - Comment - Like - Share

Nils Reinton, Björn Brembs, Alun Salt and 2 other people liked this

Pierre Lindenbaum

Wordle for "The 2010 Nucleic Acids Research Database Issue" (Titles minus 'Database') - http://www.wordle.net/gallery...

Monday from Bookmarklet - Comment - Like - Share

Khader Shameer, Björn Brembs, Neil Saunders and Duncan Hull liked this

A comprehensive update on the human protein resource - Frank from iPhone

2 more comments

"update" looks very popular :-) - Duncan Hull

And I doubt these updates will have to do anything with APIs... where's RDF in that wordle?!?! - Egon Willighagen

Egon, It was just made with the titles of the articles. Anyway, the word "RDF" doesn't appear in the abstracts - Pierre Lindenbaum

Article-level metrics

BLoG ONE: Happy third birth day, PLoS ONE! - http://niyazahmed.blogspot.com/2009...

Monday from "article-level metrics" -... - Comment - Like - Share

Björn Brembs liked this

... celebrate - for the great, unparallel success that PLoS ONE has achieved in three years: more than 8000 articles, an extended editorial force of 1000 Academic Editors, innovative article-level metrics, thematic collections, etc. ...

Paulo Nuin

Sarah Palin kicked out of hospital fundraiser in Canada. Palin has said that "Canada needs to dismantle its public health-care system and allow private enterprise to get involved and turn a profit" - http://www.reddit.com/r...

Sunday from Reddit - Comment - Like - Share

Steven Perez, Micah Wittman, Kevin Z and 6 other people liked this

It's amazing how some US citizens can be so blind to not see where market economy fails... free market requires buyers to be able to decide, "no, perhaps when you lower your price..." But it just does not work like that for health care... or housing... there does not exist something like a free market when basic needs are involved... - Egon Willighagen

10 more comments

health care, housing: these are 'constrainted' markets... you just can't decide, no, let's not have a new kidney this year and wait until the market is better... no, let's use boxes this year until the house prizes have dropped a bit again... - Egon Willighagen

Egon, you have put your finger on the worst thing about the US (imo, as a recent immigrant). It's not so much that citizens are so blind as that the kleptocracy in power understands your point completely, and completely does not care. Government of the people, by the rich, for the rich... I just hope for the revolution to be a "velvet" one when it comes. - Bill Hooker

@Egon, I'm hardly an expert on policy issues, so I don't pretend to necessarily know best, but market failure doesn't necessarily mean a non-market solution is best; if anything it suggests that the focus should be in finding a way to establish a competitive market as to prevent a government from having too much influence over private citizens. Some ideas that I'd like to see evaluated... more... - Benjamin Tseng

Problem is that consumers lack the specialized skill to properly evaluate health care choices that means an expert ie The Gov must mediate the choices and provide regulations to preent the consumer from being unwitting victim same as they license doctors and lawters they must regulate teh healthcare indistry - WarLord

"given that the American system "works" broadly speaking" -- that stretches "broadly" to breaking point imo. Have you ever "been without health insurance" (honest term, "failed to pay the required protection money") in the US? - Bill Hooker

@Bill, I'm not going to pretend the American system is perfect (b/c it isn't), but almost all employed people in the US have healthcare that they are satisfied enough with such that they're not willing to take their chances on a public option; that doesn't mean I condone the failings of it with regards to access or equity, nor does it mean I wouldn't experience hardship if I lost my job... more... - Benjamin Tseng

@Benjamin, fair enough -- I can't pretend to be a policy or market expert either. I am also not exactly an impartial observer, being for the moment without health insurance in the US! (I spent my first 30 years in Australia, so my experience of a public option is that it has its problems too, but nothing like the massive systemic failures of the US system in its current form.) - Bill Hooker

@Bill, I'm sorry to hear that :(. Does your employer not provide coverage? I thought you were at a biotech firm? - Benjamin Tseng

"When there's a problem with your car engine, you fix the engine, you don't necessarily replace the whole car" Unless the engine was damaged because another part of the car is malfunctioning due to being poorly laid out. Many people can't switch coverage because of "pre-existing conditions" even though their current insurance is severely lacking in coverage and customer service. The... more... - Heather

Benjamin, I can point to a specific example (and I have always been covered and found the US system substandard). When you go to the ER, you could get billed the full amount for an emergency procedure, just because the doctor you saw wasn't contracted with your insurance company at that particular ER. Last I checked, when you go to the ER for an emergency procedure that's not what you... more... - Deepak Singh

@Benjamin -- we're working on it. I should have said "temporarily" or similar. Can't explain in detail -- public company disclosure blah blah blah. Suffice to say I'm not being exploited, and didn't want to give that impression! - Bill Hooker

Christopher Harris

14-åring med världsomseglingsplaner återfunnen - DN.se - http://www.dn.se/nyheter...

Monday from Google Reader - Comment - Like - Share

Björn Brembs, Greg Tyrelle, Alexander Kruel and Neil Saunders liked this

14-year old girl not allowed to sail alone around the world, went anyway, now picked up in the west indies by police. go girl!! :) - Christopher Harris

Jon Udell

Major takeaway from Avatar: I want a ponytail that doubles as a biological network interface. Also, I would like to be taller, thinner, and bluer.

December 20 from Facebook - Comment - Like - Share

Duncan Hull, Peter Miller, Ashalynd and 4 other people liked this

...and obviously be able to fly around on the backs of large reptiles - Cameron Neylon

...on the back of the coolest one in particular! and get married to a prince(ss) of course (even if s/he looks like a blue-skinned cat ;) ) - Ashalynd from fftogo

Martin Fenner

Increased cancer risk following computed tomography scans - http://network.nature.com/people...

Sunday from Gobbledygook - Comment - Like - Share

Björn Brembs liked this

joergkurtwegner

Twitter, Facebook, and Open Access: "Not even an abstract is free online." Posted by petersuber to oa.ta oa.network... http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/journal...

Sunday - Comment - Like - Share

Björn Brembs liked this

Christopher Harris to Christopher's feed, small invertebrate nervous system ganglia, Neuroscience

Proekt et al (2008) Predicting Adaptive Behavior in the Environment from Central Nervous System Dynamics http://www.plosone.org/article...

December 20 - Comment - Like - Share

Björn Brembs, maxilprof and Alexander Kruel liked this

To generate adaptive behavior, the nervous system is coupled to the environment. The coupling constrains the dynamical properties that the nervous system and the environment must have relative to each other if adaptive behavior is to be produced. In previous computational studies, such constraints have been used to evolve controllers or artificial agents to perform a behavioral task in a given environment. Often, however, we already know the controller, the real nervous system, and its dynamics. Here we propose that the constraints can also be used to solve the inverse problem—to predict from the dynamics of the nervous system the environment to which they are adapted, and so reconstruct the production of the adaptive behavior by the entire coupled system. We illustrate how this can be done in the feeding system of the sea slug Aplysia. At the core of this system is a central pattern generator (CPG) that, with dynamics on both fast and slow time scales, integrates incoming sensory... more... - Christopher Harris

Richard Akerman

BoraZ: PLoS adds research blogging to metrics http://tinyurl.com/ykx5ecu - http://twitter.com/BoraZ...

December 19 from Twitter / Favorites from... - Comment - Like - Share

Steve Koch and Björn Brembs liked this

BoraZ: PLoS adds research blogging to metrics http://tinyurl.com/ykx5ecu - Richard Akerman

Marcos de Carvalho

College degrees by gender - http://vi.sualize.us/view...

December 19 from vi.sualize.us/marcosdecarvalho - Comment - Like - Share

Björn Brembs liked this

marcosdecarvalho posted a new favorite picture (via): - Marcos de Carvalho

Steve Koch

Probably the best open notebook lab entry I've ever seen in Junior Lab. Kudos to Alexandra S. Andrego and Anastasia A. Ierides! - http://openwetware.org/wiki...

December 18 from Bookmarklet - Comment - Like - Share

Mickey Schafer, Jean-Claude Bradley, Björn Brembs and 5 other people liked this

All of their notebook entries were outstanding. This was their final lab, and they still had the energy to keep up the excellent work. Definitely very strong talents for this sort of thing--willing to spend the energy on taking the photos and writing the detailed descriptions of methods. - Steve Koch from Bookmarklet

2 more comments

They do have a factor of 2 error somewhere, but I really don't care very much :) - Steve Koch

That's one of the strengths of an Open notebook: such errors won't survive very long! :-) - Bill Hooker

ditto Bill - since the results are linked to raw data errors are far less dangerous than traditional publication, where you pretty much have to trust that the authors did not make any mistakes - Jean-Claude Bradley

Mr. Gunn

The US gov is inviting comment on the Public Access to Science and Technology. http://friendfeed.com/mrgunn... I know we have some comments, can we draft a quick letter?

December 9 - Comment - Like - Share

Don Pellegrino, Graham Steel, phil baumann and 10 other people liked this

I assume international input is welcome. - Mr. Gunn

9 more comments

Don't have much time to help draft but will try -- and will certainly sign. - Bill Hooker

ditto Bill - Jean-Claude Bradley

ditto Bill, too - Graham Steel

Will be happy to contribute and carry work load. Would it be worthwhile to write an 'international' letter that could be forwarded to individual govts (a letter that would be put forward globally, and simultaneously, with signatures from around the world). - Kubke

Can look over drafts and do tinkering if it is useful...or just sign if it isn't - Cameron Neylon

Cool, I'll start something on Etherpad. - Mr. Gunn

question is: should we have 2 letters - one from US residents (whether citizens or whatever) and one from interested international folks? I don't know if they get sorted into different piles or what. - Christina Pikas

I dont see a need for two letters. The signatures could be separated into US scientists and international support. - Kubke

Writing now, noticing via Sigma Xi mailing list that there is a EU petition: https://epetitionen.bundestag.de/index... - Mr. Gunn

http://etherpad.com/AXtmx352T4 is the URL for the document. - Mr. Gunn

Jonathan Eisen

Article about credit for "grunt" genomics work: Human genomics: The genome finishers : Nature News - http://www.nature.com/news...

December 18 from Bookmarklet - Comment - Like - Share

Björn Brembs, Deepak Singh and Neil Saunders liked this

Christina Pikas

I left my comment on the OSTP forum on public access to federally funded research, have you? http://blog.ostp.gov/2009...

December 18 from Twitter - Comment - Like - Share

Mike Chelen, Björn Brembs, Joe and Mr. Gunn liked this

There is an Official Comment coming from MPOW, therefore I am enjoined from commenting personally. Sigh. - D0r0th34

2 more comments

i did the standard disclaimer. but... i'm easily google-able. i should check if the parent institution plans to comment - they are working on an open access statement. - Christina Pikas

Not yet, because I suck. But I plan to. For other procrastinators: first phase ends Dec 20, forum planned to run to Jan 07. - Bill Hooker

See also: http://friendfeed.com/the-lif... - Bill Hooker

Article-level metrics

ResearchBlogging.org News » Blog Archive » ResearchBlogging.org ... - http://researchblogging.org/news...

December 17 from "article-level metrics" -... - Comment - Like - Share

Mr. Gunn, Duncan Hull, Björn Brembs and Daniel Mietchen liked this

Blogs offer another benefit over some other article-level metrics. As Cameron Neylon and Shirley Wu noted in an article in PLoS Biology, experts may be reluctant to offer comments directly on journal articles, because they often don't ...

2 more comments

"PLoS offers bloggers the opportunity to see pre-release versions of its articles." - wasn't aware of this - how to apply? - Daniel Mietchen

Related post at http://everyone.plos.org/2009... . - Daniel Mietchen

Yes - see http://www.plos.org/journal... and follow the instructions for application. - Bora Zivkovic

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