All in Science & Nature
Living With CIPA
CIPA stands for Congenital Insensitivity to Pain with Anhidrosis. As the name implies, CIPA disease is the inability to feel physical pain. It is a rare congenital and genetic disease that affects the nervous system. It is an extremely rare disorder which may also cause a person to produce very little sweat, or none at all, and makes them incapable of feeling temperature. These symptoms appear early in childhood, typically at birth or during infancy.
Cognitive Anthropology: A Primer, Part II
Cognitive anthropology is the study of the mind in its cultural and cross-cultural context. Once again, we can turn to Edwin Hutchins (1995) and his groundbreaking book in the literature for a greater definition: “Human cognition in its natural habitat, that is – to naturally occurring, culturally constituted human activity.” It is a somewhat overlooked subfield of cognitive science more broadly, and yet it proposes a great many questions that can benefit our understanding of thought, the brain, and culture intermingle to create our experience of reality. Over the years, there have been a number of influential publications that seek to define, situate, and advance this reading of cognition.
Viewing the World Through Complex Adaptive Systems
Small differences can lead to large consequences or change outcomes. A popular example of this is that a butterfly could flap its wings in New York and the next day in Tokyo there will be rain instead of sunshine. This phenomenon is commonly known as the ‘Butterfly Effect’ and it highlights the relationship between minute conditions and ending outcomes within a system. Although interesting, the Butterfly Effect is only a piece in the puzzle of understanding our greater world. A larger piece to the puzzle, but by no means the complete picture, are Complex Adaptive Systems (CAS). If the Butterfly Effect represents the relationship in a system, then a CAS is the system itself.
Cognitive Anthropology A Primer
Are anthropologists necessary to the great hunt for a unified theory of mind? Will cognitive anthropology decisively confirm whether anthropology as a whole is part of the humanities or the sciences? Are cognitive anthropological methodologies compatible with the research methods of other subfields of cognitive science? These are the big questions, of course, and to address them exhaustively is a near-impossible task for any researcher, and there is indeed conflict among anthropologists, even those who identify specifically as cognitive anthropologists, as to how this field can and should proceed. The goal of this brief article is to act as a primer, an introduction to this colorful and, I will argue throughout this series, necessary pillar of human cognitive studies.
Systemic Lupus Erythematosus Explained
In modern times, lupus is a general term for diseases that affect the skin. Lupus, also called SLE(Systemic Lupus Erythematosus), is an autoimmune disease in which the immune system attacks its own tissues. More specifically, the immune system sees itself as foreign to the body and fights against itself, thereby causing widespread inflammation and tissue damage in the affected organs. It is known to affect the joints, skin, brain, lungs, kidneys, and blood vessels. The skin, especially. It is a systemic disease and it affects a wide variety of organs, but notably causes red lesions on the skin.
Natural Language Processing and Oncology: Unlikely Allies in the Fight Against Cancer
Natural Language Processing (NLP) refers to the ability of computers to parse spoken, written, and visual speech acts with the ultimate goal of human-level performance. Applications of this technology range widely, from text message prediction to automatic translation, but, perhaps surprisingly, NLP systems have increasingly been adapted to medical research. The focus of this piece will narrow in on oncological research, which, to one new to the field of artificial intelligence, may seem incongruous with computational linguistics. However, there is a rich application of NLP in several studies from around the world, and it has become clear that computational linguists have a necessary skill to contribute in the fight against cancer.
