When a brain scientist suffers a stroke

Dr Jill Bolte Taylor is a neuroanatomist. 12 years ago she suffered a stroke and got to experience her brain from the inside out. The New York Times has a story and a fascinating video of Dr Taylor talking about her experience. Watch it here.

Daily Mail headline watch Day 1

Have you ever uttered the words 'the world's gone mad' as you read about the latest outbreak of political correctness assaulting the sensibilities of every right-minded person? Thankfully we have the Daily Mail to restore the balance. The Mail's headline writers regularly restore our faith in human nature with their ability to get to the nub of the problem in half a dozen words. Even more impressive is their ability to include reference to any women or foreigners in their headlines whatever the story. Let's take a look at a selection from today's Daily Mail. We've put some of our own into the list just to see if we could cut it as a Daily Mail sub-editor. Try and spot the real ones from the fakes. The answer is at the bottom.

1.) Top female lawyer destroyed by City bullies could get record £13 million pay out

2.) British wildlife student dies in front of girlfriend minutes after being bitten by black mamba snake

3.) Pupils to swear oath of allegiance to the Queen or face exclusion

4.) Britain braced for more storms from across the Channel

5.) House prices fall for the first time in 10 years - many blame immigrants for difficulty selling their homes

6.) The primary school where pupils speak 41 different languages

The real headlines are 1, 2, and 6.

Interesting animation

The power of words

Nice article in the Washington Post about the power of words in politics. Read it here.

HTFU and take a chance

Every human existence is judged in reference to every other human existence, now and that has gone before it. You judge yourself in this pantheon of mankind, and the world judges you too. The drunken tramp pissing at the side of a busy road. The despot who orders the murder of men, women, and children. The drug dealer at the school gates. The mugger, the thief, the rapist, and the pedophile. The lazy bastard who hasn't done a day's work in 10 years. Stand them in a row and compare yourself. How are you doing? Feeling pretty good about yourself? Well you are also judged against the great artists, the leaders, the visionaries, and those who define courage. The student who stood in front of the tank in Tiananmen Square. The peasant farmer who took on the Gestapo. The teenager who says 'this is wrong' in the face of peer pressure. How you doing now? 

For the past 10 or so years I've been reading and hearing that ideas are the new currency. Innovate or die. I'm not sure the rest of the world was reading the same things. Mediocrity is alive and thriving. Sure it may not be making iPhone type of money but it's putting Mondeos under the backsides of grey suited nay-sayers all over the country. So what's the problem? People are the problem. Too many people have a problem separating an idea from the person who presented it. An idea may be valid or it may be flawed, that's the nature of ideas and part of the whole process of having and developing innovations (or even advertising that doesn't read like it could have been created 20 years ago). People aren't putting the ideas out there because they are scared that if the idea fails, they fail too because it was their idea. Much as it dismays me, this doesn't come as a surprise. Maybe the stakes aren't high enough. Maybe if the consequence was life or death people would behave differently. I doubt it. I've written here in the past about courage and creativity being linked. The thing that's bothering me now is how the freedom that mankind paid so high a price for in the 20th century is being cast aside. Camus said 'Freedom is nothing but a chance to be better'. If you aren't trying to be better, aren't you throwing that hard won freedom away? HTFU and take a chance.

I've just invented time travel

I posted the 'Trial of David Thewlis' this morning and it's appeared further down the page. I know some of you techno heads will say that it's posted with a 2nd Feb date because that's when I started uploading the video. Well enjoy your cynicism. The Earth isn't flat as you'll see in the future. I know, I've just come back from there.

Some Quotations

People have been sending me quotations today. Perhaps there's something in the air. Anyway, here's a selection to think about.

"The strongest guard is placed at the gateway to nothing...Maybe because the condition of emptiness is too shameful to be divulged."

F. Scott Fitzgerald.

"A casual stroll through the lunatic asylum shows faith does not prove anything."

Friedrich Nietzsche

"The only easy day was yesterday."

Sign at the Naval Special Warfare Centre, Coronado, USA

"Baring your teeth is a sign of weakness amongst primates. When someone smiles at me, all I see is a chimpanzee begging for its life."

Anon

"Freedom is nothing but a chance to be better."

Albert Camus