The article discusses research by Kevin Dunbar is a researcher who studies how scientists study things — how they fail and succeed. He conducted a number of studies, but the ones I found interesting had to do with using an MRI to see brain activity when people to shown different information.

For example, a group of non-physics majors at Dartmouth were shown two video clips. One was of two different size balls falling at the same rate, and another clip of the larger ball falling at a faster rate. We know from Galileo’s experiment at the Tower of Pisa that the two actually fall at the same rate.

This group of students was first shown the clip of the two balls falling at the same rate. These students were not as astute as we are, and the two balls falling at the same rate was not logical to them. The MRI indicated increased blood flow to the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC), which is located near the center of the brain. The ACC is usually associated with the perception of error and is often referred to by neuroscientists as the “oh shit” circuit.

He also showed the same clips to a group of physics majors from Dartmouth. They had a similar reaction in the ACC when they viewed the clip of the ball falling at different rates since they knew the rates should be the same.

Similarly, both groups had activity in another part of the brain when they viewed the clip they felt was the most accurate. This area is called the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, or DLPFC. This is an area just behind the forehead and is one of the last areas of the brain to develop in young adults. It plays a major role in suppressing so-called unwanted representations, getting rid of those thoughts that don’t square with our preconceptions.

According to the Wired article, “the DLPFC is constantly censoring the world, erasing facts from our experience. If the ACC is the ‘Oh shit!’ circuit, the DLPFC is the Delete key. When the ACC and DLPFC ‘turn on together, people aren’t just noticing that something doesn’t look right,’ Dunbar says. ‘They’re also inhibiting that information.’

So if we perform some action and get the result we expect, we congratulate ourselves for being right. If we don’t get the result we expected, we assume we did something wrong and discard the results, even if they are accurate. Which made me think of the quote by Sherlock Holmes:

“When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.”

This was a very interesting article and I highly recommend it.

When I was in school, we learned the equations, theories, whys and wherefores of math. We did all of our calculations with a pencil – there were no calculators. We learned why 1 + 1 equaled 2. We took algebra, geometry, trigonometry and calculus.

But somewhere along the way someone decided that math was being taught all wrong. So they came up with this so-called “discovery math”. This is where the students discover how to solve problems on their own. Unfortunately, the emphasis is on the discovery, not getting the right answer.

We had story problems too, but we had been taught the math skills necessary to solve the problems. Discovery math gives you the story problem, but leaves out the necessary skills to figure it out.

Here are a few of the published study results regarding Discovery math:

1. Discovering Mathematics was found to be “mathematically unsound” by a textbook consultant hired by the Washington State Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction.
2. The San Diego School District adopted Discovering Mathematics a few years ago with disastrous results, and was forced to change textbooks at considerable cost.
3. Professor Jack Lee of the University of Washington has stated: “Discovering Algebra and Discovering Geometry have too much verbiage and too little in the way of clearly stated mathematical principles. Definitions, computational algorithms, and formulas are vaguely stated if they are stated at all. Proofs, the essence of geometry are nearly absent. The program does not include enough practice for mastery. And parents will find them incomplete and confusing.”
4. An independent international study of discovery based teaching methods states: “Although unguided or minimally guided instructional approaches are very popular and intuitively appealing, these approaches ignore evidence from empirical studies over the past half-century that consistently indicate that minimally guided instruction is less effective and less efficient than instructional approaches that place a strong emphasis on guidance of the student learning process.”

So congratulations to the people who stood up for good education for our future engineers, doctors, scientists, and yes, even lawyers. As my youngest son has noticed, regardless of the degree you want to pursue in college, you have to have math. And without a sound, fundamental education in basic math skills our students will continue to be unprepared.

If you didn’t know, lactose, as I mentioned above, is a complex sugar found in dairy milk made up of the simple sugars glucose and galactose. For the majority of people, when the consume dairy products their digestive system produces an enzyme called lactase which is the key to unlock the two simple sugars from lactose. For those of us who don’t produce enough lactase to split lactose into its simple forms, the lactose continues on its merry way through the digestive system and ferments, kind of like beer. You can imagine the rest.

So enough of that.

As a result of this situation, I am constantly on the lookout for lactose on the ingredients list of the foods that I eat. That could be in the form of milk (any kind), cheese, whey, whey protein concentrate, (whey protein isolate apparently has very little, if any lactose), etc.

I am also on the look out for substitutes such as soy based cheese and sour cream. There are also a few 100% lactose reduced products on the market, such as Lactaid brand milk, and the store brands of lactose reduced milk.

Which leads me to the subject of this ramble. I heard ads for Yami brand yogurt on the radio, that said it was lactose free. So every store I went into I looked for Yami yogurt. None to be found. Not Safeway, Albertsons, Fred Meyer or Metropolitan Market. So after nearly a year I got the bright idea to look up the Yami website to see if they listed where it was sold. Sure enough, QFC and Top Foods carry it. There is only one QFC that I can think of in Tacoma, on Bridgeport Way.

So I went to the Top Foods by Highway 16 and Union Ave., and sure enough, there it was. Two flavors in the large (32 oz.) size – raspberry and strawberry. And they are both gooood. And considering I haven’t had yogurt for a long time, it was really enjoyable.

So there you go, if you are lactose intolerant, or even if you aren’t, Yami lowfat, lactose free yogurt gets two thumbs up from me. And maybe a toe, too.

“You cannot legislate the poor into freedom by legislating the industrious out of it. You don’t multiply wealth by dividing it. Government cannot give anything to anybody that it doesn’t first take from somebody else. Whenever somebody receives something without working for it, somebody else has to work for it without receiving. The worst thing that can happen to a nation is for half of the people to get the idea they don’t have to work because somebody else will work for them, and the other half to get the idea that it does no good to work because they don’t get to enjoy the fruit of their labor.”

Dr. Adrian Rogers, 1931–2005

In order to maintain the PMA status we needed to have a minimum account value which included a percentage of the mortgage balance, and the savings and checking balance. They also gave us a Wells Fargo Visa card.

So we’re going along fine, and then the economy went south. We were fortunate to continue having jobs while many people lost their jobs and houses.

As part of the so-called financial fix, banks were encouraged to allow their mortgage customers to refinance at better rates. Wells Fargo contacted us and said we could do a no-cost in place refinance at a lower rate. So we did. And they immediately sold it.

So not really an issue there, except we apparently fell below the minimum for the PMA. We received no notification until the Wells Fargo Visa bill came. It had previously had a zero balance for nearly a year. All of the sudden there was a $25 charge. Seems that was for the PMA account. We don’t remember authorizing them to charge it, but it ended up running at 51% interest. We immediately paid off, and closed the Visa card, as well as the Wells Fargo savings and checking accounts.

So be careful of those big banks. They are always thinking of ways to charge you without you knowing.