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Science and Technology links (December 19th 2020)
- The Flynn effect is the idea that people get smarter over time (generation after generation). The negative effect is the recent observations that people are getting dumber. It seems that there is no negative Flynn effect after all. We are not getting dumber.
- Year 536 was one of the worse years to be alive. Temperatures fell 1.5C to 2.5C during the summer and crops failed. Mass starvation soon followed. Cold weather is deadly.
- A drug reversed age-related cognitive decline in mice within a few days.
- Glucosamine, a popular supplement, reduces mortality. It may not do much against joint pain, however.
- Singapore will have flying electric taxi services.
- Japan’s population is projected to fall from a peak of 128 million in 2017 to less than 53 million by the end of the century.
- NASA spent $23.7 billion on the Orion spacecraft, which flew once. Meanwhile, the private company SpaceX received less than $20 billion in funding and executed more than 100 launches to orbit, it made vertical landing work, and more.
- We are working far fewer hours.