Archives
Red means stop, green means go, yellow means…?
[podcast]http://edwardwillett.com/wp-content/upLoads//2010/06/The-Yellow-Light-Dilemma.mp3[/podcast] I went through a yellow light today. I’d glanced away at the wrong moment, looked up to see the light had gone yellow, and realized I couldn’t stop without slamming on the brakes and probably skidding into the intersection. Later, I was crossing a street downtown when a van went through the yellow in front of me. It looked to me like the driver had plenty of time to stop—but no doubt he had his own excuse. It’s a rare driver who doesn’t run through a yellow light on occasion, and in most cases it’s barely even a conscious decision. You have a split second to decide to brake, keep going...or even speed up. So how do we make that decision? A transportation engineering ...The ebb and flow of curvy cars
[podcast]http://edwardwillett.com/wp-content/upLoads//2010/04/Curvy-Cars.mp3[/podcast] In the 1940s and 1950s, cars had curves. From the 1960s through the 1980s, they tended to have sharp angles. But since then, they’ve tended more toward the curvy again...although I’m seeing signs of angularity one more. Have you ever wondered why? A German researcher at the University of Bamberg with the unlikely-yet-oddly-appropriate name of Claus-Christian Carbon did, and the results of his study were recently published in the journal Acta Psychologica under the title “The cycle of preference: Long-term dynamics of aesthetic appreciation.” Carbon suggests that two basic but somewhat conflicting human tendencies influence our reaction to automobile designs: a natural inclination to prefer curved objects, and a fascination with the new. Normally, humans avoid sharp objects, because sharp objects—fangs, claws, knives, ...Morally malignant magnets
[podcast]http://edwardwillett.com/wp-content/upLoads//2010/03/Morally-Malignant-Magnets.mp3[/podcast] One of the things that distinguishes humans from animals is moral judgment, our ability to judge other people’s actions in terms of our own sense of right and wrong. Our moral judgment feels so integral to who we are, so much a part of our personality, that it’s a bit disturbing to discover, as MIT researchers reported this week, that it can be disrupted by magnets. Rebecca Saxe, an assistant professor of brain and cognitive sciences at MIT, has focused her research on social cognition: how we interpret other people’s thoughts. She wants to understand how the brain gives rise to things like moral judgments, belief systems and language. The challenge, of course, is that we have no way to observe people’s thoughts ...Boredom
Everyone is bored sometimes. You find yourself at loose ends, with nothing to read, nobody to talk to, and maybe not even anything interesting to look at...driving alone from Regina to Saskatoon, for example. Yet science has carried out relatively little research on boredom. About four years ago, Richard Ralley, a lecturer in psychology at Edge Hill University in England, set out to change that. Ralley believes that boredom must serve a useful purpose, or it wouldn’t have evolved. He suspects it may be a matter of energy conservation: boredom is the brain’s way of telling the body it’s time to rest, that the task it’s engaged in isn’t worth the expenditure of energy. Some positive aspects of boredom have been identified ...Social contagions
[podcast]http://edwardwillett.com/wp-content/upLoads//2010/01/Social-Contagions.mp3[/podcast] Parents (I don’t think I’m giving away any parental secrets here) worry about peer pressure--not least because parents remember how much their behavior was influenced by peers when they were young. The fact is, we’re all influenced by the people around us...and we often think of that influence as a bad thing. As the Bible puts it, “Evil companions corrupt good morals.” And other kinds of companions can have other effects. For instance, an analysis of 12,067 people that appeared in The New England Journal of Medicine in 2007 revealed that you are more likely to be obese if your best friend is obese. (Overstuffed siblings or spouses also makes a difference, but the greatest negative effect comes from fat friends.) To a certain ...Why I’m not Stephenie Meyer
[podcast]http://edwardwillett.com/wp-content/upLoads//2010/01/Why-Im-Not-Stephanie-Meyer.mp3[/podcast] I’m a full-time writer, but not, alas, a fabulously wealthy and/or successful one. James Cameron isn’t bugging me about film rights; Oprah isn’t plugging me on TV; fans aren’t lugging great stacks of my books around, chasing me for autographs. It’s easy, when you’re one of the little guys in any creative field, be it fashion, books, movies or music, to envy the runaway successes and wonder what, for example, Stephenie Meyer’s got that you ain’t got. Are her books, objectively, truly so much better than everyone else’s? Or, more to the point, than mine? Probably not, suggests recent research: in fact, runaway successes are runaway successes in part because they’re runaway successes...and efforts to figure out what “the next big thing” ...The scientific case for live music
[podcast]http://edwardwillett.com/wp-content/upLoads//2010/01/The-Scientific-Case-for-Live-Music.mp3[/podcast] Music today is ubiquitous, both in public spaces like malls, elevators and offices and in the very private space between an individual’s ears, courtesy of personal music players. But that’s all recorded music. Live music remains far rarer. Live musicians may occasionally show up in a public space, but you generally have to seek them out. Which raises an interesting question. Do we perceive music differently when we watch it being played than we do when we are only listening to a recording? Michael Schutz is both a noted percussionist and a noted researcher. Currently an assistant professor at McMaster University, he runs a research lab dedicated to studying the cognitive science of music, and the visual component of music is something ...Blame your brain for overeating
[podcast]http://edwardwillett.com/wp-content/upLoads//2009/12/Why-We-Overeat.mp3[/podcast] Put on a few extra pounds over Christmas? Wonder why you feel compelled to eat half a box of chocolates half an hour after finishing your second plate of turkey, dressing, mashed potatoes and gravy? Feel a little guilty? Well, new research offers clues to one of the most baffling aspects of the eternal battle of the bulge: why we keep eating even when we’re full. Short version: blame your brain. When you’re hungry, food looks more appealing than when you’re not: hence the old adage about never shopping on an empty stomach. Previous research has suggested that ghrelin, a hormone the body produces when it’s short of calories, may act on the brain to trigger this behavior. Now new research suggests that this ...Why men and women shop the way they do
[podcast]http://edwardwillett.com/wp-content/upLoads//2009/12/Shopping-and-Gender.mp3[/podcast] They shuffle along with blank faces and dead eyes, unseeing, unthinking, lost in some private hell that you as passerby can only pray never similarly engulfs you. You scuttle by, eyes averted, as though they have some horrible contagion against which neither face masks, Tamiflu nor vaccination can defend...and yet the odds are that for all your precautions, before Christmas arrives you will join their tormented ranks. What’s that? Yes, zombies are big in pop culture right now, but what’s that go to do with...? Oh, I get it. No, sorry, this column isn’t about zombies. It’s about husbands going shopping with their wives. It turns out there’s a solid scientific explanation for why women shop the way they do...and why men ...The thrill of victory depends on the fear of the agony of defeat
[podcast]http://edwardwillett.com/wp-content/upLoads//2009/11/Sports-Emotions.mp3[/podcast] The Saskatchewan Roughriders play the Calgary Stampeders in the Canadian Football League’s Western Final this Sunday. That simple declarative sentence contains a novel’s worth of angst for fans of the Riders (and possibly for fans the Stampeders, too, but I can’t speak about that, not being one of those LOSERS!...oops, sorry, did I type that out loud?). Roughrider fans, often said to be the greatest in the country, are passionate about their team. They want them to win. They really, really want them to win. (Please, God, let them win!) And yet, deep down, they fully expect them to lose. This, science tells us, is precisely why they enjoy watching the Riders play so much. A new study from Ohio State University has found that ...
Edward Willett is a The Shards of Excalibur, Book 1: Song of the Sword
My new YA fantasy novel, coming in October from Lobster Press
Before the Lady called her, Ariane’s life was a mess. Two years ago, her mother disappeared. She bounced around different foster homes until her aunt finally took her in. The meanest clique at her new high school has decided to make Ariane their prime target. And to top it all off, she is having frightening premonitions, and they are becoming more intense. The moment water touches her skin, she sees visions of a lake, a lady, and a sword. When a staircase opens up in the middle of Wascana Lake and the water begins singing to her, she has no choice but to answer the call….
Marseguro
Winner of the 2009 Prix Aurora Award for Best Long-Form Work in English
Water world Marseguro is home to the Selkies, a water-dwelling race created from human DNA. When an unmodified human seeks revenge on a Selkie by activating a distress beacon taken from the remains of the original colony ship, a strikeforce is sent from Earth to eradicate the genetic abomination. Yet Marseguro will not prove as easy to conquer as the Earth force anticipates…
Terra Insegura
Finalist for the 2010 Prix Aurora Award for Best Novel in English
Marseguro, a water world far from Earth, is home to a colony of humans and the Selkies, a water-dwelling race created from modified human DNA. For seventy years the colony has lived in peace. Then Earth discovers Marseguro, and a strike force is sent to eradicate this “abomination.” But Marseguro has created a genetically tailored plague to use against Earth’s Holy Warriors. With the enemy defeated, the people of Marseguro feel they are safe. But Chris Keating, the traitor who signaled Marseguro’s location to the Holy Warriors, has fled to Earth, unknowingly carrying the deadly plague within him. The people of Marseguro feel they must send a ship to Earth with a life-saving vaccine. Only time will tell what awaits them when they reach their destination.
Lost in Translation
Kathryn was a human empath whose world and life had been destroyed when the alien S’sinn slaughtered her parents before her very eyes. Jarrikk was a young S’sinn, an unproven warrior who’d seen his flight mates slaughtered by the humans who’d sought to colonize his world.
As humans and S’sinn found themselves on the brink of war, these two Translators had to work together to find a common ground and avert catastrophe. But whether their Translators’ oath and training could overcome the enemies leagued against them was very much in doubt…
Archives
Historic Walks of Regina and Moose Jaw
Ten walks to points of historic and architectural interest in the cities of Regina and Moose Jaw (eight walks for Regina, two for Moose Jaw).
Disease-Hunting Scientist
The true stories of six real disease hunters. Epidemiologists travel the world trying to keep us safe from deadly diseases—from high-tech labs in Canada to remote villages in Africa. Learn how these “disease detectives” are coming up with new ways to fight disease, and find out if you have what it takes to become an epidemiologist, too!
The Bounty Mutiny
The Bounty was a British ship visiting Tahiti in 1789 when some of the crew overthrew the captain, William Bligh, and set him adrift in a tiny boat with sailors loyal to him. The mutiny resulted in a number of trials–both of the men who mutinied and of Bligh for losing command of his ship. These fascinating events have been the source for numerous Hollywood movies, most recently The Bounty. The Bounty Mutiny: From the Court Case to the Movie explores the famous case and the movies it inspired.
