<table width="600" align="center" border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0"><tbody><tr><td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif"><font color="#333333" size="2"><a href="http://www.smh.com.au/digital-life/games/online-gamers-crack-aids-enzyme-puzzle-20110919-1kgq2.html" target="_blank"><b>Online Gamers Crack AIDS Enzyme Puzzle</b></a><br>
</font></font></td></tr><tr><td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif"><font color="#333333" size="2">The Sydney Morning-Herald (Australia)</font></font></td></tr><tr><td><br></td></tr><tr><td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif"><font color="#333333" size="2"><i>This is an example of an emerging new trend: hive
intelligence. Linkage through the internet leading to linkage in the
nonlocal consciousness domain, guided by shared intention. This
demonstrates the power of such a cohort, linked together in a game that
invokes both reasoning and what is called "intuition" -- which read
opening to nonlocal consciousness -- to solve urgent problems. This is
excellent news. T!
his is a new innovation process that holds enormous potential, as the
report makes clear.</i></font></font></td></tr><tr><td><br></td></tr>
<tr><td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif"><font color="#333333" size="2">Online gamers have achieved a feat beyond the
realm of Second Life or Dungeons and Dragons: they have deciphered the
structure of an enzyme of an AIDS-like virus that had thwarted
scientists for a decade.<br>
<br>
The exploit is published on Sunday in the journal Nature Structural
& Molecular Biology, where - exceptionally in scientific publishing -
both gamers and researchers are honoured as co-authors.<br>
<br>
Their target was a monomeric protease enzyme, a cutting agent in the
complex molecular tailoring of retroviruses, a family that includes HIV.<br>
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<br>
Figuring out the structure of proteins is vital for understanding the
causes of many diseases and developing drugs to block them.<br>
<br>
But a microscope gives only a flat image of what to the outsider looks
like a plate of one-dimensional scrunched-up spaghetti. Pharmacologists,
though, need a 3D picture that "unfolds" the molecule and rotates it in
order to reveal potential targets for drugs.<br>
<br>
This is where Foldit comes in.<br>
<br>
Developed in 2008 by the University of Washington, it is a
fun-for-purpose video game in which gamers, divided into competing
groups, compete to unfold chains of amino acids - the building blocks of
proteins - using a set of online tools.<br>
<br>
To the astonishment of the scientists, the gamers produced an accurate
model of the enzyme in just three weeks.<br>
<br>
Cracking the enzyme "provides new insights for the design of
antiretroviral drugs", says the study, referring to the lifeline
medication against the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV).<br>
<br>
It is believed to be the first time that gamers have resolved a
long-standing scientific problem.<br>
<br>
<b>"We wanted to see if human intuition could succeed where automated
methods had failed," Firas Khatib of the university's biochemistry lab
said in a press release.</b><br>
<br>
"The ingenuity of game players is a formidable force that, if properly
directed, can be used to solve a wide range of scientific problems."<br>
<br>
One of Foldit's creators, Seth Cooper, explained why gamers had
succeeded where computers had failed.<br>
<br>
"People have spatial reasoning skills, something computers are not yet
good at," he said.<br>
<br>
"Games provide a framework for bringing together the strengths of
computers and humans. The results in this week's paper show that gaming,
science and computation can be combined to make advances that were not
possible before."</font></font></td></tr>
<tr><td><br><strong><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica,
sans-serif"><font size="1"><a href="http://www.schwartzreport.net/addcomment.php?id=9356" target="_blank">Post Comment �</a></font></font></strong></td></tr>
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<tr><td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif"><font color="#333333" size="2"><a href="http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/2/1b5e1776-df23-11e0-9af3-00144feabdc0.html#axzz1YBnuuyJu" target="_blank"><b>Climate Change: Who Cares Any More?</b></a><br>
</font></font></td></tr><tr><td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif"><font color="#333333" size="2">SIMON KUPER - Financial Times (U.K.)</font></font></td></tr><tr><td><br></td></tr><tr><td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif"><font color="#333333" size="2"><i>This is the latest twist in the climate change trend, one
which recognizes nothing serious is going to be done about climate
change until it is too late and that all subsequent responses involve
rich countries working out local solutions while the world as a whole
does... well, whatever it can afford which, in the case of much of the
world, is nothing at all.<br>
<br>
This isn't going to work, of course, because it does not really address
the mass migrations that are coming, the utter disruption of the food
system, the increasing potential for pandemics as system break down. But
when one is as stupid as we are culturally, one is stupid all the way
through. <br>
<br>
The only "solution" I can see that has a chance is working at the local
level, for local responses that preserve the quality of life for
individuals, families and communities locally.</i></font></font></td></tr><tr><td><br></td></tr>
<tr><td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif"><font color="#333333" size="2">When someone offered me a trip to India, I
said, 'Definitely.� A couple of years ago I�d have fretted about the
carbon emissions. But like almost everyone else, I have given up trying
to prevent climate change. We in the west have recently made an unspoken
bet: we�re going to wing it, run the risk of climatic catastrophe, and
hope that it is mostly faraway people in poor countries who will suffer.<br>
<br>
Worries about climate probably peaked in 2007. That year I attended a
workshop full of northern European policymakers and politicians. The
moderator asked who believed climate change was a serious problem.
Practically everyone in the room raised their hands. We then spent two
days discussing action. I left feeling that if you were running a
country like Britain in 2007, you probably thought climate change was
the single overriding issue. Terrorism, immigration and even the economy
were details by comparison.<br>
<br>
But in 2008 the economic crisis hit. To quote political scientist Roger
Pielke Jr�s 'iron law�: 'When policies focused on economic growth
confront policies focused on emissions reductions, it is economic growth
that will win out every time.� In fact, Pielke, who teaches at the
University of Colorado, thinks the pre-2008 talk about action was mostly
just talk anyway. 'It was easier for our societies to pretend we were
doing something on the issue when we felt rich, and were naive about the
challenges of actually transforming our energy system,� he says. 'But
we never adopted any policies that had a chance to do the job.�<br>
<br>
Nowadays few societies even pretend to be doing anything anymore. The
Copenhagen global summit on climate in 2009 flopped. Carbon emissions
are rising at the high end of the scenarios of the Intergovernmental
Panel on Climate Change. Worse, the global economy is becoming less
carbon-efficient per unit of output, as more countries turn to coal.
When Japan and Germany decided to go off nuclear after the Fukushima
disaster, they weren�t thinking about climate.<br>
<br>
It�s sometimes said that democracies think too short-term to be able to
tackle climate change. Well, dictatorships aren�t tackling it either.
They too obey Pielke�s iron law. If they can get an extra person a car,
they will. Sure, countries are developing alternative energies such as
wind and solar. It�s handy to have something besides fossil fuels. But
we will still consume every molecule of fossil fuel we can find.<br>
<br>
Illustration showing two men pushing a globeNo big state is doing enough
about climate change. For the planet, it barely matters whether Barack
Obama (who believes climate change is real) or Rick Perry (who doesn�t)
wins next year�s US election. Obama won�t stop climate change either.
Ordinary people sense the cause is lost. The wasteful minutiae of daily
life that might once have worried us � running a big bath, eating a
steak, idly googling old classmates � we now just do. Governments aren�t
taxing this waste much.<br>
<br>
We journalists are dropping the topic too. It�s been a thrilling year
for news, but the great absence on the news sites is climate change. Max
Boykoff, a colleague of Pielke�s at Colorado who tracks newspaper
coverage of the issue, finds that European and north American newspapers
are writing much less about it now than in 2006/7. Asian newspapers are
also writing somewhat less, even though their economies are doing fine.
The environment bores readers.<br>
<br>
Almost everyone has given up. The question then becomes: what will
happen? Nobody is sure. Almost all climate scientists think the outcome
will be bad, perhaps catastrophic. They foresee more storms, droughts,
floods and crop failures around the world, as Obama said in 2009 when he
was still talking about these things. However, climate is far too
complex a system to permit exact predictions. Nobody knows whether
global temperatures will rise two degrees centigrade this century, nor
whether that is the tipping point for catastrophe. When climate
scientists make exact predictions, says Pielke, it�s usually a bid to
focus the minds of politicians and voters. It hasn�t worked.<br>
<br>
Rich countries now have a semi-conscious plan: whatever happens, we�ll
have the money to cope. We�ll build dikes, or pipe in more water from
somewhere else, or turn up the aircon if it gets too hot. Our model is
the Netherlands: the country below sea level protects itself against
flooding through a network of dams, sluices and barriers. This costs
about �45 per Dutch person per year. The Dutch think that even as
climate change raises sea levels, their defences can cope for another
four centuries. By then there�ll be new technologies.<br>
<br>
In short, rich countries will buy protection. If they need to abandon
vulnerable cities like New Orleans or Venice, they will. The bigger
problem is for poor countries. If Bangladesh floods or Nigeria dries up,
they probably won�t cope well. But then our mental health in the west
is built on not worrying too much about what happens to Bangladeshis or
Nigerians.</font></font></td></tr>
<tr><td><br><strong><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica,
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