Mind controller: What is the ‘burundanga’ drug? (Wired UK)

Burundanga is a scary drug. According to news reports from Ecuador, the last thing a motorist could recall, after waking up minus his car and possessions, was being approached by two women; in Venezuela, a girl came round in hospital to find she had been abducted and sexually assaulted; in Colombia, customers of a street vendor were robbed after eating his spiked food. Each had been doped with burundanga, an extract of the brugmansia plant containing high levels of the psychoactive chemical scopolamine.

The scale of the problem in Latin America is not known, but a recent survey of emergency hospital admissions in Bogotá, Colombia, found that around 70 per cent of patients drugged with burundanga had also been robbed, and around three per cent sexually assaulted. “The most common symptoms are confusion and amnesia,” says Juliana Gomez, a Colombian psychiatrist who treats victims of burundanga poisoning. “It makes victims disoriented and sedated so they can be easily robbed.” Medical evidence verifies this, but news reports allude to another, more sinister, effect: that the drug removes free will, effectively turning victims into suggestible human puppets. Although not fully understood by neuroscience, free will is seen as a highly complex neurological ability and one of the most cherished of human characteristics. Clearly, if a drug can eliminate this, it highlights a stark vulnerability at the core of our species.

Medical science has yet to establish if the drug affects our autonomy, but it is known that scopolamine affects memory and makes people more passive. Neuroscientist Renate Thienel, from the University of Newcastle in Australia, has studied its effects on problem-solving and memory tasks during brain scans. He notes that “scopolamine has a selective effect on memory, although other mental functions, such as planning and information manipulation, are unaffected”. This suggests victims remain cognitively nimble but unable to retain information.

The key seems to be that scopolamine blocks acetylcholine, a neurotransmitter essential to memory. Scans also reveal the drug affects the amygdala, a brain area controlling aggression and anxiety. This would explain scopolamine’s pacifying effect. Evidence also suggests victims tend to be confused and passive rather than unable to resist commands. Yet, until scopolamine’s role in the chemistry of free will is fully explored, we can only speculate that the criminal underworld has unwittingly stumbled upon one of the greatest discoveries of 21st-century neuroscience.

via Mind controller: What is the ‘burundanga’ drug? (Wired UK).

Scopolamine, also known as levo-duboisine, and hyoscine, is a tropane alkaloid drug with muscarinic antagonist effects. It is among the secondary metabolites of plants from Solanaceae (nightshade) family of plants, such as henbane, jimson weed and Angel’s Trumpets (Datura resp. Brugmansia spec.), and corkwood (Duboisia species ^[2]). Scopolamine exerts its effects by acting as a competitive antagonist at muscarinic acetylcholine receptors, specifically M1 receptors; it is thus classified as an anticholinergic, anti-muscarinic drug. (See the article on the parasympathetic nervous system for details of this physiology.)

Although scopolamine is often portrayed in the media as a dangerous drug, its anticholinergic properties give it some legitimate medical applications in very minute doses. As an example, in the treatment of motion sickness, the dose, gradually released from a transdermal patch, is only 330 micrograms (µg) per day. In rare cases, unusual reactions to ordinary doses of scopolamine have occurred including confusion, agitation, rambling speech, hallucinations, paranoid behaviors, and delusions. …

The effects of scopolamine were studied by criminologists in the early 20th century.^[14] However, scopolamine as a truth drug was not seriously tested for this purpose until the 1950s when it was experimented on by various intelligence agencies, including the CIA as part of Project MKULTRA. In 2009, it was proven that Czechoslovak communist secret police used scopolamine at least three times to obtain confessions from alleged anti-state conspirators.^[15]

…  Scopolamine was one of the active principles in many of the “flying ointments” used by witches, sorcerers and fellow travellers of many countries and cultures from millennia ago ostensibly down to the late 19th century or even to the present day. Scopolamine and related tropanes contributed both to the flying sensations and hallucinations sought by users of these compounds. Potions, solids of various types, and other forms were also used in some cases.

These ointments could contain any number of ingredients with belladonna, henbane, and other plants of the belladonna and datura families being present almost invariably; they were applied to large areas of the skin with the objective being to see the Gods or spirits, and/or be transported to the Sabbat.

The hallucinations, sensation of flying, often a rapid increase in libido, and other characteristic effects of this practice are largely attributable to the CNS and peripheral effects of scopolamine and other active drugs present in the ointments such as atropine, hyoscyamine, mandragorine, scopoline, solanine, optical isomers of scopolamine and other tropane alkaloids.

via Wikipedia

Polyglots Might Have Multiple Personalities

If you speak multiple languages, you might have multiple personalities. Reporting October 15 in Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, psychologists at Hong Kong Polytechnic University found that native Chinese students who were fluent in English appeared more assertive, extraverted and open to new experiences—personality traits often associated with Westerners—when conversing with an interviewer in English as opposed to Cantonese.

The interviewer’s ethnicity mattered, too. In either language, observers rated students as more extraverted, assertive, helpful and open to new experiences when speaking to a Caucasian interviewer as compared with when they talked to a Chinese interviewer.

The authors argue that personalities are not fixed. Instead the language a person is speaking—and with whom—can lead individuals to take on the personality traits of the culture associated with that language or person.

via Polyglots Might Have Multiple Personalities: Scientific American.

6 Insane Stories of a Magician Who Helped Win WWII

Speaking of the Alexandria harbor, wouldn’t it be crazy if a magician and his ragtag gang of magical misfits hid an entire harbor from aerial bombers there? … The mission was simple. The harbor at Alexandria was critical to the Allies; it housed the royal fleet and served as the avenue to deploy reinforcements. Naturally, the Axis powers wanted to destroy it. Jasper Maskelyne was supposedly charged with the task of not letting that happen.

To set up his trick, Maskelyne first needed to move the entire harbor. About a mile away from Alexandria was another body of water called Lake Mariout. The port and the lake were separated only by a narrow isthmus of land:

…

When the night of the attack arrived, the lights at Alexandria went off, the lights at Mariout went on and the Luftwaffe totally fell for the switcharoo. Maskelyne had anti-aircraft batteries on the ground fake-fighting back with fake shells, as well as a whole team over at the real Alexandria, setting up the rubble show for the next day. The craziest part of the story wasn’t just that it worked, but that it worked for eight more nights.

Or not.

While the story has been reported in publications as reputable as The Boston Globe, some skeptics say the massive trick would have been impossible or ineffective, or that the actual stunt was much smaller or was the work of someone else and that Maskelyne just took credit …  If you’re about to take to Google to try to find out the truth, good luck. Maskelyne’s Wikipedia entry repeats these stories as historical fact, citing a 1983 book about Maskelyne which itself seems to rely on a 1949 book about Maskelyne called Magic: Top Secret, whose main source was, uh, Jasper Maskelyne.

via 6 Insane Stories of a Magician Who Helped Win WWII | Cracked.com.

Unearthed: A Documentary Treasure on the History of the Internet

The impending deletion of content from Google Video has inspired quite a few uploaders to port their content to Youtube, unearthing a trove of pre-YouTube-era gems like this one. It’s a BBC documentary from 1997 called Inside the Internet, and features interviews with the scientists who actually built the infrastructure on which the Internet is based.

It’s full of details that are not common knowledge among the billions who now rely on the Internet:

• Leonard Kleinrock, the computer scientist who helped set up the very first piece of hardware to comprise the Internet, an “Interface Message Processor,” demolishes the myth that the ARPAnet, the precursor to today’s Internet, was set up as a communications network that would be able to continue to pass message even after some of its nodes were knocked out by nuclear war.

Instead, it was simply a means for engineers to give themselves access to the capabilities of remote computers that their systems might not possess.

• The Internet was — and still is — based on sending tiny packets of information back and forth (aka “packet switching”) because the mathematical theory known as Queueing Theory suggested that the best way to avoid congestion on a communications network was to send small, individually addressed packets of information that could be routed one at a time, so as to find the shortest route.

• UNIX, the basis of Linux (essential to web servers), Mac OS X and countless open-source OSes was born at Bell Labs, and was a product of the frustration of Bell Labs computer scientists with the software they had been forced to use up to that point. It was an internal project that was licensed to academic institutions for only a nominal fee, which helped it go viral.

• The combination of old-style modems operating through telephone lines and the Unix program UUCP allowed the first network of machines that was not part of the officially sanctioned ARPAnet. Called Usenet, it forwarded message from one machine to the next, whenever they happened to connect to the next machine in the chain via modem.

By connecting the edges of the blooming Internet, it helped to create a system in which there was no central node. This made the network immune to censorship, whether intentional or accidental. This, in turn, helped feed the rumor that the network had originally been conceived as one that would be invulnerable to the loss of any central communication hubs(s).

via Unearthed: A Documentary Treasure on the History of the Internet  – Technology Review.

You Are Living in a Computer Simulation

This paper argues that at least one of the following propositions is true: (1) the human species is very likely to go extinct before reaching a “posthuman” stage; (2) any posthuman civilization is extremely unlikely to run a significant number of simulations of their evolutionary history (or variations thereof); (3) we are almost certainly living in a computer simulation. It follows that the belief that there is a significant chance that we will one day become posthumans who run ancestor-simulations is false, unless we are currently living in a simulation. A number of other consequences of this result are also discussed. …

via Are You Living in a Computer Simulation?.

4.5 billion-year-old meteorite yields new mineral

A 4.5-billion-year-old meteorite from northwest Africa has yielded one of the earliest minerals of the solar system.

Officially called krotite, the mineral had never been found in nature before, though it is a human-made constituent of some high-temperature concrete, according to study researcher Anthony Kampf, curator of Mineral Sciences at the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County. [Image of new mineral]

“This is one that simply was not known in nature until we found it here,” Kampf told LiveScience. “That’s pretty dramatic.”

The meteorite containing krotite is called NWA 1934 CV3 carbonaceous chondrite. Chondrites are primitive meteorites that scientists think were remnants shed from the original building blocks of planets. Most meteorites found on Earth fit into this group.

The mineral, a compound of calcium, aluminum and oxygen, needs temperatures of 2,732 degrees Fahrenheit (1,500 degrees Celsius) to form, supporting the idea that it was created as the solar nebula condensed and the planets, including Earth, were formed, the researchers say.

via 4.5 billion-year-old meteorite yields new mineral – Technology & science – Science – LiveScience – msnbc.com.

Turn on, tune in, power up

Mike Brown  – A nanoscale antenna that can collect light and convert it into a current shows promise for energy harvesting applications, say its US developers. These nanoantennas could be combined with conventional solar cells to increase the portion of visible light that they can turn into electricity.Just as a car antenna can pick up radio waves, an optical nanoantenna can receive light waves. Naomi Halas and colleagues at Rice University in Houston have taken the concept of the optical nanoantenna one stage further to make a photosensor. They combined nanoantennas that detect light, with a photodiode that converts light energy into an electrical current.

The team grew arrays of gold nanoantennas, between 110 nm and 158 nm in length, directly onto a silicon semiconductor surface and exposed the device to infrared radiation. Halas explains that the length of the nanoantennas is very important as the wavelength of light detected – in this case infrared – corresponds to the length of the nanoantenna used.

She explains that the absorbed infrared radiation is turned into ‘hot’ electrons – highly energetic electrons – which can jump the barrier between the gold and the silicon to produce a current. Halas believes the device has a ‘unique capability for light harvesting that could significantly advance devices such as solar cells’.

via Turn on, tune in, power up.

Anonymous: Sony is incompetent (and we don’t steal credit cards)

Sony yesterday singled out Anonymous for its role in the PlayStation Network data breach, but Anonymous has its own view—namely, “Sony is incompetent.” As for the evidence against them, the group believes it is being targeted by a “false flag op.”

Back on April 22, parts of the amorphous hacker collective Anonymous were already denying responsibility for taking down Sony’s PlayStation Network. “For Once We Didn’t Do It,” proclaimed their manifesto.

“While it could be the case that other Anons have acted by themselves, AnonOps was not related to this incident and takes no responsibility for it. A more likely explanation is that Sony is taking advantage of Anonymous’ previous ill-will towards the company to distract users from the fact the outage is actually an internal problem with the company’s servers.”

The denials have been coming thick and fast ever since. Certainly, Anonymous had targeted Sony—with some Anons posting creepy messages about Sony execs and their children—but the technical attacks were supposedly limited to data floods against various Sony websites.

When the PlayStation Network went down, Anons at first worried they may have been responsible and that their tactics were alienating the very gamers in whose name they were acting. (The entire campaign was a response to Sony’s lawsuit against PlayStation 3 hacker George Hotz, which was recently settled out of court.) But they quickly and publicly declared that they had nothing to do with the PlayStation Network’s ongoing downtime.

In the Anonymous chat channel #OpSony, a message went up once: “#Opsony is over. Mission accomplished. #OpSony is not responsible for the current downtime of PSN. Whatever problems Sony have, they are nothing whatsoever to do with us. kthxbai. | DON’T ASK US IF THE PSN IS UP, WE DON’T KNOW ANYTHING ABOUT IT!”

via Anonymous: Sony is incompetent (and we don’t steal credit cards).

Necomini: False ears that read your brain waves and show your mood

As we’ve learned, Japan is into enhancing what the human body can do. (See yesterday’s innovative kissing machine.)

Today’s installment of “What will Japan think of next?” is of the more adorable variety.

A company called Neurowear has invented a set of furry cat ears that, when you wear them, can read and express your state of mind.

The ears — referred to as “necomimi,” which is a combination of the Japanese words for cat and ear — sit atop a headband that uses sensors to read your brainwaves, reports Popsci, a website covering science and tech news. They are the latest fashion trend in Japan, according to the site.

As you can see in this video, the cat ears stick up straight when you’re focused on something and lay down flat when you’re at ease.

According to the Neurowear official website, “If concentration and relaxing time comes at the same time, your new ears rise and move actively.”

Even if you don’t voice your thoughts, the ears will express how you feel. The website describes how the groundbreaking nature of their invention might take a little getting used to.

“In the beginning, people may feel strange, however people are getting accustomed to control their new ears by brain waves if they keep using. At this moment, necomimi can be part of your body.”

In this case, it’s being used for fashion, but on a more serious note, Popsci point out “it is a step toward the sort of science that may help people whose health problems make communication difficult.”

via Japan | Technology | Fashion.

Cambodian scarecrows keep out malicious spirits using ghost bazookas

If you want to ward off evil spirits, it pays to be wield some serious firepower. Farmers in the Cambodian countryside have thusly armed their scarecrows with spectral munitions.

These martial manikins were spotted by the bloggers at Asia Obscura. Here’s how they describe them:

Somewhere between Siem Reap and the River of 1000 Lingas, one of the roads leads through an area where every house is guarded by a vicious scarecrow. They’re not in the fields, or guarding the crops. They’re keeping watch on the houses.

“It’s an old superstition,” said our driver. “It’s nothing. It’s to stop bad spirits coming inside.”

One of the guards wore a motorcycle helmet, like a goon from The Road Warrior. One held out a gun, another a sword, another a bazooka.

via Cambodian scarecrows keep out malicious spirits using ghost bazookas.