Welcome to the Future

It's not everyday that you get blown away by something that screams "Welcome to the Future", but seeing this on Kickstarter today just blew my mind:

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1351910088/3doodler-the-worlds-first-3d-printing-pen

This is literally letting someone draw in the air and have their doodles extruded as 3D plastic.  

Now my free-form art would probably look a lot like what is pictured here, but for an artist to be able to sketch off the paper is just insane.  Not to mention creating "sketches" of graphs or molecules or even a face.  

Since I work in a museum, we are always trying to have that wow moment.  That time when you push a kid to see into the future and see themselves doing the impossible.  That moment that will bring teachers, parents, kids etc back.  And once this tool becomes available, I can just picture that spark in a kids eyes when they can sign there name in mid-air and take it home with them.  That's a wow.  And so is this project.

And I'm obviously not the only one to think so.  Day 1 of their kickstarter, their 30 day goal was $30,000.  In the last 20 minutes they've gone from $960K to $974K.  They need to come up with some multi-million dollar stretch goals.  Can I suggest a museum-ready super-durable version :)

Evolution and Religion

As known science geek in my circle of friends, I'll occasionally be asked my opinion on something science-y.  This is my response to someone asking about a creationist curriculum to teach high school science:

Let me start by saying that while I believe Heavenly Father created the Earth and all things in it, I do NOT believe in a 6000 year old earth.

 I've seen how God can span many orders of magnitude from atoms at 10^-12 meters to galaxies at 10^12 meters and don't see why we need to put him in the human mindset that can't handle more then about 1000 without switching reference frames.

 My belief is that like a good agile programmer, God created life in steps and reused his code (DNA and genes) as he perfected each of his creations. The spirit of man is from the pre-existent spirits and it is this breath of life given to the earliest human that turned it from a walking ape into a true human being. Thus I can NOT recommend a science series that sticks to a 6000 year old earth and ignores even the basics of what sexual reproduction does for the diversity of species (one small example from the first chapter of the Bio book). The experiments and language look good, but with such a restrictive lens to bias the writing, it won't provide an understanding to go to college or understand the world around us as described in the scientific literature.

 Here's an overview of the First Presidency's statements about evolution: http://biology.byu.edu/DepartmentInfo/EvolutionandtheOriginofMan.aspx

And this especially captures my views:

ENCYCLOPEDIA OF MORMONISM

EVOLUTION

The position of the Church on the origin of man was published by the First Presidency in 1909 and stated again by a different First Presidency in 1925:

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, basing its belief on divine revelation, ancient and modern, declares man to be the direct and lineal offspring of Deity.... Man is the child of God, formed in the divine image and endowed with divine attributes (see Appendix, "Doctrinal Expositions of the First Presidency").

The scriptures tell why man was created, but they do not tell how, though the Lord has promised that he will tell that when he comes again (D&C 101:32-33). In 1931, when there was intense discussion on the issue of organic evolution, the First Presidency of the Church, then consisting of Presidents Heber J. Grant, Anthony W. Ivins, and Charles W. Nibley, addressed all of the General Authorities of the Church on the matter, and concluded,

Upon the fundamental doctrines of the Church we are all agreed. Our mission is to bear the message of the restored gospel to the world. Leave geology, biology, archaeology, and anthropology, no one of which has to do with the salvation of the soul of mankind, to scientific research, while we magnify our calling in the realm of the Church....

Upon one thing we should all be able to agree, namely, that Presidents Joseph F. Smith, John R. Winder, and Anthon H. Lund were right when they said: "Adam is the primal parent of our race" [First Presidency Minutes, April 7, 1931].

WILLIAM E. EVENSON

(Encyclopedia of Mormonism, Vol.2)

Reprinted with permission of Macmillan Publishing Company from Encyclopedia of Mormonism, edited by Daniel H. Ludlow. Volume 2, page 478. Copyright 1992 by Macmillan Publishing Company, a division of Macmillan, Inc.

Uncanny Valley and Bodies Revealed

I've had a lot of parents worried about how their children will react to the corpses in Bodies Revealed.  And a lot of adults were creeped out by the idea of what they were looking at.  But in the 5 months that I've been facilitating Bodies Revealed, I've only had a small handful of visitors freak out and have to leave.  

So in this society where death is so hidden from the average person, and most of my visitors had probably never seen a corpse that hadn't been embalmed and prepared, why didn't they freak out? (Well ok, these bodies were embalmed and prepared too, but they definitely don't look like they are sleeping).

I think it has a lot to do with the concept of the uncanny valley that is usually discussed in animation and robotics.  Basically humans will anthropomorphize almost anything and except a lot of very non-human faces and read them easily.  But if a face starts to look TOO real we will suddenly and unconciously become a very harsh critic of what we are seeing.

So as an example think of a very exaggerated feature animation like Japanese Anime or an emotion chart:

The crazy eyes don't strike us as creepy, and we have very little trouble reading the emotions in the exaggeration. 

Yet overly realistic baby dolls, robots, masks or animation can just seem odd or somehow threatening:

We've been primed by evolution to reject signs of disease and read others emotions.  So when the emotions don't read correctly, all of our warning bells go off that this person is dangerous, or lying or otherwise just wrong.  This is the same kind of feeling a lot of people get with clowns, mimes, and heavily overdone make-up.  We can see the face underneath, but the emotions and contrast are all wrong.

If we were to see just the skin on the body, we would probably all be freaking out.  Bodies not moving is a classic evolutionary get out of town warning.  He's dead, whatever killed him is probably nearby.  But by changing the appearance of the body and especially the face by removing the skin and presenting muscle and bone there is enough unreality to create distance.  And then if you make another step out to the circulatory system, we can really appreciate the intricacy without tripping up our inner sense of creepiness.  And we have thus distanced ourselves from the humanity of the donors to study and appreciate the amazing structures of the body.

So Bodies Revealed did it right, keeping enough features to remind us of the humanity of the donors, but changing enough of the facial features to leave us out of the uncanny valley discomfort zone.  It's a good reminder that studying sciences and psychology across disciplines can provide lessons in unexpected places.  

The Slippery Slope, The End Begins

Dad is losing control of his body temperature.  It's swinging back and forth from cold to fever and back again.

This is an end stage signal that his body is shutting down.   So is the fact that despite large doses of steroids he is no longer interested in eating or drinking.  He's getting hard to wake up, and quickly falls back asleep.  The end is very near.  

Ed and Lanna are coming down from Maine, me and Robert are cutting back to bare bones crowd control at Da Vinci.  And we are watching and waiting for the end.  I've never watched anyone die.  I really wish it wasn't my father.  But I know that my heavenly father loves me and has a plan for all of our lives.  And I know that Dad will be resurrected to a perfect body in the next world, and will wait patiently for his wife who better stick around for many years.

To anyone checking in, my dad is Henry Davis, Ph.D.  longtime owner/operator of the Weed Doctor in central NJ.  He was a long-term Unitarian Universalist, active in the Princeton, Washington Crossing and Bethlehem Unitarian Churches and the UUMAC community.  The end is very near, but the love he is leaving behind will be long remembered.

Educating Visitors and Myself in Bodies Revealed

For the first time in a long while, I can truly say that I love my job.  Like any job there are downsides, but getting to engage guests in conversations about our exhibits and science in general has brought out wonderful new parts of my personality.  In starting this blog, I'm hoping to expand on interesting conversations that start in the museum and engage the cyber-world as well.

Since October, DaVinci Science Center has been hosting Bodies Revealed. (See http://body.discoverlehighvalley.com/bodies-revealed/ and http://www.bodiesrevealed.com/ for an official explanation of the exhibit, the opinions on this blog are my own and not those of DaVinci or Premier or anyone else).  Since I work assisting guests and school groups at DSC, I have spend a LOT of time in this exhibit in the last few months.  The very same months that Dad has moved from a rehab hospital to a nursing facility to home hospice.

When I first thought about this exhibit coming with Dad in his current state, I didn't think I'd be able to deal with it.  How could I work with corpses everyday when my dad was dying?  But when the exhibit was setting up, I was in the closed museum for training and got to spend a little time with the bodies as they were in transit, and felt like I could handle it.  Then an exhibit went up that featured the Thalamus and the facial nerves.  This is the part of the brain that was mostly removed on his right side and led to the hemi-paralysis and other symptoms.  Right here I was looking at the part of a brain that was causing so much trouble.  And it was like everything clicked for me.  Seeing this in 3D, right there was so different from looking at drawings or following a doctors hand waving.  It was looking at me, and I stared at it for a few minutes.  I went back and looked at it over and over again.  And by understanding where it was, seeing how deep they were working when they removed that cancer.  It really brought home what a tremendous surgery this was to even attempt.  And why damage was so hard to overcome.  Looking at the neighboring full body that is cut away to reveal half the brain and cut down to the spinal cord, showed me how protected this part of the brain was.  

Suddenly, I could understand what happened to Dad in a whole new way.  And maybe turn around some of the tragedy of the situation by being able to talk about the brain from a much different perspective.  Now I have probably shared too much information with you here on my blog, and with some of the visitors.  But I've been able to talk about the thalamus as the central switchboard, and explain how this lets you integrate the information coming in from your senses and pass information on movement back out to the body.  And I've had a lot of mini therapy sessions as I've talked out various parts of my caregiving life as I spoke with strangers about their stories.

And now if we zoom out, all of my struggles as a caregiver have given me new appreciation of all of the bodies in our exhibit.  And it's also given me a lot of empathy for all of the visitors who want to share their own struggles.  One of the first things many visitors focus on is the organs or bones that have caused them trouble in their life.  I've heard stories of overcoming many types of cancer, broken bones, various surgeries and chronic pain and I've been able to understand their struggles and connect on an emotional level.  

For someone who lives somewhere on the range of high functioning Autism to Just Plain Geek, emotions are not something I'm good at.  I'm not good at recognizing them, processing them, or conversing about them.  I like facts and rules.  But Bodies Revealed has given me a space to talk about this miraculous thing that we all have called a human body.  To marvel at the intricacies while I discuss the wonders at even smaller levels.  And to make conversations about what goes wrong, a normal part of the exhibit experience.  And while I will NEVER be a doctor, it's made me a better caregiver.  And if even a small fraction of those that go through this exhibit take better care of their own bodies and their loved ones then the exhibit is worth it.  And if even a few people can better understand the health troubles that have occurred in the past, or will occur in their future then it's a wonderful thing.

We can't all take a gross anatomy class with a human body dissection, and many of us don't want to face dissecting even a frog or earthworm, let alone a cat.  And a cat isn't a much better model of a human being then an oversimplified plastic model.  And while computer simulations of anatomy are getting MUCH better, then are still 2D representations of the complex body.  The reality is so much deeper and more complex, that I'm deeply grateful to those that donated their bodies and those that did the work to make them so approachable for so many.  

So if you live near Allentown, PA; come see Bodies Revealed before it takes off to Davenport, Iowa in a few weeks.  But if you do, try not to come on a Saturday or Sunday afternoon unless you really like large crowds.  Insider tip is weekday afternoons, or as early as possible on the weekend.

Emerging from a Chrysalis

When trying to think of an appropriate geeky metaphor for my life, the chrysalis of a butterfly came to mind.

To an outside observer the chrysalis (cocoon) of the butterfly looks dead and static.  But it's a time of great internal change before a rebirth.

As a Latter Day Saint (Mormon), I've experienced baptism by water.  This is a process of fully immersing yourself in the waters of the font, and coming out cleansed of your past and your sins.  It's an important symbol of the break from the past, and starting anew as a convert.  But conversion is a much longer process then this ritual event.  It's a lifelong process for most of us.

The basics of conversion, or maybe just being a better human, is shifting your focus from yourself to your love ones and then outwards.  It is so easy when you are sick to turn inwards.  It's also easy to shift your focal point to a loved one.  It can be a lot harder to help the needy stranger when your inner two year old wants what it wants NOW. 

An interesting example of this happened when dad was first hospitalized with this relapse.  As expected, my attention was very focused on my parents.  But a call from the Bishop (the LDS lay-leader of the local congregation) asked if we could help a woman who was escaping an abusive situation.  Now my first response was a big NO.  We have too much to worry about right now.  But then we decided to help her.  And it actually turned out to be a very good thing to re-ground both me and my husband.  

Despite everything that had gone on with dad, and money, and jobs et al.  We were still blessed.  I don't know where my path will lead me.  The last few years have been hard.  And in a lot of ways I have been living in a cocoon, separated from the world.  Now its time to show the world the beautiful person I've become.  And follow the path that Heavenly Father lays before me.

Off-ramp

Six years ago, I attended a panel discussion on lagging female professional achievement featuring then Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton.  She spoke about the many off-ramps we all experience in life and the lack of on-ramps to resume a professional career afterwards.  Little did I know that she was forecasting the next phase of my life.

Unfortunately this wasn't the happy arrival of one or more infants and balancing motherhood and a career. I got sick with one of those hard to diagnose, invisible, but all too debilitating illnesses.  Over the course of two years, I started getting sicker until I didn't feel safe driving, walking across campus, and finally walking down the hall.  Doctors seemed to write me off when it didn't fit neatly on their lists of treatments and diagnostic codes.  My student insurance left plenty of medical bills, and my research was going nowhere fast.  I eventually cut my losses and headed home.  I had a telecommuting research post-doc lined up and figured it would pay the bills while I wrote my dissertation and found an effective treatment or cure.

Then my dad went to the emergency room with an apparent stroke.  It was a bleeding brain tumor, and he was transferred to ICU with brain surgery scheduled in two days.  A month later, he was still in the ICU after a series of clotting problems and my research skills were put to use finding a neurosurgeon who would operate and didn't think he would die on the table.  I did, he lived and entered standard procedure treatment.  He was given eighteen months, and my new job and dissertation had fallen away.  Major offramp.

After helping my dad through radiation and chemotherapy, I needed to get back to work. Dad was on disability, mom had an early retirement she hadn't planned as a sole income, and I needed to push through.  My dad had just had brain surgery and was walking within a week, what was my excuse?

As a quick job I applied for an SAT tutoring position and they asked if I could get a 95th percentile on the MCAT.  I studied hard for two weeks, took a proctored practice exam and made the grade.  Unfortunately, I almost passed out during training and had to leave.  I didn't want to leave my parents with dad's prognosis, and found the impossible assistant professor position in my field, willing to consider an ABD and not only commutable but literally across the street.  The year before I flew across the country, then drove hours to interview.  This time I conducted the standard phone interview while looking at the campus and than walked to the in person.  But like the tutoring, I couldn't hide my symptoms through a six hour interview day.  I finally got a good diagnosis the next week, and started a semi-effective drug regime.

Having destroyed my dream job and still unable to do my research (which had been actively triggering migraines and associated neurological symptoms).  And still being physically and geographically limited, I changed career paths and settled on an imperfect fit with some very interesting work going on in the next department that I was assured I could grow into.  Dream department disappeared, hours of daily driving commutes pushed my physical limits and I was eventually fired for the increasingly obvious misfit.

So now I and too many million of my closest friends were on unemployment.  I picked up a lot more volunteer shifts at the local science center, and soon was hired for a part time position at a minimal wage.  I loved the job, and hoped a full time position would open up before unemployment ran out.  It didn't, the cancer is back with a vengeance.  And I'm more confused then ever on my next step, except that helping him through hospice outranks everything else.