SciExplore Connect

How Thoughts Influence What the Eyes See

A surprising study could point to new approaches for AI systems.

When you see a bag of carrots at the grocery store, does your mind go to potatoes and parsnips or buffalo wings and celery?

It depends, of course, on whether you’re making a hearty winter stew or getting ready to watch the Super Bowl.

Most scientists agree that categorizing an object — like thinking of a carrot as either a root vegetable or a party snack — is the job of the prefrontal cortex, the brain region responsible for reasoning and other high-level functions that make us smart and social. In that account, the eyes and visual regions of the brain are kind of like a security camera collecting data and processing it in a standardized way before passing it off for analysis.

Sunscreen, clothes and caves may have helped Homo sapiens survive 41,000 years ago

Ancient Homo sapiens may have benefited from sunscreen, tailored clothes and the use of caves during the shifting of the magnetic North Pole over Europe about 41,000 years ago, new University of Michigan research shows.

These technologies could have protected Homo sapiens living in Europe from harmful solar radiation. Neanderthals, on the other hand, appear to have lacked these technologies and disappeared around 40,000 years ago, according to the study, published in Science Advances and led by researchers at Michigan Engineering and the U-M Department of Anthropology.

The team found that the North Pole wandered over Europe when the magnetic field’s poles started to flip positions, a natural process that has happened around 180 times over Earth’s geological history. While the magnetic reversal didn’t complete at the time, the magnetic field weakened to cause aurora to occur…

Bach, Mozart or jazz

Scientists measure the variability in music pieces

Physicists at the Max Planck Institute for Dynamics and Self-Organization (MPI-DS) have investigated to which extent a piece of music can evoke expectations about its progression. They were able to determine differences in how far compositions of different composers can be anticipated. In total, the scientists quantitatively analyzed more than 550 pieces from classical and jazz music.

It is common knowledge that music can evoke emotions. But how do these emotions arise and how does meaning emerge in music? Almost 70 years ago, music philosopher Leonard Meyer suggested that both are due to an interplay between expectation and surprise. In the course of evolution, it was crucial for humans to be able to make new predictions based on past experiences. This is how we can also form expectations and predictions about the progression of music based on what we…

Philosophy: cultural differences in exploitation of artificial agents

A new LMU study shows that people in Japan treat robots and AI agents more respectfully than people in Western societies.

Imagine an automated delivery vehicle rushing to complete a grocery drop-off while you are hurrying to meet friends for a long-awaited dinner.

At a busy intersection, you both arrive at the same time. Do you slow down to give it space as it maneuvers around a corner?

Or do you expect it to stop and let you pass, even if normal traffic etiquette suggests it should go first?