Day: December 4, 2016

How To Break The Boredom

My Sunday dawned with some much needed cooler weather….

I would like to give my observations on a subject that is my guilty pleasure….auto racing.

No not NASCAR….while it is unpredictable and exciting at times….I just cannot get into fast driving and turn left the whole race.

Instead I enjoy sports car racing like Le Mans and Sebring and Formula One racing…..I have been an F1 fan since my childhood when I got to visit France for their 1959 Gran Prix…my long love affair began there…the sounds, the cars, the smells and the drivers…it is all too amazing….and in all that time I never never wavered from my support of the Ferrari racing teams….

Last Sunday the 2016 F1 season came to a close with the Abu Dhabi Gran Prix won by Mercedes….back in the day it was heart pounding fun…today it is just too damn boring for words.

The leader in lap one is usually the winner.  The past decade has seen too much technology and little human involvement….it is no longer car and driver but rather computer to computer as these machines squirt out graphs and stats….no longer is the driver in charge…..instead sensors are used to determine tire changes, speed, gas consumption……etc.

Like I said…all too boring.

I have found the “minor league” races far more fun to watch…GP2, GP3, Formula E, electric racing, and Indy Car Series…..at least they are interesting and fun to watch……

Formula One has been bought by an American company Liberty…but NO amount of marketing will get rid of the boredom….Americans want racing that is why NASCAR is so popular…F1 as it is today will NOT attract many Americans to the races….plus there are NO American F1 drivers…that will be a draw back also.

F1 needs to return to the days of cars and drivers….not techno geeks and computers….if they want to make F1 more appealing then give them something to watch and cheer.

Conquering Fear

You guys know me…I try to give something different than my usual on the weekends…..and today will be No different….

Fear…that is the subject…..

It appears that scientist may have found a way to eliminate fear from us mere mortals……

Why confront your fear in the hopes of overcoming it when scientists could just erase it from your brain? That’s exactly what researchers say they may be able to do in a study published Monday in Nature Human Behavior. Currently, most treatments for phobias and PTSD involve drugs, which can have side effects, or aversion therapy, which requires patients to be exposed to their fears, according to a press release. But the researchers behind the study say their technique—decoded neurofeedback, or DecNef—can “remove specific fears from the brain” using brain scanning technology and artificial intelligence.

Researchers created a fear memory in volunteers by shocking them when they saw a certain color, the Guardian reports. The brain pattern created by that new fear would occasionally reappear subconsciously, without the volunteer being afraid or thinking about it. When that happened, researchers gave the volunteer a reward. Eventually, the fear memory was overwritten. Researchers believe they can substantially reduce phobias and PTSD if they can figure out the brain patterns associated with common fears, such as spiders. Researcher Mitsuo Kawato hopes to start “systematic DecNef therapy” within a few years.

I am for anything that may assist in the treatment of PTSD….God knows that it can be debilitating…..but this has me worried.

This is one of those researches that I can foresee being abused by some…..Making soldiers reckless and unafraid…..not a way to fight a war….fear makes us mortals do crazy things but it also makes us look at situations and make better decisions.