Monthly Archives: March 2012

Tuesday night – Cheney’s heart

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I accidentally watched TV tonight.. Actually, I was eating dinner.. and there was a TV within eye shot.. so I could not look away. Even though I was having a great work talk with my buddy Tony, I could not shut out the stream of images that came over the tube.. I never can. The sound was off, thankfully, but over dinner I saw images of a fatal drug bust, and the grieving families, I saw the story of the young black man shot by a vigilante in Florida. I saw his grieving dad… at that and had to stop our conversation and sit for a bit. I also saw today about Dick Cheney’s heart transplant.. I’d seen it a few days back as well, and hadn’t commented on it.

Every time I hear of an organ transplant I have to stop and take a breath. hearing the recipient’s story is always easier.. but I know that hard duality that one persons best day.. is another family’s worst.
Still I have to say that despite what bad political feelings I may have had (or still have) for Cheney I was only happy for him. The internet abounds this week with tongue-in-cheek comment about Cheney’s change of heart.. but who knows.. a man living with that much pain and uncertainty would have surly carried emotional baggage. Perhaps that baggage manifest in a dark and mean world view.. .. maybe a fresh chance at life will mellow the man.. One thing I should add here is that the mechanical left ventricular assist device (LVAD) that kept Cheney alive these past several years is exactly the model that my brother used to fashion the world first non pulsating total artificial heart. .. interesting coincidence.. no ? .
What really made me happy though was the attention that his transplant will bring to the issue of organ donation. Say what you will of the man, he’s now a walking advertisement for life’s greatest gift.. Since Sam became a donor, I’ve used every chance I could to advocate for organ donation. What really helps is when a more visible person has a chance to do the same. I’m hoping that Cheney will join with other well known folks like Dave Crosby and Phil Lesh and make donor awareness a personal cause.. (Now there’s a trio I’d like to see play together) .
So congratulations Mr. Cheney .. i’m glad you have a new lease on life.. I hope you use it well.. And my heart goes out to the donor and his or her family.

nite all, nite sam
-me

Sunday evening – dorsal medial prefrontal cortex

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Woke early in my folks house this morning… which was no surprise as that’s where I’d gone to sleep last night.. . I spent the early morning with my folks talking to my parents about the brain, memory and our ability … or inability to remember, concentrate.. etc. Coincidentally, that was the topic of a radio program that was on as I drove back up here to Vermont. In part of the show Jonah Lehrer was being interviewed about his new book “Imagine: How Creativity Works” . I haven’t read the book.. but based on the interview.. and the cool piece on brainstorming I read by Lehrer in the New Yorker I plan on reading it soon. In today’s interview Lahrer was talking about the role of the prefrontal cortex.. or more specifically the dorsal medial prefrontal cortex in the process of creativity. . The prefrontal cortex is the late developing part of the brain that is responsible for impulse control in adults. The fact that this part of the brain does not fully develop in people until about age 23 is supposedly one of the reasons that teenagers supposedly  have less impulse control than adults. That’s the central thesis of books like “Yes, your teen is crazy” (its an average thing.. I know plenty of restrained teens and impulsive adults) ..   Anyway… in this piece today., Lehrer  described several studies… including one in whih jazz pianists were put in a functianl MRI machine and asked to play a rehearsed piece of music.. then to play an improvisational piece.. While the prefrontal cortex was fully engaged in a technical and rehearsed piece In the improv piece, the artists seemed to have a way to turn down the activity of  that part of the brain. .  The thinking is that’s the part of the brains saying “don’t screw up.. don’t play the wrong note”..   By suppressing that, good musicians are able to “go with it” and improvise.. just like children.. Lehrer went on to say that this is the part of the brain development that seems to be developing during the ‘4th grade slump’ .. when kids start to question the quality and execution of their own creative work….   interesting.  On that point,    The most interesting study Jonah mentioned was one in which two groups of people were asked to do a set of creative tasks around idea generation.. Their output was scored (somehow ) on quantity and quality.. one group was asked ot do the tasks as they were.. the other group was asked to imagine that they were doing the tasks as 7 year olds.. The latter group came out with significantly  more and better ideas…. just because they were pretending to be kids…

Here’s to immaturity !

nite all, nite sam

-me

ps. Please check out this great piece on our neighbor and freind Pat Quinn that was on WCAX last night. Pat’s been our next door neighbor for 30 years.. all three of the boys spent a whole bunch of time at his and Janet’s house over the years.. He’s an amazing guy !

 

Saturday night – First FIRST

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What a cool day.. I’m down in Boston visiting with my folks. always a nice thing to do.. I timed this trip to allow me to attend the annual FIRST Robotics Northeast Quarter Finals. at the Agganis Arena at Boston University. My friend John has been involved with FIRST from the start and had invited me for the past 3 years.. This is the first time I could make it and I’m so glad I did. FIRST is the brainchild of inventor Dean Kamen. Kamen and his colleagues recognized that one way to interest more kids in math , engineering and science was to create an activity that captured the excitement of a school sports team. FIRST gets teams of high school kids to build very sophisticated robots that compete.. and sometimes cooperate.. in a very specific and challenging set of problems. This year the challenge was shooting light weight basketballs into regulation hoops across a quarter size (about) court. Pretty tough when you think about it..  The whole thing is set up as an elimination sweepstakes.. Each team begins by cooperating in small groups of three teams.. that get mixed for each round.. In that way each team gets to work with.. and against nearly all others..  In keeping with the sports analogy, the stands were full of screaming fans.. some with face paint.. there were loud and goofy announcers and striped shirt wearing refs.   The cool thing is that the team were full of all kinds of kids.. nit just nerdy guys.. there were artists, programers, electrical kids, mechanical kids.. and even business leaning kids that helped with the sizable fundraising it takes to field a team.

I believe that there were 53 teams there today.. mostly from the northeast.. but one team from Brazil and one from Turkey.

Here I am on the floor with my host John.. He was the Exec VP and energetic spirit behind FIRST for the past 10 years.. Hes a passionate advocate for science literacy and the leader of our merry band who will be putting on the Champlain Maker Fair in the Fall of 2012. A very cool and inspiring guy..

This being Boston, there were tons of MIT folks around. I managed to crash a meeting of the MIT Club and got to hear Mitch Resnick , the father of the Scratch kids videogame/programming environment.

Throughout the day I kept running into folks I know.. Here’s my old dormmate Henry  M. and his kid Harry.. Henry’s dad Marvin is one of my heroes.. many folks consider him the father of artificial intelligence.. I don’t know about that.. but he’s the father of Henry that has lots of real intelligence.. no small feat !

 

Here’s Prof Woody Flowers. He’s one of the founders of FIRST.. . FIRST is sort of based on his 2.70 design challenge from MIT.. Every year he gets everyone to sign his shirt.. I signed.. who could miss an opportunity like that ?

I also ran into my old friend Kim.. He’s also a prof at MIT.. and a real inspiration. He runs the Edgerton Lab and the DLAB at MIT. DLAB gets folks from all over the world to come to MIT to develop technology solutions for folks in challenged parts of the world. Kim told me about a project they’re just launching for building hand cranked wheelchairs with a novel gearing system to be used in rough terrain.. very cool. Kim’s wife Cathy wasn’t there today, but she’s also quite an amazing inventor.. she created a Lego kit that demonstrated DNA synthesis.. I’ve played with  it and it finally made the whole process make sense to me. There’s something about doing things with your hands.

I happened to catch a reflection of my lights in the elevator door..  nice..

I spent the bulk of the day touring the floor, talking to teams and watching the competition. To be honest.. the robots were cool.. but the people were the thing I really liked watching..  Here are some excerpts..

The day ended with a great final round.. tons of cheering and an awards ceremony.. It really felt more like a basketball game.. the crowd was wild..

My nephew Vincent was working next door teaching an EMT class.. Just as FIRST was ending he had a 10 minute break just before 4 so we got to at least meet for a picture..

On the way home I called my freind Seth and found out that he and his girlfriend Hanna  and two of their freinds (whos pictures didnt come out.. but were very very nice) .. were just 1.5 miles away.. we all met for coffee..  It was a great bonus getting to see them

Then I headed back to my folks.. There yard was already full of flowers.. it’s definitely spring here already !

Ma made a great finger food dinner (eel sushi, squid salad, hummus, olives, cheese , eggplant goop, fish and veggies.. your typical grandmotherly meal.. yum !

 

Now we’re all sitting here looking through family albums.. nice way to end the day..

OK .. that’s all for today.. more tomorrow. Nite all, nite sam (many pictures of you in this house.. I like it)

-me