Why do scammers persist in saying they are from Nigeria?
A research report by Cormac Herley, a Microsoft security analyst, proposes a clever response to an apparent paradox. Nearly everyone minimally competent in Internet use knows about the Nigerian 419 scam. For the few others, this is the con: an unsolicited email arrives in the your inbox, purporting ...
Did human language first emerge as songs?
A thought-provoking new paper on the evolutionary emergence of language by Shigeru Miyagawa, Robert C. Berwick, and Kazuo Okanoya: "The emergence of hierarchical structure in human language." Freely available in Frontiers in Language Sciences 20 Feb 2013. Abstract: We propose a novel ...
International Society for Philosophy, History and Soicial Sciences of Biology
The International Society for Philosophy, History and Social Sciences of Biology holds its 2013 conference in Montpellier, July 7-12. Proposals for sessions and contributions from biologists, ecologists, philosophers and historians of biology are welcome until March the 1st. (extended deadline), as ...
PhD at St. Andrews: Exploring the evolutionary roots of cultural complexity, creativity and trust.
Applications are invited to join an interdisciplinary research programme directed by Professors Kevin Laland (School of Biology) and Andrew Whiten (School of Psychology) at the University of St Andrews’ renowned Centre for Social Learning and Cognitive Evolution. “Exploring the Evolut...