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How Technology Is Helping Sportsmen?

Jesse Gandara — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 14:46:09 +0000

The main objective of technology is to make things easier and faster for us. Technology has made many things like transportation, work, communications, etc, very easy to handle. We haven’t done much invention on sports side though. The inventions, I am talking about, do not include live telecasting or replays which made an easy thing for us to enjoy and judge in sports; but about increasing the capability and capacity of sportsmen.

With the recent Olympics, we have come across much invention in the sports side, which makes sportsmen easier to win the competition. But these are not appreciable in serious competitions as they decrease the spirit of sportsmanship. We saw many records have been replaced by new ones in many sports this time. None of them could have done that without the usage of technology in extreme levels. These new technology gadgets are influencing success in sports.

So slowly there will be no more competition in terms of talent and hard work. They are going to be replaced by technology and gadgets war.

Then what will be the difference between the robot sports and human sports?

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Transmission of Data through Light

John Halladay — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 14:31:53 +0000

These days where time is treated as God, you need to have new innovations to make your work faster. And as data transmissions are an important aspect of the work, we need faster methodologies for this aspect too. We can’t imagine anything faster than the light yet. Then why not we find a way to use light as source of transmission of data? Actually there is a lot of research work going on to find a way to transmit data through light. We don’t need high LASER lights for this. This can be done only by usage of visible light.

We are still in research stage of using light-emission diodes to turn ordinary household fixtures such as light bulbs, televisions, or even flashlights into data transmission tools. Soon, it may be possible for a person trapped in a burning building to hold up a cell phone to a light fixture in order to notify firefighters of his or her danger. Imagine the situation where we can transfer an entire movie from one TV set to the next one in seconds just through refracting light waves bouncing between the two televisions. There will be many such boons when we are successful in this process.

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All about Operant Conditioning Chamber

Lawrence Walker — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 14:30:26 +0000

An operant conditioning chamber (sometimes Skinner box) is laboratory equipment used in the experimental analysis of behavior to study animal behavior. The operant conditioning chamber was created by B. F. Skinner while he was a graduate student at Harvard University around 1930. It is used to study both operant conditioning and traditional conditioning. The structure forming the shell of a chamber is a box large enough to simply accommodate the organism being used as a subject. (Common model organisms used include rodents generally lab rats pigeons, and primates). It is often sound-proof and light-proof to avoid distracting stimuli.

Operant chambers have at least one operandum (or “manipulandum”), and often two or more, that can automatically notice the occurrence of a behavioral response or action. Typical operanda for primates and rats are response levers; if the subject presses the lever, the opposite end moves and close a switch that is monitored by a computer or other programmed device. Typical operanda for pigeons and other birds are response keys with a switch that closes if the bird pecks at the key with enough force. The other minimal requirement of a conditioning chamber is that it has a means of delivering a primary reinforcer or unconditioned stimulus like food (usually pellets) or water. It can also register the delivery of a conditioned reinforcer, such as an LED as a “token”.

With such a easy configuration, one operandum and one feeder, it is possible to investigate many psychological phenomena. Modern operant conditioning chambers naturally have many operanda, like many response levers, two or more feeders, and a variety of devices capable of generating many stimuli, including lights, sounds, music, figures, and drawings. Some configurations use an LCD panel for the computer generation of basically any stimulus. Operant chambers can also have electrified nets or floors so that electrical charges can be given to the animals; or lights of different colors that give information about when the food is obtainable. Although the use of shock is not unheard of, approval may be needed in some countries to avoid needless harmful experimentation on animals. Skinner’s work did not focus on punishment, and involved a “paw slap” which caused him to conclude, incorrectly, that punishment was ineffective. Works by Azrin, Sidman and others in the 60s and 70s proved this was not the case.