We construct more precise and robust measures of GDP per capita using nighttime lights; we find that GDP per capita measures are less precise for middle and low income countries

Illuminating Economic Growth. Yingyao Hu, Jiaxiong Yao. IMF Working Paper No. 19/77. https://www.imf.org/en/Publications/WP/Issues/2019/04/09/Illuminating-Economic-Growth-46670

Summary: This paper seeks to illuminate the uncertainty in official GDP per capita measures using auxiliary data. Using satellite-recorded nighttime lights as an additional measurement of true GDP per capita, we provide a statistical framework, in which the error in official GDP per capita may depend on the country’s statistical capacity and the relationship between nighttime lights and true GDP per capita can be nonlinear and vary with geographic location. This paper uses recently developed results for measurement error models to identify and estimate the nonlinear relationship between nighttime lights and true GDP per capita and the nonparametric distribution of errors in official GDP per capita data. We then construct more precise and robust measures of GDP per capita using nighttime lights, official national accounts data, statistical capacity, and geographic locations. We find that GDP per capita measures are less precise for middle and low income countries and nighttime lights can play a bigger role in improving such measures.

Space ‘colonization’ will take place and will likely be fully automated; space mining will be the primary goal of space colonies; automation may lead to a technological singularity

Why space colonization will be fully automated. Riccardo Campa, Konrad Szocik, Martin Braddock. Technological Forecasting and Social Change, April 8 2019. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.techfore.2019.03.021

Highlights
•    Humans cannot survive for long periods of time in outer space.
•    Space ‘colonization’ will take place and will likely be fully automated.
•    Space mining will be the primary goal of space colonies.
•    Automation may lead to a technological singularity.
•    Space automation could limit the negative effects of an hostile Superintelligence.

Abstract: In this article we explore a possible scenario of space colonization and its consequences for planet Earth. We argue that in the short term space colonization will take place, but not in the form often presented in scientific and science fiction literature. Space colonies will be fully automated. There are three main reasons to believe that this is the most plausible scenario: 1) space mining is very profitable; 2) humans cannot survive for long periods of time in outer space limiting the prospects for human space colonization (HSC), and 3) automation is already a leading trend on Earth. Crewed missions will have an ancillary function, while machines or human/machine avatars will ‘inhabit’ other celestial bodies, in order to pursue economic enterprises and progress scientific discovery. We also propose some considerations on the speculative hypothesis, elaborated by a few leading futurists, that the development of machine-based learning Artificial Intelligence would lead to the so-called Singularity. In relation to this scenario, we argue that fully automated space colonization (FASC) could be a solution to prevent unwanted side effects of the Singularity, such as competition for resources between humankind and a hostile Artificial Intelligence.

Male‐mediated prenatal loss can provide greater reproductive benefits to males than infanticide; compared to infanticide, male‐mediated prenatal loss may be more prevalent and of greater role in mammalian species than thought

Male‐mediated prenatal loss: Functions and mechanisms. Matthew N. Zipple et al. Evolutionary Anthropology: Issues, News, and Reviews, April 6 2019. https://doi.org/10.1002/evan.21776

ABSTRACT: Sexually selected infanticide has been the subject of intense empirical and theoretical study for decades; a related phenomenon, male‐mediated prenatal loss, has received much less attention in evolutionary studies. Male‐mediated prenatal loss occurs when inseminated or pregnant females terminate reproductive effort following exposure to a nonsire male, either through implantation failure or pregnancy termination. Male‐mediated prenatal loss encompasses two sub‐phenomena: sexually selected feticide and the Bruce effect. In this review, we provide a framework that explains the relationship between feticide and the Bruce effect and describes what is known about the proximate and ultimate mechanisms involved in each. Using a simple model, we demonstrate that male‐mediated prenatal loss can provide greater reproductive benefits to males than infanticide. We therefore suggest that, compared to infanticide, male‐mediated prenatal loss may be more prevalent in mammalian species and may have played a greater role in their social evolution than has previously been documented.

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Bruce Effect in Wikipedia:

Evolutionary benefits

Males

When given the opportunity, male mice tend to direct their urine in the female’s direction.^[23] This allows males to improve their fitness success by “sabotaging” the pregnancy of a male competitor,^[3] and more quickly returning the female to estrus.^[24] The Bruce effect can also aid in maintaining social status, with dominant males leaving more urinal scent markings,^[25] and so blocking the pregnancies initiated by subordinate males.

Females

Females can control their likelihood of terminating pregnancy by pursuing or avoiding novel male contact during their most susceptible periods.^[26] In this way, females can exert a post-copulatory mate choice, reserving their reproductive resources for the highest-quality male. Certainly, females are more likely to seek proximity to dominant males.^[26] In many rodent species, males kill unrelated young; pregnancy block may avoid the wasted investment of gestating offspring likely to be killed at birth.^[5][27] The Bruce effect is most common in polygynous rodent species, for which the risk of infanticide is highest.^[28]

The mu-opioid system can influence higher-level cognitive function via modulation of valuation & motivation, influencing decision making & cognitive control by increasing the subjective value of reward & reducing aversive arousal

The role of the opioid system in decision making and cognitive control: A review. Henk van Steenbergen, Marie Eikemo, Siri Leknes. Cognitive, Affective, & Behavioral Neuroscience, April 8 2019. https://link.springer.com/article/10.3758/s13415-019-00710-6

Abstract: The opioid system regulates affective processing, including pain, pleasure, and reward. Restricting the role of this system to hedonic modulation may be an underestimation, however. Opioid receptors are distributed widely in the human brain, including the more “cognitive” regions in the frontal and parietal lobes. Nonhuman animal research points to opioid modulation of cognitive and decision-making processes. We review emerging evidence on whether acute opioid drug modulation in healthy humans can influence cognitive function, such as how we choose between actions of different values and how we control our behavior in the face of distracting information. Specifically, we review studies employing opioid agonists or antagonists together with experimental paradigms of reward-based decision making, impulsivity, executive functioning, attention, inhibition, and effort. Although this field is still in its infancy, the emerging picture suggests that the mu-opioid system can influence higher-level cognitive function via modulation of valuation, motivation, and control circuits dense in mu-opioid receptors, including orbitofrontal cortex, basal ganglia, amygdalae, anterior cingulate cortex, and prefrontal cortex. The framework that we put forward proposes that opioids influence decision making and cognitive control by increasing the subjective value of reward and reducing aversive arousal. We highlight potential mechanisms that might underlie the effects of mu-opioid signaling on decision making and cognitive control and provide directions for future research.

Keywords: Opioid system Cognitive control Decision making Executive function Value-based choice Reward Drugs Mu-opioid receptors Affect Mood Morphine Hedonic states

We see our past good deeds as more revealing of our present self than our past bad deeds, & we make inferences about our present personality from positive past behaviors, but not from negative ones; it is different with the others

Andreas Steimer, André Mata, and Cláudia Simão (2019). Ascribing Meaning to the Past: Self–Other Differences in Weighing Good and Bad Deeds. Social Cognition: Vol. 37, No. 2, pp. 174-196. https://doi.org/10.1521/soco.2019.37.2.174

Abstract: In three studies, this research found evidence for self-serving tendencies and a self–other asymmetry in the way people ascribe meaning to past behavior: Participants saw their past good deeds as more revealing of their present self than their past bad deeds (Studies 1–2), and they made inferences about their present personality from positive past behaviors, but not from negative ones (Study 3). In contrast, participants perceived the past behavior of others as diagnostic of their present personality (Study 2), and they made inferences about others' present traits from that behavior (Study 3), regardless of whether it was positive or negative. In support of a motivational account, we also found evidence for moderated mediation of our effect (Study 2), such that the valence effect on ascribing meaning to the past was mediated by desirability only when self-relevance was high (i.e., for the self), not when it was low (i.e., for others). Implications of this self–other asymmetry are discussed.

KEYWORDS: meaning, autobiographic memory, person memory, motivated reasoning, self–other differences, belief updating, true self

Testing the potential of 50 kHz rat calls as a species-specific rat attractant for pest control

Testing the potential of 50 kHz rat calls as a species-specific rat attractant. Nicola B. Davidson, Jane L. Hurst. PLOS, April 8, 2019. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0211601

Abstract: The control of mammalian pests relies heavily on the use of pesticides that are often avoided and are not species-specific. These problems are particularly acute for pesticides used to control rats (Rattus spp.). The efficacy and targeting of control could be improved by attracting animals to control measures using species-specific cues. One cue that has the potential to attract rats is the 50 kHz calls they emit in positive social situations. Here we test the potential of these rat calls as a species-specific attractant by examining the response of laboratory rats (Rattus norvegicus; n = 48) and non-target bank voles (Myodes glareolus; n = 16) to 50 kHz calls from either sex in a compartmentalised laboratory arena. Sounds of rat movement and white noise acted as control treatments, with each sound tested against a silent control in the opposite side of the arena. When sound cues were played above an empty bait box, rats were attracted to spend time close to 50 kHz rat calls, climbing on top of boxes, regardless of the sex of subject or caller. When either 50 kHz rat calls or rat movement sounds were played inside an empty bait box, rats of both sexes spent 3–4 fold more time inside boxes and visited more frequently. Rats were not attracted by intermittent white noise. Bank voles were neither attracted to, nor avoided, 50 kHz rat calls played inside empty bait boxes. Our findings show that 50 kHz rat calls are an effective attractant for rats of both sexes under laboratory conditions, while not attracting non-target bank voles. These calls are strong candidates for providing a species-specific lure that may be attractive even in the absence of food bait, but further trials will be needed to assess their efficacy under field conditions.