A pill for perfect pitch?

http://gizmodo.com/a-pill-that-lets-adults-learn-perfect-pitch-as-easily-a-1495105058

Would be amazing if this is really true...

Wow!

This is astounding stuff, but possibly more terrifying than any of the imagined horror tales.. Imagine a drug like this administered to the population, who could then be re-programmed...

From a perspective of learning, it would be great - But would people who have happily been able to listen to off-key musical renditions REALLY be grateful if every off-key they once enjoyed bothered them and caused them irritation?

I dont know how "true" this report is - but I suspect that if it is true, and its being disclosed to the public, then its at some advanced level in some military related lab...

Fred.

"Would be amazing if this is really true..."

At least the title is really misleading. After browsing thru the full paper, I would not get my hopes up on base of that. While interesting and in need of further studies, I am not convinced at all. Firstly the AP scores were very low, even though over the chance level is somewhat significant in this context. (Sure longer training period is likely to cause improvement, but how much is the real question.) Sample size were small (can cause errors, because it is more likely to end up having some sort of a special group with small sample sizes). Results might be so called "training effects", something that does not transfer to other domains, e.g., to other instruments (as there were e.g., timbre involved) and is not permanent. 

Then one could write something about the absence of physical evidence of change in the brain, but, yea... I really hate when the press takes some preliminary results and report them as something sensational.

- Puukorva

"but, yea... I really hate when the press takes some preliminary results and report them as something sensational." - Puukorva

Me too - but we'd best get used to it.. Its been this way for many years (looking back on some of the BBC's "Tomorrows World" broadcasts recently, it was laughable - probably 99% the sensational stuff vanished within a year of each broadcast).. And its getting worse (as the quality of scientific understanding among the population is, probably deliberately IMO, being watered down).

All one can do, IMO, is to highlight the bad science one sees (as you have done here) - at least a few people may then get clearer understanding and see through the BS. One big problem though is that often when one tries to examine some media report in more depth, one finds the original thesis locked in some outrageous "vault" requiring one to part with £35 or more just to read it!

Must admit I never bothered to check on this one.. didnt seem important or serious enough to bother with.

It doesnt serve the interests of most governments or multinationals (who IMO often effectively own the governments) to have a scientifically educated population - Such a population gets in their way, refuses to buy modified foods, stops profiteering from ransacking the planet - so best to let the press feed us hopeful crap about the bright future awaiting us while were robbed of our resources and delivered to austerity.

As long as we have hope, we are compliant - they can live their lives in luxury at our expense.. all they must do is just keep the level of discontent below the point where we collectively take action against them - and theyr not even too worried by this possibility - they have their dogs and the technology to deal with us if we stepped too far out of line.

Fred.

"One big problem though is that often when one tries to examine some media report in more depth, one finds the original thesis locked in some outrageous "vault" requiring one to part with £35 or more just to read it!"

This is something I have been writing about in multiple occasions in different "forums". Not only it is sometimes hard (and potentially expensive) to access the original paper, reading scientific publications requires a lot of digging as one not only need to get access to the paper itself, but also to some of the papers that it references (and maybe to papers that they reference). I have wasted so much time in my life just to access papers, it is laborious even when you have access to ~most of the commonly used databases.

Scientific publications should be freely accessible to anyone, well, at least most of them.

"Scientific publications should be freely accessible to anyone, well, at least most of them." - Puukorva

LOL ;-) .. I agree with the above completely, except perhaps for the "At least most of them" - By this I presume you meant "most publications", not "most people" ;-)

There is quite a lot of campaigning on this matter, I have been a bit active on this as well - One may be able to accept it a bit more if the money raised went to the research establisments and the charges were acceptable - perhaps in the order of one euro per day for access to the entire database - often, as you highlight, one only finds what one is really looking for after reading (and paying for) the tenth or whatever document referenced by the original .. A hyperlinked system where one could access referenced documents within the initial fee would go a long way..

But the bottom line is that it should all be freely accessible - the vast majority of these documents come from establisments we, as tax payers, fund.

I certainly think that anything quoted and/or abused by the press should, by statute, be available freely for the public to view - To allow the media to produce distorted versions of scientific publications and not allow the public to freely access the source of these stories is, IMO, a scandal.

Fred.