Fungus-treated Violin Outdoes Stradivarius

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/09/090914111418.htm

by dimas • 17 years ago

67 22 17 years ago

mrshoe• 17 years ago

Fungus is the new computer. There's nothing like that feeling a beginning programmer has when he realizes that he can give the computer a few simple instructions and, in a matter of seconds, the computer does something that would take thousands of man-years of manual computation.

This is why biotech is such an interesting field. If we can give fungi and bacteria simple instructions and let them execute those instructions in massively parallel fashion, we can accomplish amazing feats.

jacquesm• 17 years ago

I don't really see the link with computing here. The fungi changed the cell structure of the wood, chemistry and woodworking on a microscopic scale.

trebor• 17 years ago

Which is in-line with its purpose: (in this case) the cellular digestion of waste wood. Given enough time, the fungus would have consumed all the wood, rather than die off like a scientist would prefer to program it to do.

cakeface• 17 years ago

There is no link with computing as in running a program. The link is the perception changing technology that lets us accomplish previously difficult tasks in a simple manner.

hawk2• 17 years ago

what you mean is that nature is interesting. here's a clip to watch: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qhh32JYkQPk

fizx• 17 years ago

Worth noting that this was only a single-blind test, with a sample size of 1 violinist.

hawk2• 17 years ago

There were 5 violins, 2 of which were fungus violins, one of those in particular received a staggering 60% of the votes. Not sure what the best conclusion to draw is but it's certainly believable that one day you'll be able to get a cheap violin with incredible tone quality.

jacobolus• 17 years ago

But it's quite plausible that the performer played slightly differently on the various violins. A more robust test would include several performers, playing the different violins in arbitrary order, to rotating groups of listeners.

rms• 17 years ago

I assure that you that short of molecular self-assemblers, these fungus treated violins are not going to be cheap. They will cost well above the average for a new violin, but much, much less than a violin from a classic master.

nitrogen• 17 years ago

I still think it's interesting that, even though the violinist knew which violin he was playing, the audience liked him playing the Opus 58 violin better than playing his own Stradivarius, which he could have been subconsciously influenced to play better because of its familiarity.

dmoney• 17 years ago

He could have been subconsciously influenced to play the Opus because of its novelty.

doosra• 17 years ago

Wait, just by chance it looks like there was a 4/5 chance that the Stradivarius would loose/be outdone.

ibsulon• 17 years ago

That's like saying a grandmaster has a 4/5 chance of losing a 5 person chess tournament. The competition must be genuinely good to have a chance.

Dilpil• 17 years ago

As the article points out, other more mundane violins have done the same thing.

philh• 17 years ago

"Identify these sounds" is a fundamentally different exercise to "decide which of these sounds you prefer". And the sample size in that instance was three.

mynameishere• 17 years ago

The prices of the Stradivarius violins are as reasonable as the price of Van Goghs and vintage wines. The truth is, Joshua Bell playing a swinette would sound better than me on a Stradivarius.

wallflower• 17 years ago

Since you mentioned Joshua Bell, I'd like to remind people of the previously posted on News.YC Pulitzer-award winning article, "Pearls before Breakfast"

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04...

Fungus-treated Violin Outdoes Stradivarius

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