Weekly Webcrawl: December 6, 2013

The photo of the week comes from a set on Flickr by Robert Johnson and depicts phytoplankton from the Southern Ocean blown up a few hundred thousand times.

The photo of the week comes from a set on Flickr by Robert Johnson and depicts phytoplankton from the Southern Ocean blown up a few hundred thousand times. To me it looks like a pile of electronics waste and just exemplifies how much structure exists at infinitesimally small levels. Photo via Flickr Creative Commons.

The Oxford English Dictionary named “selfie” the word of the year for 2013, but I think Merriam-Webster’s choice of “science” was a much better one. You too can engineer the perfect cookie with a little help from NPR. But if you can hold off eating it for a little while, you’ll probably be more successful in life. Remember this social media throwback from 2009? Behold, the Marshmallow Test!

Studies that follow marshmallow test participants through later life have shown that being able to postpone instant gratification is associated with later success. But a recent study in PLOS Computational Biology turns this all on its head when it asks whether thing you’re facing isn’t a delicious marshmallow but rather something you want no part of. Turns out that doing things sooner, when they stink, is actually better, writes The Atlantic. And just in case your week was as crappy as mine, here’s another video, which is awesome, heart warming, and certain to cheer you up:

Oh!! And I almost forgot: this is a blog post about the vastness of life contained beneath the ocean, written by my friends’ kids who are spending a year sailing around the world with their amazing parents.