[no subject]

[Deborah Harrell]

Hi, Nick
 
I'd like to get back on the list, please - I think I've been deleted  (been 
inactive for a long time!).
 
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Med: Autism and MMR Vaccine Study an 'Elaborate Fraud'

[Deborah Harrell]

I think there have been discussions here previously about vaccines, and while 
there might well be some people, especially children, who can have difficulty 
with multiple vaccines, the issue of vaccination causing autism is particularly 
fear-inducing.  But the 1998 'study' has been judged fraudulent:

Autism and MMR Vaccine Study an 'Elaborate Fraud,' Charges BMJ
Deborah Brauser

 ---Educational Item---January 6, 2011 — BMJ is publishing a series of 3 
articles and editorials charging that the study published in The Lancet in 1998 
by Andrew Wakefield and colleagues linking the childhood measles-mumps-rubella 
(MMR) vaccine to a "new syndrome" of regressive autism and bowel disease was 
not just bad science but "an elaborate fraud."

According to the first article published in BMJ today by London-based 
investigative reporter Brian Deer, the study's investigators altered and 
falsified medical records and facts, misrepresented information to families, 
and treated the 12 children involved unethically.

In addition, Mr. Wakefield accepted consultancy fees from lawyers who were 
building a lawsuit against vaccine manufacturers, and many of the study 
participants were referred by an antivaccine organization...

...Although The Lancet published a retraction of the study last year right 
after the UK General Medical Council (GMC) announced that the investigators 
acted "dishonestly" and irresponsibly," the BMJ editors note that the journal 
did not go far enough.

"The Lancet retraction was prompted by the results from the [General Medical 
Council] hearing and was very much based on the concerns about the ethics of 
the study," Dr. Godlee told Medscape Medical News. 

"What we found was that it was definite fraud and that is a very important 
thing for the world to know. This article shows that the science was falsified 
and should be discounted," continued Dr. Godlee...

...Mr. Deer did his first investigative stories on the Wakefield paper in 2004 
for the Sunday Times in London and a UK television network. On the basis of his 
findings, the GMC's Fitness to Practice panel convened in 2007 and heard from 
36 witnesses during a period of 2 and a half years.

At the end of January last year, as reported by Medscape Medical News , the 
panel used strong language in condemning the study's methods and noted that Mr. 
Wakefield and 2 other colleagues had broken guidelines.

The Lancet issued its retraction 5 days later, citing the panel's findings that 
the participants were not consecutive patients seeking treatment and that the 
study had falsely reported being approved by an ethics committee.
...the GMC later found that Mr. Wakefield and coauthor John Walker-Smith 
committed serious misconduct and struck them off the medical register... 

...Last spring, the BMJ went to Mr. Deer to ask if there was more to this 
story. In this newest article, he reports that "multiple discrepancies" were 
found, including the following:

•Only one of the studied 9 children actually had clear regressive autism and 3 
did not have a diagnosis of any autism type;
•Five had preexisting development concerns — although all 12 were classified in 
the study as "previously normal"; and
•The exclusion of important allegations helped create "the appearance of a 
14-day temporal link."
In addition, none of the 12 patients were "free of misreporting or alteration," 
he writes...

...The editors write that although a breach of trust this large is "almost 
certainly rare," it raises questions about what could have been done earlier, 
what further inquiry is needed, and what can be done to keep it from happening 
again..."We wanted to also look at what motivated Andrew Wakefield, looking at 
the commercial schemes he established to exploit the MMR scare, and then we 
examine what happened when the issues of concern were first raised back in 2004 
and why it was not taken more seriously at that time..."

[There was a falsified study about breast cancer and bone marrow transplant as 
efficacious(?sp) therapy that was probably on a similar scale - me]

This article came from Medscape, so I cannot give you a link.

Lying about medical research - really gives me a visceral punch.  Dreadful. (Of 
course, there isn't any rivalry between the BMJ and the Lancet, is there?)
If someone has already posted on this, my apologies.

Debbi
who didn't look through the 1000+++ emails in her in-box to check ( nor 
did she try a mail-search)


  

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Re: Facebook censorship and internet porn

[Deborah Harrell]

> Bruce Bostwick wrote:
>> Charlie wrote:
> > Jon wrote:
 
>> ...that may prevent a woman from learning how to examine herself for
>> cancer or her options if she is diagnosed...
>> ...policy of removing pictures of breastfeeding.

I glanced at the La Leche League site (an org. that promotes breastfeeding) - 
no easily accessible pix; perhaps one needs to join? Interesting article on 
age-of-weaning, which here in the US is typically less than one year, but in 
developing countries can be 3 or 4 yo.  Huh! - I'd draw the line at teething!

> > evidently there are a lot of riled up women about
> > this.  evidently, some few were using breastfeeding
> > as a way around the facebook restriction on frontal nudity. 
[on facebook]

  Some people just can't deal with bodily functions in a 
non-kindergartener way, tittering instead of just acknowledging.  Not that 
there isn't genuine humor to be found in many cases (I've _so_ had to adjust to 
living with a guy)...

 

> The problem, and this seems to be endemic to the industry [porn]
> as far as I can tell, is that the industry would very much
> rather do business the way it does now and take every
> possible tactical and/or strategic action available to make
> sure they're not only net-ubiquitous, but that they actually
> crowd out legitimate web search results for completely
> unrelated subjects, and appear in your inbox even if your
> junk mail filtering is strong enough that you end up
> filtering out your friends before you filter out the porn
> ads.  Rather than target a perfectly willing and
> sex-positive demographic that would be happy to pay for
> their premium content, they would rather make the maximum
> possible nuisance of themselves trying to convert maybe one
> in a thousand or so of the largely sex-negative remainder of
> the population that doesn't want to see anything they have to offer. 

Indeed.

> As for free speech, deciding what's abuse of it and what's
> legitimate use of it is a formitable philsophical problem
> indeed.  Likewise, which restrictions on it are
> legitimate and which are overbroad and possibly
> draconian.  There's room for considerable debate along
> that boundary...

I personally find porn repugnant, but as long as only consenting adults are 
involved, I can't advocate banning it.   As in the wikileaks 
dump - I don't want anyone endangered, but there's far too much being covered 
up by various govt's.  

> And I repeat my assertion that our society (particularly
> that of the USA, and even more particularly that of some
> regions of the USA and/or specific segments of the
> population) is not exactly objective or even rational on
> this subject, and is influenced by social and cultural
> standards that I consider dysfunctional and destructive at
> the very least.  Not the least of which is the
> perception that nudity == sex, or the related perception
> that sex == bad/dirty/evil.  Or a whole list of
> others...

We do seem to be schizoid and schizophrenic as a society WRT sexuality. 

> The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace
> alarmed and hence clamorous to be led to safety by menacing
> it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them
> imaginary. - H.L. MENCKEN

Good one!

'It's hard to fight the fire while you're feeding the flames' - Rush

Debbi
Condoms For The Mind? Maru
Debbi


  

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Re: Br*n: (Ignoring Murphy's Law) kills

[Deborah Harrell]

> Bruce Bostwick wrote:
> > Alberto Monteiro wrote:
 
> > Three days ago, a brazilian teenager was killed in hospital, because
> > instead of saline solution, the nurse gave her vaseline.

According to the translation (from below), it was a nursing assistant - point 
being that they are not highly trained, at least not in the US, and are more 
likely to make an error in such cases.  Two decades ago, only RNs and LPNs (and 
docs) administered IV fluids; drug orders were seen by at least one RN and a 
pharmacist before being filled -- now, it might only be an LPN and a pharmacy 
tech.  Sadly, I am not surprised that medication erors are so prevalent.

> > The reason was that the idiots that produced those products made
> > _identical_ vessels for them, with the difference being a minuscule
> > identification label.


Damn stupid - whyever put what should _never_ be injected intravenously  inside 
an IV-capable bottle?!?  There have been similar mistakes made with different 
concentrations of drugs here (frex heparin, lidocaine and epinephrine) also 
resulting in bad outcomes/death. 
 
> Translation of the latter link (machine translation, but
> more or less intelligible):
> 
> http://tinyurl.com/2vxjxxn
> 
> Yes, those are pretty hard to tell apart.  Doesn't
> mean it's not at least doubly important to read the labels,
> but yes, that was probably going to happen sooner or later... :(
> 
> "The eyes are open, the mouth moves, but Mr Brain has long
> since departed, hasn't he, Percy?" -- Edmund, Lord Blackadder

There's good reason for redundancy in critical operations, even if it isn't 
conducive to a higher profit margin.  ,:P

Debbi
Yes I'm Alive Maru



  

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Lions, Colorado-style

[Deborah Harrell]

It's taken over 10 years and really was pure luck, but I've finally seen 
cougars in the wild, about 1/4 mile from where I live - whoohoo!  We were 
driving out at dusk, and there they were: a pair (courting?) just ~ 30 ft (10 
meters, A?) off the road.  They looked in good shape, without any big scars, 
moving fluidly, glossy-coated.  I think the big one was a male, as it was a 
little jowly (like a tomcat, not fat!), and the slighter one was both shyer and 
appeared svelte, not 'lollopy' like an adolescent.

It was a good wildlife-sighting week: turkey chicks, a pair of golden eagles (I 
was told they're the local breeding pair at Ken Caryl), a hawk family with an 
eyas (that's the term for a now-flying chick, IIRC) and as the jewels in the 
crown, cougars.

Debbi
Can You Feel The Love Tonight? Maru   :D



  

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Re: Gateways: Tribute to Fred Pohl with stories by Bear, Benford, Brin, Bova, Gaiman, Harrison, Haldeman and me!

[Deborah Harrell]

> Han Tacoma  wrote:

> Just as a token of my resurrection
> ☺
> http://craphound.com/?p=3025

Hey, I like that -- a token of life returning... Should I go for the article on 
tai chi for brain disorders, how to prevent your horse from suffering heaves, 
or just admit that I'm rereading my Xanth novels before giving them away?  (my 
bookshelves runneth over)

Debbi
Approaching The Half-Century Maru


  

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RE: Having Dads makes you Happy

[Deborah Harrell]

> Dan Minette  wrote:
> > Dave wrote:
> >> JoAnn wrote: 

> > Maybe we should retitle this thread "Having dads makes
> >you happy"?

> >>   I know this list is
> androcentric, but, come on!
> >> ...and having Moms makes you (fill in the blank)?

> Guilty :-)  

Only if you're Lutheran.  Or Jewish.  On the other paw, does anyone else recall 
wincing in remembrance when Mufasa said "Simba, I'm *very* disappointed in 
you..."?

Fear and guilt - kept me 'safe' (frex from becoming a teenage mother) for quite 
a while.  And so what if there are a few neuroses leftover?  I'm otherwise 
perfectly...um, nearly -- sometimes...typical. 

Debbi
Yes I Do Believe In Spooks Maru   ;)


  

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Nomenclature (was) Chemicals R Us

[Deborah Harrell]

> From: Alberto Monteiro 


> I think it was established that benzene is carninogen. But
> I am
> not aware that phthalates, just because they are aromatic,
> are
> harmful. In fact, a few aminoacids are aromatic.

I'll bet there's a difference of wording -- 'organic chemistry' here primarily 
refers to petrochemicals; 'biochemistry' refers to life-related chemicals.  
This is an incorrect terminology in my opinion, but I can't change what is 
taught in colleges...

Debbi
Words, Words - What Is Brain?! Maru  :)


  

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Re: Chemicals R Us

[Deborah Harrell]

> Alberto Monteiro  wrote:
> Deborah Harrell quoted:
 
> > "A new report from the Danish Department of Environment, Food and 
> > Rural Affairs (DEFRA), highlights the critical risks facing toddlers 
> > from gender bending chemicals in everyday products. Chemicals like 
> > phthalates (found in PVC and fragrances), 

> In fact, phthalates are found in PET, not PVC. PVC is 
> polyvinylchlorine, the polymer of CH2=CHCl, PET is 
> polyethyleneterephthalate, the copolymer of terephthalic
> acid and ethyleneglycol (with maybe some i/y changed - in
> Portuguese, there's no such distinction).

Yes, the correct chemical is listed in the other article.  Although IIRC, PVC 
production is linked to cancer of some sort, and that was suspected in the 50s 
by industry doctors (Dow? Monsanto?  I can't remember what I posted exactly on 
that several years ago); it was not made public for a number of years.
 
> > "...Fewer boys are being born. 

> That's great news! The world needs less boys and more girls.
> Excess boys cause wars.

 Nevertheless, it might be a problem if we wind up with a passle of 
hermaprodites (who are usually sterile)...Could make an interesting SF story, 
however.

> > I think we will find that 
> > miniscule quantities of multiple organic compounds
> > adversely affect humans in numerous ways.
 
> I think it was established that benzene is carninogen. But I am
> not aware that phthalates, just because they are aromatic,
> are harmful. In fact, a few aminoacids are aromatic.

? So you don't find research regarding various petroleum compounds legitimate?  
We are well aware in the medical field of multiple adverse effects of various 
organic - in the sense of petroleum/industry-related - chemicals on healthe.  
And no, I who at one point could fill an entire blackboard with the Krebs cycle 
and multiple connecting metabolic pathwaysincluding peptide synthesis, had _no 
idea_ that some amino acids (not to mention hormones etc.) were aromatic...  


Debbi
Don't Want No Tryptophan Or Steroids Maru


  

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More on reproduction and environmental exposures

[Deborah Harrell]

These are more scholarly sites focusing on various reproductive and cancer 
issues WRT chemical exposures; the finding that in-utero exposure is 
increasingly linked to problems is of concern.

A 1996 European report of earlier concerns WRT sperm quality:
http://www.ehponline.org/members/1996/Suppl-4/toppari.html

More on infertility:
http://www.sfms.org/AM/Template.cfm?Section=Article_Archives&CONTENTID=1958&TEMPLATE=/CM/HTMLDisplay.cfm&SECTION=Article_Archives

"...The U.S. National Survey of Family Growth (1998) reported that the 
incidence of impaired fecundity (involuntary fertility compromise) rose 
significantly between 1982 and 1995 in all reproductive-age groups, but 
***surprisingly with the biggest increase (42 percent) in women under 25,*** 
compared to 12 percent and 6 percent for women 25 to 34 and 35 to 44 years 
old.(1, 2).."
***Asterisk emphasis mine-

Articles from a Canadian group of universities:
http://www.emcom.ca/Key/index.shtml

A 2000 mouse study:
http://www.ebmonline.org/cgi/content/full/224/2/61

"...This is the first demonstration that estrogenic chemicals induce 
reproductive malformation by direct interference with the fetal reproductive 
organs and not by interfering with the maternal or fetal endocrine system. The 
chemicals are able to induce malformation even in the absence of fetal 
testosterone; however, they are more effective in the presence of 
testosterone..." 

OK, enough-
Debbi
Too Much Information?! Maru


  

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Chemicals R Us

[Deborah Harrell]

I posted an article several years ago about the increase in hermaphrodite polar 
bears, which researchers thought related to the increased concentration of 
estrogenic chemicals.  'So what?'  This:

http://blogs.webmd.com/health-ehome/2009/11/chemicals-in-everyday-products-turning.html?ecd=wnl_day_111409

"A new report from the Danish Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs 
(DEFRA), highlights the critical risks facing toddlers from gender bending 
chemicals in everyday products. Chemicals like phthalates (found in PVC and 
fragrances), parabens (found in lotions and sunscreens), and pesticides are 
increasingly being linked to hormone disruption - and two year olds have more 
in their blood than any previous generations.

"...Today's boys have less sperm. Sperm counts are falling so fast that young 
men are about half as fertile as their fathers...

"...Fewer boys are being born. According to coverage of the report in the 
Telegraph, "A Canadian Indian community living on ancestral lands at the 
eastern tip of Lake Huron, hemmed in by one of the biggest agglomerations of 
chemical factories on earth, gives birth to twice as many girls as boys. It's 
the same around Seveso in Italy, contaminated with dioxins from a notorious 
accident in the 1970s, and among Russian pesticide workers. And there's more 
evidence from places as far apart as Israel and Taiwan, Brazil and the Arctic."

"Boys' unmentionables are getting smaller.  Scientists at the University of 
Rochester in New York discovered that boys born to women exposed to phthalates 
had smaller penises and other feminization of the genitals..."

"... What's new about this report is the emphasis on "chemical cocktails" - or 
the fact that these chemicals mixed together are far worse than they are 
alone..."

This is a 2006 technical article from The Endocrine Society(NIH sponsored):

http://endo.endojournals.org/cgi/content/full/147/6/s25

"...A VARIETY OF structurally diverse natural and synthetic chemicals, 
classified as endocrine-disrupting chemicals (EDCs), have been reported to 
interfere with the endocrine system and ultimately disturb the normal function 
of tissues and organs, particularly those of the reproductive tract. Given 
their physicochemical differences and distinct biological effects, it is not 
surprising that a variety of mechanisms are used by EDCs to influence the 
endocrine system. Advances in our understanding of these mechanisms have been 
aided by increased public interest in the health effects of EDCs and the 
development of new tools and models for studying these compounds. 
Diethylstilbestrol (DES), genistein (Gen), di(n-butyl) phthalate (DBP), and 
methoxyacetic acid (MAA) are four compounds (Fig. 1) that are discussed here in 
an effort to illustrate some of the unique mechanisms of action used by EDCs to 
modulate endocrine system function..."

"...Phthalate esters are used extensively as plasticizers and stabilizers in a 
variety of plastics and consumer goods. Exposure to phthalates through 
ingestion, inhalation, and dermal absorption occurs throughout life (51). 
Select phthalate esters, including DBP, adversely affect the male rat 
reproductive tract after either prenatal or postnatal exposure. These adverse 
reproductive tract effects, which include disrupted epididymal development, 
hypospadias, cryptorchidism, multinucleated gonocytes, and reduced fertility, 
are a result of the antiandrogenic effects of some phthalate esters (52). 
Interestingly, the reproductive tract abnormalities present in DBP-exposed rats 
are similar to those that occur in humans with testicular dysgenesis syndrome, 
which is believed to result from altered fetal development as a result of 
genetic mutations and/or pharmacological or environmental disruptions (53). 
Given the widespread use of phthalate esters, a potential
 role for DBP in testicular dysgenesis is plausible (51, 55). Humans are 
exposed to more DBP than any other phthalate ester, with maximal DBP exposure 
reaching 113 µg/kg·d (56, 57). Interestingly, these same studies showed that 
women of childbearing age have the highest estimated DBP exposures. However, 
these levels are considerably lower than the minimal reported dose of DBP 
necessary to alter male reproductive tract development of more than 50 mg/kg·d 
(52)..."

"...MAA is the major metabolite of ethylene glycol monomethyl ether (EGME), an 
industrial solvent commonly used in varnishes, paints, dyes, and fuel additives 
(65). Exposure to EGME and MAA results in toxic reproductive effects in both 
animals and humans (66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71). Occupational exposure to both EGME 
and MAA has been associated with subfertility, spontaneous abortion, and 
reduced sperm counts (70, 72, 73, 74). The toxic effects of MAA have prompted 
investigations into the cellular and molecular actions of MAA that have 
uncovered unique actions for an EDC..."

"...DES, Gen, DBP, and MAA are four compounds described herein that

Re: How to tell if a star has planets?

[Deborah Harrell]

> Dave Land  wrote:
> > Deborah Harrell wrote:
> >> Dave Land  wrote:
> >>> Deborah Harrell wrote:

> >>> But it's definitely not Higgs bosons.
 
> >> Only because the Higgs bosons came back in time to make you think so.
> >> LHC Maru
 
> > Are you saying that my brain is a weird version of a super-collider?!
> > ...I can live with that.
> >   But what does 'LHC' mean?
 
> You already knew: the Large Hadron Collider.

Well, I didn't _think_ it meant 'Lady Harrell Collider...'
 
> This is Your Brain on Bosons Maru

I'd rather be quarky, I think. ;)

Debbi
Charmed And Strange Maru


  

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Re: How to tell if a star has planets?

[Deborah Harrell]

> David Hobby  wrote:
> > Deborah Harrell wrote:
> >> David Hobby  wrote:

> >> Protomatter is obviously made out of protons.
> >> Protomorphogens would be made of protists?
 
> > Only if protists are itsy-bitsy Animorphs - or maybe that was Pokemen?
> > But it's definitely not Higgs bosons.
 
> O.K., how about stem cells, made from the
> stems of real plants?  (Yarrow could be good,
> for the I Ching connection.  But papaver somniferum was my first choice.)

I actually had to look up the latter - all the times I've seen "The Wizard of 
Oz" nothwithstanding.  As for the species, I might favor penstemon:

http://www.anandaapothecary.com/fes-north-american-flower-essences/penstemon-flower-essence.html

"... in these moments of sorrow and pain, the soul must have the courage to 
rebuild itself and the faith to trust in a higher power. Penstemon flower 
essence has enormous strengthening powers, enabling the soul to tap into 
reservoirs of courage and resilience which are normally inaccessible to human 
consciousness. At its deepest level of transformation. Penstemon essence shows 
the soul that it has freely chosen even the harshest circumstances for its 
growth and evolution..."

A lovely photo of the flower-
http://www.pbase.com/macknight/image/46316311
 
> > Debbi
> > Tardigrades Rule! Maru    :)
 
> Yes, but can I have one big enough to ride?

Funny, I just recently read a short story (old Omni paperback) about a 
clinically 'locked-in' boy who dreams of riding his teddy bear-

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tardigrade 

Oh!!! Cool video of a water bear locomoting!  Neato!!!
http://www.tardigrades.com/

Debbi
AKA Moss Bear Maru 


  

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Re: How to tell if a star has planets?

[Deborah Harrell]

> Dave Land  wrote:
> > Deborah Harrell wrote:
> >> David Hobby  wrote:

> >> Protomatter is obviously made out of protons.
> >> Protomorphogens would be made of protists?

> > Only if protists are itsy-bitsy Animorphs - or maybe that was Pokemen?
> > But it's definitely not Higgs bosons.
 
> Only because the Higgs bosons came back in time to make you think so.
> LHC Maru

Are you saying that my brain is a weird version of a super-collider?!
...I can live with that.

  But what does 'LHC' mean?

Debbi
Cringing Ahead Of Time Maru  ;(


  

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For those still following the 'balloon boy' fracas

[Deborah Harrell]

  I'd rather that Colorado was in the news for something cool; instead, 
we have a misogynistic father (apparently passing along his nasty views) 
exploiting his sons for 'fame.'  What a snot-rag.

http://www.9news.com/news/article.aspx?storyid=126836&catid=339

"...Heene and his wife Mayumi Heene were both charged on Thursday and will 
enter guilty pleas in court Friday as part of a deal to avoid deportation to 
Japan for Mayumi. 

"In a statement released early Thursday morning, Heene attorney David Lane said 
Mayumi will plead guilty to false reporting to authorities, a misdemeanor, with 
a stipulated sentence to probation. She could face up to six months in county 
jail and a fine of up to $750. 

"Richard Heene will plead guilty to attempting to influence a public servant, a 
felony, with a stipulated sentence to probation, according to the statement. He 
could face two to six years in the Department of Corrections and a fine of up 
to $500,000. 

"In the statement, Lane said authorities insisted that Richard Heene "fall on 
his sword" and take a felony plea.  The Larimer County District Attorney's 
Office says the Heenes have agreed to turn themselves in to police. They are 
scheduled to appear in court on Friday at 8:30 a.m..."

A Denver Post article listed some things the sons said/did on YouTube that show 
they're already rude little buggers -- I hope somebody straightens them out, 
because the parental units have certainly shown poor judgement.

Debbi
Probationers, Fer Shur Maru:P   


  

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Re: How to tell if a star has planets?

[Deborah Harrell]

> David Hobby  wrote:
> > Debbi wrote:

> > Are protoplanets made of protomatter?! Just who are these surveyors,
> >and are they being unethical scientists!? Is protomatter related to
> >"protomorphogens," the 'primitive matter which makes up organs' and is
> >sold on a website I decline to pass on?... 


> Protomatter is obviously made out of protons.
> Protomorphogens would be made of protists?
> (Trying to keep my fields straight, here.)

Only if protists are itsy-bitsy Animorphs - or maybe that was Pokemen?
But it's definitely not Higgs bosons.

Debbi
Tardigrades Rule! Maru:)


  

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Re: How to tell if a star has planets?

[Deborah Harrell]

> Dave Land  wrote:

> > On Nov 11, 2009, Deborah Harrell wrote:
 
> > Genesis Wave Maru  ;}
 
> Is that like Google Wave, but older?
> How do I get an invite?

It's *much* better than callow Google Wave, having mellowed for years in a 
quadrotriticale barrell than once contained protomorphogens.

It hasn't even made beta yet, so no invites possible - so sorry...

Debbi
Snakes Can't Wave, Only Sidewind! Maru  :) 


  

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Re: How to tell if a star has planets?

[Deborah Harrell]

> David Hobby  wrote:

> Hi.  I just saw the following in article summaries
> from Nature.  The actual article is behind a paywall,
> but this seems interesting.

> > Stars similar to the Sun in age, mass and composition show a wide
> > range of lithium abundances... The surface
> > lithium abundance of the Sun itself is 140 times less than the
> > primordial Solar System value, yet the Sun's surface convective zone
> > is thought not to extend far enough into the interior to reach
> > regions where lithium can...be burned.  A new survey
> > of Sun-like stars with and without detected planets now suggests that
> > the planets may hold the key to the Sun's missing lithium. The stars
> > with planets have less than 1% of the primordial lithium abundance,
> > whereas those with no detected planets range more widely, with half
> > of them having about 10% of primordial abundance. It is possible that
> > the presence of protoplanets increases mixing in the stellar disk so
> > that lithium reaches interior regions where the temperatures are
> > sufficient to destroy it.

Are protoplanets made of protomatter?!  Just who are these surveyors, and are 
they being unethical scientists!?  Is protomatter relateted to 
"protomorphogens," the 'primitive matter which makes up organs' and is sold on 
a website I decline to pass on?  (Not kidding about the latter - various 
friends with currently non-curable diseases send me stuff and ask about 
it...Predators abound.)

Debbi
Genesis Wave Maru  ;}


  

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Re: Flags?

[Deborah Harrell]

> From: Julia 

> I'm wondering how many people in the US are seeing flags at half-mast.
> 
> We've been seeing an awful lot around here, in the wake of
> the Ft. Hood shootings, but Ft. Hood is practically in our back
> yard.  I'm wondering how
> aware other folks are, and if they've been flying flags at
> half-mast in other states.

Yes, scattered here in the Denver area.  Not sure if it's related, but my 
boyfriend's intervening right now in a threatened suicide by an aquaintance of 
his, who is a veteran.  Will someone be willing to "get help" when a service 
phychiatrist, who you'd think would have at least some insight, has chosen to 
react homicidally?

Tragedy, all around.

Debbi
Saddened And Perplexed Maru


  

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RE: Lifestyle changes better than drugs

[Deborah Harrell]

> From: dsummersmi...@comcast.net 

 
> >OK, so I'm still harping on lifestyle as preferable over drugs in 
> treating and preventing chronic illnesses -- nice to have my
> opinion backed up so decisively!  

> I'd be curious to see if the lifestyle and weight loss
> group continued to include follow ups of all the failures. 

From the WebMD article (cited last post):
"...Many of the people in the lifestyle intervention group met the weight loss 
goal, losing an average of 15 pounds during the first year of the study.  While 
they regained, on average, 10 of those pounds during the next seven years, the 
lifestyle intervention group continued to have the lowest rates of diabetes..."

If you're defining 'failure' as regain of weight, they still benefitted WRT 
diabetes prevention/delay of onset.

This is from the Lancet abstract:
http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(09)61457-4/abstract

"...All active DPP participants were eligible for continued follow-up. 2766 of 
3150 (88%) enrolled for a median additional follow-up of 5·7 years (IQR 
5·5—5·8). 910 participants were from the lifestyle, 924 from the metformin, and 
932 were from the original placebo groups. On the basis of the benefits from 
the intensive lifestyle intervention in the DPP, all three groups were offered 
group-implemented lifestyle intervention. Metformin treatment was continued in 
the original metformin group (850 mg twice daily as tolerated), with 
participants unmasked to assignment, and the original lifestyle intervention 
group was offered additional lifestyle support..."

I think 88% continuance of original participants is pretty good.

"...During the 10·0-year (IQR 9·0—10·5) follow-up since randomisation to DPP, 
the original lifestyle group lost, then partly regained weight. The modest 
weight loss with metformin was maintained..."

- and yet their diabetes rate was still lower than the metformin subset.

Commentary from another journal:
http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/169082.php

"...The authors explain: "In this study, onset of diabetes was delayed by about 
4 years by lifestyle intervention and 2 years by metformin compared with 
placebo." 

They write in conclusion: "Our results have shown that a reduction in diabetes 
cumulative incidence by either lifestyle intervention or metformin therapy 
persists for at least 10 years. Further follow-up will provide crucial data for 
long-term clinical outcomes, including mortality... The long-term reductions in 
bodyweight and diabetes are encouraging, but further quantification of 
long-term outcomes is crucial to establish the benefits of diabetes 
prevention..." 

> You know of course, that weight
> loss programs that do not involve surgery have about a 3%
> sucess rate after 2 years

What made this study noteworthy to me was that *in spite of* regaining much of 
the weight lost, delay of diabetes onset still was better than the drug (or of 
course no intervention at all).  Also, surgery results for extreme obesity are 
much better than mild or overweight (further confusion with use of BMI vs. 
'ideal weight,' follow-up years, and changes in surgical techniques (some 
studies are based on out-moded procedures).  This 2006 Mayo article was one of 
the better ones I found:

http://www.mayoclinicproceedings.com/content/81/10_Suppl/S46.full

"... Few randomized, controlled prospective trials have compared bariatric 
surgery to nonsurgical weight-loss treatments, and the quality of current 
outcome data is suboptimal. However, the available evidence suggests that 
bariatric surgery, and particularly gastric bypass, is the most effective 
weight-loss treatment for people with extreme (class III) obesity. In addition 
to reduced energy intake and to a lesser extent malabsorption, numerous other 
potential mechanisms related to bariatric surgery may play a role in promoting 
weight loss and improving comorbidities. After bariatric surgery, clinical 
improvement or resolution has been reported in 64% to 100% of patients with 
diabetes mellitus, 62% to 69% of patients with hypertension, 85% of patients 
with obstructive sleep apnea, 60% to 100% of patients with dyslipidemia, and up 
to 90% of patients with nonalcoholic fatty liver disease. A wide range of other 
weight-related conditions also appear to
 improve, and limited data suggest that overall mortality may decrease in 
patients undergoing bariatric surgery. Although not conclusive, evidence from 
available studies indicates that bariatric surgery is cost-effective. Further 
research with improved methodology is needed to define the mechanisms of action 
of bariatric surgery; to document its effect on long-term weight loss, comorbid 
conditions, and overall mortality; and to determine its cost-effectiveness...

"With the exception of 2 studies published more than 20 years ago and 2 studies 
published in 2002 and 2006, no other prospective randomized controlled trials 
have compared bariatric surgery 

Lifestyle changes better than drugs

[Deborah Harrell]

At least in diabetes prevention:

http://diabetes.webmd.com/news/20091028/diet-beats-drugs-for-diabetes-prevention?ecd=wnl_day_103109

-- Lifestyle changes resulting in long-term weight loss of just a few pounds 
proved to be roughly twice as effective as drug treatment for preventing type 2 
diabetes in an ongoing government-sponsored trial.
Researchers followed almost 3,000 high-risk patients for a decade in one of the 
largest and longest studies aimed at preventing diabetes ever conducted in the 
U.S.

Roughly a third of the participants were initially asked to eat a low-fat diet 
and engage in at least 30 minutes of moderate activity a minimum of five times 
a week, with the goal of losing 7% of their body weight within a year.  Another 
third were put on the diabetes drug metformin; the remaining patients initially 
received no intervention.

Many of the people in the lifestyle intervention group met the weight loss 
goal, losing an average of 15 pounds during the first year of the study.
While they regained, on average, 10 of those pounds during the next seven 
years, the lifestyle intervention group continued to have the lowest rates of 
diabetes...

...Three years into the trial, Knowler and colleagues reported that diabetes 
incidence was reduced by a whopping 58% in the lifestyle intervention group and 
31% in the metformin group, compared to people who received no intervention.  
This dramatic difference led the researchers to offer lifestyle intervention, 
in the form of group counseling and support sessions, to all three groups for 
the rest of the study.

The 10-year follow up analysis, which appears Thursday in TheLancet, shows that:

*Compared to the non-intervention group, patients in the intensive lifestyle 
intervention group and metformin group, respectively, were 34% and 18% less 
likely to develop diabetes over 10 years.  
*Lifestyle intervention was found to delay the onset of diabetes by four years. 
Drug treatment delayed diabetes by two years.  
*The benefits of intensive lifestyle intervention were particularly strong in 
the elderly. Those aged 60 and older in the diet and exercise group lowered 
their rate of developing diabetes by half over 10 years...
 

OK, so I'm still harping on lifestyle as preferable over drugs in treating and 
preventing chronic illnesses -- nice to have my opinion backed up so 
decisively!  (Not that meds aren't often necessary and life-saving; I just 
don't like to hear them always put ahead of nutrition and exercise etc.)

Debbi
Ate My Oatmeal This Morning Maru


  

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Not now-

[Deborah Harrell]

I was going to mention the book I've just read for the bookclub I belong too, 
but having learned now of today's mass shooting, I really don't feel like it.  
Guess I won't snarl about the hunters who were too close to the horses I 
caretake today either.

Debbi
Sorrowful Day Maru


  

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Re: Fwd: Intelligence Explained

[Deborah Harrell]

> On Mon, 10/26/09, Keith Henson  wrote:

> Most of you have probably seen this, but better an extra copy than
> none at all.  Keith
> 
> http://www.technologyreview.com/biomedicine/23695/
> ==
 

> ...With the advent of technologies such as magnetic resonance
> imaging (MRI), researchers concentrating mainly on gray matter have
> been able to map the parts of the brain that appear to play a role.
> But this has taken them only so far, and the focus on gray matter has
> not told the whole story. Not until the last few years, as new
> variations of MRI home in on the brain's white matter, has a deeper
> understanding begun to emerge. "Scientists are now able to switch the
> focus from particular regions of the brain to the connections between
> those regions," says Sherif Karama... 

> ...The type of MRI typically used for medical scans does not show the
> finer details of the brain's white matter. But with a technique called
> diffusion tensor imaging (DTI), which uses the scanner's magnet to
> track the movement of water molecules in the brain, scientists have
> developed ways to map out neural wiring in detail. While water moves
> randomly within most brain tissue, it flows along the insulated neural
> fibers like current through a wire...

This is what Bob Zimmerman was working on; has anyone heard from him lately?
 
> ...It's likely that the quality of white matter is at least partly
> genetically determined and, therefore, difficult to change. The size
> of the corpus callosum, the thick tracts of white matter connecting
> the two hemispheres of the brain, is about 95 percent genetic. And
> about 85 percent of the white-matter variation in the parietal lobes,
> which are involved in logic and visual-spatial skills, can be
> attributed to genetics, according to Thompson. But only about 45
> percent of the variation in the temporal lobes, which play a central
> role in learning and memory, appears to be inherited...

> ...But environmental factors also play a role. Rodents raised in a
> stimulating environment have more white matterAlthough the adult
> brain isn't as malleable as a young brain, and is
> therefore less easily influenced by environmental factors,
> evidence is growing that the adult brain is still remarkably plastic.
> Scientists haven't yet studied white matter enough to know how to
> improve it directly, especially in healthy people. But exercise, diet,
> and mental activity have all been shown to boost brain health and
> decrease the risk of dementia, a disorder that has been linked to
> white-matter damage. And other studies have shown that just a few months
> of practicing a new skill can enlarge certain parts of the brain...
 
Like when a sighted person is blind-folded for a week+, their auditory and 
tactile areas increase (and IIRC, the "unused" portion of the brain devoted to 
vision may alter as well?).

> ...Haier envisions a day when brain scans could alert
> teachers to the cognitive strengths and weaknesses of each
> student, so that lessons could be individually tailored. It might be
> possible to derive much the same information from extensive cognitive
> testing, but such testing is rare because it's expensive and time
> consuming. A 15-minute brain scan, on the other hand, might be applied
> much more broadly...

That's the good side-
Und now fur ze Dark Zide:

> ...Some experts, however, fear it will create the sense that
> people's abilities are completely predetermined...But because
> a brain scan measures a physical property, it's likely to
> arouse even more concern than today's testing methods. "If you can
> estimate someone's IQ from a brain scan, even if it isn't any more
> predictive than an SAT [score], it gives the illusion that his or her
> future is fixed," says Karama...

Shades of GATTAGA (IIRC that title)!

But so much potential to follow and fix broken nerve tracts - spinal cord 
injuries repaired, brain trauma reversed - wow.

Debbi
Tracking The Bouncing Ball Maru







  

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Re: The thread about the thread Re: DeLong on health insurance reform

[Deborah Harrell]

> On Sun, 10/25/09, Bruce Bostwick  wrote:
> > On Oct 25, 2009, at 8:06 PM, Deborah Harrell wrote:
 
> > Hey, guess who's posting from home for the first time?
> > (I did have some serious help getting stuff hooked up,
> and I still hate this laptop's 'finger mouse.' -- hmm,
> hadn't thought of what that conjures up, but it's entirely
> apt...)
 
> You mean one of these?  http://xkcd.com/243/


Er, not exactly...more like the...oh, never mind!

Debbi
Washing With Virtual Soap Maru   ;}


  

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Re: "Cloud Computing" Smears (Was: Google Wave)

[Deborah Harrell]

> On Mon, 10/19/09, John Williams  wrote:

> >> Never underestimate the power of human error. As this
> >> debacle demonstrates.

> > (me, IIRC) Which particular debacle would that be?

> I was referring to the Sidekick debacle:
 
> http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Mobile-and-Wireless/Microsoft-Claims-Sidekick-Data-Will-Be-Restored-This-Week-491196/

Whoops!  I have a friend who isn't using that service, but somehow lost all his 
hundreds of contacts from his phone, and they weren't retreivable from his 
back-up site either.  I, OTOH, have all my contacts on paper...(and I'd be smug 
about it except I don't have hundreds, just dozens, which is quite managable).

There _was_ something about a 'hole in security of cloud computing' in a recent 
MIT Tech update (but I only get the headlines, not the full story, and doubt 
I'd understand without some major studying, which I just don't have time for at 
this point...).

Debbi
Borderline Luddite? Maru   :)


  

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Re: The thread about the thread Re: DeLong on health insurance reform

[Deborah Harrell]

> On Sun, 10/25/09, Doug Pensinger  wrote:


> Good to hear from you all that haven't posted much, maybe
> we can get a
> rip roaring discussion going.  Anybody over hear read
> Banks' new one?

Hey, guess who's posting from home for the first time?
(I did have some serious help getting stuff hooked up, and I still hate this 
laptop's 'finger mouse.' -- hmm, hadn't thought of what that conjures up, but 
it's entirely apt...)

Debbi
Posting Like A Newbie Maru


  

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Re: "Cloud Computing" Smears (Was: Google Wave)

[Deborah Harrell]

> From: John Williams 

 
> Never underestimate the power of human error. As this
> debacle demonstrates.

Which particular debacle would that be?  We gotcher health care, Afghanistan, 
Eyerak, and balloon boys...

Take yer pik!

Debbi
Whaddya Expect From A Family On "Wife-Swap" Twice? Maru


  

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Re: Google Wave

[Deborah Harrell]

> From: Matt Grimaldi 

> FUD usually appears as an acronym for
> the usual resistance to change:
> 
>   Fear
>   Uncertainty
>   Doubt

Oh, dear.  I'm hosed.  I neither twitter nor text nor have a phone that I use 
for anything other than talking...

Debbi
I Am NOT A Fuddy-Duddy!!! Maru   

...am I?


  

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Re: DeLong on health insurance reform and other stuff

[Deborah Harrell]

>On Tue, 9/29/09, Jo Anne  wrote:

> Yea!!!  More xx'ers.

And feeling every "x" in the morning...urf, when did my joints decide to become 
musical?!  I don't even _like_ Rice Krispies anymore.
 
> > Debbi wrote...
> >> and yes, I  too am still alive in the real world...  :)
 
> And Dee responded 
> > We "XX"s have just been sitting back proving we can
> >have quiet  moments and "listen"
> >  be scared when we start getting chatty again
 
> So where were you two when the heat was on with the health
> care debate?  You
> two are the heavyweights, I'm just the lightweight
> (figuratively) on this
> subject.  Please keep adding your Voices.

  It's such a disaster, and the money from the big companies so 
pervasive - nd apparently persuasive - that only with great effort will real 
reform and not mere window-dressing occur.  I'm not overly hopeful, given 
recent events (or lack thereof).

Debbi
Biting The Bullet Maru


  

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Re: DeLong on health insurance reform and other stuff

[Deborah Harrell]

>On Mon, 9/28/09, kananda...@aol.com  wrote:
> >   Debbi wrote...

> >"We're Number 37!" Maru
> >and yes, I too am still alive in the real world...  :)
   
>   We "XX"s have just been sitting back proving we can have quiet 
>   moments and "listen"  be scared when we start getting
> chatty again

I'm going to try to get a computer going at home, since I need to have email 
for my new position at the stable (Riding Academy Director)...if only it paid 
more than a pittance!  But hey, it will be a good learning experience, no?

Debbi
Who Is Forrest? Maru


  

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Re: DeLong on health insurance reform and other stuff

[Deborah Harrell]

> Jo Anne  wrote:

>> Doug wrote:  
> >> Personally, I think that a system that places an emphasis  on
> >> boner drugs, reformulation of proven drugs and anti-depressants  that
> >> don't work is in need of an overhaul in and of  itself.
 
> And Dee answered: 
> > Being the healthcare provider I can share this without
> cringing- 40% of men over age 40 will have some
> > dealing with impotence.  From a basic human intimacy element- those
> > commercials wouldn't be still playing without an audience.

True - I just wish they'd cut back to once per hour.
 
> First off, I love the 'boner drugs' moniker, Doug

Sounds appropriate to me-

> ...I do wonder
> about how many we actually need to do R&D on...  I would
> like to see the drug companies doing some research on another antibiotic 
> to deal with MRSA, frex.

But the big bucks ain't there, doncha know?

> > I think the assumption that consumers will purchase
> >policies full of loopholes is a fair one.
 
> I agree.  And I used to be in health care, too. 

Ditto.  I just terminated my "insurance" for my cats -- I have paid in for 
three years -- and when Lili got a bladder infection they 1) charged me *$80* 
out-of-pocket, and 2) told me she had a chronic condition requiring special 
food (~ $1/can, < 2 meals per)...oh, and cats didn't get bladder infections 
like people.  I replied that her symptoms began abruptly the evening before, 
that all my previous cats had had a UTI at some point, that I had been a health 
care professional, etc,...well, I'm obviously still steamed.  I got her atbx on 
my own -- symptoms cleared in 2 days.

>...I heard on NPR recently that most people are happy
> with their health care coverage until they have to use it -- then they
> discover what they do and don't have and may not be happy
> with their coverage.

Or lack thereof.
 
> And again, after living and practicing in Canada for 10
> years, I'd take that
> system *any day* over the hodge podge we have now.

We need _some_ kind of base-line coverage; folks who can afford Cadillac care 
should still be able to pay for it OOP/extra.  

Debbi
"We're Number 37!" Maru

and yes, I too am still alive in the real world...  :)


  

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Re: Aliens 'may be living among us' undetected by science

[Deborah Harrell]

> Matt Grimaldi  wrote:

> This was also covered by Brin in Earth, at least having an
> alien living among us...

And as I'm rereading _Glory Season_ by Himself (thought I'd give it another go, 
as it was back in '95 that I read it first, and didn't like it much compared to 
the Uplift series), it too deals with aliens - um, non-genetically modified 
humans - 'invading' a world.  Upon second go, it is much more interesting to 
me; of course, it could be that I've matured a bit in the past 1 1/2 decades, 
and am less easily unnervevd by certain concepts...

Debbi
It Lives...IT LIVES! Maru   ;)


  

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Re: Government regulations and complex consequences

[Deborah Harrell]

> John Williams <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> > On Wed, Dec 3, 2008 at 12:05 PM, Deborah Harrell wrote:
 
> > We still can't explain all of the effects of
> aspirinAnd look at the
> recent pull of cold and cough preps for toddlers, after
> being on the shelf for decades.
> > There is no certain or 100% safe thing in the practice
> of medicine - nor in life;

> You are giving economists way too much credit. I'm not
> asking for
> 100%, or even 90%. But 50% would be nice. But economists
> can rarely manage 10%.
> 
> Surely you would not take a drug if the doctor only had a
> 10% chance of predicting the major effects?

Nope (except maybe for that terminal disease thing).Uhm, this does 
sort of lead into the need for regulation of medical and food ingestibles - 
otherwise you end up with 300,000 babies/toddlers exposed to a known renal 
toxin.  There does need to be a 'reasonable' proof of non-toxicity, in addition 
to proof of efficacy (but one cannot ask for 100% safety either; I just want 
honest and competently-run drug studies).

 Unfortunately, we all *have* consumed a vast array of 
chemicals with unknown major and minor effects, courtesy of the industrial and 
chemical revolutions. Also, we ingest drugs and antibiotics that are dumped 
into our watersheds daily.

Debbi
who is clearly in a sour mood, induced by the fact that her car is *again* in 
the shop for the third time in 2 months, for the same problem! 


  
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Re: Government regulations and complex consequences

[Deborah Harrell]

I'm trying to catch up a bit-

> John Williams <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> > Nick Arnett <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
 
> > You would have us believe that on principle, people who fail to
> > foresee a negative event are thereby disqualified from
> > comprehending and responding to it?

 
> Likewise, if a doctor does not know the effects of a medicine
> he prescribes, I am not willingly going to follow that doctors advice.


Then you should not take *any* medicine introduced to the market in the past 
decade or so (unless it's for a terminal illness, in which case you have little 
to lose).  Recently developed drugs are never fully known, which is why the FDA 
has post-marketing surveys (not that one should trust that body, underfunded 
and oft in the pocket of the pharmas), and why some are pulled from the shelves.

We still can't explain all of the effects of aspirin, after all.  (Although 
that's more due to not understanding everthing about inflammation, as the 
body's regulatory responses are discovered to be ever more complex with 
increased research.)  And look at the recent pull of cold and cough preps for 
toddlers, after being on the shelf for decades.
There is no certain or 100% safe thing in the practice of medicine - nor in 
life;  the best one can hope for is the honest and informed inquiry/action of 
experts and "ordinary" folk alike.

Debbi
Angels' Fear Maru


  
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Re: Unknown "Structures" Tugging at Universe, Study Says

[Deborah Harrell]

> Ronn! Blankenship <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

> Perhaps of interest, or perhaps not, from 
> :
 
> On the outskirts of creation, unknown, unseen 
> "structures" are tugging on our universe like 
> cosmic magnets, a controversial new study says.
> 
> Everything in the known universe is said to be 
> racing toward the massive clumps of matter at 
> more than 2 million miles (3.2 million 
> kilometers) an hour­a movement the researchers have dubbed
> dark flow.
> 
> The presence of the extra-universal matter 
> suggests that our universe is part of something 
> bigger­a multiverse­and that whatever is out 
> there is very different from the universe we 
> know, according to study leader Alexander 
> Kashlinsky, an astrophysicist at NASA's Goddard 
> Space Flight Center in Maryland...

Well, *clearly* it's a ginormous black hole, left over after the last big bang 
- the final coalescence (sp?) of all the black holes at the center of all those 
earlier galaxies.

Debbi
17 -> 5 -> 4 Spirals Maru   :)


  
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Re: Proud and relieved

[Deborah Harrell]

> Jon Louis Mann <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

  
> I had obama on a redeye flight from d.c. to chicago two
> years ago, just before he declared.  he was in my section so
> we chatted for over a half hour.  he was very gracious and
> charismatic...

Oh, cool - he appears to be a really interesting person to talk to, so I think 
I'm envious...

He's putting his team together quickly, as indeed he ought, given the gravity 
of multiple problems we face.  Goodwill ought to help out a bit, as Rob's cites 
suggest, but it will certainly call for more than us 'shopping 'til we drop.' 


Debbi
World Relief Maru


  
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Re: Proud and relieved

[Deborah Harrell]

> Jon Louis Mann <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> > I wrote:

> > *McCain's concession speech was very much a class act;
> > I did not think he would be a particularly good president,
> > but he is a good man.
 
> He certainly was when he was a POW, but then, if he had
> come home early he would never have been able to live it
> down.  He had a serious anger management problem, and 
> discipline problems, but that could have been due to PTSD. 
> He had a record of crashing seven planes and was fifth from
> the bottom of his graduating class.   When Clinton cheated
> on his wife he was impeached.  McCain had a long affair
> while he was still married, and only left his first wife
> after a severe disfiguring car accident?  He also was a
> member of the Keating Five and ran an extremely negative
> campaign, using the same people Bush used against him in
> 2000...
> Any of those would have lost the election for Obama...

I'm fairly sure that his wife's accident was during his stay in Vietnam (not an 
excuse, but the timing is not as bad as it otherwise sounds), and a large 
number of vets, POWS or not, wind up divorcing.  He was known to be a ladies' 
man before Vietnam, and that did not change after he returned home (also not an 
excuse!).  He was a wise-ass in the Academy, and got a large number of 
demerits, which certainly lowered his class ranking.

Where he failed, to me, was in losing sight of his maverick status and 
pandering to the right (aka base): taking a more concilliatory stance on 
'coercive interrogation,' choosing Palin, and using the Republican machine to 
run this campaign -- he wanted the Presidency so badly that he compromised his 
ideals to an unacceptable level (IMO).  IOW, he screwed up.  That does not mean 
he isn't a good person, but poor judgement in those instances meant I would not 
ever vote for him.

[I ought to point out that I have been watching Obama since reading his 2004 
speech, and subsequently read his books; yesterday was the first time I voted 
*for* a major candidate instead of voting independent 'cause I didn't like the 
Parties, or, as in 2000 & 2004, held my nose and voted Democrat b/c I found GWB 
terrifyingly ignorant, inadequate and - well - imbecilic.]

Debbi
who ought to add a "You bet!" sticker to her car's "Got Hope?/Obama" 
bumpersticker   :)


  
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Re: Speaking of unicorns

[Deborah Harrell]

> Julia Thompson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> Date: Sunday, October 19, 2008

> At least, unicorns were mentioned in some other thread
> today
> 
> http://www.democraticstuff.com/Unicorns-for-Obama-Photo-Button-p/bt23828.htm
> 
> That site has an awful lot of buttons for sale.  Many of
> them are *highly* amusing for various reasons.


Their Imperial Tealnesses must be chuckling...
The Jib-jab poke at Obama's 'change' theme was funny (although the traditional 
view of unicorns would mean that, as a father of children, he would *not* be 
eligible to ride a unicorn).

Debbi
who yesterday would have liked Darby to have that magical unicorn ability to 
keep their rider from falling off...not that I'd be eligible in the traditional 
view either  ;)
(I don't know what happened - we were cantering up an easy slope and he just 
flat went to his knees and then collapsed; I didn't have any time to emergently 
dismount, it was so sudden.  My friend riding with me couldn't see any reason 
for him to fall; at least he wasn't significantly hurt although I will keep him 
at hand-walk only for at least a week.  I, OTOH, have some trail rash and 
various owies - thank goodness for naproxen!)

Debbi
Never Without A Helmet Maru


  
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Re: Proud and relieved

[Deborah Harrell]

> Nick Arnett <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

 
> There is one thing that Obama has done that truly, at last
> addresses our
> grief.  He calls for a national spirit of sacrifice,
> finally ending the
> arrogance of leadership that urged us to live life as usual
> -- go shopping!
> -- while others carried the burdens of national defense... 
> ...We have a new leader
> who is involved with humanity and who leads others to be so
> involved, though success and failure, life and death.
> 
> I am proud of what we have begun and look forward, yes, to
> what we can do.

My first reaction when I heard that McCain had conceded* was relief; joyful 
anticipation came later.  I talked with Dad, who wished that my mother had been 
alive to see this day; she would have been very pleased and proud also.

Obama's acknowledgement that we are at the beginning of what will be a hard 
slog I thought honest and realistic; the announcement that there will be a new 
puppy in the White House a lovely touch of whimsy.

*McCain's concession speech was very much a class act; I did not think he would 
be a particularly good president, but he is a good man.

Debbi
'Help us O-ba-man - you're our only hope-
'He is not the only one - but he is the best...' Maru


  
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Re: Model for the financial crisis

[Deborah Harrell]

> Rceeberger <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

> http://chronicle.com/temp/reprint.php?id=477k3d8mh2wmtpc4b6h07p4hy9z83x18
> 
> The Panic of 1873

Thanks for the history lesson; I didn't know about that crash.  Not very 
reassuring, though, is it?  Still looking like a rice-and-beans winter...

Debbi
Of Course The Ponies Get Oats maru


  
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Re: Delurking for a moment or two

[Deborah Harrell]

> I wrote:

>... And I bet I've
> missed some lively (not to say acrimonious )
> discussions; with all the political and economic goings-on,
> there's been plenty of grist for the mill.
 

Ah, the sound and smell of baboons howling while tossing fecal matter about -- 
I refer to the Meltdown thread, of course, which I am just starting to wade 
through.  Good to see that, as before, name-calling and posturing are the 
'counters' to facts, perceptions and opinions ... hmmm, rather like current 
political ads on the tube.  

BTW, even baboons have the capacity to transform their interactions in less 
than one generation: there was a troop whose alpha males all died, and when the 
betas took over, astonishingly they *did not* become swaggering bullys who beat 
up the females and juveniles, but started a kinder and gentler society with 
more grooming and non-aggressive interactions.  And incoming young males are 
'indoctrinated' into this mode, which the researcher said took about 6 months.

I recall reading somewhere about this before, but here is a PBS piece on stress 
that incorporated the data:
http://www.pbs.org/stress/

A blog that summarizes the baboon part:
http://www.pbs.org/remotelyconnected/2008/09/stress_portrait_of_a_killer.html
...One troop of baboons, we learn, was able to pull it off - to change the 
fundamental nature of their society and reduce stress all around. When the 
troop's alpha males all died - victims, tragically, of tuberculosis, which they 
got from tainted meat in the dumpster of a nearby nature lodge - the remaining 
males did something amazing: they were nice. More to the point, they weren't 
aggressive toward subordinates; suddenly, being a subordinate didn't feel worse 
than being dominant. The troop as a whole became more harmonious; as rank 
became less related to quality of life, the baboons who were lower on the totem 
pole were able, simply put, to chill out...

Here is a NYT article on the subject:
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C03E6DB1E38F930A25757C0A9629C8B63

...In a study appearing today in the journal PloS Biology (online at 
www.plosbiology.org), researchers describe the drastic temperamental and tonal 
shift that occurred in a troop of 62 baboons when its most belligerent members 
vanished from the scene. The victims were all dominant adult males that had 
been strong and snarly enough to fight with a neighboring baboon troop over the 
spoils at a tourist lodge garbage dump, and were exposed there to meat tainted 
with bovine tuberculosis, which soon killed them. Left behind in the troop, 
designated the Forest Troop, were the 50 percent of males that had been too 
subordinate to try dump brawling, as well as all the females and their young. 
With that change in demographics came a cultural swing toward pacifism, a 
relaxing of the usually parlous baboon hierarchy, and a willingness to use 
affection and mutual grooming rather than threats, swipes and bites to foster a 
patriotic spirit. 

Remarkably, the Forest Troop has maintained its genial style over two decades, 
even though the male survivors of the epidemic have since died or disappeared 
and been replaced by males from the outside. (As is the case for most primates, 
baboon females spend their lives in their natal home, while the males leave at 
puberty to seek their fortunes elsewhere.) The persistence of communal comity 
suggests that the resident baboons must somehow be instructing the immigrants 
in the unusual customs of the tribe...
 
...''We don't yet understand the mechanism of transmittal,'' said Dr. Robert M. 
Sapolsky, a professor of biology and neurology at Stanford, ''but the jerky new 
guys are obviously learning, 'We don't do things like that around here.' '' ...

...The new-fashioned Forest Troop is no United Nations, or even the average 
frat house. Its citizens remain highly aggressive and argumentative, and the 
males still obsess over hierarchy. ''We're talking about baboons here,'' said 
Dr. Sapolsky. 

What most distinguishes this congregation from others is that the males resist 
taking out their bad moods on females and underlings. When a dominant male 
wants to pick a fight, he finds someone his own size and rank. As a result, a 
greater percentage of male-male conflicts in the Forest Troop occur between 
closely ranked individuals than is seen in the control populations, where the 
bullies seek easier pickings. Moreover, Forest Troop males of all ranks spend 
more time grooming and being groomed, and just generally huddling close to 
troop mates, than do their counterpart males in the study... 

 Here is a summary of that baboon aggression taken to infanticide:
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/nature/episodes/murder-in-the-troop/a-little-help-from-their-friends/2051/

Debbi
who hopes to get her car back from the transmission repair shop very soon 


  
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Re: $10

[Deborah Harrell]

> Richard Baker <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> > Dave said:
 
> > In this case, Jon claims that John Williams is channeling erstwhile  
> > list-member Eric Rueter with his gruff posts.
> 
> I don't recall a list member of that name, but there
> was an Erik Reuter.

Who could be dreadfully annoying, but had interesting things to say at times.  
I miss several former members (even if they _were_  frequently horses' 
patooties).

Debbi
Skimming With Fervor Maru


  
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Re: Post Turtle

[Deborah Harrell]

> Doug Pensinger <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

 
> The old rancher said, "Well, ya know, Palin is a
> 'Post Turtle'."
> 
> Not being familiar with the term, the doctor asked him what
> a 'Post Turtle' was.
> 
> The old rancher said, "When you're driving down a country road you
> come across a fence post with a turtle balanced on top, that's a 'Post
> Turtle'."
> 
> The old rancher saw the puzzled look on the doctor's face so he
> continued to explain. "You know she didn't get up there by herself,
> she don't belong up there, she don't know what to do while she's up
> there, and you just wonder what kind of dummy put her up there to
> begin with."


I'm gonna haf ta pass this'un on to my friends...

But in real life that's awfully unfair to the turtle.

Debbi
Synchronicity Of The Giant Turtle Maru  ;)


  
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Re: The silence of the ludites.

[Deborah Harrell]

> 10/7/08, [EMAIL PROTECTED] <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

> On ABC, if nobody else as well, McCain was silent for 30 to 40
> seconds.
>  
> I don't have anything to comment.
>  
> Just wanted to be first in.

  Looks like the only one in...

I'm still trying to figure out why he chose Palin as VP candidate: drill, 
abstinence only, 'Creationism,'* anti-science...what independents was she 
supposed to entice?

* I strongly support teaching of 'Creationism' - as long as it includes stories 
about Tiamat, and the Giant Turtle, and the First through Fourth Worlds, and 
the Scarab and its ball of dung.

Debbi
Equal Opportunity Mythology Maru;}


  
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Re: Off-topic., monotonous posting (was Child-killing religion)

[Deborah Harrell]

> William T Goodall <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> >>  William T Goodall wrote:
> >>> I don't know who wrote:


> >>> I'm growing increasingly concerned that you are trying to use your
> >>> position on the list to intimidate and silence those with whom you  
> >>> do not agree and that this behaviour could be
> offensive to some who might otherwise participate.

> >> Seems I was right.

> It's been very quiet here since the thought police
> manifesto.

Hey, did somebody go and develop Heroes powers while I've not been looking?!

Debbi
Brain, Brain, What Is Brain? Maru


  
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Re: The Seven Warning Signs of Bogus Science

[Deborah Harrell]

> Rceeberger quoted:

> http://chronicle.com/free/v49/i21/21b02001.htm
 
 
> 4. Evidence for a discovery is anecdotal. If modern science
> has learned 
> anything in the past century, it is to distrust anecdotal
> evidence. Because 
> anecdotes have a very strong emotional impact, they serve
> to keep 
> superstitious beliefs alive in an age of science. The most
> important 
> discovery of modern medicine is not vaccines or
> antibiotics, it is the 
> randomized double-blind test, by means of which we know
> what works and what 
> doesn't. Contrary to the saying, "data" is
> not the plural of "anecdote."

But anecdotal observations by qualified people can be worth investigating 
further; I am reminded of how several of my colleagues and I, back around 1990, 
had observed that physical exercise improved patients' (and our own!) 
depression or anxiety.  Recently there has been at least one good study that 
confirms this.

Debbi
Goodall And Fossy Maru


  
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Re: Gotta get me a digeridoo

[Deborah Harrell]

> Dave Land <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> > Julia wrote:
> >> Charlie Bell wrote:
> >>> Julia Thompson wrote:

> >>> I like hearing a Theremin.  There's nothing in the world quite like
> >>> waking up to a little blues group that includes a theremin.

> >> Especially when you can't remember letting them in the house.

> > House?  What house?  I was camping!
 
> It's not camping if there's power for a Theramin.
> 
> I was once awakened from sleeping on a friend's boat on the North
> shore of Long Island by a piper playing at the end of the jetty in
> the misty dawn. *That* qualified as one of the most memorable
> awakenings in my life, and only served to confirm that, whatever
> my total ethnic make-up may be, my scots heritage is very much alive.

Oooh, bagpipes and digeridoo!  I was at the Scottish Festival in Estes Park 
last month, and the band Brother (from Australia, at least a couple of them) 
played; I'd actually seen the band at a 'fest in Oregon back in ~'95, but it 
turned out that none of the current members had belonged to the band back 
then...anyway, what a cool sound!

There was another band, mostly drums and a piper, that portrayed reasonably 
well what Klingons would sound and look like if they were into bagpipes and 
Taiko...

Debbi
More Tatoos Than You Could Remeber Maru


  
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Delurking for a moment or two

[Deborah Harrell]

Not that I was lurking, more like totally off-the-grid.  Ouch!  Over 8K emails 
to scan through!  And I bet I've missed some lively (not to say acrimonious 
) discussions; with all the political and economic goings-on, there's 
been plenty of grist for the mill.

So.  Obama is leading in the polls, including here in CO; I do think he's the 
best bet for getting us back in good standing around the world.  But whoever is 
president next is inheriting a disaster...(not having read any recent posts, I 
can only hope that all are surviving OK; I already have clients scaling back on 
lessons b/c of the economy, and it looks like a beans-and-rice kind of upcoming 
winter).

Think I'll read a few posts now-

Debbi
Cats And Ponies Doing Well Maru


  
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RE: Restricting, not: culling the species

[Deborah Harrell]

> On Fri, 6/13/08, Pat Mathews <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

> One more answer to Debbi - this time about GreenTechnology -
> as I sit here in my midcentury box in the desert with the
> swamp cooler running - people used to build for the
> climate. There once was a huge body of knowledge about how
> to do so. No high tech required; just the good services of
> an historian and an architect working in tandem. And
> wouldn't I dearly love to have a house built to such
> standards today without tearnign mine down and redoing it
> totally! Alas; a midcentury box (though rather charming in
> many ways) was what I could afford. And those were designed
> around the presence - the ubiquity - of the a/c.

If I _had_ a swamp cooler, there are many days in July and August when I'd use 
it...but sweat and a fan must suffice!

Debbi
Taosty Maru


  
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RE: Restricting, not: culling the species

[Deborah Harrell]

> On Fri, 6/13/08, Pat Mathews <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

>> Deborah Harrell says: "I think we ought to have
>> adaptation classes for those unfamiliar with our ideal
>> values."
 
> I totally agree. Enrollees will include a good many people
> who think that granting habeas corpus to accesed enemies of
> the State means we will all be murdered in our beds; those
> who think torture is an excellent and moral means of
> getting information out of suspects; and those who think
> that judges holding us to the Bill of Rights (which their
> oath binds them to do) are "activist" and
> therefore out of line; and those who think the law and the
> Constitution are not binding on the nation's chief
> executive. 


*Some* people would fail that class with lumps of coal.


Debbi
Worst-in-Show Maru


  
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Re: Evidence of gasoline guzzlers found on Jupiter

[Deborah Harrell]

Ah, seek and ye shall find:

http://seds.org/archive/sl9/sl9.html

On 1994 July 16-22, over twenty fragments of comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 collided 
with the planet Jupiter. The comet, discovered the previous year by astronomers 
Carolyn and Eugene Shoemaker and David Levy, was observed by astronomers at 
hundreds of observatories around the world as it crashed into Jupiter's 
southern hemisphere. This Web site is here to provide some of the images taken 
by amateur and professional astronomers before, during, and after the events, 
and to provide more information on this historic event.

Debbi
Dogpile Rocks Maru


  
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Re: Evidence of gasoline guzzlers found on Jupiter

[Deborah Harrell]

> On Sat, 5/24/08, Ronn! Blankenship <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

> Funny, you'd think they'd find hydrogen plentiful
> enough.  _They_ 
> must not be able to figure out how to store it, either . .
> 
> 

When did that comet smack into Jupiter?  5 years ago?  I think it was 
Goldman-sachs, or Shoemaker-levy...at any rate, it broke up and hit the planet 
in 4 or 5 places, IIRC. 

Debbi
Their Dinosaurs Have Gone Bye-Bye Maru


  
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RE: Restricting, not: culling the species

[Deborah Harrell]

Late - better than never, no?  Snippage throughout.  I *think* I've got who 
said what correct...

>On Tue, 5/20/08, [EMAIL PROTECTED] <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>> From: Deborah Harrell [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> > "[EMAIL PROTECTED]" wrote: 
> > > From: Deborah Harrell [EMAIL PROTECTED]
 
> > >Best-case scenario for population reduction is
> > >education and economic empowerment for women, as I
> > >think Pat pointed out.  
  
> > I don't really think the fact that the US has a ZPG
> > fertility rate of 2.1
> > while Europe and Japan are at 1.5 and 1.22,
> > respectively is the result of
> > Japanese women being the most liberated of the three
> > developed countries/ecconomic unions.  
 
>>Mmm, I didn't use 'liberated;' since the American
>>sense of the word has connotations of 'having sex with
>>whomever I please, whenever I please' The programs I
>>referred to (Heifer International and various
>>micro-loan systems) are about
>>reducing ignorance and poverty
>>Several studies, as I think others had mentioned, show
>>that educating girls/women leads to reduced birthrates.
 
> I agree that ecconomic development and the education of
> women have been
> correlated with lowering birth rates in underdeveloped
> countries.  It makes
> sense that areas where women cannont have ecconomic
> self-sufficiency have
> fertility rates far above ZPG...I was also thinking of liberated in
> the ecconomic
> sense, not sharing the stereotypical male understanding of
> a good sex life.

Well, Dan, doggonit, be more conscious of your word choices!  Don't give -er, 
confuse - me with ambiguous terms!  Can't you type in Gal3 or somesuch, instead 
of slippery Anglic?!
 
> Japanese culture is complex, but I'd argue that the
> requirement of
> many/most Japanese women to chose a career or a husband and
> family
> contributes a great deal to their very low fertility rate. 

Sounds logical.

> > Indeed, the EU and Japan are going to be in
> > very interesting positions in 20-50 years, with a
> > population that is highly
> > skewed towards the aged and is shrinking.  The EU's
> > population can be
> > expected to drop almost 30% every generation while
> > Japan's will drop over
> > 40%.  It is clear that, unless these
> > countries/regions show explosive
> > increases in their productivity, their GDP will
> > become stagnent and their
> > relative influence in the world will fall.  
 
>>Immigration will probably make up much of that.  
 
> Huh?  You know that that racial purity is still very
> important in Japan, right?  

Their xenophobia is legend.  And the source of many great movies, such as 
'Godzilla v. Monster X.'

>The immigration rate is so low that the CIA
> factbook simply says
> it's not available. There are 100k "guest
> workers" allowed from poorer
> countries and Americans and Europeans are allowed in low
> numbers, but
> immigration with a path to citizenship is not on the
> horizon, even though
> Japan has crossed the threshold of deaths>births.

Then they will have to adapt, or accept reduced world influence.
 
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Japan
 
> Continental Europe is at it's limit concerning
> immigration of
> non-Europeans...because of the importance of keeping the
> ethnic identity of
> Europe as it is.  This contrasts with the US, which is
> clearly on its way
> to having non-Hispanic whites as a minority.

All I am concerned about is keeping Western culture, as it aspires to be 
[liberty and justice for all, etc.], alive; I don't care who comes in, *but* I 
think we ought to have adaptation classes for those unfamiliar with our ideal 
values (obviously we have plenty of stupid priorities, as one can see from 
watching a few hours of American TV ).  My teacher friends have some 
interesting and occasionally alarming stories to tell about culture clashes 
with various immigrant groups.  The value of education for all, gender equality 
under law, no special privileges for a very few (hey, I _did_ say ideals), etc. 
-- these need to be taught and accepted as the norm.  Of course, one ought to 
have pride in one's cultural roots, while being aware of its limitations.  One 
thing that is so important to ideal Western culture as it is now, is the 
willingness to question one's assumptions and beliefs, and to alter them if 
honest reflection shows them to be in
 error.  It takes us a while, but we _have_ demonstrated this...by George, one 
of the presumptive Presidential candidates is a half-black man; when you and I 
were children, there were still racial

Restricting, not: culling the species

[Deborah Harrell]

I'm going to reply to two posts in one message here -
(*and* I changed the thread title, but won't call it
hijacking!)   ;)

> "[EMAIL PROTECTED]" wrote: 
> > From: Deborah Harrell [EMAIL PROTECTED]

> >Best-case scenario for population reduction is
> >education and economic empowerment for women, as I
> >think Pat pointed out.  
 
> I don't really think the fact that the US has a ZPG
> fertility rate of 2.1
> while Europe and Japan are at 1.5 and 1.22,
> respectively is the result of
> Japanese women being the most liberated of the three
> developed countries/ecconomic unions.  

Mmm, I didn't use 'liberated;' since the American
sense of the word has connotations of 'having sex with
whomever I please, whenever I please' I don't think it
applies to forced marriages or child brides (although
I admit I was shocked upon seeing a program about
post-pubescent Japanese schoolgirls who have sex with
older men for money/luxury goods).  The programs I
referred to (Heifer International and various
micro-loan systems - there's one in Bangladesh that
has apparently worked like gangbusters) are about
reducing ignorance and poverty.  Nearly all of the
enrollees/beneficiaries of these are women with
dependent children; health, nutritional and
environmental education are emphasized in HI, while
micro-loans are more about economic
improvement/independence (although one program
involves setting up mini health clinics as a way for a
woman to not only support her family financially, but
improves access to health care for local villagers). 
Several studies, as I think others had mentioned, show
that educating girls/women leads to reduced
birthrates.  

> Indeed, the EU and Japan are going to be in
> very interesting positions in 20-50 years, with a
> population that is highly
> skewed towards the aged and is shrinking.  The EU's
> population can be
> expected to drop almost 30% every generation while
> Japan's will drop over
> 40%.  It is clear that, unless these
> countries/regions show explosive
> increases in their productivity, their GDP will
> become stagnent and their
> relative influence in the world will fall.  

Immigration will probably make up much of that.  But I
believe that, as our Western lifestyle is not
currently sustainable, we need to reduce not merely
our numbers, but our 'human footprint.'  We ought not
be building McMansions, heating and cooling them to
70oF, driving cars that get less than 20mpg, etc. etc.
etc..  Defining "he who dies with the most toys" as a
winner is **imbecilic**.  It will drive our
civilization into the ground, and potentially affect
our home nearly as much as that comet 65 million years
ago.

>Ronn! wrote:
>>Deborah Harrell wrote:

>>I think Dr. Phlox's folk might have an interesting
>>point in their group marriage approach...wasn't each
>person married to 3 others?  Now *that* would lead to
>>wild family reunions!  :)

>Not to mention a market for king-size or larger beds.

Why not just a big ole Rumpus Room?
  ;}

>>Debbi
>>who would, if given Q powers, prevent anyone from
>>having/siring children until age 22 or so (which
would
>>also nearly eliminate the problem of birth-related
>>fistulas that devastate thousands of child brides)

>OTOH from an evolutionary viewpoint fistulas being a 
>major concern is a relatively recent development
>compared with the need to produce sufficient 
>offspring soon enough that there will be enough to 
>survive to childbearing age themselves in order to
>keep the species going before the child bride in
>question is eaten by a sabre-tooth tiger, 

  And how many other species develop
such fistulas?  We big-headed apes are at greater risk
than nearly all others, and when the child in question
is undersized because of near-starvation and overwork,
it is that much worse.  Besides, it is inefficient
from a reproductive standpoint to have females in
labor for days with stillborn results, or be a social
pariah after giving birth to one child (these girls
are not allowed to live within the family compound and
suffer exposure to weather and predators, and some
commit suicide).  Mares, does, ewes and bitches who
are unable to deliver offspring without ripping their
insides to pieces die.  Unless we humans intervene
(don't get me started on bulldogs and
Thoroughbreds)!).

>hence the reason that such a change has not already 
>occurred without the intervention of QDebbi . . .

Dammit, Jim, I oughter be a demigoddess, not a mere
docter or hosstrainer!

Debbi
who must trot off to her next lesson now


  
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Restricting, not: culling the species

[Deborah Harrell]

I'm going to reply to two posts in one message here -
(*and* I changed the thread title, but won't call it
hijacking!)   ;)

> "[EMAIL PROTECTED]" wrote: 
> > From: Deborah Harrell [EMAIL PROTECTED]

> >Best-case scenario for population reduction is
> >education and economic empowerment for women, as I
> >think Pat pointed out.  
 
> I don't really think the fact that the US has a ZPG
> fertility rate of 2.1
> while Europe and Japan are at 1.5 and 1.22,
> respectively is the result of
> Japanese women being the most liberated of the three
> developed countries/ecconomic unions.  

Mmm, I didn't use 'liberated;' since the American
sense of the word has connotations of 'having sex with
whomever I please, whenever I please' I don't think it
applies to forced marriages or child brides (although
I admit I was shocked upon seeing a program about
post-pubescent Japanese schoolgirls who have sex with
older men for money/luxury goods).  The programs I
referred to (Heifer International and various
micro-loan systems - there's one in Bangladesh that
has apparently worked like gangbusters) are about
reducing ignorance and poverty.  Nearly all of the
enrollees/beneficiaries of these are women with
dependent children; health, nutritional and
environmental education are emphasized in HI, while
micro-loans are more about economic
improvement/independence (although one program
involves setting up mini health clinics as a way for a
woman to not only support her family financially, but
improves access to health care for local villagers). 
Several studies, as I think others had mentioned, show
that educating girls/women leads to reduced
birthrates.  

> Indeed, the EU and Japan are going to be in
> very interesting positions in 20-50 years, with a
> population that is highly
> skewed towards the aged and is shrinking.  The EU's
> population can be
> expected to drop almost 30% every generation while
> Japan's will drop over
> 40%.  It is clear that, unless these
> countries/regions show explosive
> increases in their productivity, their GDP will
> become stagnent and their
> relative influence in the world will fall.  

Immigration will probably make up much of that.  But I
believe that, as our Western lifestyle is not
currently sustainable, we need to reduce not merely
our numbers, but our 'human footprint.'  We ought not
be building McMansions, heating and cooling them to
70oF, driving cars that get less than 20mpg, etc. etc.
etc..  Defining "he who dies with the most toys" as a
winner is **imbecilic**.  It will drive our
civilization into the ground, and potentially affect
our home nearly as much as that comet 65 million years
ago.

>Ronn! wrote:
>>Deborah Harrell wrote:

>>I think Dr. Phlox's folk might have an interesting
>>point in their group marriage approach...wasn't each
>person married to 3 others?  Now *that* would lead to
>>wild family reunions!  :)

>Not to mention a market for king-size or larger beds.

Why not just a big ole Rumpus Room?
  ;}

>>Debbi
>>who would, if given Q powers, prevent anyone from
>>having/siring children until age 22 or so (which
would
>>also nearly eliminate the problem of birth-related
>>fistulas that devastate thousands of child brides)

>OTOH from an evolutionary viewpoint fistulas being a 
>major concern is a relatively recent development
>compared with the need to produce sufficient 
>offspring soon enough that there will be enough to 
>survive to childbearing age themselves in order to
>keep the species going before the child bride in
>question is eaten by a sabre-tooth tiger, 

  And how many other species develop
such fistulas?  We big-headed apes are at greater risk
than nearly all others, and when the child in question
is undersized because of near-starvation and overwork,
it is that much worse.  Besides, it is inefficient
from a reproductive standpoint to have females in
labor for days with stillborn results, or be a social
pariah after giving birth to one child (these girls
are not allowed to live within the family compound and
suffer exposure to weather and predators, and some
commit suicide).  Mares, does, ewes and bitches who
are unable to deliver offspring without ripping their
insides to pieces die.  Unless we humans intervene
(don't get me started on bulldogs and
Thoroughbreds)!).

>hence the reason that such a change has not already 
>occurred without the intervention of QDebbi . . .

Dammit, Jim, I oughter be a demigoddess, not a mere
docter or hosstrainer!

Debbi
who must trot off to her next lesson now


  
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Re: culling the species

[Deborah Harrell]

Trying to start on the massive baglog of posts to
which I wish to reply-

> Julia Thompson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> > On Tue, 29 Apr 2008, jon louis mann wrote:
 
> > empowering women is definitely a pragmatic
> solution. protecting 
> > children, ending polygamy and legalizing same sex
> marriage, also...

Best-case scenario for population reduction is
education and economic empowerment for women, as I
think Pat pointed out.  Micro-loan programs and
self-help programs (frex Heifer International) are
good exemplars.  Until girls aren't force-married in
abysmal ignorance - and that's *not* just a developing
world problem, ref. JeffWarrensMayHeRotInPrison - or
denied knowledge and access to birth control, they
won't be able to choose when (or if) to have children.
 And while I applaud research on birth control pills
for men, right now nothing practical is available
(although Jay Leno's comments on the current
take-it-daily were funny - 'Ladies, are you going to
trust a man to take a pill when he can't remember to
pick up his underwear?').
 
> How do you feel about polyandry?

Actually practiced in some Himalayan communities,
where I guess resources are so scarce that it takes
more than one man to support a family (and also
apparently by some cheetahs; both groups of males are
usually brothers).  OTOH, that doesn't sound very
restful...  ;}

I think Dr. Phlox's folk might have an interesting 
point in their group marriage approach...wasn't each
person married to 3 others?  Now *that* would lead to
wild family reunions!  :)

Debbi
who would, if given Q powers, prevent anyone from
having/siring children until age 22 or so (which would
also nearly eliminate the problem of birth-related
fistulas that devastate thousands of child brides)


  
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Courage in facing death

[Deborah Harrell]

Years ago, someone asked me who my real-life heroes
were (as opposed to frex Captain Picard), and thought
it odd when I replied, after some thought, that my
parents were.  That answer remains true today, having
watched them confront my mom's pancreatic cancer,
diagnosed just over three years ago; not in-your-face
bravery, but the tight-lipped determination to fight
such a terminal diagnosis with everything (surgery,
radiation, chemotherapy), and then the long, long
journey toward accepting that some wars cannot be won.
 Not graceful acquiescence, not pretty surrender -
while Mom portrayed the gracious officer's wife
flawlessly, she grew up in the projects of
Philidelphia, and never lost that inner tough core -
but begrudging retreat when the cancer returned last
year.  Dad's steadfast faithfulness never ceased,
though I am sure it must have wobbled at times.  She
died at home, as she wished.

Debbi
Bless Hospice Maru


  

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Re: Lead (was: Resending: Malaria in the world)

[Deborah Harrell]

Today seems to be my day for computer gremlins. 
Several of the URLs in my prior post have extraneous
"..." or even "...words."  If you delete those and tap
Enter, the proper article does arrive...

Debbi
Exasperation Excess Maru



  

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Re: Lead (was: Resending: Malaria in the world)

[Deborah Harrell]

> Deborah Harrell <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

 
> I'm short on time today, but if you like I will see
> what PubMed has on crime/lead exposure, if anything.

Well, not as short as I thought.  

This is the abstract of the 2002 study about bone lead
levels and adjudicated delinquency:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12460653
...This is a case-control study of 194 youths aged
12-18, arrested and adjudicated as delinquent by the
Juvenile Court of Allegheny County, PA and 146
nondelinquent controls from high schools in the city
of Pittsburgh. Bone lead was measured by K-line X-ray
fluorescence (XRF) spectroscopy of tibia...Covariates
entered into the model were race, parent education and
occupation, presence of two parental figures in the
home, number of children in the home and neighborhood
crime rate. Separate regression analyses were also
conducted after stratification on race. RESULTS: Cases
had significantly higher mean concentrations of lead
in their bones than controls (11.0+/-32.7 vs.
1.5+/-32.1 ppm). This was true for both Whites and
African Americans...

A 2001 study on lead levels in blood and 'antisocial'
behaviors:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11792521?ordinalpos=1&itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsPanel.Pubmed_RVAbstractPlusDrugs1
... A prospective longitudinal birth cohort of 195
urban, inner-city adolescents recruited between 1979
and 1985 was examined. Relationships between prenatal
and postnatal exposure to Pb (serial blood Pb
determinations) and antisocial and delinquent
behaviors (self- and parental reports) were examined.
Prenatal exposure to Pb was significantly associated
with a covariate-adjusted increase in the frequency of
parent-reported delinquent and antisocial behaviors,
while prenatal and postnatal exposure to Pb was
significantly associated with a covariate-adjusted
increase in frequency of self-reported delinquent and
antisocial behaviors, including marijuana use. Use of
marijuana itself by Cincinnati Lead Study (CLS) teens
was strongly associated with all measures of
delinquent and antisocial behavior. This prospective
longitudinal study confirmed earlier clinical
observations and recent retrospective studies that
have linked Pb exposure with antisocial behavior in
children and adolescents... 

Both of these were small (N <200), but I'd say justify
larger studies to elaborate.

Here's one of the 'Freakonomics' guy's take on the
subject:
http://freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/10/30/did-banning-lead-lower-crime/
[Boils down to 'possibly maybe.']

This summary of two articles has some graphs and
numbers supporting the hypothesis:

http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2007-10-28-lead-crime_N.htm
...a pair of studies by economist Rick Nevin that
suggest the nation's violent-crime rate in the second
half of the 20th century is closely tied to the
widespread consumption of leaded gasoline...

This is more detailed about Nevin's studies:
http://economistsview.typepad.com/economistsview/2007/07/get-the-lead-ou.html

Commentary by Peter Schaeffer, the eighth and ninth
down, offers counterarguments that seem pretty sound
to me, except for that about 'presumably lower lead
levels in rural areas'; while rural kids no doubt had
less car exhaust exposure, they very likely had
increased gasoline/diesel fume exposure from refilling
tractors and other farm equipment.  I have no idea if
diesel had lead in it, but I can state absolutely that
you get fuel on you, your clothes, and inhale fumes
while filling farm equipment from portable fuel
containers.  (Very nasty indeed, even being as careful
as I can - watching me refuel would make any farm kid
laugh at the sissy.)  Also, farm kids did/do more
chorework like painting and pesticide/herbicide
application than their city-living counterparts.

Debbi
Use Of Borax Soap Maru   :P


  

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Re: Per capita cost/value of infrastructure?

[Deborah Harrell]

> William T Goodall <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

 
> The deniers are practising religious thinking. They
> start from the  
> desired conclusion and cherry pick and misrepresent
> evidence to  
> support that desired conclusion. Just like
> creationists and other religious asshats.


As all here know, I have no patience with deliberately
ignorant fundamentalists of all ilk, but once again
you are lumping together all believers.  And even all
conservative evangelicals are not in one camp:

http://www.religionlink.org/tip_061017a.php

...Evangelical Christians - who wield power through
their increasing numbers and political influence -
made headlines by joining the many faith groups
expressing concern about climate change. The
Evangelical Climate Initiative - including megachurch
pastors, presidents of Christian colleges, and other
leaders - issued a manifesto called "Climate Change:
An Evangelical Call to Action." While liberal and
moderate faith groups have long embraced environmental
concerns, many conservative Christians have considered
the scientific evidence inconclusive and called steps
to reduce greenhouse gases unwarranted, detrimental
and, in some cases, unrelated to religious obligation.
Evangelical leaders' high-profile campaign against
global warming, however, revealed that sharp
disagreement still exists among some in this group.
Experts say the divided opinions among evangelicals
may be key to political action on global warming...

...'The Great Warming' [is a film] endorsed by
religious groups including the Evangelical
Environmental Network. Narrated by stars Keanu Reeves
and Alanis Morissette, it includes an interview with
Richard Cizik, vice president for governmental affairs
of the National Association of Evangelicals and a
major voice supporting "creation care," a favored
Christian term for environmental awareness and action.
Cizik has written a letter on NAE letterhead that
appears on the film's Web site urging churches to
screen the film and join the campaign to reduce global
warming. The producers are encouraging congregations
of all persuasions to screen the film for their
members...

And what about Buddhists and Hindus who honor or
revere Nature as manifestation of Creation or the
Divine?

Debbi
Heretic Lutheran Gaian Deist Maru


  

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Re: Lead (was: Resending: Malaria in the world)

[Deborah Harrell]

> Alberto Vieira Ferreira Monteiro wrote:
> > Deborah Harrell wrote:

 The possible link between crime
> > and lead levels is intriguing; articles on lead's
> > harmful effects particularly WRT children have
> > been posted previously...

> I am curious about this (lead tetraethyl) - crime
> link. Brazil
> was one of the first countries to ban lead (because
> of ethanol,
> whose octane rating is high), and we don't have nice
> numbers on crime.

It was a paragraph from the posted article I was
commenting on - I didn't actually do any digging
myself.

http://www.damninteresting.com/?p=932
"...The specific harms done by environmental lead are
difficult to quantify. It is known that children are
much more apt to absorb the neurotoxic metal than
adults, and it is suspected to have stricken many
children with behavior problems, learning
difficulties, hyperactivity, and breathing
complications. Even more troubling, a number of recent
studies have shown a strong correlation between
atmospheric lead levels and crime rates. A study
published in the peer-reviewed journal Environmental
Research, which used data spanning more than fifty
years, reported a "very strong association" between
the exposure of young children to lead, and crime
rates twenty years later when they became young
adults. This correlation holds true for a wide variety
of locales, social conditions, and models of
government. The sharp decline in US crime rates which
began in the early 1990s dovetails perfectly with the
reduction of leaded gasoline in the early 1970s; and
other countries which followed suit saw similar
declines, also delayed by twenty years. It seems that
the lawmakers who claim credit for crime-reducing
legislation during that time are probably misplacing
their congratulations. In another study, Pittsburgh
University researchers found that juvenile delinquents
had lead levels four times higher on average than
law-abiding adolescents..." 

There have been several studies that show decreased IQ
with even very low levels of lead in children; IIRC it
was in the 2-4ug/dl range, with the grosser effects of
lead poisoning manifesting at greater than ~40ug/dl.  

This is the Medline for laypersons page:
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/article/002473.htm
...Over time, even low levels of lead exposure can
harm a child's mental development. The possible health
problems get worse as the level of lead in the blood
gets higher. Possible complications include:

Reduced IQ 
Slowed body growth 
Hearing problems 
Behavior or attention problems 
Failure at school 
Kidney damage 

A more detailed article from the Mayo Clinic:
http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/lead-poisoning/FL00068
...Lead levels in the blood are measured in micrograms
per deciliter (mcg/dL). An unsafe level is 10 mcg/dL
or higher — a guideline set by the CDC.

This was set in 1991; the articles I cited some years
ago about subtle effects at very low levels were from
the late nineties to early 21st, IIRC.

http://www.yale.edu/ynhti/curriculum/units/1993/5/93.05.06.x.html#r
[Has the 1991 CDC guidelines in addition to even more
detail on lead poisoning and prevention.]

I'm short on time today, but if you like I will see
what PubMed has on crime/lead exposure, if anything.

Debbi
Colonel Mustard In The Library With The Lead Pipe Maru


  

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Re: No education in Florida

[Deborah Harrell]

> Ronn! Blankenship wrote:
> > William T Goodall quoth:
 
> >* 54 percent of men said humans evolved over
> millions of years compared with 35 percent of women.
 
> The difference being those women who have experience
> with men who 
> they are very sure haven't evolved at all . . .


I didn't think that!  Nossir, not me!

Debbi
Plead The Fifth Maru   ;)


  

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keystick! Re: Lead

[Deborah Harrell]

Ah!

Darn heavy finger!

Sorry...  >:P

Debbi
It Never Did Go To My Draft File Maru


  

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Re: Lead (was: Resending: Malaria in the world)

[Deborah Harrell]

> Alberto Vieira Ferreira Monteiro wrote:
> > Deborah Harrell wrote:

 The possible link between crime
> > and lead levels is intriguing; articles on lead's
> > harmful effects particularly WRT children have
> > been posted previously...

> I am curious about this (lead tetraethyl) - crime
> link. Brazil
> was one of the first countries to ban lead (because
> of ethanol,
> whose octane rating is high), and we don't have nice
> numbers on crime.

It was a paragraph from the posted article I was
commenting on - I didn't actually do any digging
myself.

http://www.damninteresting.com/?p=932
"...The specific harms done by environmental lead are
difficult to quantify. It is known that children are
much more apt to absorb the neurotoxic metal than
adults, and it is suspected to have stricken many
children with behavior problems, learning
difficulties, hyperactivity, and breathing
complications. Even more troubling, a number of recent
studies have shown a strong correlation between
atmospheric lead levels and crime rates. A study
published in the peer-reviewed journal Environmental
Research, which used data spanning more than fifty
years, reported a "very strong association" between
the exposure of young children to lead, and crime
rates twenty years later when they became young
adults. This correlation holds true for a wide variety
of locales, social conditions, and models of
government. The sharp decline in US crime rates which
began in the early 1990s dovetails perfectly with the
reduction of leaded gasoline in the early 1970s; and
other countries which followed suit saw similar
declines, also delayed by twenty years. It seems that
the lawmakers who claim credit for crime-reducing
legislation during that time are probably misplacing
their congratulations. In another study, Pittsburgh
University researchers found that juvenile delinquents
had lead levels four times higher on average than
law-abiding adolescents..." 

There have been several studies that show decreased IQ
with even very low levels of lead in children; IIRC it
was in the 2-4ug/dl range, with the grosser effects of
lead poisoning manifesting at greater than ~40ug/dl.  

This is the Medline for laypersons page:
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/article/002473.htm
...Over time, even low levels of lead exposure can
harm a child's mental development. The possible health
problems get worse as the level of lead in the blood
gets higher. Possible complications include:

Reduced IQ 
Slowed body growth 
Hearing problems 
Behavior or attention problems 
Failure at school 
Kidney damage 

A more detailed article from the Mayo Clinic:
http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/lead-poisoning/FL00068
...Lead levels in the blood are measured in micrograms
per deciliter (mcg/dL). An unsafe level is 10 mcg/dL
or higher — a guideline set by the CDC.

This was set in 1991; the articles I cited some years
ago about subtle effects at very low levels were from
the late nineties to early 21st, IIRC.

http://www.yale.edu/ynhti/curriculum/units/1993/5/93.05.06.x.html#r
[Has the 1991 CDC guidelines in addition to even more
detail on lead poisoning and prevention.]

I'm short on time today, but if you like I will see
what PubMed has on crime/lead exposure, if anything.

Debbi
Colonel Mustard In The Library With The Lead Pipe Maru


  

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Re: Lead (was: Resending: Malaria in the world)

[Deborah Harrell]

> Alberto Vieira Ferreira Monteiro wrote:
> > Deborah Harrell wrote:

 The possible link between crime
> > and lead levels is intriguing; articles on lead's
> > harmful effects particularly WRT children have
> > been posted previously...

> I am curious about this (lead tetraethyl) - crime
> link. Brazil
> was one of the first countries to ban lead (because
> of ethanol,
> whose octane rating is high), and we don't have nice
> numbers on crime.

It was a paragraph from the posted article I was
commenting on - I didn't actually do any digging
myself.

http://www.damninteresting.com/?p=932
"...The specific harms done by environmental lead are
difficult to quantify. It is known that children are
much more apt to absorb the neurotoxic metal than
adults, and it is suspected to have stricken many
children with behavior problems, learning
difficulties, hyperactivity, and breathing
complications. Even more troubling, a number of recent
studies have shown a strong correlation between
atmospheric lead levels and crime rates. A study
published in the peer-reviewed journal Environmental
Research, which used data spanning more than fifty
years, reported a "very strong association" between
the exposure of young children to lead, and crime
rates twenty years later when they became young
adults. This correlation holds true for a wide variety
of locales, social conditions, and models of
government. The sharp decline in US crime rates which
began in the early 1990s dovetails perfectly with the
reduction of leaded gasoline in the early 1970s; and
other countries which followed suit saw similar
declines, also delayed by twenty years. It seems that
the lawmakers who claim credit for crime-reducing
legislation during that time are probably misplacing
their congratulations. In another study, Pittsburgh
University researchers found that juvenile delinquents
had lead levels four times higher on average than
law-abiding adolescents..." 

There have been several studies that show decreased IQ
with even very low levels of lead in children; IIRC it
was in the 2-4ug/dl range, with the grosser effects of
lead poisoning manifesting at greater than ~40ug/dl.  

This is the Medline for laypersons page:
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/article/002473.htm
...Over time, even low levels of lead exposure can
harm a child's mental development. The possible health
problems get worse as the level of lead in the blood
gets higher. Possible complications include:

Reduced IQ 
Slowed body growth 
Hearing problems 
Behavior or attention problems 
Failure at school 
Kidney damage 

A more detailed article from the Mayo Clinic:
http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/lead-poisoning/FL00068
...Lead levels in the blood are measured in micrograms
per deciliter (mcg/dL). An unsafe level is 10 mcg/dL
or higher — a guideline set by the CDC.

This was set in 1991; the articles I cited some years
ago about subtle effects at very low levels were from
the late nineties to early 21st, IIRC.

http://www.yale.edu/ynhti/curriculum/units/1993/5/93.05.06.x.html#r
[Has the 1991 CDC guidelines in addition to even more
detail on lead poisoning and prevention.]

I'm short on time today, but if you like I will see
what PubMed has on crime/lead exposure, if anything.

Debbi
Colonel Mustard In The Library With The Lead Pipe Maru


  

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Re: Lead (was: Resending: Malaria in the world)

[Deborah Harrell]

> Alberto Vieira Ferreira Monteiro wrote:
> > Deborah Harrell wrote:

 The possible link between crime
> > and lead levels is intriguing; articles on lead's
> > harmful effects particularly WRT children have
> > been posted previously...

> I am curious about this (lead tetraethyl) - crime
> link. Brazil
> was one of the first countries to ban lead (because
> of ethanol,
> whose octane rating is high), and we don't have nice
> numbers on crime.

It was a paragraph from the posted article I was
commenting on - I didn't actually do any digging
myself.

http://www.damninteresting.com/?p=932
"...The specific harms done by environmental lead are
difficult to quantify. It is known that children are
much more apt to absorb the neurotoxic metal than
adults, and it is suspected to have stricken many
children with behavior problems, learning
difficulties, hyperactivity, and breathing
complications. Even more troubling, a number of recent
studies have shown a strong correlation between
atmospheric lead levels and crime rates. A study
published in the peer-reviewed journal Environmental
Research, which used data spanning more than fifty
years, reported a "very strong association" between
the exposure of young children to lead, and crime
rates twenty years later when they became young
adults. This correlation holds true for a wide variety
of locales, social conditions, and models of
government. The sharp decline in US crime rates which
began in the early 1990s dovetails perfectly with the
reduction of leaded gasoline in the early 1970s; and
other countries which followed suit saw similar
declines, also delayed by twenty years. It seems that
the lawmakers who claim credit for crime-reducing
legislation during that time are probably misplacing
their congratulations. In another study, Pittsburgh
University researchers found that juvenile delinquents
had lead levels four times higher on average than
law-abiding adolescents..." 

There have been several studies that show decreased IQ
with even very low levels of lead in children; IIRC it
was in the 2-4ug/dl range, with the grosser effects of
lead poisoning manifesting at greater than ~40ug/dl.  

This is the Medline for laypersons page:
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/article/002473.htm
...Over time, even low levels of lead exposure can
harm a child's mental development. The possible health
problems get worse as the level of lead in the blood
gets higher. Possible complications include:

Reduced IQ 
Slowed body growth 
Hearing problems 
Behavior or attention problems 
Failure at school 
Kidney damage 

A more detailed article from the Mayo Clinic:
http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/lead-poisoning/FL00068
...Lead levels in the blood are measured in micrograms
per deciliter (mcg/dL). An unsafe level is 10 mcg/dL
or higher — a guideline set by the CDC.

This was set in 1991; the articles I cited some years
ago about subtle effects at very low levels were from
the late nineties to early 21st, IIRC.

http://www.yale.edu/ynhti/curriculum/units/1993/5/93.05.06.x.html#r
[Has the 1991 CDC guidelines in addition to even more
detail on lead poisoning and prevention.]

I'm short on time today, but if you like I will see
what PubMed has on crime/lead exposure, if anything.

Debbi
Colonel Mustard In The Library With The Lead Pipe Maru


  

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RE: "Ape Genius" on NOVA last night

[Deborah Harrell]

> Pat Mathews <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

> 
> The story you're loking for is Robert Heinlein's
> "Jerry Was a Man"
> 
> "Never judge a book by its movie."

Ah, thanks - I read it so long ago that I'd forgotten
just about all but the premise.

Debbi
Breed To Come Maru   =^.^=


  

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Re: "Ape Genius" on NOVA last night

[Deborah Harrell]

> I wrote:

 
> More on those spear-makers:
> 
>
http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/2008-04/chimps-with-spears/roach-text.html

[from a reporter's visit with researcher Jill Pruetz]

Shades of a short story, title and author not
recalled, of granting legal status to a
cigarette-smoking chimp (who had learned to delay
gratification, IIRC):

"...New Zealand, the Netherlands, Sweden, and the
United Kingdom have all passed legislation limiting
experimentation on great apes, and the Balearic
Islands in Spain passed a resolution in 2007 granting
them basic legal rights. In 2006 an Austrian animal
rights organization submitted an application to a
district court in Mödling to appoint a legal guardian
for a chimp named Hiasl. The strategy was to establish
"legal person" status for the hairy defendant..."

Chimp behavior snippets:

"...I had not known that chimpanzee yawns are
contagious—both among each other and to humans. I had
known that chimps laugh, but I did not know that they
get upset if someone laughs at them.* I knew that
captive chimps spit, but I hadn't known that they,
like us, seem to consider spitting the most extreme
expression of disgust—one reserved, interestingly, for
humans. I knew that a captive ape might care for a
kitten if you gave one to it, but had not heard of a
wild chimpanzee taking one in, as Tia did with a genet
kitten. The list goes on. Chimps get up to get snacks
in the middle of the night. They lie on their backs
and do "the airplane" with their children. They kiss.
Shake hands. Pick their scabs before they're
ready...As a colleague of Pruetz's once said to her,
"A chimp takes a crap in the forest, and someone
publishes a paper about it." (No exaggeration. One
paper has a section on chimpanzees' use of "leaf
napkins": "This hygienic technology is directed to
their bodily fluids (blood, semen, feces, urine,
snot). ... Their use ranges from delicate dabbing to
vigorous wiping..." 


*Cats also recognize the difference between laughing
with (as when they're playing with you and being
silly) and being made fun of (as when they completely
muff a usually-gracefully-executed move), and when
your laughter has nothing whatsoever to do with them
(as at the TV or a book).

Debbi
More Fodder For The Humorists Maru   ;)


  

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"Ape Genius" on NOVA last night

[Deborah Harrell]

This was way cool -- and a bit scary, especially
watching a chimp make a primitive spear with which to
hunt bush babies.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/apegenius/?campaign=pbshomefeatures_3_novabrapegenius_2008-02-20

One bonobo, Kanzi, understands *3000* English words
according to his researchers.

The lack of ability to understand attention-pointing
was intriguing, as dogs _do_ get this concept (even my
cats have learned this, although it took a very long
time (months) for Bashir to comprehend).  And the
related 'triangulation teaching mode' seems to be
unique to us humans, at least for now.  Inability to
delay gratification using actual desired objects
(candy) contrasted with ability to use symbols
representing those objects (numbers on cards) to
successfully wait for the treats.

More on those spear-makers:

http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/2008-04/chimps-with-spears/roach-text.html
The Fongoli chimps of Senegal will break off a branch,
sharpen it with their teeth, and use it to hunt bush
babies. That's just one of the recent discoveries that
underscore the ape-human connection.
...Unlike their better-known rain forest kin,
savanna-woodland chimps spend most of their day on the
ground. There is no canopy here. The trees are low and
grow sparsely. It's an environment very much like the
open, scratchy terrain where early humans evolved... 

Debbi
who expects Ronn or Vill to make cream pie with my
first statement  ;)


  

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Lead (was: Resending: Malaria in the world)

[Deborah Harrell]

> Curtis Burisch <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

> ...But tonight I was reading a very
> interesting article on the
> use of lead additives to petrol in the USA, and I
> thought there were some
> very interesting parallels with the whole DDT issue.
> Damn interesting site, too, with great articles.
> 
> http://www.damninteresting.com/?p=932

Even worse than the tobacco industry, no?

"...Following the death of one worker and irreversible
derangement among others at an Ethyl factory in
October 1924, the chief chemist there told reporters,
"These men probably went insane because they worked
too hard." Within days, four additional workers from
the plant died, and thirty-six others were crippled
with incurable neurological damage. The plant, it
seemed, had employed many hard workers...

"...As demand for Ethyl additive increased across the
country, the US Surgeon General launched a series of
public inquiries regarding the health risks of leaded
fuel. In response, Ethyl voluntarily withdrew its
product from the market for the duration of the
investigations. The details of over a dozen
Ethyl-related deaths and hundreds of manufacturing
injuries were revealed, but per usual these events
were blamed on worker's carelessness and horseplay... 

"...Upon learning that automotive fuel was the source
of the contamination, Dr. Patterson began to publish
materials discussing the toxic metal's ubiquity and
its probable ill effects. In order to demonstrate the
increase of lead in the environment, Patterson
proposed taking core samples from pack ice in
Greenland, and testing the lead content of each layer–
a novel concept which had not been previously
attempted. The experiment worked, and the results
showed that airborne lead had been negligible before
1923, and that it had climbed precipitously ever
since. In 1965, when the tests were conducted, lead
levels were roughly 1,000 times higher than they had
been in the pre-Ethyl era. He also compared modern
bone samples to that of older human remains, and found
that modern humans' lead levels were hundreds of times
higher...

"...The Ethyl corporation allegedly offered him
lucrative employment in exchange for more favorable
research results, but Dr. Patterson declined. For a
time thereafter, Patterson found himself ostracized
from government and corporate sponsored research
projects, including the a National Research Council
panel on atmospheric lead contamination. The Ethyl
corporation had powerful friends, including a Supreme
Court justice, members of the US Public Health
Service, and the mighty American Petroleum
Institute...

Hmm, no parallels to global warming and certain
researchers either...  The possible link between crime
and lead levels is intriguing; articles on lead's
harmful effects particularly WRT children have been
posted previously, so I won't add any.


Debbi
TEL *And* CFCs -- Quite The Resume Maru!


  

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Re: Wal-Mart and more

[Deborah Harrell]

> Dave Land <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

 
> I could have been clearer. I will beg indulgence due
> to a brain that was
> in a fog last night due to too much travel and too
> little sleep while way too ill.
> 
> Dave
> Travel advice: Don't get an upper-respiratory
> illness at 8,000 feet: it's no fun at all.

Especially if you add alcohol to the mix!  It's also
pretty arid despite the snow, given indoor heating; I
use a lot of hot tea with steam therapy when I start
to get sick.  (Little kids just don't remember not to
cough in your face, which, being seated on a pony,
they are at a perfect height to do.)

Debbi
Rooibus, Ginger And Mint Maru   :)


  

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Re: Malaria in the world

[Deborah Harrell]

> Nick Arnett <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> >jon louis mann wrote:
 
> > debbie, sorry for the top post; for some reason
> >this showed up in my bulk folder...
 
> Well, it WAS a bulky message.


Just because it's winter and I've put on a couple of
pounds is no reason to insult me, Nickelodean...   ;)

Debbi
who had a delightful ride yesterday, Cezanne's first
since before Christmas (it's been too icy to risk my
neck on a spooky horse)


  

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Resending: Malaria in the world

[Deborah Harrell]

Hmm, I've waited 5 minutes and no post, so I'm trying
again-

Here are a few article abstracts from PubMed on
mosquito nets and indoor spraying; I have edited for
length, indicated by "..." and commented or elaborated
in []:

>From Eritrea, 2006:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16635265?ordinalpos=35&itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsPanel.Pubmed_RVDocSum

A steep decline of malaria morbidity and mortality
trends in Eritrea between 2000 and 2004: the effect of
combination of control methods...This study employed
cross-sectional survey to collect data from
households, community and health facilities on
coverage and usage of Insecticide-Treated Nets (ITNs),
Indoor Residual Spraying (IRS), larvicidal activities
and malaria case management. Comparative data was
obtained from a similar survey carried out in
2001...In the period 2000-2004, approximately 874,000
ITNs were distributed and 13,109 health workers and
community health agents were trained on malaria case
management. In 2004, approximately 81% households
owned at least one net, of which 73% were ITNs and
58.6% of children 0-5 years slept under a net...IRS
coverage increased with the combined amount of DDT and
Malathion used rising from 6,444 kg, in 2000 to 43,491
kg, in 2004, increasing the population protected from
117,017 to 259,420. Drug resistance necessitated
regimen change to chloroquine plus
sulfadoxine-pyrimethamine. During the period, there
was a steep decline in malaria morbidity and case
fatality by 84% and 40% respectively. Malaria
morbidity was strongly correlated to the numbers of
ITNs distributed...and the amount (kg) of DDT and
Malathion used for IRS... 


>From the Solomon Islands, 2004 [full article avail.]:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15331840?ordinalpos=1&itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsPanel.Pubmed_RVDocSum

The incidence of malaria in Solomon Islands has been
decreasing since 1992. The control program used a
combination of methods including DDT residual house
spraying and insecticide-treated mosquito nets. To
determine how much each method contributed to malaria
control, data were analyzed on monthly incidence and
on control activities for 41 of 110 malaria zones over
the same time period (January 1993 to August 1999).
After correction for endogeneity, then spraying,
insecticide treatment of nets, and education about
malaria are all independently associated with
reduction in incident cases of malaria or fever, while
larviciding with temephos is not. The evidence
suggests that although impregnated bed nets cannot
entirely replace DDT spraying without substantial
increase in incidence, their use permits reduced DDT
spraying. The paper shows that non-experimental data
can be used to infer causal links in epidemiology,
provided that instrumental variables are available to
correct for endogeneity.


>From a trial of bifenthrin treated mosquito nets in
India (2005, full article avail.):
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15713980?ordinalpos=1&itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsPanel.Pubmed_RVAbstractPlusDrugs1

The main rural malaria vector Anopheles culicifacies
has developed resistance to dichloro diphenyl
trichloroethane (DDT), hexachloro cyclo hexane (HCH)
and malathion in the state of Haryana in northern
India. An alternative synthetic pyrethroid insecticide
bifenthrin was therefore evaluated on mosquito nets
against anopheline and culicine mosquitoes, in two
villages...Two formulations of bifenthrin, suspension
concentrate (SC) and micro-emulsion (ME) were compared
with micro-capsule suspension (CS) of
lambdacyhalothrin. The impact of three doses of
bifenthrin (10, 25 and 50 mg/m(2)) [also untreated
controls]...Efficacy of treated nets on mosquito
density was assessed by calculating mosquito entry
rate, immediate mortality, delayed mortality and
excito-repellency to the insecticides...Bioassays on
treated nets against A. culicifacies recorded 100 per
cent mortality up to tenth fortnight for all the doses
of impregnation with bifenthrin (SC and ME) and
lambdacyhalothrin (CS). Ring-net bioassays against An.
culicifacies showed median knock-down time between 3.1
to 11.4 min. Behavioural indices...reduction in entry
rates of anopheline and culicine mosquitoes into the
rooms with treated nets compared to control indicated
good efficacy...Indoor (immediate) mortality of
mosquitoes with bifenthrin ME formulation was
relatively lower compared to SC fomulation of
bifenthrin and based on delayed mortility and
continued susceptibility in bioassays, bifenthrin ME
at the rate of 10 mg/m(2) dose was found suitable for
the impregnation of mosquito nets for phase III trial.


Another 2005 from India; this includes indoor DDT
spraying as one branch:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16134977?ordinalpos=29&itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsPanel.Pubmed_RVDocSum

A field trial was carried out...on the efficacy of
mosquito nets treated with a tablet formulation of
deltamethrin (K-

Malaria in the world

[Deborah Harrell]

Here are a few article abstracts from PubMed on
mosquito nets and indoor spraying; I have edited for
length, indicated by "..." and commented or elaborated
in []:

>From Eritrea, 2006:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16635265?ordinalpos=35&itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsPanel.Pubmed_RVDocSum

A steep decline of malaria morbidity and mortality
trends in Eritrea between 2000 and 2004: the effect of
combination of control methods...This study employed
cross-sectional survey to collect data from
households, community and health facilities on
coverage and usage of Insecticide-Treated Nets (ITNs),
Indoor Residual Spraying (IRS), larvicidal activities
and malaria case management. Comparative data was
obtained from a similar survey carried out in
2001...In the period 2000-2004, approximately 874,000
ITNs were distributed and 13,109 health workers and
community health agents were trained on malaria case
management. In 2004, approximately 81% households
owned at least one net, of which 73% were ITNs and
58.6% of children 0-5 years slept under a net...IRS
coverage increased with the combined amount of DDT and
Malathion used rising from 6,444 kg, in 2000 to 43,491
kg, in 2004, increasing the population protected from
117,017 to 259,420. Drug resistance necessitated
regimen change to chloroquine plus
sulfadoxine-pyrimethamine. During the period, there
was a steep decline in malaria morbidity and case
fatality by 84% and 40% respectively. Malaria
morbidity was strongly correlated to the numbers of
ITNs distributed...and the amount (kg) of DDT and
Malathion used for IRS... 


>From the Solomon Islands, 2004 [full article avail.]:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15331840?ordinalpos=1&itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsPanel.Pubmed_RVDocSum

The incidence of malaria in Solomon Islands has been
decreasing since 1992. The control program used a
combination of methods including DDT residual house
spraying and insecticide-treated mosquito nets. To
determine how much each method contributed to malaria
control, data were analyzed on monthly incidence and
on control activities for 41 of 110 malaria zones over
the same time period (January 1993 to August 1999).
After correction for endogeneity, then spraying,
insecticide treatment of nets, and education about
malaria are all independently associated with
reduction in incident cases of malaria or fever, while
larviciding with temephos is not. The evidence
suggests that although impregnated bed nets cannot
entirely replace DDT spraying without substantial
increase in incidence, their use permits reduced DDT
spraying. The paper shows that non-experimental data
can be used to infer causal links in epidemiology,
provided that instrumental variables are available to
correct for endogeneity.


>From a trial of bifenthrin treated mosquito nets in
India (2005, full article avail.):
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15713980?ordinalpos=1&itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsPanel.Pubmed_RVAbstractPlusDrugs1

The main rural malaria vector Anopheles culicifacies
has developed resistance to dichloro diphenyl
trichloroethane (DDT), hexachloro cyclo hexane (HCH)
and malathion in the state of Haryana in northern
India. An alternative synthetic pyrethroid insecticide
bifenthrin was therefore evaluated on mosquito nets
against anopheline and culicine mosquitoes, in two
villages...Two formulations of bifenthrin, suspension
concentrate (SC) and micro-emulsion (ME) were compared
with micro-capsule suspension (CS) of
lambdacyhalothrin. The impact of three doses of
bifenthrin (10, 25 and 50 mg/m(2)) [also untreated
controls]...Efficacy of treated nets on mosquito
density was assessed by calculating mosquito entry
rate, immediate mortality, delayed mortality and
excito-repellency to the insecticides...Bioassays on
treated nets against A. culicifacies recorded 100 per
cent mortality up to tenth fortnight for all the doses
of impregnation with bifenthrin (SC and ME) and
lambdacyhalothrin (CS). Ring-net bioassays against An.
culicifacies showed median knock-down time between 3.1
to 11.4 min. Behavioural indices...reduction in entry
rates of anopheline and culicine mosquitoes into the
rooms with treated nets compared to control indicated
good efficacy...Indoor (immediate) mortality of
mosquitoes with bifenthrin ME formulation was
relatively lower compared to SC fomulation of
bifenthrin and based on delayed mortility and
continued susceptibility in bioassays, bifenthrin ME
at the rate of 10 mg/m(2) dose was found suitable for
the impregnation of mosquito nets for phase III trial.


Another 2005 from India; this includes indoor DDT
spraying as one branch:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16134977?ordinalpos=29&itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsPanel.Pubmed_RVDocSum

A field trial was carried out...on the efficacy of
mosquito nets treated with a tablet formulation of
deltamethrin (K-O TAB) against malaria vectors.
Treated nets were used in one 

Re: Titan tie-in: Extremophile Hunt Begins

[Deborah Harrell]

> Charlie Bell <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> >On 16/02/2008 Deborah Harrell quoted:

 > > "...Researchers have found
> > microbes living in ice, in boiling water, in
> nuclear
> > reactors. These "strange" extremophiles may in
> fact be
> > the norm for life elsewhere in the cosmos..."
 
> Indeed, these "extremophiles" may be part of the
> route from chemistry - 
>  > complex self-sustaining reactions (hypercycles)
> -> chemical cells - 
>  > recognisable life -> biomes and ecosystems.

It was really neat to see the various colored
algae/bacterial mats in Yellowstone's geysers and
mudpots, and red algae (I presume) in high Rockies
snow.  If I was to go back to research, that's what
I'd do.

Debbi
Check It Out Maru  :)


  

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Re: One for Pat

[Deborah Harrell]

> Ronn! Blankenship wrote:
> > Deborah Harrell wrote:

 
> >
> >...feline [wisdom] states "I rule, you drool."
 
> Last night's "Final Jeopardy" category was "Animals"
> and the clue was 
> "C. Familiaris, which ranges in size from a 2-pound
> Mexican version 
> to 200 pounds, is this animal," and one of the three
> responded "What is a cat?"

  Maybe if Garfield's belly expands
intradimensionally...?

IMO, any dog that weighs less than a cat is bound to
have serious emotional problems.   :P

Debbi
Constant Quivering Maru


  

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Titan tie-in: Extremophile Hunt Begins

[Deborah Harrell]

This is pretty cool -

> A team of scientists has just set off to explore a
> strange lake in Antarctica, which may be home to
> exotic forms of microscopic life.

http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2008/07feb_cloroxlake.htm?list91324

"...Antarctica's Lake Untersee, fed by glaciers,
always covered with ice, and very alkaline, is one of
the most unusual lakes on Earth. The upper 70 meters
of lakewater is so alkaline "its pH is like strong
CloroxTM," says expedition leader Richard Hoover of
NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center. "And to make it
even more interesting, the lake's sediments produce
more methane than any other natural body of water on
our planet. If we find life here, it will have
important implications."

Lake Untersee is a sort of test case for other exotic
places around the solar system (namely Mars, comets,
and the icy moons of Jupiter and Saturn) where life
might be found in the extremes. Many of those places
are cold and methane-rich--"not unlike Lake Untersee."

"One thing we've learned in recent years," notes
Hoover, "is that you don't have to have a 'Goldilocks'
zone with perfect temperature, a certain pH level, and
so forth, for life to thrive." Researchers have found
microbes living in ice, in boiling water, in nuclear
reactors. These "strange" extremophiles may in fact be
the norm for life elsewhere in the cosmos..."

Debbi
Mellow Jello Maru


  

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Re: One for Pat

[Deborah Harrell]

> Robert Seeberger <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

> Cat ladies always like stuff like this 

I cannot speak for Pat, but I prefer the term "Blinded
By The Feline" myself.
 
> The LOLcat Bible
> 
> http://www.lolcatbible.com/index.php?title=Genesis_1
> 
> Oh hai. In teh beginnin Ceiling Cat maded teh skiez
> An da Urfs, but he did not eated dem.
> 2 Da Urfs no had shapez An haded dark face, An
> Ceiling Cat rode invisible bike over teh waterz.
 

  Dearly Bewhiskered, forgive these foolish
primates their conceits; remember that they only seek
to emulate Your Glossiness, but lo they are naked and
practically deaf, as well as terrified of the dark
which is Your Hunting...

 
> The Strange Beliefs Of Cats Maru

Similar to the Zen contraction "Before enlightenment,
chop wood, carry water.  After enlightenment, carry
water, chop wood," feline technology states "I rule,
you drool."

Debbi
Bashir And Lihleete Have No Fear Of Anonymous Maru  ;)


  

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Re: CoS in the news

[Deborah Harrell]

> Dave Land <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

 
> We Methodists only have the expression "Dry as a
> Methodist picnic" to stereotype us.

I still grin at the joke (paraphrased):

When asked to bring something that expressed their
faith to Show and Tell, thus spake the children-
Mary: I'm Catholic, and this is a rosary.
David: I'm Jewish, and this is a mennorah.
Paul: I'm Lutheran, and this is a casserole dish.

Debbi
Heretic Lutheran Gaian Deist  :)


  

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Re: Anonymous' next target: Princess Biscuit

[Deborah Harrell]

Robert Seeberger <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

> http://tinyurl.com/2a3q37
> 
> I laughed til I almost pissed myself.
 
> xponent
> Hey Deb! Maru


You don't understand.  My Little Ponies(TM) are *evil*
inplastic.  The innocent are corrupted from the true
Way of The Horse; those depictions of The Garden are
_not_ a joke, but depict the fall from grace in
sickening pastel colors...

Debbi
Combable Manes'n'Tails Maru;)


  

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Re: US Doomed

[Deborah Harrell]

I wrote:

> Did anyone watch 'Cheney's Law' on PBS recently? 

Forgot to provide a link:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/cheney/

"For three decades Vice President Dick Cheney
conducted a secretive, behind-closed-doors campaign to
give the president virtually unlimited wartime power.
Finally, in the aftermath of 9/11, the Justice
Department and the White House made a number of
controversial legal decisions. Orchestrated by Cheney
and his lawyer David Addington, the department
interpreted executive power in an expansive and
extraordinary way, granting President George W. Bush
the power to detain, interrogate, torture, wiretap and
spy -- without congressional approval or judicial
review..."

Debbi
There Really Are No Words Maru   >:P



  

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Re: US Doomed

[Deborah Harrell]

> Charlie Bell <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> > On 16/01/2008, at 2:20 PM, Doug Pensinger wrote: 
> >> John Garcia wrote:

> >> Amending the Constitution is not as easy as
> Huckabee may wish,(pun intended)Gracias a Dios. See
> >> http://www.usconstitution.net/constam.html.
> >> If elected, he won't be able to just wave his
> >> hand and have it done.

> > You know, a few years ago I would have said the
> > same thing about official torture, 
> ...but America doesn't torture, so what they're
> > doing can't be torture...

> It's ever more astonishing to me that there has been
> no impeachment (let alone a war crimes tribunal...)
> Then again, these c***s***ers  
> have insinuated themselves at all levels, and
> they've probably made  
> sure they've got a lot of ammo on anyone who'd be
> likely to lead a genuine move to impeach.

Apparently incompetence, lying, and law-breaking are
not impeachable offenses...
Did anyone watch 'Cheney's Law' on PBS recently?  I
knew this group of chickenhawks was very bad news
indeed, but they're even worse than I believed.  And
I'll have to retract a few of the nasty comments I
directed at Ashcroft, who, scary as he was, did draw
the line at flagrant law-breaking, even from his
sickbed.

Debbi
One Nation Under Sociopaths Maru>:(


  

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Re: Correlation v. causality (was Re: Poll finds more Americans believe in devil than Darwin)

[Deborah Harrell]

> Warren Ockrassa <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> > On Dec 3, 2007, at 6:51 PM, Nick Arnett wrote:

 
> > There are iatrogenic illnesses, those that are  
> > caused by
> > the healer.  I have no doubt that there are
> > parallels in religion, but just
> > as we don't shut down hospitals because, for
> example, people pick up
> > infections there, it is not a compelling argument
> for shutting down
> > churches.  Nobody is arguing that zero harm is
> done by religion.
 
> To me, there's a difference between hospitals and
> churches, though;  
> hospitals are places where the rules and results of
> science-based  
> research are applied. By and large it seems to me
> that churches aren't of that nature.

  Well, we strive and hope for sound science
in our medicine; unfortunately we have, IMO, a runaway
for-profit frenzy.  I am astounded at the continual
bombardment of advertising to convince Americans that
they need these pills, those injectables, that
session-under-the-knife to be healthy, happy and
*normal.*  What a freak show.  Then, of course, there
are the "take these natural compounds only" hucksters
-I mean, gurus- also eager to extract dollars from
ignorant folks' pockets.  

I see a strong parallel between the desire for a
simple set of rules to win the divine jackpot, and the
desire to gain "eternal youth" by pills & procedures. 
In neither case does one have to think or question or
work for one's reward.  Genuine spiritual growth and
improved health require time, effort and
dedication...with no guarantee of "success" in the
conventional sense.  

Debbi
Embrace The Journey (Like There's A Choice!) Maru


  

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Re: Poll finds more Americans believe in devil than Darwin

[Deborah Harrell]

> William T Goodall <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

>
http://uk.reuters.com/articlePrint?articleId=UKN2922875820071129

> DALLAS (Reuters Life!) - More Americans believe in a
> literal hell and  
> the devil than Darwin's theory of evolution,
> according to a new Harris poll... 



Lookit th' evydents, boyo -- how else could Dick
Cheney's heart keep beating!?!

  Ask any Intelligent Designer why a 50%+
inherent abortion rate (of all human fertilised eggs)
demonstrates divinty over 'survival of the fittest.'

Debbi
Heretic Lutheran Gaeian Deist Maru


  

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Reading (was: Uplift at Yellowstone)

[Deborah Harrell]

> pencimen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> > Deborah wrote 

> > I recently finished _Inversion_, which I don't
> think
> > is a Culture tale, but I found it compelling. 
 
> Oh, but it is!  8^)
> 
> Doug
> Prime Directive? Maru 

Charlie also corrected me; that was only my second
Banks read, so at least I'm 'getting' his style, if
not the Culture gist...

I have, however, sworn off S. Donaldson, as he
*really* has some issues with women and torture and
helplessness...phphphth!  I need only read a bit of
news to get the same in reality.  >:/

Did I mention a book _Reliant_ this summer past?  Now
I can't recall the author, but I enjoyed the
outcast-become-heroic (heroinec?) exploration.

Debbi
who recently finished _The Golden Compass_ since the
fanatics labeled it 'evil' (I don't think so!)


  

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Re: Uplift at Yellowstone

[Deborah Harrell]

> Doug <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

 
> Consider Phlebus is my favorite Banks, but I enjoyed
> all of the culture novels.

I recently finished _Inversion_, which I don't think
is a Culture tale, but I found it compelling. 
Although he (Banks) might consider seeing someone
about his preoccupation with torture...

Debbi
Umbrella Raised And Braced Maru;)


  

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Re: Br*n: Uplift at Star Trek

[Deborah Harrell]

> "Lance A. Brown" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> >Deborah Harrell wrote:

> > Andre Norton wrote a children's book called _Star
> > Cat_ IIRC, about a race of telepathic
> > interstellar-travelling cats...hmm, maybe we've
> > mentioned that here previously.
> 
> Oh my.   I own a copy of that book. :-)

Having my own two star-kitties (...hmmm, maybe that
ought to be 'owned by'), I can attest to their
insistence on what they want, how they want it, and
when they want it!

Bashir has pretty much given up on chasing deer and
turkeys; I guess without some sort of ray-gun, he's
finally realized that he can't bring home the venison
or drumsticks.

Debbi
Randomly Accessing Maru


  

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Re: Br*n: Uplift at Star Trek

[Deborah Harrell]

> Ronn! Blankenship wrote:
> > 10/4/2007, Deborah Harrell wrote:
 
> >Not to underplay Himself's importance or
> brilliance,
> >but genetic engineering of 'lower' animals to get
> >intelligent servants/companions is not His
> invention:
> >the book I just referenced, _Breed To Come_ is
> >about gengineered cats

> Do you think cats would see being made more like
> humans as an improvement?

> At Least They Could Use The Can Opener Maru


And wouldn't Lihleete be delighted to do that herself?
 But of course all us'n cat-owned know th' answer to
yer qwery: *MMMrroewNO!**  It would be a major step
downward from their current multidimentional
existence.

Andre Norton wrote a children's book called _Star Cat_
IIRC, about a race of telepathic
interstellar-travelling cats...hmm, maybe we've
mentioned that here previously.

Debbi
who shockingly remembers enough organic chemistry
(from 'way back in 1979 I think!) to help tutor a
younger friend today...alkane, alkadiene,
1,3-dichlorocycloheptane...  

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Re: Cat free London?

[Deborah Harrell]

> Ronn! Blankenship wrote:
> > 10/4/2007, Deborah Harrell wrote:
 
> >And Of Course King Of The Wind!
 
> I've heard that Beano can help with that . . .


Do you have any idea *how much* Beano it'd take to cut
down on an equid's flatulence?!  (Well, actually, I
don't think they'd survive the experience, since their
guts are essentially big bags of fermenting...stuff.
)

Debbi
It Lives! Maru

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Re: Hybrid Cars: An unexpected complaint

[Deborah Harrell]

> PAT MATHEWS <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

> Adding a nice little purr to the hybrid motors might
> prove to catch the 
> public's fancy, so maybe we're not just accomodating
> 0.5% of the population.

 I've already been startled (and so was the
horse, thank goodness it was Darby and not Cezanne) by
a hybrid coming up behind us.  I'd guess that any
number of folks on foot or bicycle depend on _hearing_
a car as part of their safety awareness, not just
blind people.  And what about where the trail crosses
a street at a sharp turn?  I've avoided horse-, bike-
and on-foot accidents just by being able to hear the
idiot speeder before they rounded the curve at ~twice
the posted speed...I don't see speeders slowing down,
or sounding a special tootler as they whiz about the
neighborhood.

Debbi
Mare In The Headlights Maru


  

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Re: It Came From Outer Space (sorta...)

[Deborah Harrell]

> I wrote:

> Looks like the astronauts have been lucky so far and
> in retrospect justifies the extremes of quarantine
> post-return (well, and pre-flight too) from
> missions:
 

I'd meant to look up a more technical article for
those so-inclined; here is one:

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/09/070924151126.htm

...Their results, published in the journal Proceedings
of the National Academy of Sciences, reveal a key role
for a master regulator, called Hfq, in triggering the
genetic changes that show an increase in the virulence
of Salmonella as a result of spaceflight..."We chose
to measure gene expression at the mRNA level since the
technique to do this, called microarray analysis, is a
highly advanced and convenient way to quantitatively
measure the expression of every gene in a single
experiment," said Wilson, who coordinated the team's
molecular profiling efforts for the Nickerson lab, and
played a central role in the performance of these
experiments, including data analysis. "It is a very
powerful technique that was very applicable to the
spaceflight experiment. The isolation of mRNA poses
particular challenges since it is very sensitive to
degradation, but we designed the experiment using a
fixative that preserved the mRNA very well."
...The study discovered that an important regulatory
protein, Hfq, may be a key molecule responsible for
the increased virulence due to space flight. "Hfq is a
protein that binds to and regulates a number of
regulatory RNAs, which in turn, control gene
expression," said Nickerson. "Our studies suggest that
there may be a role for these regulatory RNAs in the
cellular response to the physical and mechanical
forces found in spaceflight, which are relevant to
conditions that cells encounter here on Earth during
the normal course of their lifecycles."

These results have important implications for human
health since Salmonella (and other gut-related
bacterial pathogens) are a leading cause of food-borne
illness and infectious disease, especially in the
developing world. Nickerson's group further highlights
Hfq as a potential therapeutic target, since no
vaccine currently exists for Salmonella food-borne
infections in humans. In addition, the space flight
studies may shed new light on why Salmonella has
become increasingly resistant to antibiotic
treatment... 

This one adds some interesting info too:

http://www.the-scientist.com/news/home/53627/
...Some research has indicated that Hfq expression
should increase with increasing virulence, making the
decrease in Hfq "particularly puzzling," according to
Lionello Bossi of the National Center of Scientific
Research in France, who was not a co-author. But other
work has shown that bacterial virulence can sometimes
increase when classic virulence genes are
down-regulated, Nickerson said. "This suggests
exciting new insight in terms of how these pathogens
are causing disease in our body." 
 
It's thought that the space between microvilli
protrusions on intestinal cells creates a free-fall
environment much like that encountered in outer space,
explained co-author Kerstin Höner zu Bentrup of Tulane
University Health Sciences Center in New Orleans. "We
can actually mimic now what's going on in an
environment that Salmonella sees in your gut shortly
before it infects the cells." 

According to Laura Frost of the University of Alberta
in Canada, who was not involved in the study,
activation of Hfq-controlled genes is good evidence
that stress responses are activated in bacteria grown
in space. "The interesting thing about this experiment
is that low gravity appears to be a stress that the
bacteria can detect." 

The authors also found that flight samples showed
evidence of increased biofilm formation, which could
help explain their increased virulence, said Höner zu
Bentrup. "Biofilm formation is a major player in
virulence," largely because bacteria aggregated in
biofilms are less susceptible to host defense
mechanisms, she told The Scientist... 

There's a list of lots more articles at the end of
that, as well as a disagreement from a PhD about the
conclusion.

It makes sense to me that gene expression could change
under zero-gee, as adaptation (of behavior, of growth
requirements, eventually by gene-selectio) is pretty
much what all living things must do when their
environmnet changes.

Debbi
Worms In Space Maru


   

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Re: Br*n: Uplift at Star Trek

[Deborah Harrell]

> Alberto Monteiro <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> > Deborah Harrell wrote:
 

> > and what about _Planet of the Apes_?
 
> This is not Uplift, this is time-travel paradox. The
> apes become intelligent because they inherit from
> Caesar,
> and Caeser is intelligent because his parents com
> from
> the future where chimpanzees are intelligent. 

 I thought there was something about a virus
that wiped out dogs and cats, and chimps were tinkered
with gene-wise, which is why Caesar's parents were
smart?  But that might have been in one of the movies,
not the original book...
 
> [ok, but what about gorillas and orangutans?]

  Some pesky gene-transfering virus, of course!

Debbi
You Lift Me Up Maru   :)


  

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It Came From Outer Space (sorta...)

[Deborah Harrell]

Looks like the astronauts have been lucky so far, and
in retrospect justifies the extremes of quarantine
post-return (well, and pre-flight too) from missions:

http://www.technologyreview.com/Biotech/19425/
...Salmonella grown onboard the space shuttle was many
times deadlier than its terrestrial counterparts. The
study suggests that NASA and other space agencies may
need to worry that long manned missions will increase
the virulence of microorganisms that astronauts
inevitably carry with them. It has also given
microbiologists insights into Salmonella that may lead
to new therapies for infections on Earth.

Researchers led by Cheryl Nickerson, associate
professor at the Arizona State University Biodesign
Institute, found that Salmonella grown during
space-shuttle mission STS-115 in 2006 underwent major
changes in the expression of 167 genes. When
administered to mice back on Earth, the bacteria
proved many times more deadly than an equivalent
strain grown on the ground...

...[Those] bacteria grown in space displayed major
changes in the activity of 167 genes and in the
production of 73 proteins. Lower concentrations of the
space bacteria caused lethal infections in mice, and
the space bacteria killed more mice sooner than those
grown on Earth.

Nickerson says that these changes may be due to
mechanical stresses that microgravity imposes on the
bacterial cells. In microgravity, cells in a test tube
or in our bodies are in a "state of buoyancy, floating
suspended," she says. This changes the flow of fluids
over the surfaces of the cells, and hence the cells'
behavior

Spaceflight also alters the genetic activity of human
cells. "We evolved in a one-gravity environment," says
Becker. "There are fundamental changes when you take
gravity away." One study showed that spaceflight
caused changes in the expression of more than 1,600
genes in human kidney cells grown in culture...

...The Arizona scientists provided evidence that one
particular Salmonella gene regulates most of the
molecular changes that the bacteria underwent. This
global regulator, which seems to help the bacteria
respond to stress by becoming more virulent, is a
potential therapeutic target for future Salmonella
treatments...

[me] Now that could be quite something - a new target
for antibacterial development is sorely needed, more
or less desperately, depending on who you read.  If
this gene is present in other gram-negatives, it could
be the basis for new classes of drugs/therapies.  Of
course, I'd be awfully surprised if some of the little
buggers didn't work out a counter-measure.

Debbi
Andromeda Strain Maru


   

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Re: Br*n: Uplift at Star Trek

[Deborah Harrell]

> Alberto Vieira Ferreira Monteiro wrote:

> Watching a Deep Space 9 episode, something caught my
> attention.
> 
> Quoting from:
>
http://memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/Vorta#History_and_Politics
> 
>   The Vorta believe, perhaps apocryphally, that they
> previously 
>   existed as small, timid, ape-like creatures living
> in hollowed-out 
>   trees to avoid the many predators on their
> homeworld. A group 
>   of Vorta hid a Changeling from an angry mob, and
> in return the 
>   Changeling promised that one day they would be
> transformed 
>   and placed at the head of a vast interstellar
> empire. The 
>   Founders fulfilled this promise by genetically
> changing the 
>   Vorta into humanoids and employing them at the
> highest 
>   level of the Dominion. (DS9: "Treachery, Faith and
> the Great River")
> 
> Is this an Uplift rip-off?

Not to underplay Himself's importance or brilliance,
but genetic engineering of 'lower' animals to get
intelligent servants/companions is not His invention:
the book I just referenced, _Breed To Come_ is about
gengineered cats and was written sometime in the late
'60's or early '70's, and what about _Planet of the
Apes_?

Oh, and somebody recommended _Footfall_, which I am
nearly through, and in addition to the gengineered
"oliphaunts", there is I think a reference to
Himself's work WRT 'if somebody loved dolphins, whales
and chimps...'

Debbi
Starting At The Near End Maru   :)


   

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Re: Cat free London?

[Deborah Harrell]

> Julia Thompson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> > On Tue, 2 Oct 2007, Alberto Monteiro wrote:
> >> Julia Thompson wrote:

> >> But what about the Cat Who Went To Heaven?

> > Is this another version of the joke about "The
> Lawyer Who Went To Heaven"
> > or "The Engineer Who Went To Hell"?
> 
> No, it's a book that won the Newbery Medal. 
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newbery_Medal

I read that book in 6th grade (I'd gone through all
the horse and dog stories in the school library);
cried my eyes out.  Redemption is always possible.

Then I read Andre Norton's _Breed To Come_, and the
rest is my literary history...

By the by, this was another favorite of mine from the
Newbery List:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/From_the_Mixed-Up_Files_of_Mrs._Basil_E._Frankweiler
This book tells the story of Claudia Kincaid, a
precocious 12-year-old girl who feels underappreciated
by her parents. She decides to run away from home just
long enough to show her family what they would be
missing without her. Unfortunately, she doesn't enjoy
hardship or discomfort, which makes traditional
running away problematic. To solve this problem,
Claudia decides to stay at the Metropolitan Museum of
Art in New York City. She persuades her younger
brother Jamie to accompany her: he's quiet, but most
importantly, he has a secret stash of cash he's
accumulated by cheating at card games with his best
friend, Bruce...

Debbi
And Of Course King Of The Wind! Maru
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Forget children's health, and the troops upon return...

[Deborah Harrell]

Golly gee willikers, we *can't* pay for kids to get
vaccines when we're at war!  And we sure can't pay for
those troops, coming home after so long, to get any
better education either...heck, we hafta libel - uh, I
meant LABEL - those with PSTD as having "personality
disorder" to prevent that pesky after-battle care from
draining our profits...

http://www.wcsh6.com/news/article.aspx?storyid=71741
When they came home from Iraq, 2,600 members of the
Minnesota National Guard had been deployed longer than
any other ground combat unit. The tour lasted 22
months and had been extended as part of President
Bush's surge...Anderson's orders, and the orders of
1,161 other Minnesota guard members, were written for
729 days. Had they been written for 730 days, just one
day more, the soldiers would receive those benefits to
pay for school.  "Which would be allowing the soldiers
an extra $500 to $800 a month," Anderson said...

I
Have 
Had 
It.

Impeach this hypocrite.
And send the neocons - especially Rumsfeld - off to
drive the streets of Bagdad in an unmodified Humvee
for a year.  Should they last so long.

Debbi
Jefferson Is Beginning To Make More Sense, Scarily
Maru  >:/


  

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Re: Larry Craig Interview With Police

[Deborah Harrell]

> Julia Thompson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> > Mauro Diotallevi wrote:
> >> Julia Thompson wrote:

> >> 4)  I like Bulleit bourbon.  :)
> >>
> >> 5)  And chocolate cake.  But not both at once. 
> (Not that I've had the
> >> opportunity to try both at once)

> > I've never tried it with bourbon before, but
> scotch and chocolate cake
> > is one of the true culinary joys of life.  I first
> learned this at a
> > birthday party for previous brineller Reggie B.

Mmm, a good single malt and deepest darkest Godiva...
Oh, yes.  ;}
This Sunday I'm off to Estes Park for the Scottish
Festival; Edinburgh's (sp?) pipe band is there, among
others. 
 
> OK, now you have me thinking about drinking bourbon
> with the twins' birthday cakes now

Well, I did see an infotainment snippet on Ladies' Day
out at the park, with wine and toddlers...kinda
creepy, actually, but *I'd* need serious
brain-altering drugs to survive dealing with toddlers,
even though they're cute as June bugs!  

Debbi
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Fwd: Madeleine L'Engle Dies at 88

[Deborah Harrell]

One of my bookclub friends sent this (without a link
however); I still reread some of the 'Austin Family'
series from time to time.

> HARTFORD, Conn. - Author Madeleine L'Engle, whose
> novel "A Wrinkle in Time" has been enjoyed by
> generations of schoolchildren and adults since the
> 1960s, has died, her publicist said Friday. She was
> 88.
 
> L'Engle died Thursday at a nursing home in
> Litchfield of natural causes...
 
> The Newbery Medal winner wrote more than 60 books,
> including fantasies, poetry and memoirs, often
> highlighting spiritual themes and her Christian
> faith.
> 
> Although L'Engle was often labeled a children's
> author, she disliked that classification. In a 1993
> Associated Press interview, she said she did not
> write down to children.
> 
> "In my dreams, I never have an age," she said. "I
> never write for any age group in mind. When people
> do, they tend to be tolerant and condescending and
> they don't write as well as they can write.
> 
> "When you underestimate your audience, you're
> cutting yourself off from your best work."
> 
> "A Wrinkle in Time" — which L'Engle said was
> rejected repeatedly before it found a publisher in
> 1962 — won the American Library Association's 1963
> Newbery Medal for best American children's book. 
> Her "A Ring of Endless Light" was a Newbery Honor
> Book, or medal runner-up, in 1981.

And it featured dolphins; Norberta and Basil, IIRC.  I
really like this one.
 
> In 2004, President Bush awarded her a National
> Humanities Medal.

Well, you can't blame her for that...

Debbi
Philosophy, (Meta?)Physics And Faith Maru


   

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Re: Monster, dog or chupacabra?

[Deborah Harrell]

> Gary Nunn <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

> CUERO, Texas - Phylis Canion lived in Africa for
> four years. She's been a
> hunter all her life and has the mounted heads of a
> zebra and other exotic animals in her house to prove
it.  [Aside: what makes folks think that's cool?]
> 
> But the roadkill she found last month outside her
> ranch was a new one even
> for her, worth putting in a freezer hidden from
> curious onlookers: Canion
> believes she may have the head of the mythical,
> bloodsucking chupacabra.
  
>
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20539085/wid/11915829?GT1=10357

That is one *ugly* mug - I wouldn't want to run into a
pack of those while out riding or hiking!  But Mulder
might have been fascinated...

Debbi
Not Just Any Egg-sucking Dawg Maru


   

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Properties of unicorn horn...well, narwhal really

[Deborah Harrell]

Huh; not an antidote for poison, but all those nerve
endings might be Uplifted to have some cool abilities
like touch telepathy, or healing of mental illness...

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10456798/
...After four trips to the Canadian High Arctic to
study these whales, Martin Nweeia of the Harvard
School of Dental Medicine has discovered that the
narwhal's tooth, while seemingly rigid and hard, has
remarkable sensor capabilities. With ten million tiny
nerve connections tunneling from the central nerve of
the tusk to its outer surface, the thing is like a
membrane with an extremely sensitive surface and can
detect changes in water temperature, pressure, and
particle gradients. 

Because these whales can detect particle gradients in
water, they can discern the salinity of the water,
which could help them survive in their Arctic ice
environment. They can also detect water particles that
hint at the fish that make up their diet... 

...The findings point to a new direction of scientific
investigation. The tusk is also sensitive to touch,
and narwhals are known for their "tusking" behavior,
when males rub tusks with each other. Because of the
tactile sensory ability of the tusk surface, the
whales are likely experiencing a unique sensation...

...Because of their physical structure, the tusks are
both strong and flexible—an eight-foot-long tusk can
yield one foot in any direction without breaking. For
this reason, researchers are currently investigating
narwhal tusks for practical insight into ways of
improving restorative dental materials.

Debbi
who hasn't caught up on any listmail to speak of, but
will try (no breath-holding!) "soon"


  

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