Skeptical News for 1 September 2002Skeptical News for 1 September 2002Archive of previous NTS Skeptical News listings
Saturday, 31 August, 2002, 00:16 GMT 01:16 UK
Cold was killing dinosaurs long before the asteroid commonly thought to have been their downfall hit, according to scientists.
That asteroid 65 million years ago in the past Cretaceous period was probably the "final straw".
But Australian experts say up to half of all dinosaurs were gone by then, because the climate had got too cold for them to bear.
Fossil evidence from the Drumheller valley in Alberta, Canada, covering 7m years before the asteroid hit, shows that average temperatures dropped from 25�C to 15�C.
Many cold-blooded reptiles such as crocodiles, turtles and many large plant-eating dinosaurs died out as the climate cooled.
Oxygen isotope readings from fossils show the temperatures at which they formed, so scientists can track the climate change over time.
They found there was also a decrease in annual rainfall over the period where species died out.
But, David Eberth of the Royal Tyrell Museum of Palaeontology, who carried out the research, said it was unclear why dinosaurs were so dramatically affected.
Body temperature
Dr Angela Milner, associate keeper of palaeontology at the Natural History Museum, told BBC News Online: "A lot of people have suggested that climate change is the reason dinosaurs started to decline.
"But this research, using isotopes records, shows categorically there was quite a big temperature drop."
Dr Milner said cold-blooded dinosaurs would have been able to bear a colder climate for a short time because their size would have meant they could keep their body temperature constant.
But they would have been unable to cope for very long.
Dr Milner added: "In popular perception, dinosaurs died out because of the asteroid. But the actual evidence from the fossils doesn't support that in the way some people like to think.
"But that may well have been the final straw that broke the remaining camels' backs."
The research is featured in Chemistry and Industry. .
By Ronald Kotulak
Tribune science reporter
August 30, 2002
Astronomers from the University of Chicago and four other institutions plan to build a unique telescope at the coldest place on Earth to figure out the biggest mystery in cosmology: Why is the universe, in a sense, falling up?
Funded by a $16.6 million National Science Foundation grant announced Thursday in Washington, the team expects to have the telescope running at the South Pole in four years.
Its mission is to explore a recent discovery that has turned physics on its head. Two years ago astronomers were stunned to find evidence suggesting that the universe is in the grasp of dark energy, a puzzling antigravity force that is causing it to expand at an ever-accelerating rate.
Cosmologists--scientists who ponder the origins of the universe--had thought that the expansion either was constant-- gradually spreading but basically staying the same--or that it was slowing.
If gravity were causing the universe to slow, then it would eventually collapse on itself, ending up in what has been called the Big Crunch. This would be the opposite of the Big Bang theory that the universe came into existence in a gigantic explosion 10 billion to 15 billion years ago.
Nearly 3.5 billion years ago, when the Earth was just a billion years old, a huge asteroid slammed into the young planet and produced a global rain of glass droplets and towering tidal waves that raced around the world, according to an analysis of ancient rocks.
Researchers at Stanford University and Louisiana State University say samples collected from deposits in South Africa and Australia show that a space rock about 12 miles wide smashed into the Earth and sent into the atmosphere millions of tons of dust and vaporized rock.
The rock samples have been age-dated at 3.47 billion years old and are the oldest known evidence of an asteroid impact on the Earth, said Donald R. Lowe, a researcher at Stanford University and a senior author of the study appearing Friday in the journal Science.
Lowe said that although evidence of the impact was found in both Australia and South Africa, the movement of the Earth crust in the billions of years since has wiped out any crater created by the asteroid. It did leave a concentrated layer of iridium, a chemical common in space rocks but rare on Earth.
"This is the oldest record of an asteroid impact ever found on Earth," said Gary R. Byerly, a professor of geology at Louisiana State University and co-author of the study.
He said the primitive Earth was heavily bombarded earlier in its history, but evidence of those events have been erased by geologic changes.
Lowe said the asteroid that hit the young Earth 3.47 billion years ago was about twice the size of the 6-mile-wide space rock that struck 65 million years ago and killed off the dinosaurs. When the earlier impact occurred, bacteria were the only forms of life on the planet, he said.
And it is a good thing: Lowe said anything larger than microbes would almost certainly have been wiped out.
Lowe said that as the huge asteroid sped toward the Earth, it would have punched a hole through the atmosphere, leaving in its wake a brief vacuum.
"When the meteor hits the surface, it instantaneously melts and vaporizes rock and that rock vapor is sucked right back up the hole into the atmosphere," he said. The vaporized rock probably spread around the globe, condensed and then showered the planet with glass droplets.
Since the continents were only beginning to form at the time, most of the Earth was covered with water.
"It would have taken only a second or two for a meteor that's 20 kilometers (12 miles) in diameter to pass through the ocean and impact the rock beneath," Lowe said. The impact would have created immense tidal waves - rising perhaps a mile or more in height - that raced around the globe again and again, scouring the ocean floor and eroding any bits of dry land, he said.
Children are staying away from school in Malaysia because of rumoured sightings of headless ghosts.
Rumours have spread after the apparent sightings in broad daylight at the SM Senawang II school in Seremban.
The sightings coincide with the Taoist Hungry Ghost Festival. Believers think spirits from hell roam the earth during August.
Zakaria Nordin of the state education authority says it's safe for children to go to school.
He told The Star parents shouldn't make the situation worse by spreading rumours or scaring their children.
He said: "I have not heard of anyone being injured from being 'mauled' by ghosts and it's safe for the children to go to school."
Story filed: 15:47 Thursday 22nd August 2002
"One of the first documented reports of crop circle formation--the unexplained geometric designs that occur in fields of wheat and corn--appeared in Stirlingshire, Scotland (UK) in 1678. But the phenomenon was largely ignored until the 1970s and 1980s when formations began to appear with increasing frequency around the globe."
"Yet is China really devoid of these unusual creations? Certainly if someone or something is trying to communicate with mankind through patterns carved into crops, China's sizable population could not be ignored."
"Western experts have obviously failed to carefully consider the data from this country (China). One has only to refer to the work of Zhang Hui, a research Fellow at the Xinjiang Museum in Urumqui, to find evidence which suggests that China--with its long history--experienced crop circle phenomena long before any other civilization on this planet."
"Zhang claims to have discovered more than twenty stone patterns appearing to mimic crop circle formations from other countries but pre-dating them by 3,000 years."
Zhang discovered "several of these stone circle patterns, which range from single circles to more elaborate shapes, in the grasslands of Qinghe beside" China's border with Mongolia.
"Zhang was intrigued. He quickly headed to Beijing," China's capital, "to consult Chinese translations of reference works by British crop circle experts."
"He was amazed by the similarities."
"Zhang believes the primitive people of the (Qinghe) region, after witnessing the actual formation of crop circles, concluded that the signs were a form of communication from the gods and responded in kind to the divine messages by placing rocks in the shape of the circles."
"According to Zhang, one rare eyewitness described seeing a crop circle appear in a northeastern China field in only a short time while he was in the company of Red Guards. However, the event occurred during the Cultural Revolution (1966 to 1976), when such superstition was illegal, so the account went undocumented." (See the Shanghai Star for August 2, 2002, "China says crop circles appeared there 3,000 years ago." Many thanks to Chen Jilin for this newspaper article.) Martin Gardner Pseudoscience and Fringe-Religion Collection Added to Center for Inquiry Library
We wish to announce the acquisition by the Center for Inquiry Library in Amherst, New York, of the Martin Gardner collection on the paranormal, pseudoscience, and fringe religions. Martin Gardner, considered to be one of the leading skeptics in the world, is an inspiration for so many scientific inquirers today. The Center for Inquiry is grateful to him for gifting his collection, which includes his papers in these areas. There are over 400 books and reference works and encyclop�dias in the collection. Each book will have a name plate in honor of Martin Gardner affixed to it. There are also extensive files, and numerous articles and news clippings. Among the topics covered are creationism, Catholic artifacts, psi, mediums, parascience, and monsters, but also files on physics, chemistry, astronomy, animal talk, anthropology, and other sciences.
In our view, the Center for Inquiry Library already houses the finest skeptical and freethought library in the world. The addition of Martin Gardner's priceless collection will further enrich the Library as a research resource. The intensive process of cataloguing this important addition will get underway shortly.
The Center for Inquiry has run out of physical space and plans are being formulated to expand the Library as soon as economic conditions permit.
Scientists are split over the theory that natural selection has come to a standstill in the West. Robin McKie reports
Sunday February 3, 2002
The Observer
For those who dream of a better life, science has bad news: this is the best it is going to get. Our species has reached its biological pinnacle and is no longer capable of changing.
That is the stark, controversial view of a group of biologists who believe a Western lifestyle now protects humanity from the forces that used to shape Homo sapiens.
'If you want to know what Utopia is like, just look around - this is it,' said Professor Steve Jones, of University College London, who is to present his argument at a Royal Society Edinburgh debate, 'Is Evolution Over?', next week. 'Things have simply stopped getting better, or worse, for our species.'
WASHINGTON, Aug. 30 - The California atheist who successfully challenged the words "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance has gone to court in an effort to abolish the tax-payer financed positions of Congressional chaplains.
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/08/31/national/31ATHE.html?ex=1031764800&ei=1&en=b1a9575d708a7049
Points of View: September 2002
The most beautiful experiment in physics, according to a poll of Physics World readers, is the interference of single electrons in a Young's double slit. Robert P Crease reports.
When I asked readers earlier this year to submit candidates for the "most beautiful experiment in physics" (Physics World May p17), I was pleased to receive more than 200 replies. The responses covered a broad spectrum, ranging from actual experiments to thought experiments, and from proposed experiments to proofs, theorems and models. However, one experiment - the double-slit experiment with electrons - was cited more often than any other, receiving a total of 20 votes.
Others in the top 10 included Galileo's experiments with falling
bodies, Millikan's oil-drop experiment and Newton's separation of
sunlight with a prism. Young's original double-slit interference
experiment with light also appeared in the list
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IN THE NEWS
Today's Headlines � August 30, 2002
OPEN UP AND SAY DA-DA: BABY TALK IS TELLING
from The Chicago Tribune
NEW YORK -- Listening to a newborn's plaintive squall, parents hear the hungry promise of a life to come.
In the babbling that precedes an infant's first halting attempts to talk, however, scientists are discovering crucial clues to how children master the languages that connect humans to one another.
A remarkable picture of how infants learn to speak is emerging from clinical studies, language surveys and brain imaging, all colored by hard- won crib-and-nursery knowledge from generations of parents.
The newest insight offers clear evidence that the brain has become specialized for language by the time an infant is 5 months old, according to a report Friday in the journal Science. Dartmouth College scientists found the clue in the lopsided way an infant's mouth opens and closes when he or she babbles or smiles.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0208300252aug30.story?null
THE UNCONSCIOUS YOU MAY BE THE WISER HALF
from The Wall Street Journal
According to Plutarch, the inscription at the Delphic Oracle advised, "Know thyself." To which Timothy D. Wilson, professor of psychology at the University of Virginia, Charlottesville, responds, "Good luck."
Dr. Wilson is one of a growing number of psychologists and neuroscientists whose research is showing the importance of the unconscious -- "mental processes that are inaccessible to consciousness but that influence judgments, feelings or behavior," as he puts it. But this isn't Freud's unconscious, that maelstrom of primitive emotions and repressed memories.
Instead, the unconscious being excavated by scientists processes data, sets goals, judges people, detects danger, formulates stereotypes and infers causes, all outside our conscious awareness.
In fact, there is a growing consensus that the unconscious is a pretty smart cookie, with cognitive capacities that rival and sometimes surpass that of conscious thought. How smart is the unconscious? Two experiments probing the power of intuition sold me.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/news/archive/2002/08/30/financial0919EDT0060.DTL
NASA CHANGES ITS TUNE ON SPACE TOURISTS
from The New York Times
WASHINGTON, Aug. 29 � Although his sponsors have yet to put down the $20 million he needs for his ticket as the world's third space tourist, Lance Bass of 'N Sync is being embraced by NASA as a way to attract a new generation of space explorers.
Mr. Bass, 23, would be the youngest and presumably most squeal-inducing person to travel into space, as a guest of Russia on a Soyuz flight to the International Space Station in October.
NASA resisted Russia's fielding of the first space tourist, Dennis Tito, last year, but it knows that Mr. Bass could give the American agency a public relations boost. This week it welcomed the singer to the Johnson Space Center in Houston to learn protocols for visiting the American part of the space station. And today it started putting him to work as an ambassador to the young, a role he wholeheartedly embraced.
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/08/30/science/30TOUR.html
SOUTH POLE TELESCOPE TO PROBE MYSTERY OF 'DARK ENERGY' from The Chicago Tribune
Astronomers from the University of Chicago and four other institutions plan to build a unique telescope at the coldest place on Earth to figure out the biggest mystery in cosmology: Why is the universe, in a sense, falling up?
Funded by a $16.6 million National Science Foundation grant announced Thursday in Washington, the team expects to have the telescope running at the South Pole in four years.
Its mission is to explore a recent discovery that has turned physics on its head. Two years ago astronomers were stunned to find evidence suggesting that the universe is in the grasp of dark energy, a puzzling antigravity force that is causing it to expand at an ever-accelerating rate.
Cosmologists--scientists who ponder the origins of the universe--had thought that the expansion either was constant-- gradually spreading but basically staying the same--or that it was slowing.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/chi-0208300266aug30.story
SCIENTISTS SAY EARTH FORMED FASTER
from The Associated Press
Scientists have found evidence that Earth made its final step to planet status about 30 million years earlier than previous research had suggested.
Working independently, two groups of scientists analyzed meteorites that contain telltale clues about planetary formation and compared them to rocks from Earth.
Both teams reached the same conclusion: Earth's metallic core formed about 30 million years after the solar system's birth.
The findings contrast with 1995 research that suggested Earth's core formed about 60 million years after the sun condensed at the center of a swirling disc of gas and dust. The new date pinpoints the approximate time that Earth had nearly reached its current mass.
David Stevenson, a professor of planetary sciences at Cal Tech in Pasadena, Calif., said the new analyses fit well with current theoretical ideas about the pace of Earth's formation.
PROSTATE CANCER, DIET LINK QUESTIONS
from Newsday
A low-fat, high-fiber diet rich in fruits and vegetables doesn't appear to lower PSA levels in men, nor does such a menu lower the incidence of prostate cancer, medical researchers have found in an analysis to be released next week.
The finding came as the surprise ending to a four-year study that many cancer experts thought would produce the long-sought dietary link to prostate cancer.
"This is the first rigorous, robust study to look at the question," said Dr. Moshe Shike, the study's lead investigator and the director of cancer prevention at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in Manhattan. Results of the study are to be published in the Sept. 1 issue of the Journal of Clinical Oncology.
The PSA, which stands for prostate specific antigen, is a protein produced by the prostate gland that can be detected in blood. PSA levels are elevated when cancer is present, though they can also rise in instances of benign prostate hyperplasia, a non-cancerous condition.
http://www.newsday.com/news/health/ny-hspros302843110aug30.story?coll=ny%2Dhealth%2Dheadlines
SEEING BY STARLIGHT, MORE PRECISELY THAN EVER
from The New York Times
Search and rescue groups, the military, law enforcement agencies and outdoors enthusiasts are all using night-vision technology to literally see in the dark. Although night vision is not new � it has been around in basic form since World War II � improvements in the technology are continually being made.
There are three versions of light-amplifying night-vision technology available. Generation 1, the oldest and also the cheapest, is designed for the sports and gadget enthusiast. It can be purchased at sporting goods stores and specialty shops and online, and costs between $100 and $600, depending on the model. The second and third generations, which produce sharper images in much lower light, cost from $2,500 to more than $10,000. While some models are sold for civilian use, in general they are used by the military and law enforcement agencies.
All of the types work by converting photons of light into electrons, multiplying them and then converting the electrons back into photons.
The second- and third-generation technologies benefit from use of a microchannel plate � essentially, glass with millions of microscopic holes in it � to multiply the electrons.
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/08/29/technology/circuits/29HOWW.html
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August 30, 2002
By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF
EAST PEORIA, Ill. � My interview with the Rev. Matt Hale, America's scariest hatemonger, got off to a rocky start.
As he picked at a fruit salad in a restaurant here in East Peoria, his headquarters, he recalled an incident in childhood that first led him to regard nonwhites as vermin: At a dance, he saw white girls "betraying their race" by kissing black boys.
"I felt nauseous," he said solemnly. "Interracial marriage is against nature. It's a form of bestiality."
A moment later, I disclosed that I had betrayed the white race and married a Chinese-American. It was, I felt, an awkward moment.
But Mr. Hale, as charming and charismatic as he is hateful, was unfazed. He beamed, and for a moment I thought he was going to ask to see photos of my kids.
I came to East Peoria to meet Mr. Hale because he has become the key figure in America's hate community, revitalizing racism by recruiting women, children and
convicts into a high-tech, energetic organization whose followers show a pattern of random brutality toward blacks and other "enemies." It would be flattering Mr.
Hale too much to call his group America's Al Qaeda, but the scary thing is that I think the comparison would leave him feeling flattered.
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IN THE NEWS
Today's Headlines � August 29, 2002
AT DEVELOPMENT TALKS, U.S. AND ITS ALLIES CLASH OVER ISSUES OF ENERGY
AND
POLLUTION
from The New York Times
JOHANNESBURG, Aug. 28 � For days now, the battle between rich and poor nations has dominated the United Nations talks here on the environment and development, with marches and fiery debates over how to reduce poverty.
But one of the fiercest struggles has been raging behind the scenes as the United States and the European Union clash over strategies to preserve the planet.
The allies are battling over the question of targets and time frames for the conversion from oil and gas to windmills and solar panels, for the cleanup of garbage and hazardous pollutants and for the preservation of endangered plants and animals.
The European Union says these talks must produce a strong plan with firm deadlines so the world's leaders can be held accountable for their actions. The United States opposes targets and deadlines, saying it would rather finance specific projects than support goals that might ultimately prove meaningless.
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/08/29/international/29SUMM.html
ENZYME MAY HELP BRAIN CLEAN THE SLATES
from The San Francisco Chronicle
A molecular "eraser" has been found in the brain, scientists report today, suggesting that without it our memory tracks would function about as well as a computer without a delete key.
Reporting in the journal Nature, scientists describe the intricate workings of an enzyme of forgetting called PP1, shorthand for protein phosphatase 1. And if you find that name hardly worth recording and soon forget it, it might be because you have a healthy amount of the stuff.
A series of experiments on genetically altered laboratory mice suggests that the newfound mental eraser is part of a healthy tension between learning and unlearning that keeps synaptic circuits from becoming saturated early in life with needless information.
The same memory constraint, perhaps running in overdrive, may play a role in some forms of age-related memory decline, suggesting a potential target for memory-enhancing therapies if further studies can determine just how PP1 might figure into memory-related syndromes suffered by humans.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2002/08/29/MN2052.DTL
OLD SHOTS STILL FIGHT SMALLPOX
from The (Raleigh, NC) News and Observer
Smallpox vaccines that routinely were given to babies in the United States until 1972 offer longer protection than scientists thought, with substantial immunity still evident as long as 35 years later, a researcher at UNC-Chapel Hill reports.
The findings, published today in the New England Journal of Medicine, offer insight into the scope of the U.S. population's vulnerability to the virus, which public health officials warn could be used as a bioterrorism weapon. About 111 million Americans have been born since the national vaccination program ended in the belief that smallpox had been eradicated.
The U.S. government has maintained only small stocks of the vaccine. But the terrorist attacks and anthrax outbreaks last year increased concern about a smallpox attack and prompted debate about how best to protect the public with the limited vaccine available.
"This would certainly suggest how to use the smallpox vaccines," said Dr. Jeffrey A. Frelinger, chairman of the microbiology and immunology department at the UNC School of Medicine, who conducted the study along with Dr. Lawal Garba. "You could argue to preferentially vaccinate people who have never been vaccinated, along with first responders [public safety workers]."
http://www.newsobserver.com/front/story/1682729p-1702930c.html
SWEET PROMISE OF FUEL FROM BURNING SUGAR
from Newsday
Clean-burning hydrogen can probably be squeezed from a common sugar, glucose, perhaps at reasonable cost, scientists in Wisconsin announced yesterday.
If so, it would be possible to get large amounts of a clean, energy-rich fuel from waste plant products, such as tons of leftover sugarcane, weeds and wood, and even from such animal byproducts as cheese whey, they said.
Based on experiments using metal catalysts and sugars, chemical engineers James Dumesic, Randy Cortwright and Rupali Davda reported on their findings in today's issue of Nature magazine.
"If we're using a cheap enough waste stream" to make the glucose, Dumesic said, "then I think we could be competitive" with other energy sources, the carbon-based fuels now in use. But if they had to use glucose bought from the food industry, "that would be too expensive."
http://www.newsday.com/news/health/ny-hsfuel292841948aug29.story?coll=ny%2Dhealth%2Dheadlines
WOMEN TAKING ANOTHER LOOK AT WAYS TO TREAT MENOPAUSE
from The Washington Post
The news about hormone replacement therapy's hazards hit the newspapers on a Tuesday. Before another Tuesday rolled around, sales were up for black cohosh, a botanical remedy used by Algonquian natives for centuries to ease the symptoms of menopause.
"We could see the effect on our business within the first four days," said Michele Klingensmith, the head of marketing for Remifemin, a black cohosh preparation sold by GlaxoSmithKline.
The pharmaceutical giant took the cue. Its sales force, which normally pitched the botanical only to 9,000 obstetrician-gynecologists, began passing out Remifemin information to 28,000 internists and family practitioners. Six weeks of free drug samples were snapped up in two. A promotional campaign to be shown on 13 cable channels was quickly mounted.
GlaxoSmithKline's campaign is the start of what many experts believe will be a major boost for botanical medicines after the unexpected closing of the Women's Health Initiative study of estrogen-and-progestin replacement. Anxious about the possible risks of taking estrogen, many women are more open to pitches by companies marketing alternatives.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A9107-2002Aug28.html
WHEN ECONOMICS SHIFTS FROM SCIENCE TO ENGINEERING
from The New York Times
ECONOMISTS think of themselves as scientists; their primary goal is to understand how the economy works. But scientific knowledge is not their only goal; as a famous economist once remarked, "The point is not to understand the world, but to change it."
Economists are increasingly being called on to give advice about how to design new economic institutions. They have been consultants in the design of auctions, power exchanges, financial exchanges and a variety of other market and market-like mechanisms.
In these applications, economics looks more like engineering than it does pure science. Just as a civil engineer applies principles of physics and mechanics to design bridges, economists apply principles of economic analysis to design exchange mechanisms.
Al Roth, an economist at Harvard, recently described an interesting case study of "economist as engineer." In the mid-1990's, Mr. Roth worked with the National Resident Matching Program to design a new system for matching residents and hospitals. Documents that describe his experience are available at www.economics.harvard.edu/~aroth/alroth.html.
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/08/29/business/29SCEN.html
FABRICATING THE FUTURE
from The Christian Science Monitor
CAMBRIDGE, MASS. � Maggie Orth hunches over a sewing machine in her studio, carefully stitching a tiny piece of plaid cloth.
But the new mother isn't making a baby outfit. Instead, she's creating an interactive wall hanging of fabric interlaced with electronics and special dyes. The finished product: textile art that changes colors in programmed sequence.
Dr. Orth's new technology is part of an emerging wave: weaving all sorts of intelligence into textiles, including the ability to detect dangerous chemicals, sanitize themselves, and serve as communication networks. Applications run the gamut, from health and sporting goods to sophisticated combat uniforms.
It's a field � variously known as smart fabrics, e-textiles, wearable computers, or intelligent textiles � that many anticipate will become one of the next hot drivers of the American economy. Advocates also expect it to propel technology forward in general, because its applications are so diverse.
http://www.csmonitor.com/2002/0829/p11s01-stgn.html
NO FAIRY TALE: RESEARCHERS SPIN STRAW INTO GOLD
from The Christian Science Monitor
Rumpelstiltskin, the fairy-tale rogue who spun straw into gold, has nothing on Miguel Yacaman and Jorge Gardea-Torresdey.
The two University of Texas researchers have developed a way to draw gold from wheat, alfalfa, or � best of all � oats.
No spinning wheel required. In this day and age, a simple solvent will suffice to turn homely vegetation into a source of precious metals.
But if you're thinking of quitting the day job and buying an alfalfa farm, don't be too hasty. The quantities of gold at stake won't quickly cover the cost of a harvesting combine.
http://www.csmonitor.com/2002/0829/p02s02-usgn.html
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Issue Number 2002-08
August, 2002
ISSN 1076-500X
Key words: improbable research, science humor, Ig Nobel, AIR
A free newsletter of tidbits too tiny to fit in the Annals of Improbable Research (AIR), the journal of inflated research and personalities
2002-08-01 TABLE OF CONTENTS
2002-08-01 Table of Contents
2002-08-02 What's New in the Magazine
2002-08-03 Medical Check Survey
2002-08-04 Ig Miscellany
2002-08-05 No None
2002-08-06 Science Writing Assignments #206-1 and #206-2
2002-08-07 Outstandingly Obscure: Bee and Beality
2002-08-08 Outstandingly Obscure: More Fish Sausage
2002-08-09 Outstandingly Obscure: "Boring" Man Identified
2002-08-10 Clumping Cat Litters
2002-08-11 Difficult Answer
2002-08-12 Multiplicity of Monikers: 5-Kim
2002-08-13 CAVALCADE OF HotAIR: Sleep Eating, Shatner
2002-08-14 RESEARCH SPOTLIGHT: The Case of the Cheesy Bite
2002-08-15 MAY WE RECOMMEND: Frustration and Betongs
2002-08-16 AIRhead Events
2002-08-17 How to Subscribe to AIR (*)
2002-08-18 Our Address (*)
2002-08-19 Please Forward/Post This Issue! (*)
2002-08-20 How to Receive mini-AIR, etc. (*)
Items marked (*) are reprinted in every issue.
mini-AIR is a free monthly *e-supplement* to AIR, the print magazine
2002-08-02 What's New in the Magazine
AIR 8:4 (July/August 2002) is the special WIENER SAUSAGE ISSUE. In addition to the articles mentioned here last month, highlights include:
"DOUBLE-BLAND EXPERIMENTS," by Otto Didact. The premiere of a new AIR occasional column. An experiment is double-bland if:
1) It's not at all clear what they could possibly have hoped to learn by doing the experiment; andThis article also appears on-line, at:
2) Looking at their published account of what they actually did, it's not at all clear what, if anything, they did learn from it.
"THE SKULL OF POOR OLD COPE," by Earle Spamer. A look at the curious -- and apparently counter-factual -- tale that was loudly promulgated about the skull and bones of the great scientist Edward Drinker Cope.
"QUESTIONS FROM THE CHINESE TRANSLATOR" The Chinese translator
of the Chinese edition of the book "The Best of Annals of
Improbable Research," faced with a difficult task, had some
questions. We requested and received permission to publish this
letter from him. It also appears on-line, at:
http://www.improbable.com/airchives/paperair/volume8/v8i4/chinese.html
"PROVERBIAL PREVENTION: A QUANTITATIVE STUDY," by Carmen J. Giunta. A scientific analysis of well-known, heretofore trusted proverbs.
..and much, much more.
The entire table of contents is on-line at
http://www.improbable.com/airchives/paperair/volume8/v8i4/v8i4-toc.html
(What you are reading at this moment is mini-AIR, a small, monthly e-mail supplement to the print magazine.)
2002-08-03 Medical Check Survey
This month's Medical Practice Technical Survey is inspired by recent press accounts of a surgeon named Arndt who walked out of his hospital, traveled to a bank, and cashed a check, leaving a patient unconscious on the operating table in the midst of lengthy spinal fusion surgery.
This Survey is open ONLY to properly credentialed and accredited surgeons. The question concerns the specific conversion rate of time and money:
What is the minimum value of a check that is worth cashing in the midst of an operation?Please send your answer to:
Operation Check-Cashing Survey
c/o [email protected]
2002-08-04 Ig Miscellany
TICKETS for the October 3 Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony are now on sale.
Details are at http://www.improbable.com/ig/2002/2002-details.html
DELEGATIONS: If you want to bring (and be officially recognized as!) an audience delegation, please get in touch with Louise Sacco [email protected].
CONCERT: The ceremony will be preceded by a short concert by the DRESDEN DOLLS. The Concert will be included in the evening's LIVE INTERNET TELECAST.
RELATED EVENTS: There will be two: the IG MEDICAL LECTURES, Fri, Oct 4, (at the Harvard School of Public Health)VOLUNTEERS: As always, we could use volunteer help. If you are in the Cambridge area and would like to:
the IG INFORMAL LECTURES, Sat., Oct 5 (at MIT)
help post posters in appropriate places,please get in touch with us at: IG NOBEL VOLUNTEERS c/o [email protected]
OR
host an exciting new Ig Nobel Prize winner in your home for 3 or 4 nights,
OR
help photograph the ceremony (if you are an experienced and accomplished photographer)
2002-08-05 No None
Investigator Tim Churches points out that the web site for the Journal of Negative Results in Biomedicine http://www.jnrbm.com/articles/browse.asp currently presents the following informative negative result:
There are currently no articles published in Journal of Negative Results in Biomedicine.2002-08-06 Science Writing Assignments #206-1 and #206-2
Here are two more of our Suggested Assignments for Science Writing Classes.
ASSIGNMENT #1: Write a 100-word story that begins:
"They forced me out without having any other liver transplant surgeon on staff," Katz said in an interview. "That's irresponsible to the patients. And if I'm a professional surgeon doing my job well, is it really appropriate to remove me? And to do it by isolating, manipulating, backstabbing, cheating and lying?"(The quotation in Assignment #1 is from an article in the August 23, 2002 issue of the Boston Globe.)
ASSIGNMENT #2: Devise a suitable title for the complete short short story that was told by four headlines that were listed one- after-the-other that same day, August 23, 2002, on the CNN web site http://www.cnn.com:
Shock Jocks' Sex Stunt Prompts Investigation2002-08-07 Outstandingly Obscure: Bee and Beality
Microsoft Discloses 'Critical' Security Flaws
Scientists: Giant METEORITE SLAMMED YOUNG EARTH
Report: Third Child for Michael Jackson
The OUTSTANDINGLY OBSCURE ACADEMIC JOURNALS project is moving into high(er) gear. Here are some recent finds:
FROM INVESTIGATOR DOUG LINDHOLM:
Here at the National Center for Atmospheric Research, there is a list of journals which are "Candidates for Cancellation due to Low Use." http://www.ucar.edu/library/titles.html I would propose that such a list qualifies as "outstandingly obscure."FROM INVESTIGATOR BOB GULIEN:
1. The JOURNAL OF MEMETICS, which has gems such as: "The Six Essentials? Minimal Requirements for the Darwinian Bootstrapping of Quality," by William H. CalvinPlease send news of your discoveries to either of these repositories:
The web site is http://jom-emit.cfpm.org2. The BEE VENOM THERAPY JOURNAL
http://www.gilbertsville.com/bee/3. The BEALITY JOURNAL, which has articles such as "Bodily Rebirth;" "No Peanut Butter" (with a subheader: "Man-made carcinogens are no more harmful to the American public than a peanut-butter sandwich") It advertises itself as "A Different Way of Looking at Things".
The web site is http://odin.prohosting.com/beality/
OUTST. OBSCURE JOURNALS c/o [email protected]
or
OUTST. OBSCURE JOURNALS c/o [email protected]
2002-08-08 Outstandingly Obscure: More Fish Sausage
Many and unvaried have been the responses to last month's choice for an Outstandingly Obscure Journal: the JOURNAL OF FISH SAUSAGE.
Although the JOURNAL OF FISH SAUSAGE has ceased publishing, we detect a widespread yearning for its resurrection. Perhaps the publishers will take heed. If someone can dig up contact info for the publisher, we would be happy to head up a letter-writing campaign.
2002-08-09 Outstandingly Obscure: "Boring" Man Identified
The mystery man, the man who unearthed DIRECTIONAL BORING magazine, but whose name we had lost and so could not mention last month, turns out to be investigator John Bell. Investigator Bell writes:
I sent the reference to DIRECTIONAL BORING magazine. I had been inspired to search for Boring because the UK business telephone directory I was using has a listing which read "Boring -- see Civil Engineers". The pointer has now been removed because the Civil Engineers complained.2002-08-10 Clumping Cat Litters
We would be interested in hearing a first-hand report about the clumping cat litter poster that will be presented at the upcoming Annual Meeting of the Association of Analytical Communities. (And yes -- this IS the organization which was once known as the Association of Official Agricultural Chemists). The meeting will take place September 22-26 at the Millennium Biltmore Hotel in Los Angeles, California. The poster is titled:
METHOD DEVELOPMENT TO EVALUATE CLUMPING CAT LITTERS by Irlanda Garcia, Lourdes Guevera, and Javier Lara, Nutek S.A. De C.V., Tehuacan, MexicoIt will be the centerpiece of the session on "General Analytical Methods." Details are at
(Thanks to Adam Eyring for bringing this to our attention.)
2002-08-11 Difficult Answer
The vote is in. We now know the answer to last month's Philosophy Research Question, which was:
Why is this question difficult to answer?2002-08-12 Multiplicity of Monikers: 5-Kim
Here is another item (this one submitted by investigator Carol Myers) in our Multiplicity of Monikers Program, which began, long ago, by asking what is the most number of co-authors (of a single research paper) with the same family name:
"Alcohol and Nicotine Administration Inhibits Serotonin Synthesis and Tryptophan Hydroxylase Expression in Dorsal and Median Raphe of Young Rats," M. Jang, M. Shin, T. Lee, Y. Kim, S. Jung, D. Shin, H. Kim, S. Kim, E. Kim, and C. Kim, Neuroscience Letters, vol. 329, no. 2, August 20, 2002, p. 141.
This paper has a Kim Count of 5. If you know of one with a higher Kim Count, please send the citation to:
Multiple Kim Authorship2002-08-13 CAVALCADE OF HotAIR: Sleep Eating, Shatner
c/o [email protected]
Here are concise, incomplete, flighty mentions of some of the
features we've posted on HotAIR since last month's mini-AIR came
out. See them by clicking "WHAT'S NEW" at the web site, or go to:
http://www.improbable.com/navstrip/whatsnew.html
==> More Fingerprint Art
http://www.improbable.com/news/2002/jul/fingerprint7-xmas-tree.html
==> Sleep Eating
http://www.improbable.com/news/2002/aug/sleep-eating.html
==> The Virtual Colon
http://www.improbable.com/news/2002/aug/colon.html
==> Military Cookies
http://www.improbable.com/news/2002/aug/cookie-spec.html
==> Shatner's Tambourine
http://www.improbable.com/news/2002/aug/shatner-tambourine.html
==> Lightning on Demand
http://www.improbable.com/news/2002/aug/lightning.html
==> Icky Cutesy Research Review
http://www.improbable.com/airchives/paperair/volume8/v8i4/icky.html
==> Jelly Molecule
http://www.improbable.com/airchives/paperair/volume8/v8i4/jelly.html
==> Quartzkopf
http://www.improbable.com/airchives/paperair/volume8/v8i4/quartzkopf.html
==> A Call for Acronyms
http://www.improbable.com/news/2002/aug/acronyms.html
THESE, AND MORE, ARE ON HOTAIR AT2002-08-14 RESEARCH SPOTLIGHT: The Case of the Cheesy Bite
http://www.improbable.com/navstrip/whatsnew.html
Each month we select for your special attention a research report that seems especially worth a close read. Your librarian will enjoy being asked for a copy. Here is this month's Pick of the Month:
"Comparison Microscope Identification of a Cheese Bitemark: A Case Report," H. Bernitz and B.A. Kloppers, Journal of Forensic Odonto- Stomatology, vol. 20, no. 1, June 2002, pp. 13-6. (Thanks to F. Lenya for bringing this to our attention.) The authors, who are at the University of Pretoria, report that:
"Police investigating the murder of a farmer recovered a piece of cheese containing bite-marks. The local dental practitioner used white plaster to make casts of the bitemarks in the cheese and also of the teeth of three suspects. The cheese specimen was retained by the police and seven months later the case was referred to the Forensic Odontology Unit at the University of Pretoria where a silicone rubber cast of the bitemarks in the cheese was made. A lack of concordant features present in a conventional pattern-associated comparison was overcome with the aid of a Leica DMC comparison microscope. Individual features observed under 6.3x magnification aided in the positive identification of the suspect, who when confronted with the evidence, admitted guilt at his first court appearance."
2002-08-15 MAY WE RECOMMEND: Frustration and Betongs
SOLID STATE SOAP OPERA
"Emergent Excitations in a Geometrically Frustrated Magnet," S.H.
Lee, et al., Nature, vol. 418, August 22, 2002, pp. 856-8. (Thanks
to M.J. Adams for bringing this to our attention.)
BETTONGS: BITTEN
"A Case of Bitten Bettongs," H. James, et al., Journal of Forensic
Odonto-Stomatology, vol. 20, no. 1, June 2002, pp. 10-2. (Thanks
to T. Louis for bringing this to our attention.)
ESSENTIALS OF GROOVY PHYSICS
"Properties of Groove Chambers," I. Reichwein, U. Werthenbach, G.
Zech, Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research Section
A: Accelerators, Spectrometers, Detectors and Associated
Equipment, vol. 487, no. 3, July 21, 2002, pp. 308-13. (Thanks to
T. Gill for bringing this to our attention.)
2002-08-16 AIRhead Events
==> For details and updates see http://www.improbable.com
==> Want to host an event? [email protected] 617-491-4437
12TH 1ST ANNUAL IG NOBEL PRIZE CEREMONY -- THUR, OCT 3, 2002
Sanders Theatre, Harvard University
INFO: http://www.improbable.com/ig/ig-top.html
IG MEDICAL LECTURES -- SAT, OCT 4, 2002
3:00 pm.
Harvard School of Public Health, Snyder Auditorium
FREE.
INFO: http://www.improbable.com/ig/ig-top.html
IG INFORMAL LECTURES -- SAT, OCT 5, 2002
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Afternoon
Details to be announced.
AAAS ANNUAL MEETING, DENVER -- FEBRUARY, 2003
Special Annals of Improbable Research session at
the Annual Meeting of the American Assn
for the Advancement of Science. Featuring:
* AIR Editor MARC ABRAHAMSMICHIGAN TECH, HOUGHTON, MI -- APRIL 8, 2003
* 2001 Ig Nobel Biology Prize winner BUCK WEIMER
* 1994 Ig Nobel Medicine Prize co-winner RICHARD DART and others TBA
Here's how to subscribe to the magnificent bi-monthly print journal The Annals of Improbable Research (the real thing, not just the little bits of overflow material you've been reading in this newsletter).
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2002-08-18 Our Address (*) Annals of Improbable Research (AIR) PO Box 380853, Cambridge, MA 02238 USA 617-491-4437 FAX:617-661-0927 EDITORIAL: [email protected] SUBSCRIPTIONS: [email protected] WEB SITE: http://www.improbable.com
2002-08-19 Please Forward/Post This Issue! (*)
Please distribute copies of mini-AIR (or excerpts!) wherever appropriate. The only limitations are: A) Please indicate that the material comes from mini-AIR. B) You may NOT distribute mini-AIR for commercial purposes.
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EDITOR: Marc Abrahams ([email protected]) MINI-PROOFREADER AND PICKER OF NITS (before we introduce the last few at the last moment): Wendy Mattson [email protected] WWW EDITOR/GLOBAL VILLAGE IDIOT: Amy Gorin ([email protected]) COMMUTATIVE EDITOR: Stanley Eigen ([email protected]) ASSOCIATIVE EDITOR: Mark Dionne DISTRIBUTIVE EDITOR: Robin Pearce CO-CONSPIRATORS: Alice Shirrell Kaswell, Gary Dryfoos, Ernest Ersatz, S. Drew MAITRE DE COMPUTATION: Jerry Lotto AUTHORITY FIGURES: Nobel Laureates Dudley Herschbach, Sheldon Glashow, William Lipscomb, Richard Roberts (c) copyright 2002, Annals of Improbable Research
2002-08-20 How to Receive mini-AIR, etc. (*)
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IN THE NEWS
Today's Headlines � August 28, 2002
EXPERTS DECLARE JOURNALIST'S STORY LOW ON SATURATED FACTS
from The Washington Post
On Sunday, July 7, science writer Gary Taubes created a big fat splash. In a cover story in the New York Times Magazine, the award-winning freelance author questioned whether the long-standing public health support for low- fat diets was wrong. Taubes suggested that the Atkins diet -- a low- carbohydrate, high-fat approach permitting nearly unlimited portions of fatty meats but only small amounts of vegetables and virtually no fruit, grains or milk products -- might be healthier and more effective for weight loss. A photo of a steak topped with a pat of butter ran on the cover. The story had the provocative headline: "What if it's all been a big fat lie?"
Not surprisingly, the article spread faster than peanuts at a bar among members of the dieting public as well as the professional nutrition, weight loss and cardiology communities. Sales of the Atkins diet book jumped from number five to number one on the Times's advice books bestseller list and from number 178 to number five on Amazon.com. Taubes got a $700,000 book deal with publisher Alfred Knopf.
But the author now finds himself in the center of a scientific stew of his own making.
Experts criticized Taubes for suggesting the Atkins diet has merit when it has not been rigorously studied, much less been proven effective or safe. He's been accused of downplaying well-substantiated health hazards of saturated fat and of failing to account for some significant and well-known peer-reviewed research supporting the efficacy of low-fat diets. He's been chastised for failing to acknowledge the documented benefits of diets high in fiber and rich in vegetables and whole grains.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A55532-2002Aug23.html
FORECAST FOR FUTURE: DELUGE AND DROUGHT
from The New York Times
It has been a summer of extremes. Rains have deluged Europe and Asia, swamping cities and villages and killing some 2,000 people, while drought and heat have seared the American West and Eastern cities. What is going on?
The floods and droughts could simply be flickers in the inherently chaotic weather system, some experts say. But many warn that such extremes will be increasingly common as the world grows warmer.
Such a shift could pose big problems in places where water is already a strained resource, they say. A warmer world is more likely to be a wetter one, experts warn, with more evaporation resulting in more rain, in heavy and destructive downpours.
But in a troublesome twist, that world may also include more intense droughts, as the increased evaporation parches soils between occasional storms.
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/08/28/science/earth/28BWAT.html
SCIENTISTS STUDY CLIMATE CHANGE IN ARCTIC OCEAN
from The Associated Press
ABOARD THE USCGC HEALY - Great chunks of sea ice knock against the bow of the U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Healy, jolting the ship like a series of moderate earthquakes.
The constant thumping soon fades to background noise as the 420-foot vessel plows through ice floes before its next stop in the Arctic Ocean beyond Alaska's northwestern coast. With the ice cutter anchored again, the shaking stops, and scientists on board collect another round of specimens for the most ambitious study of global climate change of its kind.
Their 40-day mission ended this week, wrapping up initial research in the Western Arctic Shelf-Basin Interactions program. The 10-year, $17 million effort - called SBI for short - is jointly funded by the National Science Foundation and Office of Naval Research.
Participants are looking at possible indicators of climate change in the Chukchi and Beaufort seas, hoping to determine whether the apparent warming of the world is a modern phenomenon or part of an ancient cycle.
http://www.sunspot.net/news/local/midatlantic/bal-ca.global00aug28.story
CDC: BETTER PREPARED FOR TERROR
from The Associated Press
ATLANTA -- The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says it is better prepared to handle the threat of terrorism following the Sept. 11 attacks.
CDC director Julie Gerberding said Sept. 11 changed the world. Then, less than a month later, the nation was thrust into the height of the anthrax scare.
"The world changed for all of us, including the CDC," Gerberding said a conference Tuesday on terrorism preparedness. "We learned a lot of lessons last fall. We have been scaling up ... and streamlining our operation. We're better prepared than we were a year ago, but we are not done yet."
According to officials, $918 million will be used next year for improvements to state and local health departments. The West Nile virus outbreak, now identified in 20 states and the nation's capital, has been an opportunity to practice public health response and implement operations, communications and leadership strategies similar to those that would be used in terrorist attacks.
http://www.newsday.com/news/health/ats-ap_health10aug28.story?coll=sns%2Dhealth%2Dheadlines
GOING TO THE DOGS, AND CATS
from Newsday
Exposure to at least two dogs or cats in the first year of life may drastically reduce the risk of allergies, including reactions to molds, grasses and pollen, scientists report in an unusual line of research published today.
The team of Georgia scientists pursuing this seemingly offbeat path of research say they now have some fairly solid leads on how animals help ward off allergies, including those known to trigger asthma.
"We started this research almost 14 years ago, looking at all of the factors that cause allergies," said Dr. Dennis Ownby, a professor of pediatrics and medicine at the Medical College of Georgia in Atlanta. Ownby and his team report the results of their investigation in today's Journal of the American Medical Association. In the study, allergies - or the lack of them - were studied in nearly 500 healthy children born between April 15, 1987, and Aug. 31, 1989.
A key in the research was to pinpoint the amount of exposure children had by age 1 to cats and dogs, the most common house pets. Those with exposure to at least two dogs or cats had a 75 percent lower risk of allergies. The study found that just one pet didn't confer protection.
http://www.newsday.com/news/health/ny-hspets282841112aug28.story?coll=ny%2Dhealth%2Dheadlines
HOPE FOR OVARIAN CANCER DETECTION
from The Chicago Tribune
A test for ovarian cancer has eluded scientists for decades, but finally there is hope.
Researchers believe they have found a promising screening tool in a field of molecular biology called proteomics that could result in a simple blood test for ovarian cancer.
Simply put, proteomics looks at patterns of protein changes in the blood, which then are analyzed through a computer program to reveal a malignancy in the ovary.
"If it pans out, it's going to revolutionize medicine," said Dr. David A. Fishman, one of the researchers and director of the National Ovarian Cancer Early Detection Program of Northwestern University Medical School. "This is not just a theory; it's reality, and now it has to go through the various steps of validation, which we're doing right now."
http://www.chicagotribune.com/features/women/chi-0208280022aug28.story
SCIENTISTS STUDY MUSSEL POPULATIONS IN VIRGINIA RIVER
from The Richmond Times-Dispatch
The Clinch River in Virginia features one of the most ancient and diverse arrays of freshwater mussels in the world.
Mussels have suffered in recent decades. Pollution, dams, poor farming practices and other threats killed many of the mollusks. Many live on the brink of extinction.
A team of federal, state and nonprofit scientists recently snorkeled a stretch of the Clinch in Russell County to map the mussels there. The effort was part of a larger program to rebuild southwest Virginia's mussel populations with young ones raised in captivity.
http://www.sunspot.net/news/local/midatlantic/bal-ca.mussels00aug28.story
GECKO'S FEET MAY HOLD CLUE TO 'SMART' ADHESIVES, RESEARCHER SAYS
from Scripps Howard News Service
Scientists have discovered how geckos' feet stick to the smoothest of surfaces - and have duplicated the trick with synthetic foot-hair tips.
"It's like Velcro without the matching surface. The same forces work whether on a rough or a smooth spot," said Kellar Autumn, an assistant professor of biomechanics at Lewis & Clark College in Portland, Ore., and lead author of the study.
The report was published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Autumn, who studies the mechanics of living things, first got interested in geckos several years ago during a visit to Hawaii. "I was lying on my bed and happened to look up and see a rather large spider on the ceiling, and I'm not a really big fan of spiders," he recalled.
http://www.nando.net/healthscience/story/514053p-4082789c.html
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- By K B Gopalakrishnan
BILL GATES' BIRTH DETAILS
Date of Birth: October 28, 1955
Time of Birth: 8:58:44 pm
Time Zone of Birth: 8:00 West of GMT
Longitude of Birth: 122 W 20
Latitude of Birth: 47 N 36
BILL GATES' RASHI CHART
Bill Gates, the world's richest man and the founder of Microsoft, of course will attribute his success to his hard work and his parental upbringing. They are true of course, but to some extent. Bill Gates' mammoth success has astrological reasons to a very large extent. He has terrific Raja yogas, which is rarely seen in anybody's chart.
Warning on homeopathic remedies for meningococal disease after health authorities ban bogus vaccine.
Newpaper item (pdf)
Newpaper item (jpg)
TV news(real video)
Developed over the last 40 years by Dr. Sir John Whitman Ray, Body Electronics is a three dimensional system of self healing, taught and used successfully by tens of thousands of people, worldwide.
Dimension 1. Diet and supplements to saturate the body with specific essential nutrients.
Dimension 2. A revolutionary method of sustained accupressure.
Dimension 3. Understanding and application of the basic laws governing the Physical, Emotional and Mental Bodies.
By saturating the body with specific nutrients it will have the building blocks necessary to begin moving towards perfect health. This is the essential first step toward regeneration of the body, the foundation upon which the rest of the program will build.
A trauma, whether it is an illness, a broken bone or a failed relationship will persist as long as the cause (the mental level) is not dealt with. For this reason no permanent (true) healing can occur without a change in consciousness.
Or as Dr. Ray states:
Until man can experience on the mental level that which exists on the physical, he will be bound to the physical.
Sustained accupressure (pointholding) is used, by someone trained in Body Electronics, to compress the muco-protein crystals which are formed at the time of trauma, or any human experience. The compressed crystal releases energy (the piezo electric effect) and stored memory. Once the memory is fully experienced, healing will take place.
Body Electronics does not fit into the realm of "Quick Fixes". However, spectacular results have been achieved through diligence, persistence and desire.
Our goal is to access the mental body where both healing and disease are created. Each level, beginning with the physical, is encompassed by the superior level. IE. The physical is encompassed by the emotional which, in turn, is encompassed by the mental. We must work in this reverse order. This is the hierarchy of our being. Thus it is on the mental level that we find the origins of all outer conditions.
http://www.heraldsun.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5478,4976580%255E662,00.html
MOTORCYCLE ace Barry Sheene has rejected chemotherapy in his battle with throat and stomach cancer and will rely on a diet of vegetables and fruit juice.
"I'm not going to subject my body to chemotherapy," Sheene, 51, said from his Gold Coast home."I believe I can beat this thing with natural therapy."
Twice the world 500cc motorcycle champion, Sheene moved from Britain to Australia to continue his career as race commentator.
He visited a doctor to complain of a sore throat on his return to the Gold Coast last month and was told he had a combination of cancers, possibly a legacy of years of smoking. The news was "a total pain -- but I'm going to fight it," Sheene said.
He revealed he would combat the disease with a diet devised by Austrian healer Rudolf Breuss, born in 1899. "I've been using it since shortly after the cancer was diagnosed," Sheene said. "I haven't eaten for the past 12 days but today I've just had a few vegetables. "I'm just going to carry on as normally as I can. "I've made a decision about not doing chemotherapy and that's it. I'm putting my faith in the natural way."
It is claimed the tough dietary regime espoused by Breuss has led to more than 45,000 patients beating their cancers. As part of his treatment, Sheene will drink a mixture of organic carrots, beetroot, celery, Chinese radish and potato.
August 21, 2002
You can find it at almost any drugstore, supermarket or corner bodega, not mention on the Internet. But does ginkgo biloba actually sharpen the minds of healthy adults, as manufacturers suggest? Consumers seem to think so: sales of the dietary supplement in 1998 amounted to about $310 million in the U.S. alone. Researchers writing today in the Journal of the American Medical Association, however, report that such claims do not appear to hold up under scientific scrutiny.
Paul R. Solomon of Williams College and his colleagues conducted a six-week, double-blind study of 230 healthy adults ages 60 and older, giving half of the subjects ginkgo and the other half placebo. Participants completed standardized tests of learning, memory, attention and concentration before, during and after the study period. The researchers also questioned the subjects themselves and their close friends and family about any perceived shifts in cognitive status. What they found was that ginkgo recipients fared no better on the tests than placebo recipients did. "The ginkgo group also did not differ from the control group in terms of self-reported memory function or global rating by spouses, friends, and relatives," they say.
Solomon and his collaborators acknowledge that higher doses of the supplement or longer periods of exposure might produce the desired effects. But they conclude that their results "suggest that when taken following the manufacturer's instructions, ginkgo provides no measurable health benefit in memory or related cognitive function to adults with healthy cognitive function." --Kate Wong
Publication date: August 21, 2002
Publisher: MIT Press
Binding:Hardcover
Subjects: DNA microarrays; Gene expression; Analysis
Functional genomics--the deconstruction of the genome to determine the biological function of genes and gene interactions--is one of the most fruitful new areas of biology. The growing use of DNA microarrays allows researchers to assess the expression of tens of thousands of genes at a time.
Jedi is the faith espoused in the Star Wars films More than 70,000 people in Australia have declared that they are followers of the Jedi faith, the religion created by the Star Wars films.
A recent census found that one in 270 respondents - or 0.37% of the population - say they believe in "the force", an energy field that gives Jedi Knights like Luke Skywalker their power in the films.
Most of the 70,509 people who wrote Jedi on their census forms were suspected to have done so in response to an e-mail encouraging all Star Wars fans to get it recognised as an official religion.
by Sharon Hill
Too often, perhaps, scientists tend to avoid research into a seemingly common but rather anomalous occurrence that interests the average person. That's why a recent news article in Science caught my attention. The journal's August 2, 2002 issue contains a report by a researcher in Spain regarding large ice balls that landed on the Andalusian region over several days.
Soon after a two kilogram chunk of ice smashed a windshield in Tocina, Spain in January 2000, planetary geologist Jesus Martinez-Frias collected the object for study. Additional objects were also retrieved over the next few days but no one could conceive of an adequate explanation for their appearance. A team was formed to figure out what mechanism could have spawned these objects from a cloudless sky.
By definition, hailstones are balls of ice accumulated by strong updrafts in cumulonimbus clouds � associated with thunderstorms. Two problems with the Spanish ice balls were as follows: 1.) There were no clouds at the time, and 2.) The ice balls were larger than known hailstones. The largest confirmed hailstone in the United States was a substantial grapefruit-sized chunk that fell on Kansas in 1970 and weighed in at 0.75 kg. One kilogram hailstones were reported in Nepal (year unknown). Greater size is obtained by the amount of time the material is kept aloft within the cloud � layers accrete as the hailstone falls and ascends repeatedly before becoming heavy enough to overcome the updrafts and fall to earth. A hailstone has a characteristic "onion-like" layering when dissected.
Any liquid or ice precipitation that falls is known as hydrometeors. Martinez-Frias designates these particular ice balls megacryometeors (large, icy atmospheric phenomena). He maintains a website with additional data (partially in Spanish) on the occurrence of megacryometeors.
By Massimo Polidoro
Prometheus Books
Amherst, New York, 2001
ISBN 1-57392-896-8
264 pp. Hardcover, $25
Book Review:
The Gullibility of Conan Doyle
William Harwood
I have long been aware that Sir Arthur Conan Doyle ended his friendship with Harry Houdini on account of Doyle's blind, gullible belief in the very scam Houdini had disproven over and over. But not until I read Final S�ance did I become convinced that incurable adherence to a security belief in the face of irrefutable evidence can only be described as a form of insanity. And I am far from the first person to reach that conclusion.
Following the publication of Doyle's second pro-Spiritualism book, the Sunday Express ran the headline in its book column, "Is Conan Doyle Mad?" So far as I am aware, no publication of comparable influence has been similarly blunt in connection with Doyle's spiritual successor, Shirley MacLaine. It is understandable why "political correctness," requiring more circumspect criticism, is not to everybody's taste. Not faced with such constraints, the Express went on, "One does not trouble to analyze the ravings of a madman. One shrugs one's shoulders, laughs, and forgets." The more polite London Times, reviewing Doyle's previous book, referred to Doyle's "incredible naivet�," while the Nation stated, "The book leaves one with a rather poor opinion of the doctor's critical abilities" (169). And when even an investigator as incredibly gullible as J.B. Rhine (who went on to authenticate ESP in a horse) saw through one of Doyle's pet mediums, Doyle placed a notice in the Boston newspapers, "J.B. Rhine is an Ass" (203).
Houdini was religiously conservative, even disowning one of his brothers for violating one of Leviticus's sectarian taboos (218-219). And when he testified before a Congressional committee in support of an anti-fortune-telling bill, he said:
This is positively no attack upon a religion. Please understand that emphatically. I am not attacking a religion. . . . But this thing they call 'spiritualism,' wherein a medium intercommunicates with the dead, is a fraud from start to finish. There are only two kinds of mediums, those who are mental degenerates and who ought to be under observation, and those who are deliberate cheats and frauds. I would not believe a fraudulent medium under oath; perjury means nothing to them. . . . Millions of dollars are stolen every year in America, and the Government [has] never paid any attention to it, because they look upon it as a religion.
Substitute "televangelism" for "spiritualism," and the obvious response is, "So what else is
new?" And when Polidoro writes of a paranormal hoax exposed by Houdini, "It was a typical
swindle, still used today by many self-claimed psychics, astrologers, and charlatans. By this
means Reese had been able to gather sums of money from gullible people who, more
often than not, were also learned men of science and culture," the response is again, "So
what else is new?"
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IN THE NEWS
Today's Headlines � August 27, 2002
LYME VACCINE IN THE LAB
from Newsday
In a 10-year collaboration, researchers from SUNY Stony Brook and Brookhaven National Laboratory have developed a new Lyme disease vaccine designed to protect against all known species of the bacterium.
The pharmaceutical company Baxter International of Deerfield, Ill., has licensed the patent and technology for the vaccine, according to Baxter spokeswoman Sally Benjamin Young. But she said a consumer vaccine is in "the very early stage of development" and "many years away" from being available.
There is no Lyme disease vaccine on the market. In February, GlaxoSmithKline pulled the only approved vaccine, LYMErix, because of dwindling sales after reports that it appeared to cause arthritis and neurological problems in some people.
The Stony Brook-Brookhaven vaccine was developed by using the National Synchrotron Light Source at Brookhaven, an extremely powerful X-ray machine that can look at the crystal structure of proteins. Lyme disease is caused by Borrelia burgdorferi and at least two other known species. Borrelia is a spiral-shaped bacterium carried inside the tiny deer tick that is passed into the blood of mammals, including humans, when the tick attaches and feeds.
http://www.newsday.com/news/health/ny-dstop2839610aug27.story?coll=ny%2Dhealth%2Dheadlines
$20 MILLION INFUSION FOR PARKINSON'S STUDY
from The San Francisco Chronicle
Twenty years after Dr. William J. Langston first linked the devastating symptoms of Parkinson's disease to a toxic exposure, federal health officials are creating a consortium of researchers to investigate the role of the environment and genes in a disorder that normally strikes only the elderly.
Scientists from three major teams of researchers plan to conduct independent investigations into the influences of the environment and genetics on the disorder.
Dr. Kenneth Olden, director of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, a part of the National Institutes of Health, announced Monday that his agency is financing the consortium with a $20 million grant.
Langston, a Stanford Medical Center neurologist, is founder and chief executive of the Parkinson's Institute, based in Sunnyvale, which will help coordinate the effort.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2002/08/27/MN139019.DTL
2ND COMET CRAFT ENVISIONED
from The Associated Press
Washington - Pessimistic about regaining contact with a spacecraft designed to study comets, officials have begun talking about a replacement mission that could be launched in 2006.
The lost spacecraft, called Comet Nucleus Tour or Contour, was launched into Earth orbit July 3. It apparently broke apart Aug. 15 after firing its solid-fuel rocket motor for a maneuver to send it into deep space. Telescopes searching along Contour's projected path have found three objects traveling together where the spacecraft should be.
"We are not very optimistic" about the chances of recovering Contour, said mission director Robert Farquhar of Johns Hopkins University's Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, Md. The university built the spacecraft and manages the mission for NASA.
Farquhar said in a telephone news briefing that engineers will make their final effort to listen for Contour in December, when its antennas would be more favorably oriented toward Earth. "Even then, we don't have a lot of hope that we'll recover it," he said.
http://www.newsday.com/news/health/ny-hscont272839841aug27.story?coll=ny%2Dhealth%2Dheadlines
FBI RETURNS TO TABLOID OFFICES IN SEARCH OF NEW ANTHRAX LEADS
from The Washington Post
The FBI announced Monday that it will again search the Florida office of American Media Inc., hoping that new techniques will reveal how deadly anthrax spores entered the headquarters of the tabloid publisher last fall.
The search, which should begin no later than Wednesday, will focus on finding a letter or other method of delivery as well as collecting additional spores from the Boca Raton office, which has been shuttered and quarantined since it was contaminated with anthrax spores last fall, officials said yesterday.
Photo editor Robert Stevens died of anthrax, and another AMI employee, mailroom worker Ernesto Blanco, became severely ill but recovered. Stevens was the first of five people to die in the series of anthrax attacks last fall.
The FBI searched the mailroom and the workstations of affected employees after the attack. It found anthrax spores but no letters like the ones that emerged in some of the subsequent anthrax attacks in New York and Washington. It is not known whether the AMI anthrax spores were delivered by mail or in some other fashion.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A64796-2002Aug26.html
THE MIND OF THE SEX OFFENDER
from Newsday
Scientists who study the minds of child molesters and rapists are getting closer to unraveling the biological, genetic and social forces that lead to such acts. Identifying similar personality features and shared behavioral conditions could ultimately lead to new and better treatments.
Earlier this summer, dozens of researchers met in Washington, D.C., at a conference sponsored by the New York Academy of Sciences to figure out what they collectively know about sex offenders and whether there are ways to predict and prevent their crimes and to treat the offenders.
Robert Prentky, a scientist at the Justice Research Institute in Bridgewater, Mass., and one of the organizers of the conference, said that there are so many types of sex offenders - including pedophiles, rapists and sexual sadists - it's been hard to develop theories that address all the complex behaviors that drive these different abnormal acts. Scientists know little about the development of normal sexual behavior at different stages of life and what behavior actually poses a risk, Prentky said.
http://www.newsday.com/news/health/ny-dsspdn2839605aug27.story?coll=ny%2Dhealth%2Dheadlines
EUREKA MOMENTS
from The Boston Globe
Dragons at Play
Komodo dragons can play with Frisbees and frolic about in much the same
way
that cats and dogs do, argue some scientists.
Don't Worry, Live Longer
People who live calm lives and maintain positive attitudes can live an
extra 71/2 years over their more-worried brethren.
No Cancer, No Fat
A class of drugs that's showing great promise against cancer may also
help
fight the war against fat.
Inside the Earth with Neutrinos
Neutrinos coming from nearby supernovae may offer a way to look deep
inside
the Earth.
For these briefs and more, click on the link below.
http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/239/science/Dragons_at_play+.shtml
WEATHER ON PLUTO, TOO, IS EXCESSIVE
from The New York Times
The weather report for Pluto remains unclear.
Astronomers from the Lowell Observatory in Arizona and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology say the atmosphere has chilled 20 to 55 degrees in the last 14 years, the surface may have warmed a smidgen, and a low-lying layer of smog has cleared up.
French astronomers disagree. The air, they say, has cooled only slightly and is still hazy.
That the pronouncements seem no more reliable than those of Punxsutawney Phil is fitting. Like predictions of winter's persistence on Groundhog Day, the Pluto findings are all based on shadows.
Pluto, 2.8 billion miles distant and receding, is no more than a point of light to earthbound telescopes. The only time astronomers can deduce anything about its atmosphere is when, by heavenly coincidence, Pluto passes in front of a distant star and casts a faint shadow on Earth.
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/08/27/science/space/27PLUT.html
FOREST THINNING CHALLENGED AS TACTIC TO CONTROL FIRES
from The New York Times
HELENA, Mont., Aug. 26 � Even as President Bush urges increased thinning of national forests, some scientists caution that there is little evidence to show that thinning will prevent fires at the catastrophic scales seen in the West this summer.
Moreover, some scientists say they believe that "one size fits all" thinning, performed without adjusting for differences in soil and vegetation, could damage ecosystems and actually make forests more vulnerable to fire.
Last week, at the site of the worst fire in Oregon, Mr. Bush announced that he would ask Congress to streamline rules to expedite thinning projects. The Forest Service has spent more than $400 million in the last two years to reduce fuel loads in the forests.
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/08/27/science/earth/27FIRE.html
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By Peter Demarco, Globe Correspondent, 6/10/2002
http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/161/metro/Mommy_let_s_visit_my_chiropractorP.shtml
It was late Friday afternoon and the waiting room at Westwood Family Chiropractic was jammed with patients in need of a back fix after a long week.
There was Zack Audet, 8, who had subjected his spine to leaps from his bunk bed and tumbles from his bike. Jonathan Murad, 7, and his older brother, Joseph, 8, had put their vertebrae on the line for karate and baseball. And Pam Stone, 19, was fresh off a stressful week of college finals and a semester of hunching over laptops and lugging backpacks.
Chiropractors' offices, once filled with middle-aged construction workers, over-the-hill athletes, and migraine headache sufferers, are taking on a younger look these days as more and more parents are bringing their children in for exams. For many children, trips to the chiropractor have become a weekly event, squeezed between sports practices, orthodontist appointments, and piano lessons.
This story ran on page B1 of the Boston Globe on 6/10/2002. � Copyright 2002 Globe Newspaper Company.
August 27, 2002 Posted: 1:47 AM EDT (0547 GMT)
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -- A gene that separates humans from the apes and all other animals seems to have disappeared from humans up to three million years ago, just before they first stood upright, researchers said on Monday.
Most animals have the gene but people do not -- and it may be somehow involved in the expansion of the brain, the international team of researchers said.
The gene controls production of a sialic acid -- a kind of sugar -- called Neu5Gc, the researchers write in an advance online issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
