Gypsy Cake

I suppose quite often it comes back to the poor scientist that mentioned it. They give an interview on the new work their doing, it's blown out of proportion, and then they're questioned by the media as to why they were wrong. I think the reporters should make clearer how much of the scientific community they're referring to when claim "experts say..." and also make clear at what point the research is at.

In their defence, a lot of the time they are reporting new theories and discoveries of which the science community are still undecided. But that tsunami was not a result of global warming.

Yeah I remember lots of news on our debt but I looked for the savings rate and that's what I found. I got the stat from [url=]http://www.statistics.gov.uk/instantfigures.asp[/url] (the houshold saving ratio). I may have misunderstood, perhaps have a look if you doubt it. The only idea I have to possibly account for the debt is that maybe its a younger age group that is in debt but older generations are still saving. I don't know.

[url=]http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/6517645.stm[/url] What a break through. Read the article. Scientists have actually grown heart valve tissue. I think it's supposed to be coming into use over the next decade. Hopefully when it comes in it will relieve some of the pressure on organ donation. With an aging population, I guess the demand for organ transplant increases; so it may come at just the right time.

how do you mean "they do not measure the same things"... Are you referring to the savings rates? Because I took the statistic of the UK's %of net household income saved. This is what I thought you were commenting on.

But the pull from the moon on the chain will tilt the earth.

I tried to find the UK savings rate so we could make a comparison; I think it was 3.7% at the end of 2006. I also think it's seen as fairly stable. In my opinion, we have a very good chancellor; Gordon Brown. That I think has managed our country's economy over the last 10 years very well. How does the US equivalent fair? Or would say it was out of their control? and more the culture ,as I realise you've already mentioned.

All this sounds very interesting. For my clarification, Pangloss, does -1% savings rate mean that people are taking more credit from banks etc.

I'm afraid no more than you. I'm not one for remembering stats nor do I really no the best places to find them. But I checked, and infertility is always mentioned as a possibility after abortion. And it was merely my point that because of this, a woman may wish to keep the possibility of having her own baby in case became infertile.

I completely disagree. It's true that we make it possible for 'weaker' specimens of our race to survive and therefore slow evolution but we aren't becoming dumber are we? You can tell by the staggering advances we've made over the last few centuries. And I also don't agree that smarter people choose not to have children. It's an instinct, It doesn't matter how successful we are, the majority of humans are compelled to have children. I believe variety would decrease because there is a common conception of the perfect human. When parents would be making their decisions about their baby then they would undoubtedly include many of the traits seen as good. And although these may be good traits, if everyone had them they would no longer be special. Who said we can't alter intelligence? But anyway, my point here was that there are many things that form a genius; there is their potential intelligence of course, but parts of their personality that cause certain things to happen to them during their lives (eg. being hated by people results in withdrawal but also possibly the formation of a genius.) we can not predict these things. And if I'm correct, and variety decreases then so will individual experience. Very little, but I just wanted to mention A Clockwork Orange coz its a good book. Sorry. Look forward to your response.

Deja vu??

Iran is a confused society.

Fair enough. Accepted, I didn't realise it'd been studied for so long, though I do believe they haven't got much closer to a proof in that time, May I ask, naively, what sort of predictions string theory needs to make to progress?

I am in a similar situation to you (Lumko) and Foodchain I would say, except I'm in my first year in sixth form college, though I suppose you may in sixth form at High school. Personally, I loved physics when I was in High school and just sort of read bits of books from library,: string Theory, Steven Hawking, new scientist magazine. Really at sort of 15/16 you don't need to know the details. It's best to just ease into, get a taste for all the ideas that are about. I've only just started looking at specific areas of physics, because I'm applying to uni. Physics at AS is rubbish btw but I think it starts to get better after that. Chemistry is amazing, if you wanna find out more about electron shells and interaction stuff then pick that. Sorry if your already at A-level, all of that will be irrelevant but send me a message and we'll chat.

I watched the animation. I did find it very enlightening and also quite challenging though I don't think it's an accepted theory. I mean, we have ideas for what a fourth space dimension would be anyway and the animation doesn't include that. But it does give interesting ways of thinking about it. I don't, however, really consider the dimensions it talks of as space dimensions.

Basically string theory is seen as an even more fundamental level to matter than the particles we know and love. Leptons, quarks. Even these smallest particles we know, and have with many of them been detected in some way, are (according to string theory) made up of loops that exist in multi-dimensions. The loops vibrate at different resonances which I think is supposed to determine the properties of the matter it exists in. I don't know but I think the loops might possibly be in non-matter as well ie. forces, dark matter, dark energy. {I'm pretty sure most of what I've said up to this point is part of the theory} Now then, string theory is being developed as a way of combining all the fundamental forces. It is still very in the early stages; but I think the scientific community is considering it. The problem is it's very hard to study. One, it's unbelievably small [understatement]. And two, we can only see in three dimensions when these loops are said to possibly reach 10 dimensions. This knowledge will get you up to pretty much everything I know about it. If you want to know more there are a few books in the library about it. Hope that was of some help.

To be honest, it always takes ages before anyone ever protests over here. We tend to let our government get on with, and only if we have genuine continual disagreement with what their doing, do we protest. Plus what would we be calling Tony Blair to do that is an different to what he's doing now?

I accept all the corrections made to my comment except that I thought infinity divided by infinity would be 1. No?. I'm with the tree, in that infinity being a direction feels quite nice. But is it actually incorrect to call it a constant? on the same point, is it incorrect to say a number is a constant? (could someone clear that up for me?cheers)

I think since we've caused such mayhem the goals have changed. I don't think we can really pass the responsibility of stabilising Iraq to anyone else really. If we leave, then the country is in a worst state than when we went in; there really is no "political" benefits that can come from leaving. I understand what you're saying, but if we leave then we're giving a country to Al Qaeda/other terrorist organisations.

I don't believe in overuse of military power; I see how your country acts and it seems to me that you want to impose your ideals on the rest of the world. Iraq wasn't in an acceptable position, but we have to accept that the middle east has developed in a different way to us. We must still concentrate on protecting basic human rights in these countries, but its definelty not America's place to move round the middle east turning, one by one, each country into a mini-America. Do you disagree with me? Again, we are not weak, per se. We're a very small country and relative to our size we do have a large force. Your country has a population of about 300 million whereas we have about 60 million. And America has assume leadership for that reason, we need you more than you need us; George Bush takes advantage of that.

I mean, it is just my opinion but I thought it may have offended anyone who is looking to buy an organ but nevermind. I agree that this would be a good idea. Probably, the only reason it's rejected as an idea is that people don't like feeling forced into anything. I disagree in some respects; selling an organ obviously has drastic physical effects on your body. But prositution is so demeaning, it would definetly have just as much consequnce in a person's life as selling an organ. And, by the way, I am completely with you. I do not judge anyone in the position that they have to sell their body (in any sense).

Furthermore, what everyone seems to have overlooked is that abortion can lead to a woman being infertile. I realise this is her risk, but this would ensure she could still have a baby of her own if she chose.

Has there been any research into this...would this appeal to women aborting? I don't think it should be available on the NHS but there's no reason it should be illegal.

Are you only interested in experts?

I know a lot of people will get annoyed about the continual arguments against testing on animals. Personally though, I think its and important part; to ensure that the testing is necessary and humane. Of course I don't condone any sort of abuse towards animal-testers. I am, by the way, pro-testing.