Glider

I don't think you're wrong in principle, but that's not how it works in the body. Nerve impulses in the body are electrochemical and are based upon the potential created by an imbalance in the distribution of ions across nerve cell membranes. There are three main factors that create a potential across a nerve cell membrane: 1) Neurons contain many large anionic proteins (albumin) that results in an overall negative charge inside the neuron compared to outside. 2) There is a higher concentration of sodium ions outside the cell than inside. 3) There is a higher concentration of potassium ions inside the cell than outside. Because of these factors, neurons have a potential of about -70mv from inside to outside (i.e. the cell is polarised). This is known as the resting potential. A nerve impulse (action potential) occurs when something causes sodium channels to open. When this happens, sodium rushes in and the cell depolarises at that point. This causes a local current at that point in the membrane where there is a potential along (rather than across) the membrane. This causes voltage gatged soduim channels further up the cell to open and so the membrane depolarises further up and the action potential travels along the membrane. As sodium channels close, potassium channels open and potassium rushes out down its concentration gradient. Sodium potassium pumps also work to remove sodium and pump in potassium (3 sodium out to 2 potassium in). These mechanisms reestablish the resting potential. The whole thing is based on the movement of ions, not electrons.

That sounds reasonable, but is that to say that if it mutates to become more transmissible, it's likely to become less virulent?

It's unlikely. Bubonic plague is quite easily treated these days.

He did cross the line. Schools and schooling are supposed to be apolitical and secular, promoting no particular political or religious agenda (unless it's a religious school). The personal beliefs of a teacher have no place in a classroom.

The H5N1 virus exists and can infect humans, fatally in many cases, but is not easily passed from human to human yet. But viruses mutate, so what we have is a potentialy lethal virus that is already transmissible from birds to humans, randomly trying out different combinations on the lock to human to human or even airborne transmission. If you role a bunch of dice a sufficient number of times, you will eventually get the right combination. It is only a matter of time, so the risk remains. The WHO has done its job by alerting people to that risk and by helping to develop measures against it. The reduction in mortality is due largely to the measures already put in place concerning the movement and handling of infected poultry and so-on. I don't think it's wise to classify the actions of the WHO as a 'screw up' because a pandemic hasn't happened yet. Alerting people to a threat in time to allow prophylactic measures to be put into place is a lot more effective than 'Oh, by the way, we've identified the thing that's killing all these people...'. A fire alarm will only sound when the building is already on fire. If a fire alarm existed that would warn of a significant/impending risk of fire in time to prevent it (or at least take measures against it), would people consider it a screw up because the fire didn't happen or thousands of people didn't die?

I always wanted to go to Lourdes and ask people how many amputees have spontaneously regrown limbs.

...and we can actually treat the common cold very effectively. We can reduce the fever and inflammation. We can aleviate the headache and sore throat and so-on. We can even reduce the chances of full infection if we catch it early enough. We just can't cure it. Putting a man on the moon would be a lot harder if the moon changed position as randomly and frequently as the cold virus mutates.

To filter a urine sample of any genetic markers, toxins or other chemicals, would need an extremely good filter. We're talking at least dialysis quality. The result would be pretty much just water. Anybody testing it would know it was not 'straight' urine.

It might have something to do with the swallow reflex. Humans have to stop breathing to swallow (saliva etc.) and as humans breathe both through nose and mouth, breathing would have to be decoupled to allow a panting human to swallow without choking. Horses, on the other hand, can't breathe through their mouths and so can swallow and breathe at the same time.

But then, to assume that every member of the line was there because they believe in psychics would be an error. Some might. Others may just be curious, some may be absolute disbelievers who want to see if they can see how it's done. Some might just want a laugh. You can't infer intent. Sampling, by definition of the term means a small group of an overall population. The key factor is whether or not the sample is representative. In this case, whilst those queueing at the psychic's tent was a sample of the student population, it was not representative because it was a self-selecting sample (i.e. only those with some interest in the psychic queued). So, this sample posesses a characteristic the rest of the student population does not and so no conclusions based on their behaviour can be generalized to the student population. All it does is indicate roughly what proportion at that University (who attended that day) have some kind of interest in psychics. What proportion of that proportion actually believe in psychics was never measured. =================================================== Only if you assume belief is the defining factor in that sample.

This I agree with absolutely. I'm not a techie and to me, my computer is a tool, and not an end in itself (i.e. computing is absolutely necessary for my work, but my work is not computing). I've been using windows based systems since 3.1 and each major edition seems to provide less control. It is irritating that in its latest, 'best' iteration, I'm constantly engaged in dialogue that serves no other purpose than to reassure the OS that, yes, I really did mean to start that programme, and yes, I trust its author as much as I did this time yesterday. Vista does what I need it to do (as I said) and for the most part, it does it well. I just wish it wasn't designed with the default position that the user is an idiot. It gets wearing.

I had to buy a new laptop 6 weeks ago. My desktop was definitely past it, and as I'm living in a flat now, I have no office, so a good laptop was a better choice for me than a desktop. The laptop came with vista home premium installed, and so far, I have had no probelms with it. I've had to upgrade a few of my applications, but having done so, the system works very well. I had heard a lot of bad things about vista but I didn't think it was worth re-formatting the drive and loading XP, as (I supposed) vista is the way things are going anyway, so I just went with it. This system has a core 2 Duo at 2.2GHz, 4Gb Ram and a 160Gb HDD (7200rpm). On this system, vista seems very stable (so far) and smooth. It copes well with applications like SPSS (that are graphically more basic and less worried about appearance). When I start SPSS, vista automatically switches to basic graphics mode, and back to aero when I close the application. Everything I ran before, runs now, just as well. One issue about upgrading RAM. 32 bit OSs can only address 4Gb of memory max (2 to the power of 32 is 4Bn). So given that it has to address all memory, including chache etc. a 32 bit OS will only recognize about 3.58Gb (on my system). The BIOS recognizes all RAM, but the OS is limited. 64 bit OSs don't have this issue as 2 to the power of 64 is way beyond what you could possibly install these days, but well cooked drivers for 64 bit OSs are still hard to come by. Anyway, I use this system every day and in my experience, vista seems ok. I may not be a power user, or extreme gamer, but I rely on this system for my work and reliability is important. I use office apps, and some powerful graphics apps along with statistical spreadsheets with some quite huge data sets. I often have many of these apps open and running at the same time and there hasn't been a single hiccup in the 6 weeks I've had the system. Having said that, I can't really tell the difference between vista and XP apart from vista is purty and has a new start-up chord. I have been told that the first service pack (out in Jan), should speed things up a bit. Not that it's particularly slow, but boot up times seem the same as with XP. In short, I do what I need and want to do and I don't even notice vista. I suppose that's what it's about. I don't really want to notice the OS, it's only a platform from which I launch the things I need to use. It might be resource greedy, but as has been said, it's also flexible and will adapt to demand.

There's a lot of truth in that

Yes, I think it's saying a person is defined by what they do, rather than what they look like: A stupid person does stupid things (more often than non-stupid people). In the original then, it would mean that a handsom person is defined by their deeds, not their looks. Hmmm...still not making much sense. Perhaps they are as green as they're cabbage looking?

I think he does make some good points. 'Science' doesn't care what it finds, but people tend to be more resistant to findings they don't like, or disagree with, and much more prepared to accept without question findings they like or agree with. It is extrememly difficult to remove the element of concensus when trying to move scientific results from the lab to the population, especially if those results hold some potential for cost. I have one particular issue. Where Chrighton says "Nobody believes a weather prediction twelve hours ahead. Now we're asked to believe a prediction that goes out 100 years into the future?. I think he is confusing two separate measures. If I went to a sea wall on the South coast of England on a choppy day, I could not place a line on the wall that predicts the exact surface level at any specific point on the wall 30 seconds in advance. That is pretty much like trying to predict tomorrow's weather. However, I could place a line on the wall that accurately predicts the mean surface level (+/- chop) four hours in advance as long as I knew know the state of the tide at the point I arrived. That is more like predicting a future state based on measurable trends.

That is my point. And in terms of science, the statement 'it's God's will' is not a meaningful answer, as it is an answer to everything and therefore answers nothing. Dawkin's original statement was made in the context of science, i.e. in the context of seeking explanations for natural phenomena, and as I said "As far as science is concerned they ['why' questions] are [meaningless] and so, in that context, he's quite right.". To extend his statement beyond the context in which it was made is unfair and putting words in his mouth. iNow has it. Thank you.

I'm not sure about the nature of the effect of nicotine on Alzheimer's, but I remember seeing some research recently that indicated it helped slow the progression. I can't rememeber the source though.

In what way is the cliche correct? Where science has answered the question concerning how stars form, in what way is theology equipped to answer the question Why stars form? What is the motivation behind star formation? That was my point, which is why I went on to say: As far as science is concerned they are and so, in that context, he's quite right.

Rubbish. Bowie's eyes are the same colour. He had an accident as a kid (involving head trauma) and blew his left pupil. His left pupil is fixed and dilated due to damage to the ocular motor nerve. His irises are the same colour (hazel/green) but his left pupil is permanently dilated, so that eye appears darker.

'How' questions ask for underlying processes. 'Why' questions ask for a rationale for those processes. For example, 'How did the earth come into being?' asks for the processes that resulted in the formation of this planet. This question can be answered through cosmology, physics, geology and so-on. 'Why did the earth come into being?' asks for (and thus assumes) some rationale behind those processes and the existence of the planet. Dawkins' position is that in studying the natural world/Universe, most 'why' questions are unanswerable and so, meaningless. There is no rationale behind a product of physical laws beyond the physical laws themselves, which are sufficient on their own to explain their product (i.e. 'how'). So, most 'why question simply become circular. For example: 1) "How is a star formed?" "A gravitational instability in a hydrogen cloud causes the hydrogen to coalesce on an area of higher gravitational density until the internal pressure of the mass of hydrogen is sufficient to cause the hydrogen to begin to fuse into heavier elements." 2) "Why is a star formed?" "Because some perturbation in a previously stable gravitational field caused hydrogen to begin to coalesce ..." "Yes, but why?" "..er..because, that's what gravity does" "But WHY does it do that?" "Because, it's GRAVITY, dagnabbit!...." Most parents will recognise the pointlessness of such 'why' questions. A more sensible iteration of the second question would be 'for what reason does a star form?' If you think about it, there is no answer beyond the one given to the 'how' question, i.e. a star is a product of the processes of physical laws acting on matter and once the laws and processes are understood, there are no more questions. Thus, the 'why' question is a pointless 'non' question.

Nicotine has a strong neuroprotective effect and inhibits the loss of dopaminergic neurons (see here). As psychoactive drugs, with effects in the reward centres of the brain, nicotine and caffine also increase the release of dopamine (see here, which can further help control the symptoms of Parkinson's and Parkinsonian syndromes. If you google 'Neruprotective effects of nicotine' you will get lots of information on it. There is also research into the benefits of nicotine in the treatment (slowing the progression) of Alzheimer's.

The problem is that people are confusing terminology. Smoking and nicotine are different things. Smoking is harmful. However, nicotine (aside from being one of the most lethal substances known) has been shown to have some neurological benefits. Research is ongoing, but there have been some promising results. However, as I said, smoking is harmful. It doesn't matter how beneficial nicotine may be shown to be, its benefits will always be outweighed by the damage done by smoking. One doesn't need to smoke to self-administer nicotine, but nicotine is an extremely addictive substance nonetheless.

It's been suggested as a way to address the chronic shortage of donor organs, but I haven't heard anything about it for a while. It's not really a slippery slope fallacy because (as I said) the system already exists and is already being abused. Inthe same way as strong committes have solved the problems of the illegal drugs trade and the illegal trade in Eastern European women as sex slaves and so-on? The problem of illegal trade in human organs already exists, so there is no slope. All the idea does is to widen (and so heat up) a market that already exists. To suppose that it will be any different in the USA is just naive.

As soon as you put monitary value on a thing, it gets abused. Unfortunately, kidneys already have a monitary value in many areas, and so the system is already being abused. Another idea being considered is to put people on the donor list by default. At the moment, people have to 'opt in' to the donor list. The new system would put people on the donor list automatically, with the freedom to opt out. This still provides freedom of choice, it just reverses the direction. I like this idea better than heating up the market for a trade in human organs.

These are exactly the kind of things that newbie medics do. Doctors don't really get a lot of practice at venipuncture which is why they tend to rely on trained phlebotomists to do it for them. Venipuncture is a skill and requires a lot of (supervised) practice to be able to do safely. There's also learning what to do if things go wrong. For example, hitting an artery (which is easily done as in many people the brachial accessory artery runs directly under the antecubital vein) does not have to be catastrophic, as long as you know how to recognise that you've done it and what to do about it. The same applies to hitting a nerve (the median nerve is the one at risk). If you know how to recognise that you have come too close to it, you can avoid doing permanent damage. If you don't then you're in trouble. Even if you successfully hit the vein, and I've no reason to suppose you will other than by lucky accident, as many docors still have trouble doing this (it really is not as easy as it seems), then you still have to know what to do to avoid bleeding into the tissue risking severe abscess and/or phlebitis. You can trust my word on this. I am a trained phlebotomist and worked as the senior phlebotomist on a Renal Transplant Unit in a London teaching hospital for four years whilst I was doing my PhD. Please don't attempt venipuncture on anybody unless you know exactly what you're doing.