Moontanman

You have asked a question that opens up a can of worms or to be more exact a can of crazies. I looked rather hard and most of the stuff I found was from one extreme end or the other of the spectrum. Very little realistic research seems to have been done about this. I smoked pot around my kids when they were young, both turned out to be highly intelligent young men with college degrees and if anything they are over achievers. But one point does not a graph make. I've read and heard so much hype about second hand cigarette smoke, bad/no effect, but I tend toward the idea that any smoke is not good for you. Cannabis smokers seldom if ever smoke as much as tobacco smokers but if I had it to do over again I would err on the side of caution and smoke outside like I make all smokers do now at my house. Here is reasonable study I found. http://www.articlesbase.com/quit-smoking-articles/the-health-hazards-associated-with-passive-smoking-1029317.html

More studies of the effects of drugs on the fetus. http://www.addictionireland.ie/faq/article.asp?FID=82&T=F http://www.marijuanapassion.com/The_Debate_on_the_Effects_of_Marijuana_Use_During_Pregnancy.html http://www.americanpregnancy.org/pregnancyhealth/illegaldrugs.html http://www.a1b2c3.com/drugs/wom06.htm http://www.drugpolicy.org/marijuana/factsmyths/ I think it's important to note that most studies of the effect of marijuana on the fetus are either inconclusive or so small they are difficult to show but alcohol, a legal and commonly abused drug during pregnancy has been shown to cause specific and definite problems with the fetus. http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/article/000911.htm And tobacco http://www.enotalone.com/article/11305.html

Has anyone done a study of stars to see if any match the metal "print" of our sun? Possibly these are the stars we should be looking for to find intelligent life? Merged post follows: Consecutive posts mergedBTW, even though the OP did indeed get his wires crossed this should not be in Pseudoscience, I think it's a reasonable line of inquiry.

The Conservatives are well down the road to batshit crazy, they cannot deal with loosing power to the liberals. They cannot see they pretty much screwed the pooch themselves by all the nutty bullshit they tried to pull when Bush was pres. Socialism is only bad when it helps the poor, it's wonderful when it helps the rich. The Conservative movement thought they were speaking for everyone in the country they forgot that not everyone is a Conservative Christian fundamentalist. Now they are so desperate to show their displeasure they are stepping and fetching like their asses are on fire and their heads are catching.... BTW Has anyone else noticed that the spell checker always suggests capitalizing Conservative but not Liberal?

The Sun moves around the core of the galaxy in it's own orbit, the local neighbor stars are not the same stars that were neighbor stars when the Sun was formed. The Sun moves around and up and down through the galactic disc and there is no way to know for sure where the sun formed or if any other stars formed at the same time or where they might be.

The term "leaks" could simply be a poor choice of words, excrete might be better. The algae is symbiotic with the corals. The way nutrients are transported to the coral is mutually beneficial and works both ways. The algae lives through out the flesh of the Coral, mostly at the surface of the polyps to maximize the absorption of sunlight. The bright colors of the corals is due primarily to the symbiotic algae and the reason for the pigments is to allow the algae to use sunlight outside the blue and red parts of the spectrum generally used by plants. Many of the pigments allow the use of UV light by the algae.

dr.syntax, the fish in your link are not sculpins, they are mud skippers. Yes, sculpins do indeed live in New York State but sculpins are not by any measure amphibious. Mud skippers are amphibious but they only live in the tropics.

I've been growing and propagating live coral for many years, almost 35 years. From what I've read about the process in my attempts to understand how and why coral grow the main idea is the Zooxanthellae leak their excess nutrients through their cell walls. No digestion of the Zooxanthellae actually occurs. I did a quick search to find some links to confirm this but I couldn't find any. It's been so long since I read this I can't remember the book or books i got it from.

Yes, when you exceed the speed of light there is a "photonic" boom. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cherenkov_radiation

I for one can't wait for the aliens to get here and take over. It's about damn time!

The republicans have lost their grip on reality just as surely as they have lost their grip on power. The Conservative right actually thought they had gained a permanent hold on power through the grace of god or at least by manipulating the religious right. Right now they are doing the political equivalent of going insane. Their well executed plans have come to naught, they simply cannot understand how this could have happened and like an animal caught in a trap they are in the process of chewing their own legs off. They are probably beyond noticing the stars.

I understand how something can be compressed, even compressed into a solid but does that make it ice? Water deep in the ocean super heated by touching molten lava is the same density as steam as it is as a liquid but it's still not liquid water. I'm not trying to be obtuse , just trying to understand.

Just because a civilization has managed to colonize the space around most suitable stars doesn't make them a super civilization. super civilization implies technology far beyond our own , using the energy of entire stars or galaxies. A civilization not much more technologically advanced than our own could, given enough time, IE 250,000,000 years colonize the entire galaxy. No FTL, no impossible physics no fantastic energy use. Just technology similar to us and determination.

I am quite sure that cannabis use has some long term effects on the mind as do most mood altering substances people put into their bodies. To me the question is not if cannabis has long term effects but how severe are these effects compared to other substances we use to "relax" Are we talking about a .0001% difference or a 25% difference? Are the effects statistically significant or are they within the variance of normal brain chemistry? Are the effects the same in all individuals or are some individuals more prone to the effects than others? Do some people who already have brain chemistry problems use because the substance helps them deal with their problems? Or does the problem attract certain people to the substances in question? Alcohol has long term effects, as does nicotine, magic mushrooms, cocaine, caffeine, the list goes on and on. Even substances we do not take to intentionally change our mindset such as plastic residues from drink bottles can have lasting effects. The only sure way is not to ingest any substance into the body that is not needed by the body.... Good luck.... It seems that nearly all these studies are so polarized because they set out to prove positive or negative effect with out looking at the big picture. The idea that all levels of use or exposure to any of these substances is some how harmful to everyone in the same way is also flawed. Some people are more prone to alcoholism or even cocaine abuse and others can use the substance and take it or leave it. The OP says he wants unbiased research or opinions but the very idea of such research is virtually always biased. No one starts out to show neutral effects and any effects are bound to be harmful in some way. I say bound to be harmful because any tinkering with brain chemistry is bound to have some effects that are less than good. Even medical attempts to correct brain chemistry problems always has both positive and negative effects. I think the idea of an unbiased look at the effects of any substance that alters brain chemistry is flawed from the very start because we are part of the study and so no actual neutral study can be done.

I have to ask, how could there be ices inside jupiter when it is so hot?

I see no reason to assume super civilizations. Type II type IV or what ever. A civilization not much more advanced than our own could in theory colonize pretty much the entire Galaxy and never touch an earth like planet or even make any beings living on those planets aware of their existence. Orbiting artificial colonies in the shape of a torus or other form that allows rotation for artificial gravity could be reproduced in the millions from the material around one star. Such structures could spread slowly at a small fraction of the speed of light, possibly making the trip between stars in a few centuries or maybe decades depending on the technology or distance. Within about 250,000,000 years such a civilization could have a presence around pretty much all the suitable stars in the galaxy. Groups of objects like the asteroids at Jupiter's Lagrange points could support millions of aliens without humanity ever knowing it unless we go there and look. Planets and their gravity wells would be avoided by such a civilization and they would have no need to worry about "Earth" like planets and stars with huge clouds of asteroids instead of planets would be preferred to stars with lots of planets. No need for FTL or using the energy of whole galaxies. Just good solid technology and time, the galaxy would be theirs and might very well be, we wouldn't know it.

Just sent me $100 US and I'll prevent the end of the world in 2012....Trust me.....

Nazca lines are cool, but what about the Antarctic maps? That is really interesting, has anyone else have info on any anomalies similar to that one?

I think the underwear gnomes use socks as fuel to allow them to steal underwear and transport them to he gnome home dimension.

Have they gone too far? yeah, for about the last 40 years! Obama on the toilet would be par for the course, you can't be a human anymore. No one is perfect enough to stand the scrutiny.

http://www.physorg.com/news65376545.html http://library.thinkquest.org/C003763/index.php?page=planet09 http://www.skyandtelescope.com/resources/seti/3304591.html

The hard drive becomes floppy everytime you log on......

Obviously nuclear power plants aren't for making power they are for releasing radiation, get with the program ydoaPs!

Life is an emergent property of atoms and electrons, alone they are not alive but in huge numbers ordered the proper way they can be alive. Order and arrangement is what makes living matter different from non living not some mystical "thing" that makes them alive.....

Dobsonfly fly http://bugguide.net/node/view/4873