Saturday, August 21, 2010
The most isolated man on the planet
Now, here's a guy who enjoys his privacy.
New studies into hallucinogens and mental health
LSD and ketamine, two powerful hallucinogens, are also potential cures
for depression, OCD, and anxiety. Two studies published this week, in Science and Nature, confirm that hallucinogenic drugs stimulate healthy brain activity, even promoting the growth of neurons.
Monday, August 16, 2010
Thursday, August 12, 2010
What celebrities would look like if they lived in Barrie, Ontario
You have to log into Facebook to see this, but this is the biggest collection of photo(shopped)s for this theme.
Hats off to Pat Boogie for assembling the collection.
Sunday, August 8, 2010
Saturday, August 7, 2010
Beware deceptively labeled "healthy" foods
“In fact, Vitaminwater is no more than non-carbonated soda, providing
unnecessary added sugar and contributing to weight gain, obesity,
diabetes, and other diseases."
Friday, August 6, 2010
Saturday, July 24, 2010
Rogers to reduce download limits
They're still better than Sympatico, who throttle users at various times of the day, regardless of your package limits.
Thursday, July 22, 2010
Wednesday, July 21, 2010
Monday, July 19, 2010
Universal vaccination patch
The patches contain hundreds of microscopic needles, each barely any
bigger than a 10,000th of an inch. (You can see an array of 36 such
needles up top.) The needles are each tipped with vaccines, and when the
patch is applied to the skin they dissolve painlessly to provide
long-lasting protection. That's a big improvement on hypodermic needles,
the current mode of vaccine delivery, because those needles are nothing
but trouble once they've been used. Disposing of hypodermics so that
they don't accidentally hurt someone or end up getting reused is a
public health nightmare, and the patch eliminates those concerns
completely.
...
Friday, July 16, 2010
Part of the brain that tracks limbs in space discovered
Scientists have discovered the part of the brain that tracks the position of our limbs as we move through space.
When a mosquito lands on your hand, you can rapidly and effortlessly make a movement of the other hand to brush it away, even in darkness. But performing this seemingly simple action involves a surprisingly complex coordination of different types of sensory information in order for your brain to construct a constantly updated 'map' of the body in space.
...
Tuesday, July 13, 2010
HST shifts the tax burden from businesses to individuals
The message of Andrea Horwath's party against the new harmonized sales
tax, which took effect on Canada Day, has not been quite as simplistic
as that of Tim Hudak's Conservatives. But it's often been more
convincing.
For one thing, the NDP isn't conflicted by federal
cousins who partnered with Dalton McGuinty's Liberals to implement the
new tax. Instead, it’s tied to the only party in Ottawa that firmly
opposed the policy.
For another, the NDP's position actually
makes sense. The Tories have claimed the HST is a “tax grab,” which it’s
really not. The NDP more accurately argues, at least sometimes, that
it's a shifting of the tax burden from businesses to individuals. And
that's something that, alone among the parties, it can very strongly and
credibly oppose.
...
Garden Pest & Disease Detective
Here is a handy guide for garden pests and diseases and solutions. Pick the vegetable, then where the damage is on the plant and it then shows the pests and diseases in pictures and words. Click on the one you recognize and it offers solutions.
Our Amazing Planet
An interesting chart looking at our planet from the top of the atmosphere to the deepest ocean depth.
Historians locate King Arthur's Round Table
Researchers exploring the legend of Britain’s most famous Knight believe
his
stronghold of Camelot was built on the site of a recently discovered
Roman
amphitheatre in Chester.
...
Conservative voters vote Conservative because ???
But "Lemmings" in a metaphorical sense do exist, and they vote
conservative.Why are people so willing to swallow complete bullshit and fabrications, and to abandon common sense? Every single conservative government runs the deficit up. And this deficit started well before things went south, globally.
Despite all evidence to the contrary they vote for the worst policies
for a country and a society. They do it even when they can see that it
has caused millions of bodies to wash up on the shores of economic
destruction.
...
Read the link for the full post
Harper and his unelectable senators
This is a brilliant post by A BCer in Toronto about all the senators who originally ran in elections and could not get elected - showing us that Harper is not serious about an elected Senate.
Monday, July 12, 2010
Doomsday coming? Truth, theory or conspiracy theory? (or bad joke?) - DEBUNKED
According to Terrance Aym, writing at Helium.com, the BP oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico may be triggering events below the ocean floor there that may lead to the extinction of most life on Earth within the next 6 months. Read the article at the link above, including the references cited and you be the judge.
Here is a response to Aym's article:
RedBedHead: BP Oil Disaster May Destroy Planet Earth!
...
DEBUNKED!
Methane Bubble "Doomsday" Story Debunked
...
While it's true that there are methane bubbles (and methane ice) beneath the ocean floor, they are not about to erupt from Gulf and destroy all life on Earth. This morning I spoke with two Earth scientists, Dave Valentine of UC Santa Barbara and Chris Reddy of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute, who study methane and oil seeps from the sea floor. Valentine has just been out to the Gulf to study the methane levels there, and told io9:
During our recent cruise to the Gulf we observed significantly elevated levels of methane at water depth greater than 2500 feet, in the vicinity of the Deepwater Horizon spill site. While the total quantity of methane and other hydrocarbons is enough to cause problems with the regional ecosystem, there is no plausible scenario by which this event alone will cause global-scale extinctions.
So yes, there is a methane seep. No, it will not cause tidal waves or explode.
Another fishy fact in the methane bubble doomsday story is Aym's description of how methane bubbles are what caused the End Permian mass extinction event 250 million years ago - a mass extinction that I wrote about recently, here. Many scientists do believe that atmospheric changes and ocean anoxia (de-oxygenization) were to blame for that extinction - but even Gregory Ryskin, the scientist whose highly speculative work is cited in the article, doesn't try to claim this as the sole cause, nor does he believe that one bubble of methane could bring down the biosphere instantly. The End Permian extinction took millennia to happen.
So the BP oil spill isn't going to end the world - it's just going to kill a lot of ocean life. And already-existing methane seeps may be doing slow, deadly damage to our climate. All this makes it even more obvious that we need to invest in alternate forms of energy. But who wants to hear difficult, complicated pieces of information, when we could just be screaming about doomsday? ...
Saturday, July 10, 2010
Thousands of abandoned oil well in the Gulf of Mexico pose risk
Excerpt:
As a forceful reminder of the potential harm, the well beneath BP's Deepwater Horizon rig was being sealed with cement for temporary abandonment when it blew April 20, leading to one of the worst environmental disasters in the nation's history. BP alone has abandoned about 600 wells in the Gulf, according to government data.
There's ample reason for worry about all permanently and temporarily abandoned wells -- history shows that at least on land, they often leak. Wells are sealed underwater much as they are on land. And wells on land and in water face similar risk of failure. Plus, records reviewed by the AP show that some offshore wells have failed.
Experts say such wells can repressurize, much like a dormant volcano can awaken. And years of exposure to sea water and underground pressure can cause cementing and piping to corrode and weaken.
"You can have changing geological conditions where a well could be repressurized," said Andy Radford, a petroleum engineer for the American Petroleum Institute trade group.
Whether a well is permanently or temporarily abandoned, improperly applied or aging cement can crack or shrink, independent petroleum engineers say. "It ages, just like it does on buildings and highways," said Roger Anderson, a Columbia University petroleum geophysicist who has conducted research on commercial wells.
Despite the likelihood of leaks large and small, though, abandoned wells are typically not inspected by industry or government.
Friday, July 9, 2010
Will Stephen Harper do the right thing regarding Omar Khadr? - No.
...
The Federal Court has given the Harper government until Monday to intervene in Khadr’s case. If Ottawa did ask for his repatriation at this late date, there is no certainty that President Barack Obama, under his own domestic pressures, would agree. But it is time for Harper to show confidence in the Canadian legal system and make the request.
Stephen Harper should do the right, decent, and Canadian thing and make that request.
...
Indian port boycotts Israeli ships
...
Trade unions at India's Cochin Port, one of India's main seaports and
its fastest growing, have agreed to boycott the unloading of Israeli
ships in protest of the siege of Gaza. This follows on from boycotts at Turkish, Swedish,
Norwegian and South
African ports.
...
Cell phone access coming to subway stations in Toronto
...
Last year, the TTC began screening potential contractors to set up
cell service across the system. But lack of resources and other
priorities forced it to whittle the project down to just the platforms
for now, according to a staff report. The list of possible proponents is
down to three: Bell Mobility, Extenet Systems, which is partnering with
Telus, and Broadcast Australia, which is partnering with Rogers.
With the TTC now providing next vehicle information updates via text
messaging, staff urged the commission to move ahead with the cell
network. A staff report to the commission says that the winning bid will
pay for all costs, including installation work done by TTC workers.
Thursday, July 8, 2010
Now you can text the TTC to get the next streetcar time
Send the stop # to 898882 and you will get a quick response text listing the next 6 streetcar times.
Right now this only works for streetcars, but by early 2011, this will also work for all bus stops too!
Read the link for more details.
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