LiberatedMind.com » Science

Seriously? Two More Oil Leaks.

LiberatedMind.com — Wed, 28 Jul 2010 05:05:45 +0000

For those Americans who haven’t received the memo that we use too much oil and drill it irresponsibly, we have a few more million gallons to dump. This morning a Tugboat collided with an oil rig off the coast of Louisiana. The crash caused the rig to catch fire and oil to leak, covering a 1 mile radius in only a half day. The tugboat driver claimed that the rig was not fully illuminated, even though it was 11am in the middle of the day.

In Michigan today, Detroit News reported that an oil pipeline had burst and was flowing into tributary rivers that feed into the Great Lakes. The oil leaked undetected for hours before local river residents complained of an oily smell. Local residents have been evacuated as the oil contamination reached dangerous levels. It has been estimated that 1 million gallons have been spilled, the largest oil spill ever in the midwest, according to the EPA.

“The oil spilled into Talmadge Creek, which flows northwest into the Kalamazoo River. The site is in Calhoun County’s Marshall Township near Battle Creek and about 60 miles southeast of Grand Rapids. The pipe may have been leaking for many hours before it was originally reported to have burst Monday morning. Marshall Township fire officials responded to complaints of an oily smell from residents. More than 20 homes have been evacuated.” - Detroit News

When will American’s have enough of their own poison and switch to renewable energy sources? I fear that money is the determining factor in the oil equation. We will continue to use it at alarming rates, to the detriment of our environment and ourselves until it becomes too expensive. When is too expensive? For everyone, this is a different answer, but for a country in economic crisis and high unemployment, that number may be lower than previously conjectured.

Air Fresheners linked to Breast Cancer

LiberatedMind.com — Fri, 23 Jul 2010 16:11:16 +0000

Are you a neat freak? Always cleaning with windex, pledge, air fresheners and 409? The same chemicals that may be killing all those germs in your home may also be causing breast cancer in women.

“Women who report greater use of cleaning products may be at higher breast cancer risk than those who say they use them sparingly. Researchers writing in BioMed Central’s open access journal Environmental Health asked more than 1500 women about their cleaning product usage and found that women who reported using more air fresheners and products for mold and mildew control had a higher incidence of breast cancer.” - ScienceDaily.com Continue reading…

Because the FDA does not require cleaning products to list their toxic ingredients, our family decided years ago to rid our home of all cleaners, soaps and personal products. We make our own soap and use a vinegar/water mix to clean surfaces. When we buy personal products, we research them and their ingredients and only buy products without human carcinogens or parabens.

Your Couch may cause ADHD in Your Child.

LiberatedMind.com — Wed, 21 Jul 2010 22:13:34 +0000

There is a chemical warfare happening in American homes. We have taken measures to eliminate all toxic cleaners, personal products and cosmetics from our home. The result is a cheaper, healthier way of cleaning. We also do not buy PFC coated furniture, carpet, etc and we avoid clothing made from anything but cotton or bamboo. From ScienceDaily.com:

“A new study led by a team of Boston University School of Public Health researchers suggests a link between polyfluoroalkyl chemicals (PFCs), industrial compounds which are widely used in many consumer products, and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in children.” Continue Reading…

Montage of Frustration surrounding the Gulf Spill

LiberatedMind.com — Fri, 18 Jun 2010 22:56:55 +0000

BP’s CEO Tony Hayword stopped by congress yesterday to testify about the Gulf Oil Spill. He seems to have been in a coma for his entire term as CEO of BP. Here is a summation of the frustration that ensued as Hayword was questioned.

No related posts.

Baby Talk: Cute, but Possibly Harmful

LiberatedMind.com — Mon, 24 May 2010 13:20:42 +0000

It can be amusing for parents to speak “babyeeze” to their little ones, often mimicking their child when she says a word incorrectly. Babies learning to speak sound so cute and their mispronunciations often make us giggle. Between the ages of 3 and 6 when language is being tested and solidified by a child is the most vulnerable period of language aquisition.

Recent studies by Dutch researcher Lotte Henrichs suggests that speaking academically with your child instead of simplifying your speech patterns actually helps a child do better in school later in life.

Henrichs demonstrated that children are already confronted with academic language in the nursery school. They already hear a lot academic language from the teacher and are often expected to use academic language themselves. The extent to which academic language is used at home was found to differ strongly between families. An essential aspect is how parents approach their children during conversations. If children are given the opportunity to make meaningful contributions to conversations, they often use characteristics of academic language proficiency naturally. In addition to this, the knowledge of academic language depends on the extent to which parents read to their children, tell them stories and hold conversations about interesting subjects. - NWO.com

This may carry over to a polite correction of your child when he pronounces a word incorrectly. When I was growing up, as most children do, I misprounced common, long words like spaghetti (bascetti) and Popsicle (popsible). I also took to saying breakfast by switching the middle consonants to “brefkist”. My mother failed to correct me until I was 8 years old because she thought it was cute and couldn’t bring herself to tell me. Even more scarring was that I found out I had been pronouncing it incorrectly when a neighborhood friend had a sleepover at my house and I asked if she would like some “brefkist”, whereupon I was thoroughly embarrassed as my mother explained her reason for not correcting me sooner.

With every child I encounter, whether family or children of friends I have noticed a marked difference in their participation in the “adult” conversation when I speak to them as I would to my peers. Children live up to our expectations. Treat your child like an individual with ideas and thoughts to contribute and she will not only surprise you, but she may be better off in life both academically and socially.

Craig Venter has Created Artifical Life!

LiberatedMind.com — Sat, 22 May 2010 21:31:46 +0000

This is HUGE. This gives scientists the capability to make ANY protien. Some of the possibilties include: Making organs from scratch that fit a person’s individual DNA with the “bad” parts replaced with “good” code; creating a new biofuel that is genetically designed to be as efficient and clean as possible…

From the BBC:

Scientists in the US have succeeded in developing the first synthetic living cell.

The researchers constructed a bacterium’s “genetic software” and transplanted it into a host cell.

The resulting microbe then looked and behaved like the species “dictated” by the synthetic DNA.

The advance, published in Science, has been hailed as a scientific landmark, but critics say there are dangers posed by synthetic organisms.

The researchers hope eventually to design bacterial cells that will produce medicines and fuels and even absorb greenhouse gases.

The team was led by Dr Craig Venter of the J Craig Venter Institute (JCVI) in Maryland and California.

He and his colleagues had previously made a synthetic bacterial genome, and transplanted the genome of one bacterium into another.

Now, the scientists have put both methods together, to create what they call a “synthetic cell”, although only its genome is truly synthetic.

Dr Venter likened the advance to making new software for the cell.

The researchers copied an existing bacterial genome. They sequenced its genetic code and then used “synthesis machines” to chemically construct a copy.

Dr Venter told BBC News: “We’ve now been able to take our synthetic chromosome and transplant it into a recipient cell – a different organism.

“As soon as this new software goes into the cell, the cell reads [it] and converts into the species specified in that genetic code.”

The new bacteria replicated over a billion times, producing copies that contained and were controlled by the constructed, synthetic DNA.

“This is the first time any synthetic DNA has been in complete control of a cell,” said Dr Venter.

Continue reading…

Geographic Concentrations of Religion Irrational at Best

LiberatedMind.com — Sat, 15 May 2010 12:13:23 +0000

Science put religious “upbringings” and convictions to shame with it’s level of rationality and requirements for evidence.

Richard Dawkins explains:

I’m watching you: Geographic Data and Your Privacy

LiberatedMind.com — Wed, 12 May 2010 13:13:53 +0000

Geographic information about you is easy to collect these days. When we carry around cell phones and give our our home address for everything, it makes it very easy for your location to get into the wrong hands. Today you might not worry about someone finding you at your home, but when the need to arises, it may be too late.

A new research study published online in the BMC Medical Informatics and Decision Making journal measures how easy it is to determine the identity of individuals using their geographical information.

In the article, Prof. Khaled El Emam, Canada Research Chair in Electronic Health Information and lead author, explains that they have developed a new method for measuring the privacy risk for Canadians, in particular, those living in small geographic areas. This privacy risk measure can then be used to decide whether it is appropriate to release/share geographic information or not and what demographics to include with this geographic information. The article also presents a set of criteria and checklists for managing the privacy risks when releasing/sharing location information. - Science Daily

Most people are not away of how much of their personal data is availble for anyone to find out. For example, if you post your city and birthday on a social networking site, it is very easy for a stalker or any unwanted guest to track you down just based on that information. Unless you have a very common name like Adam Smith, your name, city and birthday are enough information to locate you, especially if you live in a small town. Some people don’t think twice about giving out their address and birthday at department stores with the promise to send you coupons. Selling your address to junk mailers makes more money than those pair of panties every will.

Aside from the obvious, women especially should consider keeping their home address private to prevent possible future stalkers from locating them. A study called the National Violence Against Women Survey (NVAW) found that 8% of women and 2% of men have been stalked at some time during their lives. 1 out of every 12 women, and 1 out of every 45 men have reported being stalked during their lives.1 You might not be concerned now, but should you need to keep your home address safe, now is the time to start.

So what can you do?

Start by changing your phone numbers and email addresses.
Get a Post Office box that you can receive your mail at. Change all your home mail to your Post box
If asked to provide your home address simply state that you never give out your home address. Use your PO box if necessary.
Remove your birthdate and hometown from all social networking sites and reconsider what kind of information you give out and who might have access to that information. I opted to delete my social networking accounts because they were consuming too much of my time. I also noticed that the people I used to keep in touch with via phone or email no longer did so because they could “keep tabs” on me through the social networking sites. It seemed like an anti-social rather than a social method to me.
If you are really interested, google and yahoo search your name to see what other people might be able to find out about you via the web. This might be shocking an unnerving. Take down what you can and be informed.
If you live in an apartment, review the privacy policy with your landlord. Make sure that he/she is not going to give out your name or personal information to a “flower delivery man” or “undeliverable package man”. A stalker knows that by wearing a “uniform” he can solicit information from people like your landlord by making up a story. Change your name on your call box if necessary by simply using your middle name as your first or just using your first name with last initial. By the time you realize you are being stalked, your stalked might have already solicited information from your landlord if you haven’t had the privacy discussion with him/her.
Educate yourself on how to defend yourself. Take a self defense class, get a conceal and carry license, anything to prepare yourself should you need to defend yourself.

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1 Tjaden, P., & Theonnes, N. (1998). Stalking in American: Findings from the national violence against women survey. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Justice. NCJ Report No. NCJ 169592.

Ovarian Cancer May be Prevented by Eating Flaxseed

LiberatedMind.com — Sun, 09 May 2010 13:08:41 +0000

This article in the Science Daily explains an experiment’s findings that chickens who are feed flaxseed in their diet are less likely to develop ovarian cancer. Chickens are the only other animal besides humans known to develop ovarian cancer in a similar way.

Hens fed the control diet had significantly more late-stage tumors that presented with fluid and metastases as compared to the hens fed a flaxseed diet. Though hens fed the flaxseed diet did not have a
decreased incidence of ovarian cancer, they did experience fewer
late-stage tumors and higher survival rates.

“In hens fed flaxseed, we found that more tumors were confined to the ovary and they had less metastatic spread,” she said. “This is an important finding as the metastases that accompany late-stage ovarian
cancer are the main cause of death from this disease. If the cancer is
found at an early stage, when the tumor is still confined to the ovary,
women have a much better prognosis and more treatment options.”

This study may have two implications:
1. Should women who are at risk of ovarian cancer add flax seed into their daily nutrition?

2. If you own egg producing chickens, would you consider feeding flax to your birds to ensure their health?

Thoughts?

FOOD: Do you care what’s really going on in the kitchen?

LiberatedMind.com — Sun, 02 May 2010 13:22:27 +0000

On PBS.org you can watch this revealing documentary about where Americans get their food. It is disturbing, frustrating and will make you want to know what you are putting into your body.

Watch “FOOD, INC.”

I have seen other documentaries on the way food, especially beef is manipulated in such a way that makes it unhealthy. Those documentaries caused me to stop eating beef and pork all together. The other read meat we would eat is grass fed local buffalo or cow from a local farmer who sells at our farmer’s market. We had switched to eating only bird, because we thought it was more difficult for their unhealthy conditions to effect the meat we ate from them. Since watching FOOD INC I have decided that only locally grown chickens and eggs is what I need to seek out. I am willing to pay more to ensure the birds I am eating are not pumped full of antibiotics and live their lives in a windowless shed walking about in their own feces. This solution will have to suffice until we buy enough land to raise our own food humanely and without chemicals and antibiotics.