Science/Technology blog

Posted in Health, Bird Flu at 4:00 pm by David Bradley — Click to comment

Is flu vaccination a shot in the dark? Regular readers will recall the recent debate on multiple vaccines, statistics, and risk we had here in September. I also have rather close personal experience of one of the risks associated with having the annual flu vaccine - Guillain-Barré Syndrome (GBS). This autoimmune disorder is purportedly associated with a respiratory or gastrointestinal tract infection although there is a statistical risk that connects it to the flu vaccine. A close relative of mine developed GBS symptoms about six weeks after having the flu jab last December and has not yet fully recovered. GBS support groups recommend she not have the vaccine again.

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Gitmo Rendition Camp.

The prisoners know from day one the proposed torture ain’t going to work. How so? Listen, say, Randolph will tell you why:

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Posted in Science at 4:00 pm by David Bradley — Click to comment

Sciencebase is now on Scintilla, the science blog portal from the journal Nature. It’s worth checking out and with the help of the site’s guru Alf Eaton, I got a couple of minor technical issues quickly resolved.

One of the key features of Scintilla you will discover as you browse its myriad science blog listing is a neat little box that shows up offering you a list of similar sources. It does exactly what its name suggests and provides links to other sites with content that is likely to be closely related to the blog you are currently reading. “Those are actually calculated based on what users are subscribed to (’people who subscribed to Sciencebase also subscribed to…’), rather than content,” Alf told me.

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This fall, fishing was banned or sharply limited in 18 percent of California’s ocean waters from Half Moon Bay to Santa Barbara under a landmark state plan. But that was only the first part. Now, scientists need to see how fast sea life recovers. QUEST finds out: how do you count the fish in the sea?

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B-52 dropping some lovelies.

The U.S. Air Force has reworked the B-52H Stratofortress cover story. Check out yesterday’s news story re the Air Force. They’ve gone beyond their first draft of the news release re the B-52H episode on the 29th-30th of August. It took them six weeks to “investigate” and issue a report. That is, a second press release.

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Snipped from the Union of Concerned Scientists.

What if I told you that the White House is looking for more power over many of our federal agencies? Power that is not supposed to be in the hands of the Administration. Would you be surprised? Would you do something about it? What if it had something to do with our health, our science, our truth? Well, here it is. The White House is looking for another power grab, and it involves agencies that deal with public health and environmental regulation. How do you feel about your health being in the hands of Dubya? Well, then do something about it … Now!

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In the Midwest and Northeast United States, homeowners are anticipating increased fuel oil costs this coming winter. Here in California, we don’t face their kind of extreme weather (in my freshman year at Notre Dame, in South Bend, Indiana, I woke up one morning in January to -25°F weather with the prospect of a one mile walk to a math class–it took me several months to thaw) but heating costs are still a significant part of our budgets, especially for low-income families. And electricity costs are still at an all-time high across the country and are expected to keep rising.

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Posted in Science at 4:00 pm by David Bradley — 1 Comment

The most ludicrous media storm blew up in the UK this week over alleged plans that the government was supposedly to force us to use ultra heat treated, so-called long-life, milk in our tea and on our breakfast cereal rather than the nice fresh pasteurised product we have been used to for decades. Wayne Smallman on the blah blah! technology news site has a detailed analysis of the situation. He quotes from a news story on the subject in which it is claimed that “Officials at the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs have made a serious proposal that consumers switch to UHT”.

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Can you imagine what San Francisco Bay looked like 15,000 years ago?

Actually at that time– during the last ice age– San Francisco Bay wasn’t a bay at all. Instead, it was a valley dotted with grazing antelope. Hills jutted up here and there (destined to become the Bay’s islands). The Sacramento and San Joaquin Rivers of the Central Valley joined forces in the vast marshy Delta, flowed west through a 300-foot deep gorge in the Coast Range (now the Golden Gate), and across a broad coastal plain to the ocean. California’s coastline was out past the Farallon Islands.

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Are you crying?!

The traditional boot camps for kids are being outlawed and disbanded due to a few reckless trainers who kicked a couple of kids to death. No more boot camps. However, there is a window of opportunity open for a new profession, a new career. The At-Home Boot Camp DI (Discipline Instructor). The visiting DI.

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