please take that rash to the doctor

in honor of the us' recent display of its complete inability to deal with infectious disease, among other natural disasters, i thought it might be nice to take a look at how we're doing on a global scale to keep ourselves alive. i am referring here to mr. andrew speaker, the gentleman infected with tuberculosis, who, due to his antibiotic-resistant form of tb, was listed as an international health-risk, and then subsequently was allowed to board a series of international flights from the united states, to canada, to the czech republic. if avian flu becomes transmittable from human to human, we're essentially fucked, but we can't keep one guy with tb from getting on a plane. somehow, this doesn't sound promising.

in any event, according to the World Health Organization, "With about 2.1 billion airline passengers flying each year, there is a high risk of another major epidemic such as Aids, Sars or Ebola fever." familiar as we are with acquired immune deficiency syndrome and severe acute respiratory syndrome, and perhaps even the ebola virus, we also seem to be simultaneously immune to awareness and/or logic on the subject, due to a constant saturation of fear-style propaganda from the media. this announcement, however, comes not from the media, but from the WHO, a slightly more reputable source.

what is more frightening, though, is not the fact that we are completely unprepared, but the increasing rate with which we are rapidly being confronted with new diseases; "In the report, A Safer Future, the WHO says new diseases are emerging at the 'historically unprecedented' rate of one per year." the WHO unfortunately seems to give us no solid explanation as to why this is the case. misuse of antibiotics is one factor, but that, of course, would not account for the viral epidemics. inadequate medical care in much of the world (to make no mention of the continual blockages to complete access even here in the united states) may also share in the responsibility.

keep in mind also that these are new diseases, and we are currently as a global nation unable to deal with the simplest and most curable infections on an international level. "More than 90 percent of the deaths from infectious diseases worldwide are caused by only a handful of diseases. These diseases - lower respiratory infections, HIV/AIDS, diarrheal diseases, tuberculosis, malaria and measles - are also the leading cause of death in sub-Saharan Africa". (http://web.globalhealth.org/view_top.php3?id=228). with the exception of malaria and aids, these are curable.

curable.



if this is not a problem of poverty, i don't know what is.

now, let's take a look at the numbers. in the us alone, defense spending for 2006 was 556,505 million dollars. that looks like a typo, doesn't it? it's not. spending on health, you ask? 56,489 million dollars. how about education? 39,688 million. the basic message that should be gained here is that the nation seems far more concerned with death than with the health or education of its citizens. at least 10 times more concerned. these figures can all be found here: http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/fy2008/pdf/ap_cd_rom/27_1.pdf

anyone else a little scared about that cough?

W.P. Greene

The other afternoon, for lack of air conditioning and a better thing to do, a female companion and myself, snuck into a movie! Aren't we badasses? The primary attribute required of the movie was that it be starting as near to our arrival as possible. What we ended up seeing was well worth the metaphorical firebombing of the film industry by seeing a 10 dollar movie for free. It was Don Cheadle's new vehicle, Talk To Me. Now neither of us had any idea what this movie was, let alone cared, let alone that it was based on real people, and events, and even a real place: Washington DC, in a real time: the 1970's. Wow! I was just happy it wasn't a romantic comedy (as I had assumed based on the title). But anyway, it's a fairly decent film, with some fairly decent points touched upon.

More interestingly is the fact that this man, Petey Greene, played by Cheadle was a genuine human being. Prominent DJ for DC's WOL 1450AM. Ex-con, activist, loudmouth, and all around bad-ass mother-SHUT YO MOUTH! Anyway, Greene articulated a lot of the rage felt in the black communities of DC in the 70's. He also spun some most excellent funk and soul records. He eventually branched out into stand up comedy, and settled in on his own tv show, Petey Greene's Washington on WDCA-TV20.

Greene died of cancer in 1984 and an estimated 20,000 mourners turned out to show their last respect. I'll do my best to dig up some of this cat's more radical moments and shoot em back at you. Sounds like a righteous dude. Hat's off to ya Petey Greene.

Biological Myths Debunked!

Alright, so this isn't news to me (because I'm so smart, duh!) but apparently there are alot of you out there who still believe stuff like this. ...A LOT! Could have something to do with that fact that we came in 33 out of 34 surveyed countries in terms of our acceptance of EVOLUTION! So anyway, you don't have to stop believing in God or Leprechauns yet, but let's at least put two big myths about us humans in the ground.

First up, the assumption (ASSUMPTION! This CAN and IS proven every day) that men have two fewer ribs than women, since God had to take a pair from Adam to make Eve. But dig this, that's not true. Men and women BOTH have 12 pairs of ribs. Period. There is no argument to be made here, just the calm acceptance of the fact that you have spent you life under a false assumption. Link if you still don't believe me.

Secondly, lets address the less biblical belief that oxygenated blood is blue. It is not. It is certainly a deeper, more purple tinged color, but a far cry from blue. It is our veins that look blue through our skin, it is not a result of the royal blue blood that floweth through all of our veins.

Longer, redder wavelengths, though, can penetrate more deeply into the skin than shorter, bluer wavelengths before reflecting out. A vein looks blue because red light travels far enough into the skin to be absorbed by the blood in the vein. If the blood vessel is far enough below the skin, however, blue light--which would normally also be absorbed by the vein--reflects out of the skin before reaching the vein. So the light reflecting from tissue over the vein contains less red light than blue, giving the vein a bluish cast.

From the MadSci Network. Try this experiment if you still don't believe anyone.

So sleep soundly with a slightly better understanding of yourself tonight. Know your own body if nothing else. Maybe next week we'll get on to the widely held bullshit that there is no separation of church and state in the Constitution. Yeah...we'll get on to that for sure.

Decoherrence

Quantum Decoherrence occurs as a particle becomes more entangled with it's environment; removing it from a quantum super position, and "forcing" the particle to behave in a "classical" manner. Dechoerrence is what prevents large objects from exhibiting quantum behavior. The more linked a particle becomes with it's environment (the more information it has given off in the form of photon radiation, or collisions with other particles) the more absolute it becomes. Larger objects cannot maintain a quantum super position because to much decoherrece will have necessarily occurred.

from Decoding the Universe