Bloglantis

Tue, 10 Dec 2002 04:49:32 GMT

Pills For PTSD I was reading an article by Ellen Goodman--A Pill For What Haunts You--where I discovered that pills may be able to dim down trauma so a person isn't haunted and harmed by recurring memories of the distrubing event. You see the awful effects of post trauma in the Post Traumatic Stress Disorder of Combat Vietnam Veterans who, to this day, relive the horrors of war. Perhaps, as with pills to prevent nervous breakdowns, pills to dim the harmful memories of extreme trauma would save a person from a lifetime of nightmarish memories? CAN BETA BLOCKERS PREVENT PTSD? A FIRST LOOK

Mon, 09 Dec 2002 16:38:12 GMT

Botox And Body Dysmorphic Disorder What's Body Dysmorphic Disorder and what does it have to do with Botox?

Mon, 09 Dec 2002 16:17:20 GMT

The Sutton Family's Feud With The Little Green Men "Most of the Sutton family members who said they fought the aliens off with shotguns are deceased." On Aug. 21, 1955, the little green men landed at the Sutton home on the Old Madisonville Road in Hopkinsville, Kentucky. Not taking kindly to trespassers, particularly of the alien persuasion, the Suttons went to war with the aliens, the rest is history and the subject of an upcoming documentary based on eyewitness accounts.

Sun, 08 Dec 2002 18:51:52 GMT

The Roots Of Muslim Anger Found this excellent post The Roots of Muslim Anger at yourish.com.

Sun, 08 Dec 2002 18:32:32 GMT

Why Is Cardinal Law Above The Law? Somebody help me out here with the enigma of why *Cardinal Law appears to be above the law. I have no doubt if a person who owned a number of Child Care Centers discovered one of her/his workers sexually abused children and just moved the pedophile worker to one of the other centers, the law would come down on the owner like an avenger from hell. The owner would probably go to jail--and rightfully so, for not reporting the crime and being an accessory in allowing the predator to harm more children. Why does it appear that Cardinal Law has been given a pass when he covertly shuffled pedophile priests from parish to parish without informing the law or firing the priests? Given all the children who were harmed by his silence, shouldn't he be held accountable to the highest degree? What gives? "Pressure on Boston's Cardinal Bernard Law to resign increased Sunday with a large protest planned at Holy Cross Cathedral and the circulation among Boston priests of a letter calling on their boss to step down....The renewed activism comes after a fresh wave of scandal hit the Boston Archdiocese. Personnel files made public Tuesday contained some of the most spectacular allegations yet, suggesting church officials tolerated priests with a range of aberrant behaviors — not just sexual abuse of young boys." Boston priests demand Law resignation *"The Boston Globe broke the scandal in the archdiocese of Boston, the jurisdiction of Bernard Cardinal Law, who is in the forefront of a child sexual abuse controversy involving the cover-up of sexual abuse by a priest now in jail for molesting boys. The accusations against Cardinal Law involve other pedophile priests in his area who were protected by being moved from parish to parish, even though Cardinal Law knew of their behaviour." The Pope confronts sexual abuse

Sun, 08 Dec 2002 18:01:58 GMT

Don't Let Porn-Nabbers Steal Your Domain A number of people and organizations that have allowed their domain registrations to lapse, even for a few hours, have had their domains whisked away and used for porn sites: churches, the Ballet Theater of Maryland, the Boston Philharmonic, to name a few of the unfortunates. "All it takes is a few hours for a porn-napper to snap into action. Scores of companies, primarily based in the former Soviet Union, scour domain-name lists 24-7, looking for sites that have fallen into arrears. They plunk down about $35 per expired name, then redirect traffic toward an adult site that offers them per-visit kickbacks of a penny or two. Unfortunately, it seems to be the most wholesome enterprises that get porn-napped; churches, in particular, tend to be rather remiss in renewing their domain names....A porn-napper's greatest hope is that you'll pay up the ying-yang to recover your beloved domain name....it can be a particularly "expensive lesson learned"—the bidding starts at $500, and high-traffic names go for several thousand bones." Porn-napped!

Sun, 08 Dec 2002 03:34:32 GMT

7,000 Jewish And Arab Israeli Children Send The World A Message Of Peace 7,000 Jewish and Arab Israeli children marched around a soccer field in Israel in support of peaceful coexistence and played soccer together afterwards." "I play with Jews and Arabs - it's not a problem." ~Aboudi Karsoun, a 15-year-old Israeli Arab Adults fighting all over the world could learn from the message of peace these children sent. When I was a child I was always struck by the irony of adults scolding children for fighting in schools when adults in the wide world outside the schools were killing each other all over the planet. "Bless the beasts and the children...." Jewish, Arab children use soccer to promote peace, coexistence

Sat, 07 Dec 2002 19:58:24 GMT

Ungodly slaughter in God's name by Leonard Pitts, Jr. "Eyewitness reports of the carnage they escaped were horrific -- bodies lying in the street, bands of Christians and Muslims stoning one another, people chopping other people with machetes, bystanders set afire and burned alive. The death toll: more than 200 people. All because of a perceived affront to Mohammed. Pardon me for saying, but that's not exactly the most effective advertisement for the goodness of Islam. More to the point, it's not the most effective advertisement for the goodness of God." Miami Herald

Sat, 07 Dec 2002 19:43:26 GMT

A Dog In A Cat's Body The body of a cat...the soul of a dog...meet pixel-bob!

Sat, 07 Dec 2002 02:18:13 GMT

A Small Favor To Ask Comrades, help me make the prestigious Sites Blocked By China List. I know I'm unworthy, but I beseech you: Please write the Chinese authorities and cast your vote to get me on that coveted list.

Sat, 07 Dec 2002 01:45:50 GMT

A Spammer Gets His Due--How Sweet It Is West Bloomfield bulk e-mailer Alan Ralsky, alleged to be one of the world's biggest spammers, is paying the piper with spam coming at him from land, internet, air, and sea. The anti-spam community launched the blitzkrieg which has him running to his lawyer to sue the parties who exercised their "turn about is fair play option." Geez, you'd think he'd be a little more understanding being a professional spammer. Here's what he says: "They've signed me up for every advertising campaign and mailing list there is. These people are out of their minds. They're harassing me." ~Alan Ralsky Alan, my heart goes out to you and I feel your pain--everytime some lowlife, scum-suckin', piss ant SOB sends me spam. Prostrations to the anti-spam community!

Fri, 06 Dec 2002 18:05:56 GMT

Kids In Karachi Love The Osama bin Laden Toy "The kids in Karachi (that's in Pakistan, folks) are mad about the toy Osama. Says one misguided little rugrat: "As you know Osama is very popular in the whole world. The same thing is happening in Pakistan. People like him and he has become a celebrity now." With allies like these..." Saw this post at Accordionguy's great blog where he posts fascinating material. Forgot to mention, he also posted, with photos, about breast scarves in Japan. Prostrations to the Accordionguy. :-)

Fri, 06 Dec 2002 16:23:44 GMT

The Seti Project's Mysterious Signal Back in the seventies the SETI project received a signal from space, the Wow signal, that puzzles researchers to this day as to whether or not it was an extrateresstrial conact. "But is the Wow signal’s notoriety merely the triumph of marketing over substance? Could this momentary cosmic burp have really been ET, or was it just random terrestrial interference dressed up with a sexy moniker? For a decade, Robert Gray, a long-time, independent SETI researcher from Chicago, has been trying to find out." Interstellar Signal from the 70s....

Fri, 06 Dec 2002 10:00:15 GMT

Bodhisattva, A Short Story I don't usually write spiritual fiction, the truth being generally more exciting to me with spiritual matters. And I prefer to write about earthy characters with conflicts--at least that has been my trend. However, an idea came to me to write a story about a nontraditional Bodhisattva; i.e. a regular guy named Eddy, who collects garbage for a living, wakes up from a series of remarkable dreams and begins to remove the garbage from peoples' lives. In this story unlike my last one The Layoff, nobody swears or gets murdered. Maybe I'm reforming. :-) Bodhisattva

Thu, 05 Dec 2002 22:36:25 GMT

Incredible Crustacean Debut Somewhere in the placid fishing grounds off southwestern Nova Scotia where gulls glide on the sea air and crustaceans feed merrily on mussels, clams, urchins and flounder, a lobster who just happens to be hermaphroditic and half-albino has made its debut.

Thu, 05 Dec 2002 20:57:38 GMT

Europe's Anti-Semitism "One of the first steps in Adolf Hitler's anti-Semitic drive in the creation of his Third Reich was instituting a ban on the kosher slaughter of animals. "Today, as a new wave of ugly, and sometimes violent, anti-Semitism sweeps through the European continent, at least five countries have banned kosher food production, and one of them is considering halting all import of kosher meat. "The latest nation to join the movement is Holland, where the move was guised in concern for cruelty to animals." Europe's new face of anti-Semitism "As human homicide bombers carry out their deadly slaughters of innocent civilians in Israel, Arabs are exhorted to kill Jews by radical Islamic religious leaders around the world. The government-controlled media outlets of Arab countries engage in a systematic, vicious, anti-Jewish campaign, complete with ugly cartoons that picture Jews in Nazi-like caricatures. Simultaneously, the current level of anti-Semitism is the worst in Europe since the defeat of Nazi Germany in 1945. Many Jews have become walking targets in cities in Germany, France, and Belgium. Synagogues and Jewish schools in France were firebombed, a kosher butcher shop was sprayed with bullets and a school bus carrying Jewish students in Paris was attacked with stones." Anti-Semitism in Europe

Thu, 05 Dec 2002 19:51:31 GMT

Forget About Pitbulls For Protection Forget About Pitbulls for protection. Retired General Kostadin Kostadinov in Bulgarian has a better solution that makes pitbulls look like pussy cats.

Thu, 05 Dec 2002 19:26:13 GMT

Dude, Your Dell Could Be A Death Sentence In China In China e-mails are blocked, Internet cafes shut down, strict laws enforced on internet usage and certain key words and terms forbidden. According to Amnesty International, "Those violating the laws and regulations which aim to restrict free expression of opinion and circulation of information through the Internet may face imprisonment and according to recent regulations some could even be sentenced to death." Amnesty International

Thu, 05 Dec 2002 19:06:17 GMT

World's Oldest Rocks Discovered Canadian geologists have discovered what may be the world's oldest rocks, dating back 3.825 billion years. The earth is estimated to be 4.6 billion years old; thus the geologists believe this discovery of rocks formed close to that time period may provide more information about the earth's first billion years of evolution.

Thu, 05 Dec 2002 18:47:10 GMT

Inorganic Incubators What are inorganic incubators and what do they have to do with a revolutionary theory on the origins of life on earth?

Thu, 05 Dec 2002 06:19:29 GMT

Wake Up Call Or Good News For Insomniacs Contrary to the conventional wisdom that you need eight hours of sleep a night, a new study not only refutes this but concludes that sleeping eight hours a night shortens your life.

"There's an old idea that people should sleep eight hours a night, which has no more scientific basis than the gold at the end of the rainbow."

~Daniel Kripke, a professor of psychiatry at the University of California

Study Links 8 Hours' Sleep to Shorter Life Span

Wed, 04 Dec 2002 23:22:37 GMT

Nonotechnology Or This Could Be Heaven, This Could Be Hell "The opposing sides are asking whether nanotech will fill the world with self-replicating microscopic “nanobots” -- a thousand times smaller than the diameter of a human hair -- that will wipe out humanity, or whether nano is a silver bullet that promises a cure for cancer, an end to crop shortages and the solution to cleaning up pollution."

I like the Science Fiction aspects of this and have wondered if an ultimate weapon could be fashioned with this technology; nanotech nuclear bombs--so small you couldn't see them but with a blast big enough to take out a land mass as large as Texas.

But the peaceful applications hold greater appeal to me: microscopic robots repairing damaged heart tissue, destroying cancer cells, and healing many ills. The possibilities are immense in medicine alone. This is the path I believe nanotechnology will take in the future.

The future dances on a pin’s head

Wed, 04 Dec 2002 20:37:28 GMT

It's Legal For A Man To Murder A Woman In Pakistan If you're a woman in Pakistan you're less equal than your male counterparts and can, presumably on a whim, be murdered by a man who claims you've "sullied his honor."

"Such murders – where a man kills a woman he views as having sullied his "honor" - are on the rise, the independent Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRC) says, "with more and more reported from areas where they had once been unknown".

"In 2001, at least 226 women in the southern province of Sindh were killed – usually by their husbands or brothers - while some 227 honor-related killings took place in the Punjab, according to the HRC's annual report issued earlier this year."

Honor Killings Leave Pakistan's women fighting a war

Wed, 04 Dec 2002 16:39:23 GMT

Modern Day Witch Hunts It's Salem, Massachusetts, and worse, all over again in Assam.

"The local quack doctor told some people that I was a practicing witchcraft and that was why many sick villagers were not getting cured," the mother of six said. "After that some 100 men dragged me out of my house one night and started beating and torturing me publicly before deciding to bury me as punishment."

~Subadhra Basumatary

Wed, 04 Dec 2002 02:26:16 GMT

Are More Surface To Air Missle Attacks On Airliners An Inevitability? Terrorists with no concerns about the santity of human life or qualms about murdering innocent men, women and children, are targeting airliners as evidenced in Kenya last week when the Arkia Airlines plane narrowly escaped being blown out of the sky. Don't be surprised if airliners in the U.S. and other countries are next:

"The threat of SAM attacks on U.S. airliners was acknowledged in an FAA study in 1993, which noted that as passenger and baggage screening became more rigorous, the chances of missile strikes would rise. The U.S. government's interest in the problem followed its decision to supply Afghan mujahedeen fighting the Soviets in Afghanistan — whose ranks included Osama bin Laden....— with about 1,000 Stinger missiles in the 1980s. Pentagon officials credit the Stinger with downing about 250 Soviet aircraft."

How To Protect Airliners From Missiles

"Hundreds if not thousands of the relatively cheap but highly lethal missiles are believed to be circulating on the black market, and they already have been used with deadly accuracy against civilian planes in a number of overseas war zones."

Missiles and airlines: fear becomes reality