Author Archives: Rory McGowan

The Depressive Force of Good to Go

Sometimes, the worst of moods are remedied by the worst of foods. The home-wrecking force that is the scientific community, however, may have something to say about this–and it’s not good. According to a new study published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, a few sugars have been found to contribute to the perpetuation of various depressive disorders. Could junk food really alter the chemicals within our brain for the worst? Could added sugars really contribute to a state of sadness? According to James E. Gangwisch, PhD, and his findings, it may be a good idea to alter your diet if it is characterized by a high glycemic index. 

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James E. Gangwisch and his team of researches compiled various sets of data in a meta-analysis in order to parse through the question: Can sweets make us depressed? One of the most interesting sources that Gangwisch drew from was a study taken involving nearly 70,000 women, none of whom suffered from any sort of depression before the study’s beginning in 1994. Over the course of a decade, the diets of these women were recorded once every few months. Every few months, a questionnaire would be sent out to the participants of a study, and, every few months, loads of data concerning their diets were provided. Women with diets on the higher end of the glycemic index tended to suffer, experiencing greater odds of developing some sort of depressive disorder.

Overall, the study analyzed by Gangwisch displayed insufficient evidence in order to elucidate any sort of mechanism that may be responsible for the development of depressive disorders in response to a high glycemic diet. What’s more, various other studies conducted, and later analyzed by Gangwisch, display the protective effects of foods high in sugar yet low on the glycemic index–foods that contain natural, total sugars such as whole fruits, and lactose.

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Is it rational to alter your diet to include fewer sweets high on the glycemic index? One should hope so. Foods rich in added sugars often carry little in the way of nutritional benefit, and, in addition to possibly being related to some sort of mechanism that brings about a depressive disorder, have an overall negative impact upon the body. Avoiding foods that might lead to depression will, invariably, also aid in avoiding the development of afflictions such as type 2 diabetes. Furthermore, perhaps avoiding the development of such awful an personal afflictions may, in a sense, help to avoid the development of a depressive disorder.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sugar

http://time.com/3939974/sugar-junk-food-depression/

http://asp.cumc.columbia.edu/facdb/profile_list.asp?uni=jeg64&DepAffil=Psychiatry

http://nutritiondata.self.com/topics/glycemic-index

Should You Take Antibiotics For Your Cold?

With the winter rolling around, Penn State is soon to become–if it has not already–a dominion ruled over by terrible and inconvenient illnesses. Every single year, is typically the same. There is at least a month of absolute misery, whether that misery be a stuffy nose, a coarse throat, or an aching body. Every day, it seems, we are serenaded by coughs during our lectures. Illness is extremely pervasive throughout our student community here in Happy Valley, and, sometimes, it seems as though all we can do is weather the storm. But what if you decide to take an antibiotic for your ailment. Is this wise?

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It may not seem like any harm, but evidence points towards a clear danger in taking an antibiotic for an ailment as simple as the common cold. A lot of the time, the symptoms complained about by those suffering from some sort of seasonal ailment cannot be helped by antibiotics in the first place. Ailments typically brought about by viruses, such as acute Bronchitis, for example, are not relieved in any way shape or form by taking an antibiotic. Distinguishing between an ailment that is caused by a virus, and an ailment that is caused by bacteria is a job most easily performed by a trained professional, yet, too often, we allow ourselves to self-diagnose. A lot of research done over the past few decades has shown us that a wanton use of antibiotics may be leading to a very scary, very possible future–resistance. 

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Antibiotic resistance occurs when an antibiotic loses its ability to effectively control and curb the harmful effects of the bacteria that the antibiotic is created to combat. When an antibiotic is used, bacteria naturally seek to form a resistance to the substance so that they stand a greater chance of surviving an encounter with it. This leads to antibiotic-resistant bacteria, and, consequently, bacteria immune to medicine. Seeing as the common cold is a virus, it is more than likely never a good idea to take an antibiotic to combat it. 

Antibiotics are meant to treat bacterial infections. Afflictions such as pneumonia, strep throat, an ear infection, or conjunctivitis are valid pretenses for a doctor to prescribe something as drastic as an antibiotic–in this case, you will be both avoiding a chance to react allergically to the antibiotic, and, will also avoid building an unnecessary resistance. At the end of the day, everything passes in time. In the case of seasonal illness, however, if the symptoms and misery that you are experiencing linger, then it may be possible that you are suffering from a bacterial infection, and a visit to UHS may be warranted. 

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http://www.webmd.boots.com/cold-and-flu/cold-guide/antibiotics-colds

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virus

http://www.webmd.com/cold-and-flu/cold-guide/antibiotics-colds

TV and Decreased Mental Capacity

A recent observational study performed over the course of 25 years suggests that a routine that favors watching TV rather than physical exercise may actually provide consequences that go beyond the realm of mere physical health. Researchers at the University of California at San Francisco kept tabs upon 3,247 individuals–at the time of the initiation of the study these individuals were young adults–and found that over the course of 25 years, those that got little exercise of watched a minimum of 3 hours of TV per day performed comparably worse on the examinations than those that lived a healthier lifestyle.

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I don’t really find these discoveries to edge on the side of controversial. Rather, I am more interested in the mechanism through which prolonged exposure to an unhealthy routine of vegging out and watching TV can contribute towards a weakening of cognitive capacity? Reverse causation, that is, the idea that a relatively diminished ability to perform well on cognitive tests impacting one’s daily routine, doesn’t necessarily sound very convincing to me. Of course, if an individual is unable to think clearly and think without severe handicaps, then there is a strong likelihood that their physical lives may not be the healthiest. However, the demographic that I am interested in concerning a study such as this one would be those not afflicted by crippling mental illnesses. The level of analysis in regards of cognitive ability should be somewhat moderate when discussing an issue such as this one.

Or is more a specific ingredient of the screen that contributes to a decrease in cognitive ability than it is a general lack of physical activity? There is a wide variety of media out there for people to consume–can we really write it all off as being something that will eventually be the undoing of your mind? There are plenty of programs available to individuals that fall under the category of being cognitively stimulating. Informational documentaries, programs that outline political policy, and others. Likewise, there is also a staggering amount of mind-numbing programming such as the Bachelor, the Kardashians, and shows such as the Apprentice. The issue with this particular study was its inability to distinguish between the various camps of subjects. Rather than creating various groups, only two groups were created. Those individuals that consumed media over a certain threshold were all lumped into one big category, while those who were under the threshold were categorized likewise.

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At this point, I am under the impression that the mechanism responsible for depleting the cognitive ability of an individual to score well on a test lies more in an unbalanced daily routine rather than some sort of toxin transmitted by watching a particular show. Furthermore, the observational study performed within the article listed is unsatisfactory in a number of ways. The inability of the researchers to provide a number of groups is my primary problem. There is simply no ethical way to create consistent groups of individuals with consistent routines–some of which may be detrimental to the health of the subjects. Overall, I found the study listed within the article to be unsatisfactory in the pursuit to explain and discover a mechanism of depletion.

 

http://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2015/12/02/458071139/too-much-tv-and-chill-could-reduce-brain-power-over-time

Can We Measure Gullibility?

In today’s day and age, we constantly find ourselves bombarded with an excess of information. Almost every outlet that we access nowadays is accompanied by some sort of message that is attempted to be conveyed. Despite the methods through which these messages attempt to communicate, the end goal is unsurprisingly ubiquitous–to convince. Take a minute to reflect on your personal exposure to advertisements, and general opinions voiced by faceless avatars on the internet, and I am sure that you will find the sheer bulk of information that our minds parse through on a daily basis to be absolutely staggering. In fact, according to San Diego Super Computer Center, the average American consumes nearly 15.5 hours worth of media per day.  I found this finding to be staggering, yet, I cannot help but understand the magnitude of the situation that it frames, as many of my colleagues, the strangers around me, as well as myself, are constantly plugged into the World Wide Web through some sort of channel.

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With this perpetual connectivity seemingly a thing to stay, one cannot help but wonder how well others might react to such an influx of information. Too often, I see some sort of silly Facebook link pasted across my feed detailing some sort of strange new-age prism cure for ailments as diverse as the common cold and AIDS. Compound these silly beliefs with frequent, opinionated vocalizations from groups such as the Anti-Vaxxers, and it appears that there seem to be a noteworthy community of people stuck too deep within the depths of the Internet’s rabbit hole. I understand that it’s one thing to mock these people–and to claim that I am any better than them would be to completely disregard every trivial and silly fad/idea I’ve expounded since I first had access to media–but is there a way to quantify their gullibility? Based upon an individual’s repertoire of communication, is it possible to assign a value towards their exact level of ignorance?

Recently, a researcher named Gordon Pennycook published a paper in Judgement and Decision Making. The observational study took a broad range of individuals from various samples, and exposed them to coherent sentences characterized by the utilization of buzzwords. What they found was that there appears to be a tendency to rate vague, meaningless statements as profound is a legitimate psychological phenomenon, and that the application of this observation towards various variables in other realms of theoretical interest is, in the very least, lent a measure of credence. One of the primary attributes that seemed to contribute towards the acceptance of nonsensical BS was a relatively weak ability adequately analyze. Although this is an extremely vague concept, could this inability to analyze be quantified in any way?

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I firmly believe that there is a correlation between intelligence and the acceptance of the nonsensical. This is not to say that intelligent people are unable to extrapolate value from the absurd, rather, that unintelligent people more than often are more susceptible to conspiratorial ideation.

 

 

Sources:

http://www.geneticliteracyproject.org/2015/12/01/deepak-chopra-alert-psychologists-assess-bullshit-detecting-senses/

Click to access jdm15923a.pdf

Does Friendship Make Us Stronger?

Human beings are, by nature, social animals. This observation has been recorded time and time again throughout history by great minds such as Aristotle. We constantly find ourselves thrust into situations where we are forced to collaborate in order to succeed. Can forging and maintaining a friendship help to make our endeavors more prosperous and our efforts more efficient? Is there a way that this can be tested? Does friendship inherently make us better people? If so, it could possibly suggest a natural necessity towards forming alliances with others. If a strong bond fosters a stronger individual, then is would be natural to assume that said bonds are naturally sought out by individuals.

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Where do we start? Well, for one, it would make sense to accumulate a large sample of individuals, some with prior friendships, and others with no acquaintance whatsoever. The experiment would focus upon the performance of an array of tasks where efficiency in said task can be succinctly measured. Groups of friends would execute these tasks, and groups of strangers would execute them as well. The results, with any luck, would offer answers as to the question posed: Do friendships make us stronger?

PLOS ONE recently released a report of an experiment undertaken by various scientists in order to elucidate this very issue. Partner visibility, and relationship were both variables used in order to test the efficiency of human interaction. The study purportedly found a very positive correlation between the performance of a group of individuals and their level of prior involvement. This threshold of efficiency, furthermore, saw a further increase when partner visibility was increased.

So what does this all mean. Do friends lead us to having more efficient interactions? Do efficient interactions lead us to friends? Is this a universal constant. I believe that there is still room for a healthy amount of skepticism. After all, titles alone are more than often not enough to provide any sort of assurance of quality. What makes a marriage happy? The fact that the marriage exists? Or do happy people make happy marriages? Do friends merely decide their relationship based upon a problem to be overcome, or are friendships formed out of commonality? Humans and the relationships between them are often extremely subjective and I wager that you would be hard pressed to find an exact replica of any one relationship between any set of individuals.

 

 

 

 

http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0143469

Can Science Recreate the Paranormal?

Throughout history and present within our contemporary popular culture, the idea of the existence of a paranormal dimension persists. Before we begin to really dissect and construct an experiment, however, it’s important to define what exactly the paranormal entails. For many, the paranormal entails a dimension of phenomena that simply cannot be explained by science. Quintessential paranormal activity, for example, would include hauntings and the perception of ghostly presences. For our purposes, we are going to restrict our scope of the term paranormal simply to the presence of ghostly phenomena. However, I digress. Is it possible to recreate ghostly experiences? Are paranormal experiences primarily a reaction to forces little understood yet easily explained? Is there any possible way that we, as a scientific diet, could test the hypothesis that paranormal activity is merely the result of the body’s reaction to various atmospheric, environmental, or biological factors?

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In order to enforce a clinical approach and hue to the study we wish to complete, I believe that there are a few variables that would have to be held constant in order to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that ghostly apparitions can indeed be recreated by available devices. One variable I would hold consistent would be the environment. I would conduct the experiment in a clean, uncluttered environment with a clinical and stoic decor. So often, people associate ghostly apparitions with disheveled and decrepit environments.

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Seeing as ghostly apparitions often are reported to elicit a physical reaction, an observational study where certain subjects are exposed to a range of physical stimuli, and other subjects would be exposed to another set of stimuli, and, finally, a control group would be introduced to the environment and would be offered the same devices, but without any physical stimuli.

I have plenty of confidence that paranormal activity such as ghostly apparitions can be explained through various scientific channels. Already, scientists have found evidence that sounds registering in flow frequencies between 7 and 19 Hz can induce fear within an individual, and, in my opinion, fear is the commonality that unites all paranormal phenomena. However, perhaps the scary encounters are more inexplicable than I would like to believe.

Does Wasted Food Hurt the Environment?

Before we get ahead of ourselves, it is important to understand the immense amount of labor that actually goes into producing food. Water, energy, fuel, transportation, wages, and all of the associated variables that accompany those components comprise the end result: your meal. Furthermore, it is also important to understand that our food tends to decompose into elements that act as catalysts for the phenomena of environmental contamination and global warming. In a recent PLOS study, researchers measured all of the aforementioned variables, as well as the methane and CO2 emmissions from decomposing food sources, and the impact that these variables currently have on our environment.

Figure 1.  Food Supply, Intake, and Waste in America.

 

Above are two graphs that I found quite important to take into account when initially considering this question. Overall, there has been a serious increase in the overall waste of food since the 1970s in America. In fact, US per capita food waste has increased by approximately 50% since 1974, and only seems to be increasing year after year. This number has far-reaching consequences, as waste this extensive constitutes nearly a quarter of our overall use of freshwater within the United States per year. Furthermore, the cost of oil associated with such waste amounts to nearly 300 million barrels per year. These numbers are truely staggering, but what exactly is the impact upon the environment?

The rubbish, cost of resources associated with the production of food, and the overall waste of water that accompanies the waste of food has led to an absolute increase in the sources of contamination throughout the United States of America. It doesn’t take much thinking to understand that the sheer bulk of waste that is produced–waste that is not just organic, but also inorganic–is slowly increasing and accumulating throughout the United States. Furthermore, the decomposition of food products throughout the United States releases an element known as methane, which is a gas with 25 fold more potent global warming potential than CO2. Stereo, skeletal formula of methane with some measurements added

Regardless, the issue with the study by PLOS is perhaps compounds the disturbing nature of our general waste. The statistics utilized by PLOS in order to create their models were drawn from various National sources, which do not account for food produced off-the-books i.e subsistence farming. The United States of America is in no way reliant upon subsistence farming, but, it is more than likely that a degree of waste is present in that facet of production, and, as a result, the issue of environmental contamination is probably larger than we can possibly calculate at this time given all of the data at hand.

Works Cited:

http://www.fao.org/docrep/014/mb060e/mb060e02.pdf

http://www.livescience.com/topics/global-warming/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_carbon_dioxide_emissions

http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0007940

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methane

Can A Person’s Grammar Predict Their Income?

A recent study by PLOS ONE recently explored this very question. Researches analyzed a number of social media outlets such as Twitter, Facebook, and Google+ as sources for data. The results were pretty surprising, as the models formulated by the PLOS staff found that their models allowed for extensive qualitative and quantitative analyses of individuals, their backgrounds, and their grammar. PLOS did a pretty good job here with accounting for a number of variables, types of people, and various opinions when creating their models.

Does a person’s grammar predict their income accurately? Surely, we all have at least one person on Twitter of Facebook that is locally infamous for posting outlandish opinions, often poorly and with poor grammar as well. Is this simply due to their lower class status? To an extent, I would agree. Some of the information gathered by PLOS, however, seems a bit unsatisfactory. Out of all of the people on my Facebook–even those from lower socioeconomic backgrounds–the worst tend to be the oldest. Seemingly most susceptible to utilizing shortcuts and emoticons.

Furthermore, could this study suggest that we have a better chance of creating a more educated populace with an increase in the general standard of living within our society? Earlier in the semester, we all witnessed the staggering impact of introducing life-altering medication to children in woefully underdeveloped African states, and the subsequently positive impact upon academic performance. Many of the countries that constitute Scandinavia register within the top 20th percentile of IQs based upon a national scale. These countries, coincidentally, also have some of the most comfortable standards of living per-capita. Although this may seem like pure speculation, could it suggest that increasing the standard of living via effective educational and governmental programs is plausible?

This sort of study is extremely promising in this regard, I believe. The primary shortcoming appears to be the limited nature of variables from which the framers chose in order to create their data models. If these data models were broadened to include more variables, then there remains a possibility that studies such as this one could produce tangible reports that could lead to augmented decision-making in the realms of health, politics, and education.

 

 

 

 

Works Cited:

 

http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0138717

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammar

https://iq-research.org/en/page/average-iq-by-country

http://www.eschoolnews.com/2015/06/18/scandinavian-schools-291/

Do Common Colds and School Shootings Have Something in Common?

As outlandish as the question may be, there seems to be an uncanny frequency to school shootings. In particular, outbursts of violence always seem to occur at an accelerated pace after an initial trigger. Could it be that the contagious nature of afflictions such as the Common Cold also characterize the affliction of violence that our country current seems to find cyclical? Are school shootings contagious? Is the increase in frequency after a single event contributed to a susceptible component of the psyche of our society, or are they merely broadcasted by news stations eager to captivate a scared audience? A recent study done by PLOS ONE has taken to examining this disturbing phenomena.

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The study found that 20% or 30% of school shootings within a period of 13 days occured due to the spread of a “contagion.” Furthermore, the study also took into account the stories that were broadcasted at a national level. Events where casualties exceeded 4 were more likely to bypass local channels and by displayed on national news for the American audience to digest. Just as humans tend to act as conduits in order to spread infectious diseases such as the Common Cold, so too does the media act as a conduit to spread infectious content. However, I don’t really find this information to be holistically satisfactory.

The findings of the study were clearly based upon an observational mode of accumulating data. Creating an experimental environment vast enough to encompass a societal phenomena would be pretty difficult. For this reason, scientists had to rely upon retrieving data from various sets and compiling them into a singular chart which was in turn able to point out various correlations between school shootings and the frequency at which they occured once they were broadcasted to society at large.

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Overall, the study conducted by PLOS did its best to take into account a variety of external factors that could lead to the altering of the results received from years of observation and recording. One such external variable was the access to state mental-health facilities. There seemed to be a positive association between the number of individuals killed in an attack, and the frequency of attacker-suicide. Perhaps this suggests a course to diving deeper into the issue, and seeing if the number and accessibility of mental-health institutions impacts the overall frequency of school shootings in general? One shortcoming of the study–admitted by PLOS–was the inability to parse through the data and distinguish any sort of biases offered by the media institutions that reported on the events. In order to counter this, I believe that the government should begin the funding of an extensive report that takes into account an number of external factors , as well as accessory factors. At a minimum, this report should include background information as to the pretense of the crime, and the current state of mental healthcare in the localized community in which the event took place.

Momentary Euphoria?

Our generation likes to party. This distinction, in many ways, is no distinction at all, however. Throughout the last half of the 20th century, powerful compounds such as MDMA, LSD, Cocaine, Mescaline, Marijuana, and Heroin gave all been used recreationally, with some having at least a measure of medical application. Regardless, it is indisputable that various subsets of our modern American culture have grown to accept these drugs and use them frequently when going to various social gatherings, such as parties or festivals. Recently, however a study done by the Swineburne University of Technology in Australia focused upon one drug in particular: MDMA.

MDMA is a psychoactive drug related to a substituted aphetamine class of drugs, consumed primarily for the euphoric effects. The drug has become a staple for rave culture, and is used frequently at clubs, festivals, house parties, and other social gatherings where there is a great deal of sensory stimulation going on. Users purport to feel a sense of mass communion with others, and increases the sociability of users. Essentially, it is incredibly euphoric, and begets a sense of inner peace. Regardless, the recreational impact of MDMA leads one to assume that usage would help to foster a sense of inner-peace.

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Cortisol, the hormone observed by the study.

Or does it? The team involved in creating the study took to recording the levels of cortisol–a stress hormone–among three different groups. These groups were heavy users, light users, and a control group that had never done MDMA. The study was conducted over the span of three months. The results were as follows: cortisol levels of the heavy-users were nearly 50% higher than the control group, and they were also experiencing almost four times as much stress.

So what does this mean? Is it safe to say that the recreational impacts of MDMA are not wholly vindicated by the momentary euphoria that it provides? Perhaps, but I hold that there are various reasons to be skeptical of this study. First and foremost, I believe that one should still hold a healthy amount of doubt for a study such as this one. Indeed, there were three distinct groups of users utilized by the group; however, who is to say that third variables were not to blame for the disparity in levels of cortisol? Perhaps this study would better explain the phenomena that drug-users, on average, live more stressful lifestyles than people that don’t use drugs? There are dozens of external variables that the study did not account for–and in many ways, cannot. It is difficult and expensive to conduct an objective examination of the lifestyle of any individual. The capital costs involved with the study would be immense. Put simple, unless these subjects were to live in a habitable box for 3 months, the study will continue to be plagued by external and compounding variables. Furthermore, it is important to note the golden rule: correlation does not imply causation.

So is it a good idea to take MDMA? I wouldn’t recommend it. Does MDMA directly impact the stress felt by an individual in regards to the frequency of its use? Perhaps, but this particular study does not hat the breadth of extensiveness to assert this.

Source

The Big Question.

It’s hard to look out into our big, vast sky and not ponder the question, “Are we alone?” Take into account the hundreds of bright little dots that you can see shinning in the average nighttime sky, and realize that what you are seeing is merely a fraction of what exists within our galaxy, let alone out entire universe. Scientists estimate that for every grain of sand on every single beach throughout the earth, there are at least 10,000 starts. That is a monumental figure, and I find it nearly impossible to wrap my mind around the sheer magnitude that encompasses and envelops our entire existence.

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A current rendering of the hypothesized framework of the Universe.

Scientists have taken it upon themselves to begin towards answering perhaps the biggest existential question that humanity has to offer at this current moment, “Are we alone? Is life common? Are we simply just rare? Where is everybody?” The latter question has developed itself into an entire paradox of its own, and is known as the Fermi Paradox. The Fermi Paradox holds that there is an inherent contradiction between the high estimates of probability concerning the existence of extraterrestrial civilizations, and the relative lack of any sort of tangible communication that we have had with any sort of purported alien life-forms. So, the question remains, how exactly do we conduct an experiment in order to help provide answers towards vindicating optimism in the face of this perplexing paradox?

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In this scenario, we are talking about the big game. As a result, any sort of experiment that we could possibly conduct in regards to fostering life in a hostile environment would take hundreds of millions of years. Instead of creating a species by scratch–which would most certainly be a heraculean feat of scientific ingenuity that we are probably not capable of in today’s current technological abilities–we should look towards the various extremophiles that exist throughout the earth. Organisms such as Endoliths may thrive on dry, rocky planets such as Mars. This first priority for any individual or organization interested in providing concrete predictions as to the ubiquity of life throughout the Universe rests first in venturing outside of our own world, with an open mind supplemented by useful inferences from our own. There are a plethora of various organisms that thrive in situations that many throughout the ages have deemed to be anathema to life itself, yet, life yet continues to flourish within these various areas.

A Matter of Survival: How Much Chocolate Pudding Would it Take to Absorb an Asteroid Impact?

We all know the properties of chocolate pudding, and most of us can imagine the properties of a space-rock. Chocolate pudding–depending on whether or not you’ve messed up making it–tends to be pretty viscous, thick, and creamy. Asteroids tend to be made up of a slew of disparate materials such as rock, metal, and possible even ice. How much of the former would it take to effectively stop a statistically common sized copy of the latter? In many ways, this may seem like a silly question; however, science has provided many observations and theories that may aid in gaining some sort of handle upon a possible answer.

 

Asteroids rip through a planet’s atmosphere fast. Really, really fast. So fast, that the term “hyper velocity” is used when examining the force, speed, and impact an asteroid may have when it comes into contact with a surface of any kind. Hyper velocity impacts are incredibly hard to model, as a there are a vast rage of factors and possible outcomes. The most common outcome is outright vaporization. Such an outcome seems natural when a large ball of solid, hard matter smashes into an object at the rate of 3000 m/s. One should also take into account that asteroids tend to have a density that ranges up to 5.32 g/cc.

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Chocolate pudding, on the other hand, has a density that is much similar to water. This density is measured in around 1g/cc. Pudding in general seems like it is a pretty confounding material. It walks a fine line between solidity and fluidity at room temperature. Science has dubbed fluids such as chocolate pudding to be labeled into a category called a non-newtonian fluid. A non-newtonian fluid is essentially a fluid that doesn’t act similarly to water or oil: it doesn’t follow many of the physical laws that liquid water does.

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According to Isaac Newton, penetration depth tends to be related to the ratio of densities between the impactor and the impacted. With this in mind, it seems as though the answer is pretty simple. Taking into account the numbers mentioned previously, one would need more than 5 asteroid-lengths of pudding in order to adequately halt the object moving at hypervelocity.

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However, one of the major problems one faces in combating the impact of an object such as an asteroid and mitigating the destruction wrought is the way in which materials are organized to deflect the impactor. Often times, a single shield is just splintered entirely by the impact. A Whipple shield is a far more effective solution that one should pursue if they are ever faced with stopping a destructive with pudding and other materials.

A Soapy Stigma

Hygiene is a practice that forms the basis of our Western civilization. Over the course of our history, there appears to be a strong correlation in regards to the degree of sanitation within a community and its overall health and well-being. In our day and age, however, it seems as though certain brands of soap can have a more positive impact upon our health. For that reason, the pattern of consumption often follows a trend of sensation and a holistic focus upon the definitions of the product.

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A recent study has put a major and prominent ingredient under the scrutiny of scientific testing. Triclosan has been one of the most ubiquitous ingredients in soaps that are branded as antibacterial for decades, and is used by millions and millions of people across the world. Consequently, these soaps cater to a massive market worth billions of dollars. Are they safe to use? One of the most concerning problems to date within the medical field is the issue with antibiotics and the relatively adaptive nature of the bacteria that evolve traits to help combat the substances that threaten them.

According to the article linked above, there appeared to be no significant difference between antibacterial and normal soap. Based upon a correlational study using human subjects, the 20 stains of dangerous bacteria were relatively unharmed by the triclosan-rich soap relative to non-antibacterial soap. The breadth of samples of bacteria and the data concerning the soap’s impact upon those strains provides convincing evidence that there really is no difference. In fact, it may be argued that a rational person should just save his money rather than investing a few more dollars into a soap that has no relative benefit. Hygiene is invariably good, and so is soap; however, money is precious and money wasted on a product with a barely marginal benefit is a waste.

Perhaps it is possible that the ingredient triclosan has, throughout the years, diminished in effectiveness in the face of a foe that is constantly evolving to resist its cleansing power? Is it time to retire an ingredient that has lost its once effective edge over bacteria? There are clearly many opinions concerning this debate.

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Personally, I find that if people insist upon buying a product that they feel improves their quality of life, they should be able to. Although it may be disadvantageous, the power of the market will eventually lead to triclosan diminishing in effectiveness and thus a reduction in prices as well as demand for it plummets. In the meantime, the FDA will continue to look into the the claim made by many that triclosan is indeed a harmful chemical to human health that yields no benefit to even its use in any sort of potency. If the FDA does indeed find that triclosan harms the health of humans, then I believe that it should be regulated, and, in many cases banned as it would then provide absolutely no redeeming qualities to its use.

 

An issue of stress

We all experience it. The feeling of utter helplessness in the face of insurmountable pressures is a feeling not unique to any single individual, or species for the matter. Stress is an intrinsic part of our lives and it seems to follow us through all the various paths of our lives. What impact, exactly, does stress have upon our lives? Aside from the all-too-common feeling of dread and impending trial, does it have a palpable effect upon our bodies? Why? If so, are there ways that we as a species have coped with the burden? All of these questions, I believe, pose interesting queries and I took some time to browse through the internet in order to put my finger on what exactly lies at the heart of this pesky, secondary emotion.

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As mentioned previously, observations into the animal kingdom has found that, invariably, animals experience very similar degrees of stress as their human counterparts. Often this stress upon the animal leads to incredibly negative effects. In the case of various species of elephants throughout India, the impact of stress can be so severe that when a mother is afflicted by it during her pregnancy, the offspring will age much faster than their unstressed counterparts. Additionally, there is even evidence that these stress-born infant elephants will also go on to produce fewer offspring themselves, which poses a much greater issue to the overall population of the species in general. It seems that in the case of these pressured animals, the reduction of stress would go a long way to creating a happier species. It is hard to imagine that stress can have such enduring consequences for a species–consequences that are unfortunately offered up for the child to shoulder.

The impacts us stress upon animals such as the elephant may be surprising, but what about us? It seems as though we all deal with it in different manners and with different tools, but what sort of impact does it have upon us? Are there foreboding consequences to such a natural and ubiquitous feeling? The most common symptoms of any sort of stress induced ailment is as follows: headaches, an upset stomach, elevated blood pressure, chest pain, and insomnia. Additionally, research suggests that stress has the ability to compound any existing ailment, which is especially alarming given the consequences and the possible chain of events that could occur from something like that. Stress also has a fiscal impact upon our economy, according to WebMD, stress ends up costing American businesses an annual expense of approximately $300 billion dollars. That is some serious cash, and goes to show the enormous amount of inefficiency such a natural reaction to trial costs us, and, by extension, our economy each year. Is there anything remotely positive about it?

Many professionals throughout the past century have taken the phenomena into great consideration. Psychologists like Hans Seley characterize the stress that imparts a beneficial impact upon a human as eustress. Eustress acts as a cognitive enhancer. When we are able to approach a situation with confidence, no matter how dire the scenario seem, we are more likely to find success in our endeavors and achieve professional, and academic success. There always seems to be a clear duality to every issue. Just as infectious diseases can be used to combat themselves through the utilization of their own potency (vaccines), so to can stress be used to augment our ability to operate and be successful.

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Medieval Mischief

Often times we look back upon our history with eyes keen to understand the result rather than the cause. Much of what we know concerning the society of the medieval west is stored within countless illuminated texts and manuscripts. These scripts tend to be somewhat dry and uninteresting; however, a surprising volume of these particular texts display images and ideas that continue to perplex us.

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Above is a strange, yet oddly frequent image throughout countless illuminated manuscripts. The primary method of printing and reproducing texts during the middle ages was through the arduous labor of monks often pent up in stuffy, isolated, monasteries. Nevertheless, these cold, damp, and disparate monasteries managed to churn out many histories, manuscripts, and images of pugnacious snails beating up on people. Surely there is an explanation as to why so many monks separated by hundreds and hundreds of miles felt the need to do this? Perhaps these garden pests posed a far greater threat to our medieval ancestors than they do to our contemporary society? I believe this poses a good opportunity to exercise one of the most fundamental pillars of science: the hypothesis.

If such a diverse population of literate individuals illustrated identical images within their manuscripts, then these sentiments must express a tangible fear relevant to their reality. In other words, if these monks insisted on filling their pages with images of snails killing people, then snails must have been quite the menace back in the day.

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The ubiquity of these illustrations is incredible. If we look upon the issue with eyes solely affixed to the face-value of these illustrations, then surely one could conclude that these images portray grizzly images of a somewhat common occurrence. If we take these supposedly terrified monks at their word, then there must be a reason for the commonality.

However, one of the most important truths to be taken from the field of science is that correlation does not imply causation. The lack of evidence for the existence of such large, belligerent gastropods is but one nail in the coffin of our simple hypothesis. Furthermore, these images were often supplemented by dire biblical passages. In fact, the ubiquitous portrayal of an armed man combating a snail was perhaps also a common metaphor known across medieval Christendom. These depictions were, perhaps, merely an allusion to the dangers of nature in a time where it was anything but tame. The inevitability of death and the possibility to be felled by even the simplest of ills seems like a good reason to scribble down images of yoked snails thrashing on terrified knights.

One should not disregard the human imagination in the same manner in which one should not disregard the plethora of variables that often comprise the phenomenon studied by science. Correlation does not indicate causation. Science demands a careful analysis of a multitude of variables, and, often demands that one think outside the box no matter how simple human intuition suggests the problem be. Multifaceted issues should be celebrated, and I am looking forward to putting these thoughts into more concrete prose as the blogging session moves forward,

Regardless… Cheers, and go Buccos.

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Sources:

http://io9.com/why-do-knights-fight-snails-in-illuminated-manuscripts-1414832198

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/why-were-medieval-knights-always-fighting-snails-1728888/?no-ist

http://britishlibrary.typepad.co.uk/digitisedmanuscripts/2013/09/knight-v-snail.html

http://www.digitalmedievalist.com/2013/09/29/knight-vs-snail/

 

 

Initial Blog Post

My name is Rory McGowan and I am a senior currently majoring in International Relations with a national security focus, and a minor in the Spanish language. I am enrolled in this class in order to fulfill my final GN credit so that I will be able to graduate by the 2016 spring semester. Although my intentions for taking this class may seems a bit blunt and, in general, holistically utilitarian, I do have a deep vested interest in learning how to consume and communicate contemporary scientific ideas. I’m looking forward to reaching out into the internet in order to find interesting and diverse stories and news that I can relate back to this class.

Until then, here is a link to a live stream website for baseball.

Go buccos.

 

 

 

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