husmusen

O is the blood type of around about 47% of caucasians. O is also recessive. That struck me as a high figure for a recessive gene. Also AB is at 5%, that struck me as low. What causes this? I asked my lecturer and he hummed and haaahd, and said it was "a result of the inherent strength of type O". (In other words he didn't know.) Cheers.

I was wondering why Brain tumors were so deadly. Compared to other tissues, like bowel or skin, neurons are not rapid dividers. Which shoudl allow very tight targetting(and hence highr doses of) the drugs which whack rapidly dividing cells with minimal colateral damage. Yet the figures suggest otherwise? Any ideas why? Cheers.

Phiforall: Relax, I'm not having a go at you. Infact I'll say that's a very natural mistake for someone who has no experience of ABI rehab. But I don't know the specifics I'm just warning about hasty conclusions so I can't say they weren't slobs I don't know any more than you. Me too, 100%. I was actually thinking of the Hilton Sisters and Anna Smith. Also I was implying correlation not a 100% causality. Being rich does not compel you to become nuts, just as being poor doesn't force you into depression. Think of it like this, exposure to TB doesn't ensure infection. Yet we know TB is causitive. So the fact that some people are exposed and don't get it, does not mean it's ok to be exposed and the more heavily you are, they worse your odds are. Yeah well you see I got the impression that you had called them 'lazy' and 'opporunistic'. And I was pointintg out there were other possibilities, that you did not appear to have considered. Also I must take issue with the 'far more people', Australia has one of the toughest dole complainance schemes of any country in the world. The best result was 5% cheating and some of that(proportion unknown) were false positives due to mental ilness and illiteracy. Yes, well having a good measure of down to earth common sense has always been a known protective factor . Cheers.

pangloss: "That's all well and good, but the issue is whether (and how much) to force people to take care of the issue. Not ask. Force." Perhaps you'd like to elaborate on what you mean by that. I was not proposing force. I don't know about Florida but we have an elected democratic government. And as a citizen in such a state, I have been expressing my rightful views that the current actions of government are making homelessness a biger problem not a smaller one. In the meantime because the cogs of government move slowly, it will fall on private citizens to do what they can. Again I don't see any force.

Ohh, I missed yours darthtater. I must say I find your post a tad immature. "People are a little like electricity in that they take the path of least resistance." Ohh if only that were true. You have no idea how much people make things hard for themselves, no idea. "It is easier to blame someone else than it is to blame the person in the mirror." You're right there, it's much easier to blame the emaciated guy you see on the street, than ask yourself what the demands of the human being require you to do in such a situation. And I have no doubt there are metho drinkers convinced they don't have a problem with alchohol(apart from it's scarcity), that it's not their fault. But the wonderful thing is you don't have to worry about their choices, only yours. "Looking for a helping hand? Try the ones on the ends of your arms." Is it good to make flippant comments about things one knows nothing about? But I'll pass your comments on, only it might be a bit hard, you see some of the homeless, they havent got any arms.

Pangloss: "It's always somebody's fault, right?" No, last time I checked there was no known way to reliably contract or give someone a serious mental illness. Sometimes shit happens. But when it does, we are given a choice. One can walk away with our fingers in our ears and humming real loud. One can try and help(that may or may not be possible). Or one can put the boot in. That is your choice that you must make as we make ours. People in the real world get homeless in basically three ways, 1) They screwed up. 2) They got screwed. 3) They got unlucky. Usually it's various combos of the above, each person is unique. How we respond to that is *our* choice. Choices, consequences, and responsibility. Cheers.

"especially as it relates to single parenthood," Interesting, over here families are the worst affected, usually it's either mum or dad is very I'll and the well parent and kids iare in the front of the car. But we have something called the sole parent pension, an expanded version of the widows pension, that keeps a lot of sole parents from homelessness. I think It's overwhelmingly a good thing, but we are starting to see a small problem, there are a few (IMHO silly) girls who have taken a, well not macho but, to coin a word 'femcho' attitude. "I don't need a man, I can do it all myself", and see this as some sort of validation of womanhood. I think it's unwise, not in a holier-than-thou sense, just practical, starting without a failsafe is tempting fate and that goes for the men you were talking about who walk off too. Oh I forgot the other big cause of homelessness is the 'breaching system' where they take a zero tolerance to the most minor mistakes in forms and remove 18%, 27%, 51%, and then all income for 2 months. They want to extend that to the disability pension. So if a psychosis sufferer is a day late(or early) with there form, bang! you got 'breached'. But I'd better not get started on that, I just feel we have a big enough problem in this country with the .gov manufacturing additonal homelessness. "I am glad the MS turned out to be only a scare. A friend of mine is currently waiting to hear if this is her diagnosis." You and me both. Best of luck to your friend. I've enjoyed this chat. Sadly, the "physical" world summons. Cheers.

Hi Coral, I've been close enough to have an idea of what you went through. I'm glad you made it through , I don't know what it's like in the U.S. but in this country once your homeless it's hard to get out and not a lot do. There is this sharp cut-off period(about 20 weeks), after which only about 1% will regain housing. This is because of structural things like housing references that keep people out. Like rental databases, the owning/leasing of a house and bank acccount being necessary to obtain any gov't benefit, and so-on. Also some kids are born homeless, so they don't have a birth certificate, that creates huge headaches. The government in .au has been divesting itself of social justice issues, so the charities are groaning under the weight, plus the Salvos had their main depot arsoned last year which really hurt them. And ofcourse without a registered address the homeless can't vote. So therefore no priority. The people running the charities, St Vincents, Brotherhood etc, are quite worried about third generation homelessness, is that a big problem in the U.S.? 'Contrary to the law, they try to collect pet deposits or even deny disabled people housing.' That sucks, there are laws again that here, and the Blind Association is utterly militant about enforcing them(as they should be). Cheers. P.S. How are things for you now? I'm fine, but I had an MS scare a few weeks ago(turned out it was a more benign condition), so I'm all too aware that one is only an accident or two away from poverty. (MS would have royally screwed up my nursing job).

Phiforall: "I realize that some of these people were not at the high points of their lives, but I can't help but think they would have taken better care if they had worked hard to own that home. " I would need to know more about the situation to definitivly comment. But I'll mention a few caveats. 1. If these people were clinically depressed, no, it would not have made the slightest differance wether they owned the homes or not. 2. Did anyone teach these people how you clean houses? Or did they just assume that such knowledge is automatic? 3. Were there clauses in the agreement that prevented maintainance? I know of a situation in Australia where a retarded council basically said "You don't own these houses, you make any repairs or alterations and you can consider yourself evicted." So they notified the council so they could send people around and so stuff went unrepaired for months. 4. Long term poverty can inculcate unhealthy attitudes,as can long term excessive wealth (Ordering take away to be flown by supersonic jet across the atlantic seem odd to anyone? Bottled water for a mongrel dog?, Golden rings in pigs snouts?). Putting the boot in is rarely constructive. 5. Sufferers of Psychosis and Schizophrenia are someimes not very good at the requirements of daily living. Niether are people suffering advanced heart disease, but people don't judge them for that. (Because, as we all know, no one chooses Heart Disease, but there are diets and excercise that can minimise psychosis and schizophrenia ) I don't know the situation you were in, or what had happened there, for all I know they may indeed have been complete lardass slobs. But they may not have and it's really dangerous to make assumptions. Cheers.

Nice links Jaques. Cheers.

I can't see any physical reason(i.e. laws of physics) that would prevent it. You could encourage the lightning to come to you by making an inviting enough target. But natural lightning is a bit of an untamed beast. The actual energy in a lightning strike varies enourmously, and if you are planning on attracting half a countries lightning to one spot I'd hate to be the guy in charge of writing the Occ. Health manual. It's more a matter of safety, cost/return, and feasability than any fundamental reasons of physics. Oh and stuff would get worn out fairly quick so you'd have high maintainence costs. At least thats my initial impression, no expert. Cheers.

Corporal Himmelstoss was a character in "All's quiet on the Western front". I think you've pretty well defined him to a tee though . Agree. But I would say that these sorts of weaknesses are best discovered by high endurance excercises, requiring team cooperation, and which put those partaking through a lot of psychological and physical stress. Not by bullying and bastardisation. If a member is not up to it, it will show up during these stress tests. That person should not be bullied or beaten out of the unit, but just be part of the 10%, 25% or 75%(the ultra elite units) that don't get in. 'Bad luck soldier, good try, keep working out and training and try again next year.' Bastardisation destroys team character. Rigourous excercises and training builds trust and team character. Even so I don't think you really 100% can be sure until the bullets are real . Again I can't prove any of this it's just my observations. Anyway I have an A&P assignment that ain't doing itself. Cheers.

"Mandatory volunteering" That phrase should be shot and put out of it's misery. It's like chalk on a blackboard. Nothing personal. Cheers. P.S. I suppose what's really being asked is, should compulsory community service be applied like a military national service scheme. Providing it's done sanely,(a big if), and the person is given some choice of when and what sort of thing they do, and there is injury cover the same as if they were in paid employment, I don't find it in any way immoral. It would be essentially a tax collected in labour rather than money, at least as I see it. Hmm, Tax == Mandatory voluntary contributions, that'll sell. Heh heh. Cheers.

klanger: 1. There are specialist military training systems for interrogaton resistance. Contact counselling behind the mess hall on the other hand is neither rigourous or beneficial. 2. The 'toughening up' excuse has been used for far too long by the little Corporal Himmelstosses, and they exist in every military, as justification for their own personal sadistic fun. Instinctively I feel that a long history of being bastardised would probably help an enemy interrogator as the connection of obedience/compliance == reward/ceasing of suffering is something that an interrogator could use. Now compare a soldier who loves and trusts his fellow teammembers with his life? How much harder to betray them than a bunch of sadistic bastards who've been grinding your face in the dirt since day one? Just MHO. Cheers.

In reply to weasel54849: Lets assume that rather than ultimate and true morality, you're asking about a persons general sense of morality. How about this, 1)Religion is the relationship a human being percieves between himself, that is his own individual self, and that which created him, that is his point of origin. Wether he understands that to be the one true God, creator of all that is seen and unseen(Abrahamic faiths). Ancestors(Shinto I think, perhaps err better go check). The family-state entity(Roman paganism). 2) Morality is the permanent guide to correct attitudes and actions that flows naturally from this understanding. Hence there can be no morality without religion (in the above sense). Don't use the above in an essay without citing L.N. Tolstoy, your teacher likely has a source checker program, and Tolstoy WILL be in it. . (I based my argument pretty heavily on something he wrote) Cheers.

Have you considered sonoluminescence? Cheers.

I'm not greatly versed on Mexican politics, but I really don't see how that follows. It seems to me like saying that just because Russia dropped communism Putin must be less authoritarian. Cheers. P.S. I have doubts that the organised crime in Mexico is feeling too much of a squeeze as to the best of my knowledge no ones tried to kill him lately. (Or perhaps I am too cynical)

Just saw this, No quick silver, right near his police station just after he'd been explaining how there was no crime problem. Cheers.

That reminds me of those little paradoxes that people use to "prove" that it's impossible to go back in time. Congrats, I think you just "proved" that linear time doesn't exist . Cheers.

While browsing I came across this: Police chief robbed driving to work Now I'm sure it wasn't very funny for him, or for that poor city, but given that he didn't get hurt(pride excepted) I can't help but find it a little humerous. Cheers

O.K Anti-biotic is, to put it simply, a chemical that kills nasty bugs without killing or maiming you in the process. There are naturally occuring ones, like Penicillin. There are also some artificially produced ones. The artificially produced ones may or may not be proteins. The molecules extracted from organic sources, like penicillin mould, are almost certainly proteins. And yes bacteria can produce other proteins that interfere with anti-biotics, hence anti-biotic resistant bacteria. One example of this is Beta-lactam(penicillin) some bacteria produce a protein called Beta-lactamase which basically shreds the Beta-lactam molecule to bits. (After which it doesn't work so good ) Generally IIRC AB resistant bacteria have several main ways, 1) They produce a protein that shreds or gums up the anti-biotic. 2) They produce a protein that stops the anti-biotic entering the bacteria. 3) They produce a protein that destroys the anti-biotic inside the bacteria. 4) Golden-S also I think has an active pump system that expells AB's from the cell although I could be wrong on that. Cheers.

I know what you mean. Looking around the web I found the following http://www.medicalprogress.com/pdf_files/management_IVM.pdf It seems to suggest that with modern techniques she has a very good chance(90-95%) of complete recovery(Table 3). I hope it's some comfort. Husmusen.

My father used to be a firm advocate of that statement. The first thing that occurs to me is that a) It may be somehow more in phase with the bodies natural rythyms. b) Going to sleep earlier means you weren't up as long the day before . Speaking of sleep and strange coincidences, I just looked at the time. Cheers, I'm off to bed.

Well on matters of XP I'll have to defer to your more extensive experience, I find Win98SE and Linux breeze along on 512MB. Cheers.

If you have 512 MB, that should be adequete for most tasks, unless you're doing high end image processing and the like. I'm not sure you'll get the speed up your hoping for. If you take the info you posted (minus the brand name) to any vaguely reputable store they should be able to tell you the right ones, and if they can't then RUN! from the place. As for good stores to buy from in your country, that's probably better left to a local. Cheers.