Cap'n Refsmmat

So, I was reading my New Scientist today and came across a book review for Anatomy of an Epidemic: Magic bullets, psychiatric drugs, and the astonishing rise of mental illness. Surprisingly, while the book's about how psychiatry is to blame for the rise in mental illness, the reviewer gave it a positive review and said it was "frighteningly persuasive." So I headed to the Internet and dug up some stuff. Here's a paper by the author in Ethical Human Psychology and Psychiatry: http://psychrights.org/articles/EHPPPsychDrugEpidemic%28Whitaker%29.pdf Some quotes: It goes on from there, and I suggest you take a read. I'm going to see if I can get the book from my library or on my Kindle soon. I realize that we like to come to the defense of psychiatry here. But could Mr. Whitaker have a valid point? His paper seems to be well-supported.

This looks like what you want: http://reference.wolfram.com/mathematica/tutorial/ImageProcessing.html You can use Table[] to make the matrix of values: http://reference.wolfram.com/mathematica/ref/Table.html Not sure how exactly that'd work, but you can probably work out a way that'll work...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Altar_stone http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Catholic_Encyclopedia_%281913%29/Altar_Stone Looks like it's no longer mandatory. It's a stone consecrated by a bishop, not necessarily from a particular place, although perhaps there used to be some specific source that was popular.

Then they'd be using the withdrawal symptoms to encourage cooperation, which ends up being physical torture in the end. Suppose they simply demonstrated the pleasure button's abilities once or twice, then simply told the prisoner "We'll use it as much as you want once you tell us the secret plans"? In other words, no withdrawal symptoms, and the device basically isn't used unless the guy gives information. (Incidentally, this is what I described in the first post, although that seems to have been forgotten.) In that case, if I were a prisoner who had nothing to tell the authorities, the bad part would be the imprisonment, not the pleasure button. Since I wouldn't experience the button -- I have nothing to tell them -- they'd just drag me into a room once a day to ask me if I've changed my mind and am willing to talk. The bad part would be the unwarranted imprisonment.

http://blogs.scienceforums.net/swansont/about Yes, the government does more than push paper.

So long as you use IMAP rather than POP for your email. If you use POP, you'll download the message from the server and it'll be stored on your computer anyway. Only IMAP keeps messages on the server.

I wonder if any SFN members would be willing to get that picture for us.

Depends on what's in it, but there'd certainly be a very high risk of dangerous infection. Heck, sneezing near him would be a high risk.

Mmm, business cards. Can I say I'm an official SFN Oligarch on mine?

Papal infallibility is rarely invoked. There's a list here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Papal_infallibility#Instances_of_papal_infallibility None seem like Supreme Court material.

Probably because you rapidly developed resistance to any bacteria in the raw milk. Give it to someone who's never had it before and their response might be very different. Now, the CDC (according to the link) says 800 people have fallen ill due to raw milk since 1998. Given how many thousands of people probably drink raw milk, the percentage is probably quite small. But then consider how many people drink milk at all, and how many people would get sick if everyone drank unpasteurized milk.

I have only read a chapter or two and I already love the book. Seriously, this is hilarious. (And frighteningly perceptive.)

Did you mean this? [math]\int \frac{1}{x^2 + 7x +10}\, dx[/math] If so, you can probably do this: [math]\int \frac{1}{(x + 2)(x+5)} \, dx[/math] and use partial fraction decomposition to solve it.

I believe the correct answer in physics is "uh, let's call it 'dark matter'."

And that's the difference right there, in bold. Wal-Mart might employ atomic physicists, but they don't employ them to build atomic clocks. That may be true (though I don't know), but I'd think the vast majority of Wal-Mart employees are not in administrative roles. They're putting cans of beans on shelves and saying "Hi, welcome to Wal-Mart," not doing complicated accounting. (Apart from the small percentage that are accountants.) Merged post follows: Consecutive posts merged This reminds me of some deals that Lockheed did at Skunk Works when designing various aircraft. If you could shave a pound off the aircraft, you'd get a bonus (I forget how much). A good idea if you have an aircraft that needs to be exceedingly light.

Have you already taken some level of chemistry? If you've done relatively advanced chemistry in high school (but have forgotten most of it), you could get one of the AP Chemistry review books. They try to explain the material in an accessible way to people who've already learned most of it and just want a refresher.

k has to be nonzero so that your equation there won't have division by 0. If y0 were 0, the equation would be ludicrously simple, since it'd just be 0 = 0. The constraints are just there to make it all work.

I don't think you're supposed to turn the pressure up to Steel Cutter except in special circumstances.

Well, you know exactly what the cat is content to clean itself with, so in comparison, paper isn't all that bad...

It's clearly time for someone with some cotton swabs, a microscope, and a strong stomach to compare the hygiene of those who use toilet paper vs. those who use bidets, and also compare cleanliness before and after a shower to determine the shower's efficacy in replacing a bidet. Merged post follows: Consecutive posts mergedI have just discovered an article in the Journal of Diseases of the Colon & Rectum, from 1959, titled "In Praise of the Bidet." It's an editorial, but Dr. Pack has a strong opinion about bidets: I came across this after reading "In Reappraisal of the Bidet, Nearly Half a Century Later", which states: doi 10.1007/s10350-006-0564-8 Unfortunately, I haven't found any direct buttock-hygiene tests.

The point was that we have indeed changed sociologically, as evidenced by us not killing each other nearly as much. Did you watch the video, or just read the summary blurb? Pinker is not just talking about wars but about violent deaths in general, so global (de)militarization is not the sole factor here.

From what I've heard, that's true. Dimming the screen will still work, as long as the dimming actually dims the backlight bulb rather than just making all the colors darker. (I don't know if you can dim the fluorescent backlights in some computers, or if it's faked in software. You can probably dim LED backlit LCDs.)

Indeed. I actually blame my change on learning to do card magic. Once I started performing magic in high school (I'd be sitting around at lunch and a group would spontaneously form around me and demand that I do magic), I got much better socially. But then, magic is also the art of manipulating and BSing your audience. If you can handle that, you can handle regular social situations.

http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/steven_pinker_on_the_myth_of_violence.html Take a look. Interesting talk.

I'd say that since the wire has a given resistance, it'll have a current running through the loop. You can use that resistance to find the potential drop over a portion of the loop. On the other hand, I'll bet it doesn't quite work that way, since the field is symmetric. How can you get a potential difference when the ring and field are completely symmetric?