SkepticLance

Lots of drugs cure diseases. Antibiotics cure bacterial diseases. Antifungals cure fungus caused diseases. Many other drugs kill parasites and cure diseases caused by parasites. There are drug anti-cancer treatments that result in cures of a few cancers, though many cancers cannot be successfully cured in this way. Incidentally, the first cure of AIDS has happened, though not by drugs. A sufferer also had leukemia, for which the treatment is a bone marrow trnsplant. Some people have been found to be immune to AIDS, by virtue of having two copies of an immunity gene. In this case, a bone marrow donor was also immune to AIDS. The AIDS patient had his own immune system destroyed by radiation, and replaced with the bone marrow transplant, that included the immune genes. The AIDS patient had a double recovery. Cured of both leukemia and AIDS. This opens hope for AIDS cures by gene therapy. Not a drug, but nevertheless, a cure.

Most of the research on resveratrol has been on laboratory animals, and very little on humans. The list of products that work well on mice and are useless in humans is very long. Until it is proven, it may not be a good idea to megadose on something that might be useless and have long term side effects. As stated, the amount in red wine is too small to have much impact. Most of the resveratrol pills on the market are actually herbal pills, and may be highly variable, both in resveratrol content and amounts of other, potentially harmful impurities. I think the smart thing to do is sit back, and wait for longer term results. If it is as good as it is touted, these results will not be long coming. At that stage, standardised resveratrol pills will become available without the potentially nasty impurities, and the proper dose will be known.

As I have said before, it is not as if Africans are all olympians. However, it appears that Africans are more genetically diverse than other races. This means more at the athletic end of the bell curve. This makes sense if we assume that the portion of humanity that left Africa 60,000 years ago was not a large number, and hence carried less genetic variation. However, if this is true, it also would mean that Africans contain a group at that end of the bell curve that are smarter than the rest of humanity. Perhaps Africa contains more true geniuses?? African variability is much greater than any other racial group. Ethiopians, for example, have quite fine facial features, while other Africans may have large lips and noses. Some equatorial Africans are ebony black, while others, further from the equator, are merely brown. Africans who emigrated about 10,000 years ago became the Pacific Melanesian group. Of these, Papuans are generally small. Fijians are big, and make great rugby players. In Africa, we have pygmies, and we have Masai, who are tall and lean. IQ tests are culturally based. Cultures such as the Japanese and Koreans who are trained from youth in problem solving do well. Others do less well. There is no evidence that there is any genetic component in the superficial differences shown by IQ tests.

Race versus IQ is a good question, and is not racist. The answers given, though, may be incredibly racist! Genomics has shed light on this topic, as with many others. The genetic similarities between people of different races is far greater than genetic differences. Some of the physical differences seem great (eg skin colour) but are minimal in terms of genetics. Skin colour is determined by less than 20 genes, and this small number is enough to give a full range of colour from ebony black to snow white. However, there is no reason to assume any correlation between skin colour and IQ. After all, genes for skin colour are totally different to the genes for intelligence. Generally, the genetic difference between you, and a person of the same race and gender living next door, is roughly the same as the genetic difference between a snow white European, and an ebony black equatorial African. Either could be smart, or idiotic. As others have said, any difference between IQ test results from one race or culture to another are probably the result of environmental differences, not genetic.

iNow That is seriously close to religion bashing. That's thread closin' stuff, hombre! Just quietly, though, I agree with you.

npts History is a very good guide to certain things, but predictions based on history have to be modified in the light of modern technology. History tells us that developing industrial countries are dirty and polluting, but later clean up their act. Modern technology for this clean up, though, does not need to be invented again. Thus, we can expect the second cycle of industrialisation, dirty emissions, leading to clean-up, to be quicker. China and India already know they have to clean up, and the technology is there already waiting for them. We can expect them to do this relatively expeditiously. At least compared to the West, which took 100 years. Global warming tipping points are very controversial. I disagree that we are near such 'tipping points'. In the last interglacial period, 120,000 years ago, the average world temperature rose to 2 to 3 Celsius warmer than we now have, and there was no 'tipping point' disaster. The world followed the same pattern it had through all glaciation/interglaciation periods of the current Ice Age. For the world to warm greater than it did 120,000 years ago, will take, at the present rate 160 years or more. This gives us time. There are those who claim that things are accelerating. That is so for CO2 emissions, which are accelerating, but the warming process is not. We know that the relationship between greenhouse gas increase and temperature increase is not linear. An exponential greenhouse gas increase can lead to a linear increase in temperature, and this is what has happened over the past 30 years. Theory says that, unless greenhouse gases increase more than the current exponential increase, warming will remain linear. There is now a move towards methods of running our energy economy, and our agriculture, which will ameliorate greenhouse gas emissions. Given time, this will have its effect, and global warming will slow, eventually stop, and even reverse. There are people who do not agree with this. Some models suggest that anthropogenic greenhouse gases are preventing us descending into the next glaciation period, which is stated to be a good thing. Of course, I am sceptical of models, so regard this as merely one of many possibilities.

Willpower will not do it. However, training and experience can make a difference. If you develop a skill to a high degree, your level of skill will diminish when intoxicated, but may still be far higher than that of a sober person not so skilled. Also, tolerance to alcohol increases with exposure, so that a 'hardened' drinker will be less affected than a neophyte by the same amount of alcohol. On the other hand, at the greater extreme, an alcoholic who has utterly wrecked his body may have too little liver detox function left to reduce alcohol's effects. Such a person may be more readily knocked flat by alcohol than the aforesaid neophyte. The only thing willpower will do is to fool you into thinking you are less drunk than you really are. This is seriously dangerous, since it may lead you into doing things, like drive a car, when you should not.

Please note that I did not say we could continue with 'business as usual'. The world has environmental problems that need addressing. However, just as stretching the truth into denial of problems is very bad, it is also bad to stretch the truth the other way, and exaggerate problems. Pollution is a problem in China, India and similar places, but it is potentially controllable, and it is predictable (from what we have seen of history) that they will control it in the future. Similarly, population growth is well on the way to proper control. Global warming is still uncontrolled, but the first steps are under way. We need to present a balanced view of the situation, and not go 'all disaster', or else "all is well and we can pollute as much as we like".

scalbers You will be happy to know that the population trend will be to a reduction after 2050. Population growth is not something we should worry too much about, though we can speed the reduction by making contraceptives more available in third world countries. Hopefully there will be no Dubya to prevent such targeted aid in future.

To Now What you said is very much a matter of opinion and there is a more optimistic view. Take pollution. Agreed that China is a heavily polluting nation. However, 100 years ago, so was the USA and Western Europe. London's 'pea soup' fogs as so well described in the Sherlock Holmes stories were a reality. They were caused by rampant air pollution. Ditto water pollution. At that time the Thames River was an open sewer. The eastern cities of the USA were similar. However, in the last 100 years, these regions have cleaned their act miraculously, and fish can now be caught in the Thames, and pea soup fogs are pretty much gone. It is predictable that third world nations will pass through a similar stage and then clean their act up also, as they develop. In 50 years, China will be a much cleaner country. The population explosion. Many authorities believe the population explosion is already over, and we are now dealing with growth that is a matter of inertia rather than excess numbers of children per couple. 50 years ago, the average children per couple in third world nations was 5.5. Today it is 2.5. The reason the world population still grows is simply that the excess children of the previous generation have now reached adulthood and are in the process of having 2.5 children. In the 'advanced' West, the numbers of children per couple is already below 2. In other words, except for recent immigrants from third world nations, and an increase from immigration, Western nations are actually falling in population. Some nations, like Japan and Italy, are so scared of this drop that they are offering financial incentives to women to have babies. The rate of growth is getting less every year, and the United Nations (http://www.un.org/popin) believes it will level out at 9 billion (plus or minus 1.5 billion)by about 2050.

iNow The reason that my post was slightly different to the reference, or at least included different elements, is that my first discovery of this research was from a paper copy of New Scientist. Since I could not reference that onto an internet post, I googled the author, and found an alternative reference. Sorry I did not make that clear. The 14 Feb page 22 paper version of New Scientist article quotes Liming Dai as saying : " ...iron free nanotubes were even better than platinum." And goes on to say " The team's devise produces four times as much electric current as an equivalent using platinum."

I have always taken an optimistic view of the future for humanity. A discussion I was in a little while ago included people who argued that resource depletion would slow or reverse progress. An example given was the shortage of platinum as a catalyst for vital processes, such as hydrogen fuel cells. My view has been that human ingenuity can overcome most problems, by finding alternatives. Thus I was most interested to find that, not only can Platinum in fuel cells be replaced, but can be done so with an alternative that is four times better. http://www.rsc.org/chemistryworld/News/2009/February/05020902.asp Carbon nanotubes that are doped with nitrogen can catalyse the hydrogen fuel cells, and much more effectively than Platinum. The researchers say that even nanotubes are not essential. The same effect could be obtained with other forms of carbon doped with nitrogen, making the technology available in the near future.

Not needed. Old sperm dies and there are specialised cells that reabsorb them. However, regular orgasms do keep the old equipment functioning well. There is also biochemical feed-back. For example : orgasms result in endorphin release, making a guy feel good (you already knew that, didn't you?). Regular endorphin release is stress lowering, and has long term health benefits. You can get the same thing from long distance jogging, but let's go with what feels good.

Visa is totally correct. There was an item in New Scientist about this several years back, though I have lost the exact reference. Males who masturbate to orgasm regularly when lacking a sexual partner retain more healthy sexual function than those that do not. This should not surprise anyone. It is just a part of the old principle of 'use it or lose it'. Any part of the human body will perform better if regularly exercised. Sure, there is a temporary lowering of sperm count. But in the long run, keeping sexually active, whether with a partner or not, keeps sexuality in better condition than abstinence.

To JohnB Did you consider that human impact in Australia might be more than just over hunting? The aboriginees had a habit of lighting fires. In fact, the early European explorers reported that the entire landscape was a mass of separated smoke columns. This is called 'mosaic burning' and is today hailed as a wonderful positive effect on the ecology. However, it did not happen before humans arrived, and the impact must have been considerable. I could well imagine that the regular burning off of plants would result in sufficient change to, for example, reduce wetland area.

This is not really a science joke, but I was gonna post it on the 'believe in Thor' thread, which got closed before I could post it. The great God Thor was looking down at the world, when he saw an incredibly beautiful young woman. Quick as a god, he popped down to Earth, and a little rapid and enthusiastic seduction happened. When it was over, he decided that she deserved to know what a great honour was done to her. "I am Thor!" he declaimed. She giggled. "Tho am I" she said, "but it wath fun."

Sayonara I am not sure exactly how many there were. Today, there are about 240 native bird species, which would suggest close to 300 before the first humans. This may be a bit misleading, though, since a lot of that 240 are on offshore islands and have limited range. They are NZ birds only because politics gives certain islands to NZ. Certainly, the Maori never visited many of those islands. Taking this into account, I would calculate that the Maori wiped out about 15% of the total they came into contact with, but allow a reasonable error factor in this result. Say 10 to 20%.

I can confirm the 2000 lost species in the Pacific, from my other reading. These have been studied in the sub fossil record. The time period was a lot longer than 3000 years, since it includes the islands of Melanesia, which were colonised as far back as 10,000 years ago. However, killing off a lot of species need not take much time. The polynesian Maori of my country arrived 800 years ago, and wiped out 36 species of native bird. Europeans arrived 200 years ago, and wiped out a further 15 species. Most of those the Maori killed were by over-hunting. Most of those by Europeans were by introduction of rats, stoats, possums, cats etc. Although the Maori also introduced the small polynesian rat, which accounted for some smaller bird species. In Australia, evidence is indirect. Te fossil record shows a mass extinction event about 50,000 years ago, in which over 100 species of megafauna died out. Anthropological evidence suggests that humans left Africa about 60,000 years ago, and certainly 10,000 years is ample time to get to Australia and spread across it. The oldest human skeleton in Australia is Mungo Man, about 45,000 years old. Since this was found on the East coast, it suggests arrival of humans on the west coast long before. Some researchers are trying to claim that the mass extinction event was due to climate change. Sadly for that claim : 1. Any climate change at that time was minor 2. There have been much more potent climate changes in Australia over the past 120,000 years without any associated mass extinction. My conclusion is that humans in Australia were the main, if not the only, cause of the mass extinction. The arrival of Clovis Man in North America 'coincides' with another mass extinction of megafauna. The giant Irish elk died out some 10,000 years ago - when humans arrived in Ireland. There is even an interesting theory about Africa (unproven). Apparently, about 1 to 2 million years ago, there were several species of small elephant, which went extinct. Perhaps our pre-human ancestors were at the extinction game also? In terms of mega fauna, there is little doubt that our more primitive forebears killed off a lot more species than modern man has.

I don't believe in God, but I think I am coming to believe in miracles. Just think, six pages of posts on this incredibly controversial topic, and not one person has said anything nasty enough to force the thread closed. If that aint a miracle, what is?

If we are a figment of your imagination, you are one sick dude!

Cogito ergo sum!! Quod Erat Demonstrandum. Sorry iNow - we both gave the same 'proof' and posted at the same time by coincidence.

On Atolepus longirostris, Wiki says : "The species has been classified as extinct, due to huge declines probably related to chytridiomycosis, climate change, among other synergistic causes." Main cause of extinction - an introduced pathogen - the chytrid fungus. Chrysophyllum januariense is a tree once found in the Laranjeiras Forest, which is a protected habitat and still clearly there. Since the forest has not gone, it is a bit disingenuous to claim this species died out due to habitat loss. Cnidoscolus fragrans. I could not find a resource that described the cause of this extinction. Conuropsis carolinensis, the carolina parakeet according to Wiki died out because (I quote): "The Carolina Parakeet died out because of a number of different threats. To make space for more agricultural land, large areas of forest were cut down, taking away its habitat. The colorful feathers (green body, yellow head, and red around the bill) were in demand as decorations in ladies' hats, and the birds were kept as pets. Even though the birds bred easily in captivity, little was done by owners to increase the population of tamed birds. Finally, they were killed in large numbers because farmers considered them a pest, although many farmers valued them for controlling invasive cockleburs. It has also been hypothesized that the introduced honeybee helped contribute to its extinction by taking a good number of the bird's nesting sites.[3]" I could go on, but running down this kind of data is very time consuming. The point is that clear cut cases of extinctions due to habitat loss are very rare. Normally habitat loss is listed as just one of a series of causes, and it is debatable how important a cause it might be.

A rational belief is one based on objective, empirically derived evidence. An irrational belief is one that derives from something that lacks credible evidence - such as an extreme statement (meaning well removed from what objective and empirically derived data shows) that comes from something someone said. If I claim that there are fairies at the bottom of my garden - that is irrational, since there is no empirical objective evidence to back up that claim. If I say that polarising one photon here, can change the polarised state of an associated photon there, that is equally weird, but still rational, since the objective and empirically derived evidence can be shown.

Mokele I think you are seeing arguments in my last post that are not there. I was not arguing a point - just trying to get a little quantification into the issue of extinction rate, even though I know that any such estimate is almost certainly inaccurate. Any time you try to quantify something so poorly measured, you make assumptions that can be questioned. For example, how many eukaryote species are there? No-one knows. You suggest 10 million. I suggest 100 million based on discussion I have had with various professors of biology. One is a nematologist, and his estimate of the number of marine nematode species is 10 million. There are probably an equivalent number of species of beetle. Suddenly 100 million (an estimate by another prof. I spoke to) seems realistic. I also attended a lecture by a bacteriologist who pioneered whole genome techniques for detecting bacteria in various environments, and his estimate for bacterial species alone is another 150 million, which is why I said 100 million eukaryotes. However, these are only estimates, and one estimate varies from another by a massive amount, so either of us could be correct, or (more likely) both of us are wrong. On extinction by habitat loss - give me ten examples of species that have gone extinct due to habitat loss - when other factors are minimal or non existent. I could readily, from memory give you ten examples of extinctions caused by introduced predators , and another ten due to over hunting by man. Can you do the same for habitat loss? You said : "Irrelevant and a poorly chosen example. Birds have huge ranges, and can often find new habitat with ease." At least 20 of those species of birds were flightless, and could not do that. They were made extinct by over-hunting, not by habitat loss. Also "1/10th of that many species is a much more widely-accepted number, reducing the duration to 45,000 years. But even 450,000 years is less than half the estimated duration of the Permian extinction. Congrats, you just proved yourself wrong." I cannot prove myself wrong when I have made no argument. I am happy to accept your view on the rate of Permian extinctions. I just made that point for perspective - not to argue any point. However, I do not think we can equate the current extinction event with that of the Permian (or any other) since it has just begun (10,000 years being an eye blink in biological evolution), and we cannot predict what will happen over the next few thousand years. Hopefully, humans will stop hunting and harvesting to extinction, and will control the spread of alien predators. In the advanced western world, pollution has been substantially reduced, and we are far more environmentally aware than any time in history. This appreciation must spread to third world countries, and control of extinctions globally managed a lot better.

The problem with this whole argument is the lack of quantification. We do not know how many species per year went extinct in the Permian event. We do not really know how many go extinct per year today. Prof. E.O. Wilson estimate 30,000 species per year. However, that is based on a calculation with dubious asumptions. For example : a prime assumption is that species loss is mainly due to habitat loss. Hellooooo!!! I know for my own country that about 50 native bird species went extinct in the last 1000 years due to human activity. All died due to over-hunting or the introduction of exotic predators. Not one due to habitat loss. Greenpeace argues 250,000 species per year. Greenpeace is dwelling in Fantasyland. I would rather go by actual data rather than dubious calculations or wild guesses. I have seen various sets of data listing species that have gone extinct, and they range from 2 per year to 20 per year. Assuming the maximum (20), and assuming that only 10% of extinctions are noticed, then we have a total extinction rate of 200 per year. This is certainly wrong, since the data is so poor, but is probably closer than the estimates of thousands. Assuming 200 per year, and assuming 100 million species (not counting prokaryotes), then it will take 450,000 years to achieve the extinction level of the Permian event. This is also certainly wrong. The data is too poor. However, it may help to put things into perspective.