Glider

What's your point? Such as? It's nothing to do with its age. It's to do with the unsupported claims you make, e.g. "it is said to have solutions for AIDS" (but the manuscripts are missing). Well, if the manuscripts are missing, then it cannot in fact be said to have solutions for AIDS, now can it? Follow my logic here. The AIDS syndrome (a/w the HIV virus) has only been around since the early 80s? Somewhere around there. This being the case, the length of time Ayurveda has been around and the fact that the manuscripts "are written in an ancient language which was lost hundreds of years ago" (but are missing), suggests that Ayurveda produced 'solutions' for a condition that didn't even exist? Can you understand our scepticism yet? Show us, by which I mean present the relevant articles, don't just direct us to a site which presents hundreds of animal studies with (in some cases) ambiguous results and titled by the substance rather than the condition. What? Ah...I see, it's our fault. Such as? Such as?

If you want it that strong, it's not a laxitive you need, it's a purgative. A different experience altogether

I don't think so. Sociopaths can be charming and manipulative, but they also tend to have a grandiose sense of self, which would work against their adopting the personality of another (the other's personality simply wouldn't be good enough).

I've never heard of that as a clinical condition. I have heard of cases of obsession that have resulted in more or less what you describe, but not as a condition on its own. There are more limited symptoms of other conditions that result in the copying of speech and the meaningless repition of phrases (echolalia) and the same with certain movements (echopraxia), but I've never heard of a condition involving the adoption or copying of a complete persona.

Oh yeah, very much so.

Then it is of no more use than a system that never had such manuscripts, is it?

Atropine (from atropa belladonna or deadly nightshade) is a muscarinic antagonist. It can be used to counter the effects of certain nerve agents working as muscarinic agonists. It actually has several medical uses, for example it can be used to influence heart rate by acting upn the autonomic nervous system, or by direct application. Another is to cause pupillary dilation during eye examinations or cataract surgery.

You're welcome

See the 'fuel' thing above. Nothing that a balanced diet can't cure

True. Pure oxygen is used as a compensatory measure only. It allows non-blocked haemaglobin to work more efficiently (compensating for the overall reduced O2 capacity of the blood) until you can get rid of the monoxide.

It's way too long to explain fully, but essentially, memory is a function of long-term potentiation. This is a property by which a series of neurons that are triggered have their firing threshold reduced and so are more likely to fire in the same configuration when exposed to a trigger stimulus (a trace), evoking a similar 'experience' to the original. Memory is reconstructive and experiencial. We don't store things in the same way as video or computer hard drives.

There really isn't such a thing as an olfactory illusion. The olfactory sense is our oldest sense and of all our senses it is the only one that does not project to the thalamus. It sends projections to the older parts of our brains though, including limbic areas associated with emotion and memory, which is why smell is so evocative. This being the case, there is less 'top down' processing involved in the perception of smell. Vision has a huge amount of top down processing involved; we tend to fill in a lot of the blanks and there is a lot of interpretation going on. This makes visual processes easy to fool. The sense of smell on the other hand very involves very little top down processing. It's a very basic sense (relatively), responding only to chemicals. We might be able to synthesize chemicals that 'smell' like other chemicals, but that is a function of the molecules, not the sense, so it can't really be considered an illusion. If we make a molecule that triggers the same receptors as aromatic molecules from, say, strawberries, then it can't really be called an illusion of we say it smells like strawberries. That would be like drawing a strawberry and calling the fact is looked like a strawberry a visual illusion just because it wasn't a real strawberry. However, there are such things as olfactory hallucinations. This is often a symptom of temporal lobe epilepsy. The difference between illusions and hallucinations is that illusions exist externally and hallucinations don't. For example, a mirage (e.g. the appearance of water over a hot desert road) exists as a function of particular environmental conditions and anybody standing in the right place can see it. An hallucination on the other hand is visible only to the person experiencing it. Is there any difference between a mirage and the appearence of moving circles on still paper? Not really, insofar as they are both illusions and everybody (who can see) can see them (so they are not hallucinations). However, there is a difference in their production. A mirage requires little top-down influence. It exists objectively as a function of envoronmental conditions. The movement in the moving circles illusion on the other hand, does not exist objectively. This is a function of top-down visual processing. I.e. we impart the 'movement'.

VikingF is right. This is an interesting question. I have often wondered too. It's one of those questions that are even hard to phrase and thinking about it leads to an odd feeling. What is me? Why did this spark of awareness; this 'I' manifest in this body? Of all the time that has passed and all the people and who have gone before, what particular combination of what particular factors made me and determined that I would be aware here and now? What am I, that I am not anybody else at any other time? You can see why I was attracted to Psychology

Back atcha Celeste. I'd have posted the DSM link if I could have found it in time. Thanks for doing it

Stop doing it. Take a break. Try not to think "But I can't, there's still so much to do". Find a way. If you collapse (and you will in time), then nothing will get done. There are a number of different things you could do, depending on your precise situation. For example, you could delegate more, if you are in a position to do so. You could be more selective in your prioritisation, again, if you are in a position to do so. There are two things you should do soon. First, it is important for your state of mind that you find a way to take back at least the perception of control. You could do this by making a conscious desicion to change things, and then acting on it (the changes don't have to be big, but just making them will demonstrate to you that you have the power to affect things and this will help). Second, you need to reduce the total demand on your resources, at least for a while. Often, both these targets can be achieved through the same action. Decide to take a short vacation, and then do it. Decide to take a weekend away somethere, and then do it. Decide to reduce your load a little, and then do it. If things get too bad, you should approach your employer. Employers have a duty of care to their empoyees, and whilst it is reasonable for them to expect people to work hard, they are not entitled to expect people to drive themselves to breaking point.

Hypertension is usually managable using vasodilators. There are many other factors involved too; dietary (e.g. smoking, drinking, sodium intake etc.) and lifestyle (body mass index, cardiovascular fitness etc.), changes in which which can often have a significant effect, sometimes negating the need for drugs. I'm sure your doctor will have gone through these with you. S/He might also have warned you the one of the side effects of vasodilatory drugs can be postural hypotension (increasing the liklihood of dizziness/passing out if you stand up too quickly).

Ringworm is a fungus. It has no particular 'place' of manifestation, but it can more usually be seen on the arms, chest and back. The lesions/rashes do not look like bruises, nor are they dark purple, rather they appear as circular, pinkish red blotches, often with clear centres (hence the term 'ring'worm). Green: Are you qualified to diagnose and prescribe? If so, do you think you can perform an accurate diagnosis on-line, without having seen the lesions and using only the less than detailed description provided?

Cool

You can find a reasonably good listing of the criteria for sociopathy here http://faculty.ncwc.edu/toconnor/428/428lect16.htm

True, but the heart is autonomous. The brain is the most vital organ. The evidence for this is the lengths a body will go to in order to preserve the brain.

Well that was short and sweet. Seems like a good time to close a largely pointless thread.

It's pretty much exactly as Celeste22 says. Both substances elevate dopamine (DA) levels in the reward centres of the brain (mainly the nucleus accumbens, ventral tegmental area, medial forebrian bundle and the mesolimbic pathway). Alcohol excites dopaminergic neurones in the ventral tegmental area and the nucleus accumbens. Nicotine increases dopamine efflux in the reward pathway by mimicking acetylcholine at presynaptic nicotinic receptor sites, and exciting dopaminergic neurons, mainly in the nucleus accumbens. Most drugs of abuse target the nucleaus accumbens. However, all psychoactive drugs, whilst having the common end effect of elevating DA levels in the reward system, also have their own specific effects. Alcohol is a general supressant. It's function is to suppress (inhibit) neurological function. It makes you feel good because a) it causes DA release in the reward pathway by inhibiting DA neurone inhibition (which has the same result as exciting DA neurones), and B) one of the first behavioural systems it suppresses is also inhibitory (such as the response selection systems in the anterior singulate gyrus). If you inhibit inhibitory systems, it's like taking your foot off the brake, so you become less socially and behaviourally inhibited. Increased doses go on to inhibit the vestibular nuclei (resulting in loss of balance) and motor systems (resulting in loss of motor coordination, slurred speech etc.). A high enough dose will inhibit respiritory systems and more important things like that, and that will kill you. Nicotine, on the other hand, has a dose-dependent biphasic effect. Low, bolus doses excite nicotinic ACh receptors (acting like a stimulant). Higher doses block them (acting like a sedative). So, as people drink alcohol, you will see them 'nipping' at cigarettes, providing themselves with a stream of small bolus doses. Whilst the common effects of both nicotine and alcohol is to increase DA relase, their specific effects are opposite. For example, where alcohol results in vasodilation and reduction in blood pressure, nicotine results in vasoconstriction and elevation in blood pressure. The cutoff point occurs because of the dose-dependent biphasic effect of nicotine. As you continue to consume alcohol, your neurological function becomes more supressed. For a while, small bolus doses of nicotine can counteract this, whilst also increasing DA release (feelings of reward). However, as you consume more alcohol and get more pissed, it takes more nicotine to counteract the suppressive effects of alcohol and as I mentioned, at high enough doses, nicotine is also a supressant (it's a nicotinic ACh receptor antagonist). You then get the state where both drugs are acting as suppressants and it's pretty much downhill from there with the puking and falling down and swearing never to do it again thing going on for the rest of the night.

No, we aren't that far apart. I think it's only our starting point that differs. I start from 'nothing happens, until there's evidence to the contrary', but I don't rule anything out. I don't know enough to be able to do that. It may well be. This would need to be tested though. Of course it doesn't. But until these unknown occurences are known, they can't be said to be happening either. I agree with that. I would never state that these phenomena don't exist. I accept that there are phenomena that we don't understand. But that's the function of science as a process. To identify these phenomena and attempt to explain them. If it turns out that they are due to the reincarnation of the soul, then cool. If they turn out to be nothing more than the emergence of memories encoded through preattentive processes, then equally cool. My only reservation is that I don't like rushing to, or simply accepting an explanation of a phenomenon until it's understood. So, it's not whether or not these phenomena exist that I have a problem with. My problem is with the explanations/conclusions that people jump to based upon only their existence and with no understanding of the processes causing them. True. I think your experiences would be contaminated by the amount of related reading you have done on exactly that topic. Unfortunately, it tends to be the people who have become interested in the area and therefore will have done some self-directed research into it who put themselves forward for regression. This makes it a largely self-selecting and biased sample. The ideal subject would be people like your niece at the age of six. At that age it's unlikely she would have become aware of the phenomenon or to have read around the area. She would be a completely naive subject which would be ideal. However, there are the ethical issues of subjecting a six year old to what is still a poorly understood procedure. I wouldn't advocate that at all.

What do you need to inject? It makes a difference. Do you need to inject intramuscularly, intravenously or subcutaniously?