Category: interesting

A look at kids (or adults) and the effects of trauma points to something other than just so-called brainwashing.

Under some circumstances detecting betrayals may be counter-productive to survival.

Specifically, in cases where a victim is dependent on a caregiver, survival may require that she/he remain unaware of the betrayal. In the case of childhood sexual abuse, a child who is aware that her/his parent is being abusive may withdraw from the relationship (e.g., emotionally or in terms of proximity).

For a child who depends on a caregiver for basic survival, withdrawing may actually be at odds with ultimate survival goals, particularly when the caregiver responds to withdrawal by further reducing caregiving or increasing violence. In such cases, the child’s survival would be better ensured by being blind to the betrayal and isolating the knowledge of the event, thus remaining engaged with the caregiver.

Betrayal trauma occurs when the people or institutions we depend on for survival violate us in some way. An example of betrayal trauma is childhood physical, emotional, or sexual abuse.” from http://www.loyola.edu/campuslife/healthservices/counselingcenter/trauma.html

…the core issue is betrayal — a betrayal of trust that produces conflict between external reality and a necessary system of social dependence.

…if the person who has betrayed us is someone we need to continue interacting with despite the betrayal, then it is not to our advantage to respond to the betrayal in the normal way. Instead we essentially need to ignore the betrayal.

Betrayal trauma theory

Plus a thorough examination of Loss of the Assumptive World,
A Theory of Traumatic Loss – the reconstruction of meaning processes, the nuanced relationships with self and others, the wide range of psychological processes and “what cannot be said” in response to traumatic loss. at Amazon

can’t
rise like a tree
lie like a mountain
that’s the trouble with me

listening to water
excited by its willingness

Heat mining has the potential to supply a significant amount of the country’s electricity currently being generated by conventional fossil fuel, hydroelectric and nuclear plants.

A comprehensive new MIT-led study of the potential for geothermal energy within the United States has found that mining the huge amounts of heat that reside as stored thermal energy in the Earth’s hard rock crust could supply a substantial portion of the electricity the United States will need in the future, probably at competitive prices and with minimal environmental impact.

… continuing improvements in deep-drilling and reservoir stimulation technology
… requires depths of ~5,000 feet in the west, deeper in the east
… a non-interruptible source of electric power
… a non-carbon-based energy source

The expert panel offers a number of recommendations to develop geothermal as a major electricity supplier for the nation. Science Blog

Maybe the first “closed-loop geothermal power plant” proposal?

I worked with Tom Brown over several years, a founder of Tosco Petroleum and a Fellow of the American Petroleum Institute. In the months before he passed away, we were developing prospects for “re-injectable” geothermal systems. Many geothermal sites exhaust their supply of steam water.

A new and exciting breakthrough was also being introduced where hot brine water would be expanded directly onto the generator’s turbine blades. A direct turbine system eliminates the capital and lifecycle costs of a conventional two-stage system now used in order to separate caustic and corrosive brine from critical machinery.

Will Howtopedia.org become popular?

A list of the most fundamental and crucial terms that are coming to define and will soon re-define the human condition.

Must-know terms for the 21st Century: zeitgeist of the quickly changing

The Improving State of the World: Why We’re Living Longer, Healthier, More Comfortable Lives on a Cleaner Planet, Indur Goklany, Cato 2007

It is a sobering thought that, until relatively recently, most readers of this article would be dead before they reached their current age. As recently as 1900 the average human life expectancy worldwide is estimated to have been about 31 years. In the Middle Ages it was 20-30. Even those readers who have not yet reached their twenties would probably not have many years left if they lived in the pre-industrial era.

Goklany, who has worked in environmental policy for over 30 years, says it was partly his Indian upbringing that motivated him to write the book. Most of the people he meets in his professional capacity, specialising in climate change and in health policy, have a bleak view of the world. They tend to assume things are getting worse all the time. ‘I don’t share that point of view…’

For a meeting of minds, anyone’s mind, Cafe Philosophy keeps the door wide open.

For the past 10 years in Victoria, British Columbia, it has set the scene for casual, modern-day philosophical discussion that draws on the wisdom of the ages.

It doesn’t matter whether participants are puzzled by Plato and hopeless about Heidegger: this is street-level philosophy, no course work required, life experience desired. And it’s believed to have gone on longer, week in and week out, than any other such mental meeting ground in Canada. That’s thanks in large part to the leadership of philosopher-facilitator Michael Picard.

“There is definitely a need to hear oneself think…, a comforting way to build a sense of community. “You have these ideas of what it is to be human in your head and then hear other people talk about them. It’s the nitty-gritty of life underneath all the trappings.” There’s a lot of joy to it. It is lovely to have that direct dialogue, it’s really exciting.

…and you can learn how he does it.

To scientists, he is the world’s happiest man. His level of mind control is astonishing and the upbeat impulses in his brain are off the scale.

Now Matthieu Ricard, 60, a French academic-turned-Buddhist monk, is to share his secrets to make the world a happier place. The trick, he reckons, is to put some effort into it. In essence, happiness is a “skill” to be learned.

“Our life can be greatly transformed by even a minimal change in how we manage our thoughts and perceive and interpret the world. Happiness is a skill. It requires effort and time.” [news article at The Independent]

The happiness of your life depends on the quality of your thoughts. Marcus Aurelius

A few moments of beauty, of hope, of humanity, and a very nice song too!

Linked to YouTube
Via: VideoSift

Memorial to Israel Kamakawiwo`ole, a very big man (600 pounds) with an aching beautiful voice. It can be found on two CDs: “Facing Forward” (mostly Hawaiian language songs with ukulele), and on the soundtrack to “Meet Joe Black”, where it played in the credits. Guitar tabs here

Kamakawiwo’ole sort of kept his manager on “stand-by”….to be able to respond whenever he was inspired to record. Kamakawiwo’ole was a perfectionist and wouldn’t record something until it was just right.

One night his manager had to get a guy to open up the recording studio because Kamakawiwo’ole had been up working on something and wanted to record it right away.

That night he recorded this song one take and he was done. He never sang the arrangement again.

I don’t know if it’s true or not, but I liked the story. Sad to know he’s gone.

Iz lay in state at the Capitol building in Honolulu. He was only the third person in Hawaiian history to have this honor bestowed, and the only non-politician… wikipedia

Our brains are designed to help us “power through.” Under stress, the brain signals to release hormones including adrenaline and cortisol. They give us energy, strengthen the immune system, improve reflexes and even help our memory.

But if we are always under stress, the release of cortisol begins to work against us.

“Chronic stress affects your head, your heart, your liver, your immune system,” says Bruce McEwen, a scientist at Rockefeller University in New York.

McEwen has discovered that chronic stress causes neurons in the brain to shrink and change shape. In animals, that causes a loss of memory, increased anxiety and aggressiveness that can lead to signs of depression.

Other research, undertaken by psychologist Elissa Epel, has shown how chronic stress can speed up aging and make us more prone to disease.

“Stress has been shown to affect virtually every physiological system we have,” Epel says. “Stress even affects cells at the molecular level.”

Eppel’s research has shown that telomeres, the protective coating at the end of chromosomes, get frayed and worn by stress, mimicking the effects of aging.

[story at CBS]

Previous post: Cortisol when you wake up

What Do Humans Want?

Satisfaction comes less from the attainment of a goal
and more in what you must do to get there. ~ Gregory Berns, MD, PhD

Dr. Berns, a psychiatrist and neuroscientist, says human contentment is indeed possible in Satisfaction: The Science of Finding True Fulfillment. And he should know. He’s spent his academic career investigating happiness – or in neuroscientific terms, the circumstances under which the brain releases dopamine (for happiness) or cortisol (for stress).

The news that 51 percent of all women live without a spouse might be enough to make you invest in cat futures.

But consider, too, the flip side: about half of all men find themselves in the same situation.

As the number of people marrying has dropped off in the last 45 years, the marriage rate has declined equally for men and for women. [story]

It might be hard to understand what’s happening across our culture.

Nearly a quarter of people surveyed said
they had “zero” close friends.

TRANS fats, used to cook foods like French fries and found in biscuits, dramatically increase a woman’s risk of becoming infertile, according to new research.

Scientists found that for every two per cent increase in the number of calories a woman got from trans fats instead of carbohydrates, her risk of infertility increased by 73 per cent.

Scientists believe trans fats – found mostly in processed vegetable oils – interfere with cells that play a vital role in ovulation.

Harvard School of Public Health
18,555 healthy women

Story at the Scotsman, with goodly doric wry, ey?
Whit ah want tae know is….aw thae hormones in ma pill that ah pee doon the bog and flush away intae the sea…thit are turnin the fish hermaphrodite…well is anybody taking a census here o’ how much hormonal activity is bouncin aboot in the sea n’ bein absorbed by yir dinner? Cos ye know….thirs quite a few o’ us wimmin swallowing these wee pills, and thirs quite a few o’ us wimmin eatin fish as well……and guys of course.

Vegetable oil? Drive it away.

Aside of me

Just take a tiny moment, and take a small dream;
just have a wondrous hour and take a strong love,
and there you’ll be,
and there you’ll be,
aside of me.

Just call a grand forgiveness and wake forevermore,
and there you’ll be,
and there you’ll be,
aside of me.

If I could a walk a longer mile;
If I could talk a wider smile;
If I could bring a heavy weight to gravity;
If I could find a deeper gold;
If I could gild a finer bold;
If I could…
there you’ll be,
aside of me.

The herald of society rises slowly.

And often from surprising corners. This is the fabric of history itself. Even the most tense social order is always on the verge of surprise.

Here, where surprise is most profound, liquid cultures are absorbing the incessant passions of humanity and do so best by ingeniously recognizing tensions between individual and collective sovereignty. It is the application of this ingenuity that presses the wise.

What is clearer today though is the effect of inaction. The ideal can be lost. We can be losing individuals in a crowd of individualists. This is the lesson of nihilist utopianists.The individual’s talent, the individual’s spirit of reliance upon change, is a response to the potential of the whole, not to the arrangement of the immediate.

The simultaneous fostering of the individual within the whole of society is the crucible of our imagination and the growth of a free society. The realization of this moral cooperation is the transcendent victory of all humanity. This victory is our new constant.

I’m walking today,
listening,
whistles on the eagle’s wing,
while watching
sweet liberty,
vast horizon,
joined among the season;
the good we of us;
all.

whistl’e whiszles
whistles on the eagle’s wing,

a Marge Piercy poem:

The low road

What can they do
to you? Whatever they want.
They can set you up, they can
bust you, they can break
your fingers, they can
burn your brain with electricity,
blur you with drugs till you
can’t walk, can’t remember, they can
take your child, wall up
your lover. They can do anything
you can’t stop them
from doing. How can you stop
them? Alone, you can fight,
you can refuse, you can
take what revenge you can
but they roll over you.

…the agriculture of agglomeration, the technocracy of econometrics, the arrogance of opportunism, the cowering of publicans, the architecture of unstudied power, and the weak thing of democracy. What’s the weak thing?

this country is going to die of too many lies

Quite awhile ago Tom Wright, whom I know to be a very good fellow, built a quantitative analysis firm involved in implementing innovative computer driven, non-linear, dynamical, adaptive trade timing models using emerging and proven predictive technologies for world financial markets.

Applied Market Analytics, Inc.

Tom is the chief architect of an advanced exploratory quantitative analysis platform and meta-language for developing computer based trading systems.

The platform facilitates using mathematical time series transformations, sophisticated statistical and mathematical analysis, portfolio analysis, market indicator and model synthesis, signal generation, non-linear optimization, and trader support.

The system allows market analysts to explore market dynamics heuristically, build indicators, and model trading systems without programming, while using advanced vector and array processing techniques.

Tom’s models are constructed in such a way that parameters adapt — something much more than mere analysis.

TeleSex. Twenty-five years ago I also called it “Techsex” and “Telegasm” – remote-responsive and media-responsive electronic stimulation.

Consumer-level net sex:
Wired calls it Teledildonics – a product suite from Japan:

Ethanol is big bucks for agri-biz
Ethanol production will continue to expand as fast as private-sector funding can construct capacity. The Energy Policy Act mandates a goal of seven billions gallons of domestic ethanol use by 2010.

But diversion of corn to ethanol production is having a big impact on the meat and poultry industries. Heavily subsidized, highly centralized ethanol production plants may introduce damaging increases in the price of corn and soybeans. Corn prices are now $4.20 a bushel up from $2.19 in September.

Cattle feedlots and poultry houses are in a hurry to make use of the lower priced waste of ethanol production, the leftover material known as dried distillers grain, to hedge against the price increases as crops are diverted toward ethanol. The high fat content of distillers grains may introduce a challenging nutritional frontier around the world.

Biodiesel is smaller scale
Although less attention is being paid to lower-tech, smaller scale decentralized energy production from vegetable oils, biodiesel has a role to play as well – as much as one billion gallons by 2012. Oil grain farmers are speeding to install fuel production equipment to add value and profit to their oil crops.

Many smaller scale operations that convert manure into fuel are already under construction. Plus biodiesel demand will directly benefit packers and processors. Animal fat fuel stocks from tallow and rendered chicken fat could account for one-half of the biodiesel volume.

Move over Big Oil
This is a fully automatic biofuel plant — in a shipping container — made by BioKing in Holland which is now shipping about 25 farm-sized biodiesel manufacturing units a week. BioKing proudly asserts they will be a world leader in biofuel production machinery.

Dan Murphy at Meatingplace.com reports,
“Ethanol production delivers less net energy than biodiesel, compromises the economics of feed production and would require hugely expensive conversion to and/or manufacturing of millions of flex fuel automobiles to fully rationalize its usage.

On the other hand, biodiesel arguably has a greater positive impact on air quality and can be deployed not only across the entire transportation sector but in construction and manufacturing as well.

Most importantly, biodiesel helps not hurts industry’s bottom line. It affords a new technology to sustain renewable, domestic energy production and support small-scale businesses that would strengthen the viability of the agricultural areas and rural communities upon which meat and poultry production depends.”

Is Kitchen Table Fuel next?

Ecotec Resources UK announced the launch of small scale biodiesel reactors known as the ETRUK. How much fat to fuel your SUV?

Risk of higher prices and inflation
Downstream are rising consumer prices for soap, shampoo, cosmetics, processed food, ‘fast food’, even ‘instant noodles’, folding higher costs throughout the global economy.

Converting the infrastructure of energy…
now that’s economic backbone!

There are many predictions, often using data we are not yet able to collect, but it seems that costs are rising and that there will be substantial losses in North American animal agriculture in order to adjust to higher grain costs.

Preliminary figures for 2006 indicate the US ethanol industry used 1. 7 billion bushels of corn, or about ten percent of total production, and by 2010 that figure could double. Corn prices are rising. Now $4. 20 a bushel in the US up from $2. 19 in September

Pointing to a review at American Scientist, Mind Hacks succinctly summarizes this point from the book “Brain and Culture: Neurobiology, Ideology, and Social Change.”

Fearing the unfamiliar:
The reason that the distrust of people with a different skin color, different values or a different ideology is so prevalent is because the early development of crucial brain pathways makes it hard for people to accept new and unfamiliar experiences.

Bruce Wexler argues that when people are faced with information that does not agree with their internal structures, they deny, discredit, reinterpret or forget that information.

When changes in the environment are great, corresponding internal changes are accompanied by distress and dysfunction. The inability to reconcile differences between strange others and ingrained notions of “humanness” can culminate in violence.

The neurobiological imperative to maintain a balance between internal structures and external reality fuels this struggle for control, which contributes to making the contact zone a place of intractable conflict.

The Importance Of Protecting Anonymous Speech Online

There tends to be this feeling of entitlement that anything someone doesn’t like must somehow be “illegal.” This is especially true when it comes to anonymous speech — even more so when it’s anonymous speech that’s “critical” of someone or some organization. The EFF is discussing an interesting case where the publisher of a newspaper is trying to uncover the identity of an anonymous blogger who runs a blog that has had several critical posts of the newspaper’s strategy to stop its employees from unionizing.

Anonymity can be messy, but that doesn’t mean it shouldn’t be protected.

We will live out our years in poverty if we don’t buy mutual funds.

“Yup”, says me. “Thus Enron, Tyco, Cisco, HP and Microsoft and a couple similar dozen clipped nearly $250,000 out of my pocket in Spring 2000, would now be a loss near $700,000 and I have nothing. Companies and governments prey; prey on us. Little firms too, selling false cures, diets, land, work and money hustles. We are becoming less a people and more an agriculture.”

Though with a Canadian bent, this CBC column will give you a short knock on the head, a new focus:

Fear sells.
Scaring the money right out of our pockets

• the war on terror comes with its own set of scary images, and the intention of persuading us not to question the government when it spends our money…
• Pharmaceutical companies are in a class by themselves, as they wield the ultimate threat: Buy our product or you will die…

Something else Congress and States failed to manage:

A reanalysis of nicotine yield from major brand name cigarettes sold in Massachusetts from 1997 to 2005 has confirmed that manufacturers have steadily increased the levels… in smoke nicotine yield per cigarette averaged 1.6 percent each year, or about 11 percent over a seven-year period…

[link through Science blog]

Oh, woe.
Men don’t like men that are liked by women.

”…competition promotes negative attitudes towards men who are the target of positive interest from women…”

“Men rated men who had been smiled at as less attractive.”

New Scientist

“Women rate a man as more attractive after they’ve seen another woman smiling at him.”