Skeptical News for 18 October 2002Skeptical News for 18 October 2002Archive of previous NTS Skeptical News listings
Issue Number 2002-10 October, 2002 ISSN 1076-500X Key words: improbable research, science humor, Ig Nobel, AIR, the ---------------------------------------------------------------- A free newsletter of tidbits too tiny to fit in the Annals of Improbable Research (AIR), the journal of inflated research and personalities ================================================================
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2002-10-01 TABLE OF CONTENTS
2002-10-01 Table of Contents
2002-10-02 What's New in the Magazine
2002-10-03 The 2002 Ig Nobel Prize Winners
2002-10-05 Smelly Limerick Winners
2002-10-06 Bleb Limericks?
2002-10-07 Hair Club Rock Star Scientist
2002-10-08 Reality and the Ig Book
2002-10-09 Broken Egg Math
2002-10-10 Of Prizes and Prizes
2002-10-11 CAVALCADE OF HotAIR: Silent Whistle, Jargon, HMO-NO
2002-10-12 RESEARCH SPOTLIGHT: Halloween Reading
2002-10-13 MAY WE RECOMMEND: Pink Teeth and Chubby Cheeks
2002-10-14 AIRhead Events
2002-10-15 How to Subscribe to AIR (*)
2002-10-16 Our Address (*)
2002-10-17 Please Forward/Post This Issue! (*)
2002-10-18 How to Receive mini-AIR, etc. (*)
Items marked (*) are reprinted in every issue.
mini-AIR is a free monthly *e-supplement* to AIR, the print magazine
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2002-10-02 What's New in the Magazine
AIR 8:5 (September/October 2002) is the special SMELLY ISSUE. Highlights include:
"BODY OF WORK: Mel Rosenberg's Bad Breath," by Alice Shirrell Kaswell and Stephen Drew. Selected highlights from the published works of the world's most celebrated halitosis researcher.
"Putrescine Scratch 'N Sniff ," by Lilly Duval. A fun demonstration item.
"Ask Symmetra: How to Say? (Cheese)," by scientist/supermodel Symmetra. AIR's advice columnist dispenses further wisdom.
"Dante's Hair, Buddha's Teeth, and Tutankhamun's Breasts: Intimate Celebrity Gleanings From the Medical Literature," by Christopher D. McManus. A guide to published medical reports concerning celebrated persons.
..and much, much more.
The entire table of contents and a few of the articles are on-line at
http://www.improbable.com/airchives/paperair/volume8/v8i5/v8i5-toc.html
(What you are reading at this moment is mini-AIR, a small, monthly e-mail supplement to the print magazine.)
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2002-10-03 The 2002 Ig Nobel Prize Winners
The 12th First Annual Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony was held on October 3 before a capacity crowd of 1200 enraptured spectators at Harvard's Sanders Theatre. Seven of the ten winners traveled to the ceremony at their own expense, and an eighth sent a tape- recorded acceptance speech from his office in Kerala, India. Nobel Laureates Richard Roberts, William Lipscomb, and Dudley Herschbach personally handed the winners their Ig Nobel Prizes, and other Laureates sent tape-recorded nods of acknowledgement. David King, the Chief Scientific Advisor to the British Government, stopped by the ceremony to wish the winners good luck; and the world's most prominent scientist, Stephen Wolfram, dropped by the intimate party afterwards to personally congratulate them.
All the new winners, like all their predecessors, have done things that first make people LAUGH, then make them THINK. Here are the 2002 Ig Nobellians:
BIOLOGY Norma E. Bubier, Charles G.M. Paxton, Phil Bowers, and D. Charles Deeming of the United Kingdom, for their report "Courtship Behaviour of Ostriches Towards Humans Under Farming Conditions in Britain." [REFERENCE: "Courtship Behaviour of Ostriches (Struthio camelus) Towards Humans Under Farming Conditions in Britain," Norma E. Bubier, Charles G.M. Paxton, P. Bowers, D.C. Deeming, British Poultry Science, vol. 39, no. 4, September 1998, pp. 477- 481.]
PHYSICS Arnd Leike of the University of Munich, for demonstrating that beer froth obeys the mathematical Law of Exponential Decay. [REFERENCE: "Demonstration of the Exponential Decay Law Using Beer Froth," Arnd Leike, European Journal of Physics, vol. 23, January 2002, pp. 21-26.]
INTERDISCIPLINARY RESEARCH Karl Kruszelnicki of The University of Sydney, for performing a comprehensive survey of human belly button lint -- who gets it, when, what color, and how much.
CHEMISTRY
Theodore Gray of Wolfram Research, in Champaign, Illinois, for gathering many elements of the periodic table, and assembling them into the form of a four-legged periodic table table.
MATHEMATICS K.P. Sreekumar and the late G. Nirmalan of Kerala Agricultural University, India, for their analytical report "Estimation of the Total Surface Area in Indian Elephants." [REFERENCE: "Estimation of the Total Surface Area in Indian Elephants (Elephas maximus indicus)," K.P. Sreekumar and G. Nirmalan, Veterinary Research Communications, vol. 14, no. 1, 1990, pp. 5-17.]
LITERATURE Vicki L. Silvers of the University of Nevada-Reno and David S. Kreiner of Central Missouri State University, for their colorful report "The Effects of Pre-Existing Inappropriate Highlighting on Reading Comprehension." [PUBLISHED IN: Reading Research and Instruction, vol. 36, no. 3, 1997, pp. 217-23.]
PEACE Keita Sato, President of Takara Co., Dr. Matsumi Suzuki, President of Japan Acoustic Lab, and Dr. Norio Kogure, Executive Director, Kogure Veterinary Hospital, for promoting peace and harmony between the species by inventing Bow-Lingual, a computer-based automatic dog-to-human language translation device.
HYGIENE Eduardo Segura, of Lavakan de Aste, in Tarragona, Spain, for inventing a washing machine for cats and dogs.
ECONOMICS The executives, corporate directors, and auditors of Enron, Lernaut & Hauspie [Belgium], Adelphia, Bank of Commerce and Credit International [Pakistan], Cendant, CMS Energy, Duke Energy, Dynegy, Gazprom [Russia], Global Crossing, HIH Insurance [Australia], Informix, Kmart, Maxwell Communications [UK], McKessonHBOC, Merrill Lynch, Merck, Peregrine Systems, Qwest Communications, Reliant Resources, Rent-Way, Rite Aid, Sunbeam, Tyco, Waste Management, WorldCom, Xerox, and Arthur Andersen, for adapting the mathematical concept of imaginary numbers for use in the business world. [NOTE: all companies are U.S.-based unless otherwise noted.]
MEDICINE Chris McManus of University College London, for his excruciatingly balanced report, "Scrotal Asymmetry in Man and in Ancient Sculpture." [PUBLISHED IN: Nature, vol. 259, February 5, 1976, p. 426.]
Links to the winners' home pages and/or supporting documentation are at http://www.improbable.com/ig/ig-pastwinners.html#ig2002
---------------------------------------------------------- 2002-10-05 Smelly Limerick Winners
Here are the winners of our SMELLY LIMERICK COMPETITION, in which each competitor composed, or at least tried to compose, a limerick that elucidates this research report:
"Characterization of Emissions From Burning Incense," J.J. Jetter, Z. Guo, J.A. McBrian, M.R. Flynn, The Science of the Total Environment, vol. 295, nos. 1-3, August 5, 2002, pp 51-67.
INVESTIGATOR GRAHAM DE VAHL DAVIS:
When Jetter and Guo and McBrian
And Flynn started particles fryin',
The smells that they made
Exceeded the grade
Set by NAAQS, and left everyone cryin'.
[EDITOR'S NOTE: "NAAQS," pronounced "NACKS" by those who are so inclined or who want to make Professor de Vahl Davis's limerick scan, is an acronym for the US Environmental Protection Agency's "National Ambient Air Quality Standards."]
INVESTIGATOR CARL WITTHOFT:
Some burning incense smells better
When described in a technical letter
It's science? May be.
But it seems to me
That this is a joke by J. Jetter
INVESTIGATOR ANGIE FINLEY:
With emissions finally admitted,
The scholarly four submitted
That, true to their test,
Fresh air is still best,
And incense is best left omitted!
The winning smelly limerick authors will each receive a free, odor-enhanced copy of the Annals of Improbable Research.
---------------------------------------------------------- 2002-10-06 Bleb Limericks?
We invite you to enter the first and last annual BLEB LIMERICK COMPETITION, in for the best (NEWLY composed!) limerick that elucidates this research report:
"A Case of a 360 Degree Exuberant Trabeculectomy Bleb," J.D Rossiter, S.J. Godfrey, K.G. Claridge, Eye, vol. 13, part 3a, June 1999, pp. 369-70.
Please make sure your rhymes actually do, and that your limerick at least pretends to adhere to classic limerick form.
The winning author will receive a free, completely visible copy of AIR. Send entries (one entry per entrant) to:
BLEB LIMERICK CONTEST
c/o [email protected]
---------------------------------------------------------- 2002-10-07 Hair Club Rock Star Scientist
The Luxurious Flowing Hair Club for Scientists is proud to announce the induction into its ranks of a genuine Italian rock star scientist who is, of course, endowed with luxurious flowing hair. We speak of none other than Dr. Piero Paravidino.
You can see Dr. P's photograph at
http://www.improbable.com/projects/hair/hair-club-top.html#newest
---------------------------------------------------------- 2002-10-08 Reality and the Ig Book
We are most pleased to announce the publication, by Orion Books, in London, of the new book "The Ig Nobel Prizes" (ISBN 0752851500). For details see
http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0752851500/ref%3Dase%5Ftheannalsofimpro
The book is available in the UK; elsewhere it can be obtained from on-line booksellers. Amazon.co.uk began listing it several weeks ago, and in so doing they illustrated the most common misunderstanding about the Igs. Amazon classified the book as "FICTION." Despite pleas from the publisher to correct that listing, Amazon persisted. After several weeks, the author stepped in and used Amazon's "I am the author and I want to comment on my book" facility, posting this message:
The most difficult thing about organizing the Ig Nobel
Prize ceremony all these years has been getting people
to realize that the winners -- and their achievements
-- are real. Want some evidence of how difficult it can
be for people to accept reality as reality?
AMAZON.CO.UK PERSISTS IN CLASSIFYING THE BOOK AS "FICTION."
Two weeks later, Amazon did, at last, remove its classification of the book as "FICTION." They classified it instead as "AUDIO." A week later, after a round of highly audible pleading by the book's publisher, Amazon finally settled on a classification of "HARDCOVER - 224 pages." And so it stands, at least for the moment.
---------------------------------------------------------- 2002-10-09 Broken Egg Math
Investigator Ron Josephson alerted us to the following mathematics-related dispatch, which appeared in the October 11, 2002 issue of "The Salt Lake Tribune":
The menu at the Coffee Garden at 900 East and 900 South in Salt Lake City has included a scrumptious selection of quiche for about 10 years. The recipe calls for four fresh eggs for each quiche. A Salt Lake County Health Department inspector paid a visit recently and pointed out that research by the Food and Drug Administration indicates that one in four eggs carries salmonella bacterium, so restaurants should never use more than three eggs when preparing quiche. The manager on duty wondered aloud if simply throwing out three eggs from each dozen and using the remaining nine in four- egg-quiches would serve the same purpose. The inspector wasn't sure, but she said she would research it.
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2002-10-10 Of Prizes and Prizes
Close readers of mini-AIR will recall that on September 21 Nobel there was a festive 70th birthday celebration for Nobel Laureate (and AIR editorial board member) Dudley Herschbach. AIR played a tiny role in the celebration, helping to organize an informal, light-hearted competition for the very-first-ever Dudley Herschbach Prize. Competitors were invited to give three minute talks on scientific topics "so imaginative they could one day win either a Nobel or an Ig Nobel Prize." The Dudley Herschbach Prize was awarded to four co-winners:
Pete Siska John Fenn Felix Smith John Briggs
Less than three weeks later, John Fenn was announced as one of this year's Nobel Prize winners.
Thus it appears that the Dudley Herschbach Prize is a powerful predictor of who will win a Nobel Prize.
The next Dudley Herschbach Prize competition will be held on the occasion of Dudley Herschbach's 140th birthday. By that time we will probably know whether the destinies of Pete Siska, Felix Smith, and/or John Briggs have further added to the predictive power of the Dudley Herschbach Prize.
No matter what further honors the coming years may hold for them, our congratulations, cheers, and hurrahs go to Pete Siska, John Fenn, Felix Smith, and John Briggs!
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2002-10-11 CAVALCADE OF HotAIR: Silent Whistle, Jargon, HMO-NO
Here are concise, incomplete, flighty mentions of some of the features we've posted on HotAIR since last month's mini-AIR came out. See them by clicking "WHAT'S NEW" at the web site, or go to:
http://www.improbable.com/navstrip/whatsnew.html
The Pleasures of the Silent Whistle
http://www.improbable.com/news/2002/sep/whistle.html
The words to "The Jargon Opera" (which premiered at this year's Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony)
http://www.improbable.com/ig/2002/jargon-libretto.html
Research to Sniff At (from AIR 8:5)
http://www.improbable.com/airchives/paperair/volume8/v8i5/sniff.html
HMO-No News: Like-Treats-Like! (from AIR 8:5)
http://www.improbable.com/airchives/paperair/volume8/v8i5/hmo-no-8-5.html
Plausible Statistics (from AIR 8:5)
http://www.improbable.com/airchives/paperair/volume8/v8i5/plausible-8-5.html
THESE, AND MORE, ARE ON HOTAIR AT
http://www.improbable.com/navstrip/whatsnew.html
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2002-10-12 RESEARCH SPOTLIGHT: Halloween Reading
Each month we select for your special attention a research report that seems especially worth a close read. Your librarian will enjoy being asked for a copy. Here is this month's Pick of the Month:
"Disgust and Fear in Response to Spiders," Laura L. Vernon and Howard Berenbaum, Cognition and Emotion, vol. 16, no. 6, November 1, 2002, pp. 809-30. (Thanks to Kristine Danowski for bringing this to our attention.) The authors report that:
We examined disgust and fear responses to spiders.... [Pa]rticipants completed questionnaires concerning responses to spiders... In addition, we obtained self-report and facial expressions of disgust and fear while participants were exposed to a live tarantula.... The results of this study provide evidence that spiders have a specific disgust-evoking status in both distressed and nondistressed populations.
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2002-10-13 MAY WE RECOMMEND: Pink Teeth and Chubby Cheeks
MOUTH OFF
"Pink Teeth of the Dead: II. Minor Variations," C.W. van Wyk,
Journal of Forensic Odonto-Stomatology, vol. 6, no. 2, December
1988, pp. 35-42. (Thanks to B.K. Wilderblad for bringing this to
our attention.)
EXPANSIVE ANALYSIS
"Relation Between Chubby Cheeks and Visceral Fat," J.A. Levine, A.
Ray, and M.D. Jensen, New England Journal of Medicine, vol. 339,
no. 26, December 24, 1998, pp. 1946-7.
A UNIFIED THEORY OF EVERYTHING
"Antiadhesive Effect of Green and Roasted Coffee on Streptococcus
Mutans' Adhesive Properties on Saliva-Coated Hydroxyapatite
Beads," M. Daglia, et al., Journal of Agricultural and Food
Chemistry, vol. 50, 2002, pp. 1225-9. (Thanks to Andreas Bohne for
bringing this to our attention.)
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2002-10-14 AIRhead Events
For details and updates see http://www.improbable.com
Want to host an event? [email protected] 617-491-4437
NATIONAL PUBLIC RADIO -- FRI,
NOV. 29, 2002
Broadcast of specially edited highlights from this year's Ig Nobel
Prize Ceremony, on NPR's "Talk of the Nation / Science Friday with
Ira Flatow" program. Simulcast on the web at WWW.SCIENCEFRIDAY.COM
(consult WWW.NPR.ORG for times and radio stations)
COAST GUARD ACADEMY -- TUES, DEC. 3, 2002
AIR editor MARC ABRAHAMS will present a public talk about Advances
in Improbable Research.
AAAS ANNUAL MEETING, DENVER -- FEBRUARY, 2003
Special Annals of Improbable Research session at the Annual Meeting of the American Assn for the Advancement of Science. Featuring: * AIR Editor MARC ABRAHAMS * 2001 Ig Nobel Biology Prize winner BUCK WEIMER * 1994 Ig Nobel Medicine Prize co-winner RICHARD DART and others TBA
MICHIGAN TECH, HOUGHTON, MI -- APRIL 8, 2003 8:00 PM, Rozsa Center for the Performing Arts INFO: Valerie Pegg, [email protected], 906-487-2844 http://www.greatevents.mtu.edu/main.html
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2002-10-15 How to Subscribe to AIR (*)
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2002-10-16 Our Address (*)
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--------------------------- 2002-10-17 Please Forward/Post This Issue! (*)Please distribute copies of mini-AIR (or excerpts!) wherever appropriate. The only limitations are: A) Please indicate that the material comes from mini-AIR. B) You may NOT distribute mini-AIR for commercial purposes.
------------- mini-AIRheads ------------- EDITOR: Marc Abrahams ([email protected]) MINI-PROOFREADER AND PICKER OF NITS (before we introduce the last few at the last moment): Wendy Mattson [email protected] WWW EDITOR/GLOBAL VILLAGE IDIOT: Amy Gorin ([email protected]) COMMUTATIVE EDITOR: Stanley Eigen ([email protected]) ASSOCIATIVE EDITOR: Mark Dionne DISTRIBUTIVE EDITOR: Robin Pearce CO-CONSPIRATORS: Alice Shirrell Kaswell, Gary Dryfoos, Ernest Ersatz, S. Drew MAITRE DE COMPUTATION: Jerry Lotto AUTHORITY FIGURES: Nobel Laureates Dudley Herschbach, Sheldon Glashow, William Lipscomb, Richard Roberts
(c) copyright 2002, Annals of Improbable Research
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2002-10-18 How to Receive mini-AIR, etc. (*)
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10/18/02
STAN BAILEY
News staff writer
MONTGOMERY America's moral decline is directly linked to its failure to acknowledge the God of the Bible as sovereign over the nation and its laws, Chief Justice Roy Moore testified in federal court Thursday.
Moore said he placed a 5,280-pound granite monument to the Ten Commandments in the lobby of the state judicial building to help restore the moral foundation of law in Alabama.
"The purpose was to restore the moral foundation, and you can only do that by recognizing the source of those moral laws, which is God," Moore said.
Moore testified in the third day of trial in a suit by three lawyers who want the monument removed. They contend it violates the constitutional principle of the separation of church and state.
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IN THE NEWS
Today's Headlines � October , 2002
INCREASE IN AUTISM BAFFLES SCIENTISTS
from The New York Times
Trying to account for a drastic rise in childhood autism in recent years, a California study has found that it cannot be explained away by statistical anomalies or by a growing public awareness that might have led more parents to report the disorder.
But the study's authors, who reported their findings yesterday to the California Legislature, said they were at a loss to explain the reasons for what they called an epidemic of autism, the mysterious brain disorder that affects a person's ability to form relationships and to behave normally in everyday life.
"Autism is on the rise in the state, and we still do not know why," said the lead author, Dr. Robert S. Byrd, an epidemiologist and pediatrician at the University of California at Davis. "The results are, without a doubt, sobering."
As diagnoses of autism have increased throughout the nation, experts and parents have cast about for possible explanations, including genetics, birth injuries and childhood immunizations. The California study found that none of these factors could explain an increase of the magnitude reported there � more than triple from 1987 to 1998.
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/10/18/health/18AUTI.html
COLLEGES SEEING A BUILDING BOOM FOR MODERN SCIENCE FACILITIES
from The Associated Press
OBERLIN, Ohio (AP) -- When Sputnik hurtled into orbit in 1957, American colleges took note.
Fear that the Soviet Union would win the space race prompted a flurry of construction at U.S. schools not necessarily known for their science programs. Working with millions of dollars in federal aid, they put up new science buildings over the following decade.
But now those structures seem as antiquated as that first artificial satellite. The result: another spurt of construction as small, liberal arts colleges put up sleek, new science centers.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/news/archive/2002/10/17/national0207EDT0426.DTL
CLUES TO ONSET OF MAD COW DISEASE
from Newsday
The molecular problem that leads to mad cow disease and similar brain disorders is becoming clearer, scientists announced yesterday.
Based on experiments with tiny protein molecules - prions - researchers now think the damage occurs when a cell's normal quality control system slows down or fails because of age, stress or illness. This allows poisonous, misfolded proteins to accumulate and kill nerve cells. And if enough neurons die, the brain can be seriously damaged.
This, the scientists wrote in a study published today in the journal Science, "suggests a model to explain the rare, spontaneous origin" of some prion disease cases, such as human Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease. And like a row of falling dominos, the study found, "once misfolding begins, it has a self-sustaining character, influencing more proteins to adopt the same form," leading to disease and death.
SMALLPOX VACCINE RISKS EYED
from Newsday
Adverse reactions are expected among health care workers vaccinated against smallpox, but federal health advisers yesterday said screening methods should greatly reduce chances of injury or death from the vaccine.
For two days this week, members of a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention immunization panel have been working on ways to protect the nation in the event of a smallpox attack. But the smallpox vaccine has problems of its own.
Negative reactions that most worry doctors are overwhelming viral infections caused by vaccinia, the virus in the vaccine. In people with pre- existing infections, such as with HIV, the vaccine can cause a superinfection, doctors say, leading to death.
BIG BUTTOCKS: ALL IN THE GENES? from The (Raleigh, NC) News & Observer
When Duke University geneticist Randy Jirtle popped up on London Daily Mail's fashion pages this month, his ho-hum wardrobe had nothing to do with it.
Credit goes to Jirtle's fixation on bottoms, especially big bottoms.
Scientists have long wondered about odd creatures called callipyge (CAL-la- peege) sheep. The animals are named for Greek love goddess Aphrodite Kallipygos, a beauty whose name literally means "beautiful buttocks."
The sheep have huge, firm back-sides, a trait passed down only by their fathers. Working with researchers from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Jirtle's lab found a gene behind the big butts with possible implications for humans. And people all over the world want to hear about it.
http://newsobserver.com/news/triangle/story/1819933p-1818715c.html
ANY DRINKING HURTS UNBORN DURING PREGNANCY, STUDY FINDS
from The Associated Press
PITTSBURGH - Children born to mothers who drink even small amounts of alcohol early in pregnancy are shorter and weigh less at age 14 than children born to mothers who abstain, a study says.
The federal government has long said that no amount of alcohol is safe for a pregnant woman to drink. University of Pittsburgh researcher Nancy Day, the study's principal investigator, said her study reinforces that.
"The message should be that women should not drink at all during pregnancy," Day said Wednesday.
The deficiencies found in the study are slight and fall within normal height and weight ranges, Day said, but were still surprising. The differences also were statistically significant, meaning they were not a matter of chance.
http://www.nandotimes.com/healthscience/story/580779p-4534130c.html
HEALED ONCE, LAKE ERIE IN RELAPSE
from The Chicago Tribune
CLEVELAND -- Lake Erie, once so polluted and putrid that it was irreverently called "the place where fish go to die," is now often cited as a worldwide model for ecosystem recovery.
But on the 30th anniversary of the Clean Water Act Friday, legislation inspired in part by Lake Erie's near-death in the 1960s, scientists say parts of the Great Lake are dying once again.
Mysterious dead zones, or areas without oxygen, have returned to about half of the lake's central basin. Yellow perch and prized walleye populations declined in the 1990s. Meanwhile, avian botulism, also present in the 1960s, has killed thousands of water birds, including common loons and ring- billed gulls.
Decades ago, the problem was chemical pollution, primarily phosphorous from sewage, detergent and fertilizer. Today, despite controls, the phosphorous is back and scientists suspect the culprit is biological pollution, due in part to changes wrought by invasive species such as the zebra mussel and the round gobie.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/chi-0210180254oct18.story
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Tue Oct 15, 4:27 PM ET
By LIZ SIDOTI, Associated Press Writer
COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) - The state school board said Tuesday it will adopt a science curriculum that leaves it up to school districts whether to teach the concept of "intelligent design," which holds that the universe is guided by a higher intelligence.
The board voted unanimously in favor of the standards, which emphasize both evolution and critical analysis of the theory. It will adopt them formally in December.
The standards put into writing what many school districts already do � teach evolution, but also explain that there is debate over the origin of life.
"In no way does this advocate for creation or intelligent design," said Michael Cochran, a board member who had pushed for the concept to be included in the standards. "I do look upon this as a compromise."
The decision follows weeks of behind-the-scenes talks to reach an agreement with members who wanted alternative theories to evolution to be put of an equal footing with Darwin's theory.
In January, Ohio became the latest battleground in the debate over what high school biology students should know about evolution.
Supporters of intelligent design included some conservative groups that had tried and failed to get biblical creation taught in public schools. Critics of intelligent design said it is creationism in disguise.
The Washington Times
www.washtimes.com
Larry Witham
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
Published 10/17/2002
The Ohio Board of Education has broadened the definition of "science" to allow instructors to "teach the controversy" of evolution. After a year of debate on whether new science standards should mandate teaching of "intelligent design" and criticism of Darwinian evolution, the 17-member school board voted unanimously on Tuesday to adopt two compromise statements.
The new language does not limit life sciences to materialism, which some consider a kind of atheism, and says students must learn how scientists "critically analyze" Darwinism and not just accept it dogmatically.
Ohioans who support evolutionary theory say that they won the debate because the standards are the strongest the state has had, while backers of intelligent design assert victory because students will learn criticism of Charles Darwin's theory. "The standards are tremendous, and they don't open the door to intelligent design," said Patricia Princehouse, a Case Western Reserve University professor with Ohio Citizens for Science, an anti-creationism group.
She said creationists also lost on other demands, such as teaching that the earth is several thousand years old, in accord with the account in Genesis. Robert Lattimer, a member of the standards writing team who is also with Science Excellence for All Ohioans, a group criticizing Darwinism, said students will now hear the weaknesses of the evolutionary theory.
"A large majority of Ohioans favors the 'teach-the-controversy' approach," said Mr. Lattimer, a chemist who argues that intelligent design is a scientific theory. The two-part change, he said, "acknowledges a growing number of credentialed scientists, including over 50 from Ohio, who endorse" students learning about problems with Darwin's theory.
Many states have debated how to handle evolution as they upgrade science standards, but only Ohio had a serious debate on including "intelligent design," the idea that nature features design, not just random evolution.
In the first of the two changes, the definition of science has been broadened to "a systematic method of continuing investigation" of nature. It replaced the previous contention that science is limited to "natural explanations," which, according to some, rules out any concept of a Creator. Ms. Princehouse said the change is "innocuous." But Mr. Lattimer said it allows students to consider that a higher force can be part of how science interprets the world.
The second statement requires that teachers "describe how scientists continue to investigate and critically analyze aspects of evolutionary theory." The decision by a five-member standards committee followed a year of hearings and public opinion polls indicating that Ohioans liked the idea of "teaching the controversy."
The entire board unanimously approved the alterations on Tuesday. Ohio school districts are not required to teach the state science standards. But assessments of district achievement and a graduation test for high school seniors are based on the standards. Earlier this year, the board was told by Ohio's congressmen that the standards should reflect the evolution-instruction language in President Bush's "No Child Left Behind Act," a federal law that funds state education.
The act says, "Where topics are taught that may generate controversy (such as biological evolution), the curriculum should help students to understand the full range of scientific views that exist [and] why such topics may generate controversy." The standards face one more public hearing next month.
The Ohio superintendent of schools must present them to education panels in the state legislature, where bills have been drafted to mandate criticism of evolution in science classes if the standards did not make that a requirement.
The final vote on the standards will be held in December, after which Ohio must design a science curriculum and assessment tests based on the standards.
Copyright � 2002 News World Communications, Inc. All rights reserved.
October 13, 2002
Interview by WILLIAM SPEED WEED
Q: Within 24 hours, you, a theoretical physicist, won your MacArthur grant and a panel of experts announced that another physicist, J. Hendrik Sch�n, had committed fraud at Bell Labs. Do you see any cosmic connection between the two events?
My only cosmic comment is that such accidental conjunctions are the basis for all superstitions. You want to know conjunctions? That day was also my sister's birthday.
Had you been following Sch�n's case?
I went to look up the review committee's report. That was one of the things I read that day rather than all the reports about myself. I had been waiting for this finding for months. It's like when you go to the circus and everybody's watching the guy on the high wire. You don't want him to fall, but if he does fall, you want to be there to see it.
How did Sch�n get away with his phony experiments?
He didn't. That's a very easy answer. The question you meant to ask was, ''What was he thinking?'' In this, I'm the scientist; I'm interested in knowing the mentality. It must have been a habit or an addictive rush for him. Here was an obviously smart guy. You don't get in to work with those materials unless you are already the creme de la creme. There had to be a screw loose there.
Skeptical biologists say people are probably reporting a Steller's sea eagle Steller's sea eagle
By Peter Porco Anchorage Daily News
(Published: October 15, 2002)
A giant winged creature, like something out of Jurassic Park, has reportedly been sighted several times in Southwest Alaska in recent weeks.
Villagers in Togiak and Manokotak say they have seen a huge bird that's much bigger than anything they have seen before.
A Dillingham pilot says he spotted the creature while flying passengers to Manokotak last week. He calculated that its wingspan matched the length of a wing on his Cessna 207. That's about 14 feet. Other people have put the wingspan in a similar range.
Scientists aren't sure what to make of the reports. No one doubts that people in the region west of Dillingham have seen a very large raptorlike bird. But biologists and other people familiar with big Alaska birds say they're skeptical it's that big.
A recent sighting of the mystery bird occurred last Thursday morning when Moses Coupchiak, a 43-year-old heavy equipment operator from Togiak, 40 miles west of Manokotak, saw the bird flying toward him from about two miles away as he worked his tractor.
"At first I thought it was one of those old-time Otter planes," Coupchiak said. "Instead of continuing toward me, it banked to the left, and that's when I noticed it wasn't a plane."
The bird was "something huge," he said. "The wing looks a little wider than the Otter's, maybe as long as the Otter plane."
The bird flew behind a hill and disappeared. Coupchiak got on the radio and warned people in Togiak to tell their children to stay away.
Pilot John Bouker said he was highly skeptical of reports of "this great big eagle" that is two or three times the size of a bald eagle. "I didn't put any thought into it."
But early this week while flying into Manokotak, Bouker, owner of Bristol Bay Air Service, looked out his left window and 1,000 feet away, "there's this big . . . bird," he said.
"The people in the plane all saw him," Bouker said. "He's huge, he's huge, he's really, really big. You wouldn't want to have your children out."
To Nicolai Alakayak, a freight and passenger driver from Manokotak who was flying with Bouker, said the creature looked like an eagle and was as large as "a little Super Cub."
Comparison to an eagle, certainly. Super Cub? Probably not, scientists said.
"I'm certainly not aware of anything with a 14-foot wingspan that's been alive for the last 100,000 years," said federal raptor specialist Phil Schemf in Juneau.
Schemf, other biologists, a village police officer and teachers at the Manokotak School said the sightings could be of a Steller's sea eagle, a species native to northeast Asia and one of the world's largest eagles. It's about 50 percent bigger than a bald eagle. The Steller's eagle has occasionally shown up in the Pribilof Islands, on the Aleutian chain and on Kodiak. A bird known to be a Steller's sea eagle has been spotted three times since May and in August of last year, 40 miles up the Nushagak River from Dillingham, according to Rob MacDonald of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
Another Steller's eagle took up residence on the Taku River south of Juneau for 10 summers starting in the late 1980s, Schemf said.
The fish-eating Steller's sea eagle can weigh 20 pounds and have a wingspan of up to 8 feet. It has a distinctive and impressive appearance, Schemf said, with a pronounced yellow beak, a black or dark brown body and large white shoulder patches. "It's hard to mistake it for something else," he said. It's clearly an eagle, though more "like a giant bald eagle."
People who observe animals "don't always have the sizes right, but this is very different because the people in that area know what eagles look like," said Karen Laing, also a federal biologist.
"I don't know of any bird that's three times the size of an eagle," Laing said. "What would that be? An ostrich? What bird occurs here that would possibly be three times the size of an eagle or the size of a Super Cub?"
Reporter Peter Porco can be reached at [email protected] and at 907 257-4582.
http://www.ananova.com/news/story/sm_690946.html
A giant bird with a reported wingspan of about 14ft has been sighted in Southwest Alaska.
Villagers in Togiak and Manokotak say they have seen a huge bird much bigger than anything they have seen before.
The Anchorage Daily News says a pilot taking passengers to Manokotak last week said he saw the creature.
Scientists aren't sure what to make of the reports of the large raptor-like bird, but biologists familiar with big birds in Alaska say they're sceptical it's that big.
"I'm certainly not aware of anything with a 14-foot wingspan that's been alive for the last 100,000 years," said federal raptor specialist Phil Schemf.
Schemf, other biologists, a village police officer and teachers at the Manokotak School say the sightings could be of a Steller's sea eagle, a species native to northeast Asia and one of the world's largest eagles. It's about 50% bigger than a bald eagle.
Story filed: 12:22 Wednesday 16th October 2002
Published online before print October 8, 2002
Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA, 10.1073/pnas.222389599
Anthropology
Corey S. Sparks * and Richard L. Jantz
*Department of Anthropology, Pennsylvania State University, 409 Carpenter Building, University Park, PA 16802; and
Department of Anthropology, University of Tennessee, 250 South Stadium Hall, Knoxville, TN 37996
Edited by Henry C. Harpending, University of Utah, Salt Lake City, UT, and approved August 30, 2002 (received for review July 1, 2002)
In 1912, Franz Boas published a study demonstrating the plastic nature of the human body in response to changes in the environment. The results of this study have been cited for the past 90 years as evidence of cranial plasticity. These findings, however, have never been critiqued thoroughly for their statistical and biological validity. This study presents a reassessment of Boas' data within a modern statistical and quantitative genetic framework. The data used here consist of head and face measurements on over 8,000 individuals of various European ethnic groups. By using pedigree information contained in Boas' data, narrow sense heritabilities are estimated by the method of maximum likelihood. In addition, a series of t tests and regression analyses are performed to determine the statistical validity of Boas' original findings on differentiation between American and European-born children and the prolonged effect of the environment on cranial form. Results indicate the relatively high genetic component of the head and face diameters despite the environmental differences during development. Results point to very small and insignificant differences between European- and American-born offspring, and no effect of exposure to the American environment on the cranial index in children. These results contradict Boas' original findings and demonstrate that they may no longer be used to support arguments of plasticity in cranial morphology.
Next Phase in This Cycle is Imminent.
A naturally occurring cyclic process is revealed here that coincides with the start of all our World Wars, and most conflicts of world magnitude in the twentieth century.
A direct link to NASA's Horizons system, allowing you to generate samples of this data, is provided on later pages at this site.
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IN THE NEWS
Today's Headlines � October 17, 2002
FEELING GRAVITY'S PULL: BERKELEY SCIENTISTS AMASS PROOF OF BLACK HOLE AT
GALAXY'S CENTER
from The San Francisco Chronicle
Charles Townes, the UC Berkeley Nobel Prize physicist, was flying at 41,000 feet aboard a NASA plane 20 years ago, on the hunt for evidence that a monstrously powerful black hole was lurking in the heart of the Milky Way galaxy.
With him on those flights was his German postdoctoral student, Reinhard Genzel, and a team of other scientists trying to discover whether the invisible object was gulping entire stars and cosmic gases under the tug of its own irresistible gravity.
If that "supermassive" black hole did exist, Townes and Genzel knew, it would provide an extraordinary opportunity to study the dynamics of gravitational forces and the behavior of matter under those immense pressures, and could also help clarify many aspects of Albert Einstein's theory of general relativity.
Today, Genzel, together with more than 20 other astronomers and physicists, are reporting they have finally found the strongest evidence yet that indeed a dense black hole, more than 3 million times as massive as our sun, does exist at the center of the Milky Way.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2002/10/17/MN209397.DTL
NASA'S STARDUST SPACECRAFT TO FLY PAST ASTEROID ON PRACTICE RUN
from The Associated Press
PASADENA, Calif. (AP) -- A NASA spacecraft will swoop within 1,900 miles of a small asteroid next month in a practice run before an even closer brush with a comet scheduled for January 2004.
The Stardust spacecraft is on track to fly past the asteroid Annefrank on Nov. 1. The robotic probe will snap pictures of the 2.5 mile-wide space rock as it speeds by at a relative speed of 15,660 mph.
The flyby will allow flight controllers at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's Jet Propulsion Laboratory to hone their skills needed for the later encounter with the comet Wild-2. Stardust will fly within 100 miles of the comet's nucleus on Jan. 2, 2004.
During that flyby, scientists hope to collect samples of the dust streaming off the comet. The spacecraft will return to Earth in 2006 to drop off the samples in a parachute-equipped capsule.
2 STUDIES ON CANCER CHALLENGE MASTECTOMY
Removing a small portion of breast tissue is just as effective as removing
the entire breast in saving lives of women with breast cancer, according to
two studies published Thursday.
Several leading breast surgeons said the reports, which tracked 2,552 women
for 20 years, strengthens what many scientists had long been saying:
Mastectomies are not required in the vast majority of cases of breast
cancer.
Smaller operations, such as lumpectomies, which remove only the cancer and
surrounding tissue, are just as effective at stopping deaths and the spread
of cancer to other parts of the body.
"These papers . . . show you can do a little operation, save the breast and
the end result in terms of living and dying is the same," said Dr. Melvin
Silverstein, professor of surgery at the University of Southern
California's Keck School of Medicine and director of the breast center at
the school's Norris Cancer Center.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/features/health/chi-0210170290oct17.story
A CHIP OF RUBBER WITH TINY RIVERS RUNNING THROUGH IT
THESE are not your typical circuits. Pressurized fluids, not electrons, run
through them; the pathways are made of rubbery silicone, not rigid silicon;
and the on-off controls are valves, not logic gates.
These fluid-routing circuits are the building blocks for a new breed of
microchips based on the fledgling technology known as microfluidics - the
manipulation of minute quantities of fluids in tiny channels, and all the
minuscule plumbing it takes to do that.
Created by a physicist at the California Institute of Technology and his
associates, the microchips have passages the width of a human hair. The
silicone pathways are honeycombed with individual chambers, each about the
size of a few human cells, within which chemical reactions can take place.
Thousands of minute micromechanical valves and many hundreds of chambers
can be integrated on a single one-inch microchip. Separate operations like
mixing or purging can be controlled in the tiny chambers.
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/10/17/technology/circuits/17next.html
STEP-BY-STEP PROMPTS PUT THE BLIND ON TRACK
AN interactive personal navigation system developed at the University of
Florida could someday guide blind people through corridors and along busy
city sidewalks.
The system combines off-the-shelf hardware, software and a voice-controlled
interface of the students' own design. It communicates wirelessly with
widely available but little-known databases of detailed geographic
information that can quickly be updated to reflect changing conditions.
The project began as a master's thesis project for Steve Moore when he was
a computer science student at the university's Gainesville campus.
When the user gives voice commands to ask for directions, the system
responds with verbal instructions, giving distances in feet and providing
corrective guidance along the way.
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/10/17/technology/circuits/17blin.html
MEASURING A STORM'S INTENSITY
Hurricane Lili, which hit the Louisiana coast earlier this month, was the
kind of storm that gives forecasters sleepless nights long after the winds
have died down.
Forecasts of the storm's track were right on the money. But no one
predicted that Lili would jump from a minimal hurricane just south of
Cuba's western tip to a roaring storm 24 hours later, bearing down on the
Gulf Coast with maximum sustained winds nudging 140 miles an hour. Nor
could forecasters give a heads-up that the storm's fiercest sustained winds
would quickly drop to less than 110 miles an hour just before Lili struck
the coast.
Now, scientists are poring through data from a unique set of experiments on
Tropical Storm Isadore and Hurricane Lili that could help sharpen storm-
intensity forecasts.
The work is focused on increasingly subtle interactions between the ocean,
the storm, and high-altitude weather features that may appear 1,000 miles
or more away from the storm's core.
http://www.csmonitor.com/2002/1017/p14s01-stss.html
Please follow these links for more information about Sigma Xi, The
Scientific Research Society:
Sigma Xi Homepage
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American Scientist magazine
For feedback on In the News,
October 9 2002
http://www.latimes.com/news/science/la-sci-polygraph9oct09.story
Polygraph testing for national security screening is little more than
junk
science, with results so inaccurate that they tend to be
counterproductive,
according to a long-awaited report released Tuesday by the National
Academy
of Sciences.
The nation's premier scientific organization said such tests, a key
counterespionage tool for 50 years, promote false confidence that spies
and
other national security threats have been ferreted out.
Produced by experts in psychology, engineering, law and other fields,
the
report confirms long-standing doubts about the validity of polygraph
testing that led to a 1988 federal law banning the use of such tests for
employment screening in most private businesses.
Polygraph results are also inadmissible as evidence in nearly all state
courts, with federal courts leaving the decision up to the judges.
"If logic has anything to do with it, then the report will have a major
policy impact," said Steven Aftergood, an intelligence analyst with the
Federation of American Scientists.
"I don't think federal agencies stop and ask themselves how many spies
have
we caught with this�because the answer is 'none'�or how many people have
been unfairly denied employment, because the answer is 'many.' "
Associated Press
http://www.intelihealth.com/IH/ihtIH/EMIHC000/333/333/356742.html
WASHINGTON (AP) -- A new study, prompted by an urban myth spread on the
Internet, shows there is no evidence that antiperspirants or deodorants
can
cause breast cancer.
The study, appearing this week in the Journal of the National Cancer
Institute, examined the personal hygiene habits of 813 women with breast
cancer and 793 women without the disease and found no link between
cancer
and body odor control cosmetics.
"Antiperspirant and deodorant use did not differ whether or not a
participant (in the study) had breast cancer," said Dana K. Mirick, an
epidemiologist at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle.
This indicates, she said, that use of the personal products does not
cause
the disease.
Mirick, first author of the study, said that the data was collected
starting in 1992 as part of a larger study testing if other common
exposures might be factors in breast cancer.
"About that time, these rumors (about antiperspirants and cancer)
started
to pop up on the Internet," said Mirick. "So we threw in these
additional
questions."
Other results from the large study were published earlier, but nothing
was
done about the antiperspirant question until Mirick and her co-authors
realized that women were still concerned about the issue, even 10 years
after it was first raised on the Internet. The American Cancer Society
and
the National Cancer Institute were so concerned that both put out
notices
on the Internet stating there was no evidence linking the personal
products
with cancer.
"On the main Fred Hutchinson line they still occasionally get phone
calls
from women who are concerned about this," said Mirick. "Even though no
researchers believed there was a connection, there were no published
studies on it."
Since they had the data, she and her co-authors decided to write up a
paper
and, perhaps, lay to rest a persistent myth.
"It is important for people to have correct information ... that can
eliminate fear about a deadly disease from an exposure that is quite
common," said Mirick. "These myths induced fear because this is a
product
that almost everybody uses."
Mirick said the original rumor started more than 10 years ago, probably
from a widely distributed, anonymous e-mail.
She looked for a Web site that carried the myth, but found nothing.
"I don't know if there was ever a Web site, or if it just came from a
round
robin E-mail," said Mirick. "But I do know the question was raised
before
1992. ... People were concerned."
Many of you have already seen the 3-4 minutes shorts currently being run
on
Discovery Science, which are titled "Skeptical Inquirer." The new show
is
modeled upon these shorts, but will be an hour long and examine several
topics within each episode.
CSICOP did not have final script approval, but we did contribute a great
deal
of time to them, as well as most of the skeptical guests presented. We
have
high hopes for the final product, which is still being worked upon. It
think
it pretty safe to say that the skeptical point of view will be very well
represented. William B. Davis (The X-Files-smoking man), will be the
series
host. He is a longtime reader and supporter of the Skeptical Inquirer
and had
been instrumental in keeping the show true to its mission.
I hope you can mark the airdates on your schedule, and then let us know
your
thoughts.
Barry Karr
Critical Eye
This series hosted by William B. Davis (The X-Files-smoking man), looks
into
the science behind the paranormal, new age philosophies, and the
unexplained.
The series will investigate 34 topics including, subliminal messaging,
alien
abduction, acupuncture, ghosts, astrology, exorcism, Stonehenge,
near-death
experiences, and the lost city of Atlantis. Each topic will be addressed
by
leading experts and scientists. These subjects will be brought to life
through lively debate and extraordinary visuals in order to shed light
on its
scientific relevance.
Critical Eye will premiere on Monday Oct 28 at 8pm/ET. A second hour of
the series will also air on 10/28 at 9pm. Please see schedule below for
more details. http://science.discovery.com/tuneins/criticaleye.html
10/28 (8pm) - Mind Games
http://www.gosanangelo.com/shns/shns_story.cfm?pk=BIGBIRD-10-15-02&cat=AN
ANCHORAGE, Alaska - A giant winged creature, like something out of
Jurassic
Park, has reportedly been sighted several times in Southwest Alaska in
recent weeks.
Villagers in Togiak and Manokotak say they have seen a huge bird that's
much bigger than anything they have seen before.
A pilot says he spotted the creature while flying passengers to
Manokotak
last week. He calculated that its wingspan matched the length of a wing
on
his Cessna 207. That's about 14 feet.
Other people have put the wingspan in a similar range.
Scientists aren't sure what to make of the reports. No one doubts that
people in the region west of Dillingham have seen a very large
rapto-like
bird. But biologists and other people familiar with big Alaska birds say
they're skeptical it's that big.
A recent sighting of the mystery bird occurred Oct. 10 when Moses
Coupchiak, a 43-year-old heavy equipment operator from Togiak, 40 miles
west of Manokotak, saw the bird flying toward him from about two miles
away
as he worked his tractor.
"At first I thought it was one of those old-time Otter planes,"
Coupchiak
said. "Instead of continuing toward me, it banked to the left, and
that's
when I noticed it wasn't a plane."
The bird was "something huge," he said. "The wing looks a little wider
than
the Otter's, maybe as long as the Otter plane."
The bird flew behind a hill and disappeared. Coupchiak got on the radio
and
warned people in Togiak to tell their children to stay away.
Pilot John Bouker said he was highly skeptical of reports of "this great
big eagle" that is two or three times the size of a bald eagle. "I
didn't
put any thought into it."
But early this week while flying into Manokotak, Bouker, owner of
Bristol
Bay Air Service, looked out his left window and 1,000 feet away,
"there's
this big ... . bird," he said.
"The people in the plane all saw him," Bouker said. "He's huge, he's
huge,
he's really, really big. You wouldn't want to have your children out."
Nicolai Alakayak, a freight and passenger driver from Manokotak who was
flying with Bouker, said the creature looked like an eagle and was as
large
as "a little Super Cub."
Comparison to an eagle, certainly. Super Cub? Probably not, scientists
said.
"I'm certainly not aware of anything with a 14-foot wingspan that's been
alive for the last 100,000 years," said federal raptor specialist Phil
Schemf in Juneau.
Schemf, other biologists, a village police officer and teachers at the
Manokotak School said the sightings could be of a Steller's sea eagle, a
species native to northeast Asia and one of the world's largest eagles.
It's about 50 percent bigger than a bald eagle.
The Houston Press recently came out with a large article on Attachment
Therapy (AT). Journalist Wendy Grossman covers a lot of ground, and
though
apparently no fan of AT, she attempts a balanced treatment (something
skeptics now refer to as "pseudo-symmetry").
The interviews with AT proponents are quite revealing, and it's
gratifying
to see part of a sadistic AT training video made by Neil Feinberg in
1993
at the Attachment Center at Evergreen given some public exposure.
But Grossman's article shows that Attachment Therapists can continue to
shield themselves with a winning 2-point approach:
1.) The "These-Kids-Are-Violently-Deranged" Offense
After Grossman accepted the validity of the diagnosis of "Attachment
Disorder," AT proponents were allowed to do a lot of free-wheeling
demonization of "AD" children. (Though validating alleged extreme
behavior
is quite another thing, as they are said to calculatingly save their
worst
behavior for their mothers alone.) The message is that we should allow
these brave AT therapists and long-suffering parents a free hand in
trying
to save the world from more Columbines.
2.) And the "We-Don't-Do-That-Anymore" Defense
Grossman let slide claims by the "Evergreen institute" (aka the
Attachment
Center at Evergreen) that they no longer use holding therapy and that
they
no longer employ holding therapist Neil Feinberg. A simple jaunt around
ACE's website today reveals that a.) ACE still recommends the most
overtly
violent of pro-holding materials to parents, b.) that ACE's executive
director serves on the board of ATTACh (the national AT/pro-holding
organization), and c.) that Neil Feinberg is still listed as
"PROFESSIONAL
STAFF--IN HOUSE"
(see: http://attachmentcenter.org/bios.htm#NeilFeinberg).
Further, Grossman left unchallenged a claim by ACE's Forrest Lien that
ACE
hasn't done holding therapy since 1995, although the journalist was in
possession of footage of an ABC 20/20 program demonstrating coercive
holding at ACE -- in 1998.
http://www.houstonpress.com/issues/2002-09-19/feature.html/1/index.html
"HOLDING ON: Families search for a miracle therapy that won't hurt
their
troubled children"
BY WENDY GROSSMAN
Carol put an alarm on her daughter's door, terrified that one night
Stephanie will slip out of her room and kill her while she sleeps...
SIDE BAR:
BY WENDY GROSSMAN
Two or three nights a week, "Ruth" woke up with her six year old
daughter,
"Lisa," standing over her holding a steak knife in each hand...
[AT NEWS sends the latest news to activists and interested organizations
about the many abusive, violent practices inflicted on children by the
fringe psychotherapy known as Attachment Therapy, aka "holding therapy"
and
"therapeutic parenting." Attachment Therapists claim to work with the
most
vulunerable of children, e.g. minority children, children in foster
care,
and adoptees.]
Contact: Linda Rosa, RN
Man hit while chasing half-full beer can across freeway
Police say a man was struck by a truck after he ran across the freeway
chasing a partially empty beer can.
ABC13 Eyewitness News (10/15/02) - A rush hour accident brought traffic
to
a halt on the Southwest Freeway. Around 4:30 Tuesday afternoon, a man
was
struck by a black Chevy truck. The driver stopped to render aid to the
victim. Police say the man who was hit was running across the freeway
chasing after a partially empty can of beer.
The victim was taken to Memorial Hermann Hospital where he is listed in
critical condition. No word if the driver will face any charges.
By Andrew Wolfson
A Lexington, Ky., doctor active in anti-abortion circles -- who has written
books recommending Scripture reading and prayers for such ailments as
premenstrual syndrome -- is being considered to head an influential Food
and Drug Administration panel on women's health policy.
But a ''quiet battle is raging'' over the Bush administration's plan to appoint
Dr. W. David Hager to an 11 member Reproductive Health Drugs Advisory
Committee, according to a story this week in Time magazine.
The Time article described Hager, an obstetrician and gynecologist who is
also a part-time professor at the University of Kentucky College of
Medicine, as ''scantily credentialed.''
And New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd said his resume ''is more
impressive for theology than gynecology.''
The UK College of Medicine and the Bush administration, however, rallied
to Hager's defense yesterday.
In a letter to the editor of Time, Dr. Emery A. Wilson, the medical school's dean, called Hager a
''nationally recognized'' doctor ''whose contributions to the literature and our knowledge of infectious
diseases in women has been significant and respected by others in the field.''
Wilson also said Time's assertion that Hager refuses to prescribe contraceptives to unmarried women
is false.
UK gave a copy of Wilson's letter to The Courier-Journal.
Hager declined to return phone calls and referred questions to the
Department of Health and Human Services, which includes the FDA.
Spokesman Bill Pierce said Hager is being considered because he
''highly qualified'' and ''has great experience in reproductive health.''
Pierce said Hager is a candidate for one of 11 vacant positions on the
panel, which has been inactive for two years; Pierce said the chairman will be selected after all
vacancies are filled. There is no timetable for doing that or for Hager's approval.
The appointments will be made by FDA officials.
Pierce said that he wasn't familiar with Hager's books -- which are written for a primarily Christian
audience -- but Pierce said Hager's entire record will be reviewed extensively.
Wilson also said he hadn't read Hager's books, but he added, ''I would be surprised if David would
allow personal opinion to interfere with scientific data.''
The New York Times' Dowd noted that one of Hager's works for lay readers -- ''As Jesus Cared for
Women -- Restoring Women Then and Now'' -- mixes biblical accounts of Christ healing women
with case studies from his own practice.
The FDA panel will lead a study of hormone-replacement therapy for menopausal women, a major
controversy in health care. Time said some conservatives are trying to use doubts about such therapy
to discredit use of birth control pills, which contain similar compounds.
In 1996 the FDA committee made a key recommendation that led to the approval of the abortion pill,
RU-486, which Hager has helped the Christian Medical Association try to reverse.
Hager, who operates one of Lexington's largest gynecological practices, has said he would not
prescribe RU-486 for patients because he is ''pro-life.''
He has also condemned the birth control pill, used by an estimated 10 million American women,
saying it has provided a ''convenient way for young people to be sexually active outside of marriage.''
After participating with 28 experts in an FDA review of the effectiveness of condoms in preventing
sexually transmitted diseases besides HIV and gonorrhea, he told the Lexington Herald-Leader that
''the only safe sex is in a mutually monogamous relationship'' that ''should be within marriage.''
Hager may be best known in Central Kentucky as chairman of a revival led by the Rev. Franklin
Graham -- the Rev. Billy Graham's son -- which brought more than 22,000 to Rupp Arena two years
ago.
Hager supervises UK medical residents at Central Baptist Hospital but doesn't treat patients in
university clinics, said Mary Margaret Colliver, director of UK public relations.
Wilson said in his letter that Hager serves as ''a valuable teacher and consult to faculty, residents and
students.''
The medical school's Web page said he has garnered national and international recognition for his
work in infectious gynecological diseases and was named in the book ''Best Doctors in America'' in
1994 and 1996.
Hager has written that it is dangerous to compartmentalize life into ''categories of Christian truth and
secular truth,'' but he told Dowd that ''the fact I am a person of faith does not deter me from also
being a person of science.''
He is a co-author of one of the standard books in his field, the 605page ''Protocols for Infectious
Diseases in Obstetrics and Gynecology,'' in addition to his several books for lay readers.
With his wife, Linda, who studied at Asbury Theological Seminary in Wilmore, he wrote ''Stress and
the Woman's Body,'' in which he explains stress-related ailments from medical points of view while
she offers religious insights into the same problems along with Scriptures that stressed-out women can
meditate on to relax.
''To exorcise affairs,'' the Hagers say in their book, they suggest a spiritual exercise, Dowd said in her
column.
''Picture Jesus coming into the room. He walks over to you and folds you gently into his arms. He
tousles your hair and kisses you gently on the cheek. . . . Let this love begin to heal you from the
inside out.''
Wilson said in an interview that Hager's scientific articles are of high caliber.
''He has opinions on other issues that may be at odds with what some people think,'' Wilson said.
''But he has the academic freedom to offer those opinions.''
Dr. Thomas J. Wheeler, Ph.D.
Dept. of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology
University of Louisville School of Medicine
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IN THE NEWS
Today's Headlines � October 16, 2002
RESEARCH INSTITUTES UNVEIL PLANS FOR FORT DETRICK LAB EXPANSION
FREDERICK - Two of the nation's top military and civilian medical
research
institutes unveiled plans yesterday to work together on a huge expansion
of
high-security laboratories at Fort Detrick to devise better defenses
against bioterrorism and emerging diseases.
The first stage will be construction, beginning in 2004, of a $105
million
laboratory equipped to handle the deadliest organisms in existence,
including the Ebola virus.
The so-called Biosafety Level 4 lab will be operated by the National
Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease, whose main campus is at the
National Institutes of Health in Bethesda.
After the NIAID lab is built, officials plan to seek roughly $1 billion
to
build new laboratories for the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of
Infectious Diseases, the top military biodefense center.
http://www.sunspot.net/news/nationworld/bal-te.detrick16oct16.story
RESEARCHERS DESCRIBE HOW POTATO POWDER INSTANTLY CLOTS BLOOD
ORLANDO, Fla. - A powder made from potatoes can clot blood instantly and
could prove useful in surgeries and on the battlefield for stopping
life-
threatening bleeding, researchers reported Tuesday.
The powder, made of purified potato starch, essentially "acts like a
sponge
and soaks up the water in the blood, concentrating coagulation factors,"
Mark Ereth, an associate professor of anesthesiology at the Mayo Clinic
in
Rochester, Minn., and principal investigator of the study, told United
Press International.
The study, presented at the American Society of Anesthesiologists annual
meeting, described how Ereth's team made small lacerations on the arms
of
30 volunteers and found the powder plus pressure on the wound reduced
clotting time by 5 minutes compared with pressure alone.
"That's a substantial reduction" and could mean the difference between
life
and death for someone with a massive injury such as a gunshot wound or
something that may occur in combat, Ereth said.
http://www.nandotimes.com/healthscience/story/578289p-4516533c.html
WASPS A GYPSY MOTH SOLUTION, OR DID TOWN GET STUNG?
In a laboratory in California, entomologists are trying to identify a
tiny
wasp that doesn't sting but has stirred up a hornet's nest for
agriculture
officials in Illinois.
Thousands of the wasps were released into the environment last month by
Crystal Lake park officials, who ordered them through the mail for
$2,200
after hearing that they were an effective way to eradicate gypsy moths.
Now, officials in the McHenry County suburb aren't quite sure what they
set
free, the company that provided the wasps won't say, state agriculture
officials are expressing skepticism that any bug can do the job--and it
will be months before anybody knows for sure what the pepper-flake-size
insects have been up to.
As questions buzz over the mystery, the release of the wasps highlights
a
growing frustration as gypsy moths inexorably chew their way across the
state.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/chi-0210160277oct16.story
PROSTATE TESTS COULD BECOME SIMPLER
Researchers have found that a simple blood test can effectively screen
for
prostate cancer in its earliest stages, offering what may become a more
reliable substitute for the popular PSA test, long considered an
imperfect
tool for detecting the disease.
In a study being published today, scientists found that a screening
method
pioneered by Bethesda biotechnology firm Correlogic Systems Inc. can
accurately distinguish between blood samples from men with prostate
cancer
and those without it. The test, already used to screen for ovarian
cancer,
recognizes patterns of proteins in the blood rather than identifying a
single protein, as the PSA, or prostate-specific antigen test, does.
That innovation -- searching for the interplay of many proteins rather
than
the presence of one -- is a leap that may result in more dependable
screening data for prostate cancer and fewer invasive biopsies performed
each year to diagnose it.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A32141-2002Oct15.html
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A conservative Iranian cleric has denounced the "moral depravity"
of
owning a dog, and called for the arrest of all dogs and their owners.
Dogs are considered unclean in Islamic law and the spread of dog
ownership in Westernised secular circles in Iran is frowned upon by the
religious establishment.
"I demand the judiciary arrest all dogs with long, medium or short
legs - together with their long-legged owners," Hojatolislam Hassani is
quoted as saying in the reformist Etemad newspaper.
"Otherwise I'll do it myself," said the outspoken cleric, who
leads
Friday prayers in the north-western city of Urumiyeh.
"In our country there is freedom of speech, but not freedom for
corruption," he said.
Canine clampdown
Tehran journalist Mafiseh Kouhnavand told the BBC that the subject
of
dog ownership had been brought up many times before.
Hardline judiciary agents and police occasionally clamp down on
the
practice, fining owners and confiscating their pets from streets and
parks.
In June, police banned the sale of dogs and penalised anyone
walking a
dog in public. The practice is seen by conservatives as a corrupting
influence of decadent Western culture.
But despite the clampdowns, dog ownership has been on the rise,
especially among rich Iranians in the north of Tehran.
"Now it has reached Urumiyeh, but some people were not ready for
it,"
Ms Kouhnavand said.
Hojatolislam Hassani appears to be widening the scope of his
anti-canine campaign.
Last year, he publicly thanked police for their policy of
exclusively
confiscating short-legged dogs in Urumiyeh.
The Jacksonville Amateur Ghosthunting Society and Times-Union editors
have
differences over the way a ghost hunting story was reported.
The ghost hunters turned over research on paranormal activity in
Jacksonville and expected the news staff to check it before publication.
Editors, aware of the serious nature of the ghost hunters, didn't feel
the
need to check everything.
The result was publication of an urban legend and other material that
the
ghost hunters did not approve. The group seeks to maintain "the highest
respect for privacy and legitimacy," said President Jodi Battin.
As the headline indicated -- "Ghost hunters rely on science" -- the
story
in Sept. 21 community sections took the ghost hunters seriously. Also
included was a map of local residences and office buildings where
paranormal activity has been reported.
However, some of the locations identified in the map had not been
investigated by the ghost hunting society, Battin said. She turned over
three years of research to the news staff. She expected these incidents
would be confirmed and permission obtained from property owners before
the
Times-Union published reports of hauntings.
For instance, the Times-Union map referred to Riverside Baptist Church,
where an organist supposedly died during a service in the mid-1970s.
That
story was based on a single e-mail reporting a rumor, Battin said. It
never
happened, the Rev. Lynn Heyder, an associate minister there, said in a
telephone interview.
Battin also was concerned about publishing the address of a duplex
residence without obtaining permission from the owners.
"Printing unfounded rumors and the addresses of private residences is
irresponsible in the extreme," she wrote. "We neither condone or
encourage
what was done. We would like the citizens who approach us to know that
their privacy will be held to the highest standard, and we apologize for
our naivete in sharing our information. We value the Times-Union as a
partner in keeping the fascinating haunted history of Jacksonville
alive.
We only hope that the editors regret this incident as greatly as we do."
Times-Union editors have a different understanding.
David C.L. Bauer, assistant metro editor, responded that Battin should
have
known that the information she provided was likely to be used in print.
She
also was told in advance about the map.
"There were no promises or discussions in regard to seeking permission
from
landowners with either the reporter or the editor," Bauer said.
Also, editors did not see the need to verify the information since
sources
were clearly identified, many of the sightings had been publicized and
the
ghost hunting society has established itself as the most recognizable
source for reporting paranormal activity, Bauer said.
The staff had not intended to list a private residence, and had deleted
several from an earlier list obtained from the ghost hunter society, he
said.
My comments: It was a red flag when the Times-Union mentioned incidents
that the ghost hunting society did not include on its Web site. Though
some
ghost stories can't be verified, some facts can be checked. Since three
months were spent on this project, it would have helped to do more
reporting and not rely so heavily on one source. More reporting would
have
added color to the story and would have alerted the staff to several
pitfalls.
David Lazarus
Mark Boccuzzi, a San Rafael Web designer, has finally hit on a dot-com
venture that works. With no marketing or advertising, he gets several
requests online every day from potential clients seeking his services.
There's just two problems:
He works for free.
And Boccuzzi, along with his partners, a Muni employee and a technician,
is
a ghost hunter.
Make that three problems: The trio have yet to actually catch a ghost.
"We've been at it for two years now and haven't come across anything we
can't explain," Boccuzzi said as we chatted in his apartment, where,
when
not designing Web sites for small businesses, he coordinates the
activities
of Bay Area Paranormal Investigations.
"I'm a hopeful skeptic," he said. "I want to believe there's something
more
to our existence than just flesh and death."
Bay Area Paranormal Investigations was born when Boccuzzi met Tina
McGarty
and Scott Mosbaugh, who shared his lifelong fascination with the
supernatural.
When not living an "X-File," McGarty works as secretary for a senior
Muni
official. Mosbaugh provides technical support for a Hayward company that
makes weather instruments.
The three recently completed an investigation into eerie doings at a
South
Bay home. A woman -- client specifics are kept confidential -- had
complained of hearing voices and seeing odd things. She sent in photos
showing inexplicable mists and orbs. Her dog was acting strangely.
"The woman seemed credible," Boccuzzi said. "She had a decent position
in a
fairly large company. She was scared."
The ghost hunters at Bay Area Paranormal Investigations look into every
claim that's sent their way, but only a small fraction actually lead to
on-
site examinations.
In the case of the supposed South Bay haunting, Boccuzzi, McGarty and
Mosbaugh first met with the woman and a friend who also claimed to have
witnessed the occurrences. Satisfied that something unusual was indeed
transpiring, the team then arranged for a visit to the house.
This is always the tricky part. Boccuzzi freely admits that there's a
danger in entering the home of a stranger, and not from otherworldly
beings.
"Dude," he told me, "I'm going into somebody's house I met on the
Internet.
Who says they have a ghost."
To ensure the safety of all concerned, McGarty remained elsewhere,
checking
in regularly via cell phone. Boccuzzi and Mosbaugh brought along two
other
ghost-hunting friends to assist the investigation.
If all this sounds a bit like a "Scooby-Doo" episode, well, the ghost
hunters are the first to acknowledge that they're in it first and
foremost
for a sense of fun and adventure.
They arrived in the South Bay with their cases of gadgets -- infrared
video
cameras, tape recorders, electromagnetic gauges. They went from room to
room shooting photos. They poked around until 11 p.m. (ghosts, of
course,
being mainly nocturnal creatures).
"Unfortunately, we weren't able to capture anything," Boccuzzi said, the
frustration evident on his face.
The ghost hunters followed up with a report for the client about their
methodology and findings (or lack thereof) and awaited word of
subsequent
apparitions. So far, nothing.
A past investigation, for what it's worth, determined that a sound the
client had interpreted as spectral children running the length of her
mobile home was in fact a family of squirrels living beneath the floor.
So why don't the members of Bay Area Paranormal Investigations charge
for
their time and efforts? The cost of film and batteries alone for each
on-site study run into the hundreds of dollars.
"It's still a hobby," McGarty told me by phone. "I don't feel
comfortable
charging $500 or $600 to say that I don't understand why something is
happening."
For his part, Mosbaugh said the group will probably begin billing
clients
"when we actually get to the level of proving stuff."
Needless to say, all three believe it's just a matter of time before
they
capture an honest-to-goodness spook on film or tape. "Most definitely
there
are ghosts out there," McGarty insisted.
To help make ends meet, though, the three may add an e-commerce
dimension
to their Web site (www.bayareaparanormal.com) so they can sell enough
haunted- house books or videos to cover basic expenses.
Professional parapsychologists, meanwhile, dismiss the efforts of groups
like Bay Area Paranormal Investigations as amateur-hour theatrics.
"You don't want to call an amateur group because most don't have the
skills
to deal with a situation," said Loyd Auerbach, a well-regarded (in
supernatural circles) ghost chaser. He runs the Office of Paranormal
Investigations in Orinda and is preparing to launch a nationwide
Paranormal
Research Organization for other pros.
Auerbach charges customers between $100 and $150 for each investigation.
"Many people don't value what we do unless they pay for it," he
observed.
The gang at Bay Area Paranormal Investigations counter that what they do
is
a labor of love and that they're uncomfortable seeking money from people
undergoing creepy, potentially traumatic experiences.
"They're grieving, they're upset," Boccuzzi said. "I don't see how we
could
charge them."
As we spoke, another e-mail arrived from a potential client, a woman who
said some weird images could be seen in photos from her daughter's
slumber
party. Would the ghost hunters like to see them?
Boccuzzi nodded to himself as he read the message.
"This is a personal quest," he said. "If I could just experience
something,
see something, hear something -- then I'd be happy."
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20021014/ap_on_re_us/evolution_debate_1
COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) - A state school board panel Monday recommended that
Ohio science classes emphasize both evolution and the debate over its
validity.
The committee left it up to individual school districts to decide
whether
to include in the debate the concept of ``intelligent design,'' which
holds
that the universe is guided by a higher intelligence.
The guidelines for the science curriculum simply put into writing what
many
school districts already do. The current guidelines do not even mention
evolution.
``What we're essentially saying here is evolution is a very strong
theory,
and students can learn from it by analyzing evidence as it is
accumulated
over time,'' said Tom McClain, a board member and co-chairman of the
Ohio
Board of Education's academic standards committee.
Conservative groups, some of which had tried and failed to get biblical
creation taught in the public schools, had argued that students should
learn about intelligent design. But critics of intelligent design said
it
is creationism in disguise.
On Monday, the committee unanimously forwarded a final draft without the
concept in it to the full 19-member board.
Board member Michael Cochran, who had pushed for intelligent design in
the
standards, said, ``The amendment allows teachers and students in Ohio to
understand that evolution really is a theory and that there are
competing
views and different interpretations. This allows them to be discussed.''
The Ohio school board will decide Tuesday whether to adopt the new
standards or order that they be revised.
from The Chicago Tribune
from The New York Times
from The New York Times
from The Christian Science Monitor
http://www.sigmaxi.org
http://www.mediaresource.org
http://www.americanscientist.org
[email protected]
Scientists Give the Lie to Polygraph Testing
Security: The tool has failed to ferret out spies and other threats, an
expert panel concludes.
By CHARLES PILLER
TIMES STAFF WRITER
No Link Between Deodorant, Cancer
October 16, 2002
Critical Eye on the Discovery Science Channel
I want to draw your attention to a new show to premiere soon on the
Discovery
Science Channel. The show is called "Critical Eye" and it was produced
in
cooperation with CSICOP and the Skeptical Inquirer magazine.
CSICOP/Skeptical Inquirer
10/28 (9pm) - Dark Side (repeats Thu 10/31 at 10pm)
11/4 (8pm) - Alternative Medicine
11/11 (8pm) - Legendary Myths
11/18 (8pm) - Fortelling the Future
11/25 (8pm) - Mystical Wonders
12/2 (8pm) - Death Zone
A super-sized bird in Alaska
By PETER PORCO
Anchorage Daily News
October 15, 2002
Wednesday, October 16, 2002
AT NEWS: Houston Press on AT
AT NEWS COMMENTARY:
Houston Press, September 19, 2002
http://www.houstonpress.com/issues/2002-09-19/sidebar.html/1/index.html
"ORPHAN SOULS: Without love or trust, these children can't connect to
anyone unless they get a lot of help"
Corresponding Secretary
Loveland, CO
(970)667-7313
[email protected]
Potential Darwin Award Winner
http://abclocal.go.com/ktrk/news/101502_local_autoped.html
Controversial doctor may lead FDA panel
http://www.courier-journal.com/localnews/2002/10/10/ke101002s292212.htm
Kentuckian's views, credentials are questioned
[email protected]
The Courier-Journal
A Scientific Look at Alternative Medicine
http://www.biochemistry.louisville.edu/grad/alternative_med/Syllabus.htm
Science In the News
The following roundup of science stories appearing each day in the general
media is compiled by the Media Resource Service, Sigma Xi's referral
service
for journalists in need of sources of scientific expertise.
from The Baltimore Sun
from UPI
from The Chicago Tribune
from The Washington Post
http://www.sigmaxi.org
http://www.mediaresource.org
http://www.americanscientist.org
[email protected]
Iranian cleric denounces dog owners
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/2326357.stm
T-U's handling of ghost article haunts local group
http://www.jacksonville.com/tu-online/stories/101302/opc_10674971.shtml
Ghostbuster snares clients on Net
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2002/10/13/BU98579.DTL
Ohio Panel Gives Evolution Nod
By LIZ SIDOTI
The North Texas Skeptics
P. O. Box 111794
Carrollton, TX 75011-1794
214-335-9248 Skeptics Hotline (current information)
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