The body electric

ScienceDaily: Electric Fields Have Potential As A Cancer Treatment

An interesting report on hopeful indications of low level electric fields to the head helping treat some forms of brain cancer.

The idea that electric fields could be helpful therapy has been around a long time (ever since electricity was understood, I guess.) It also gets a mention in science fiction every now and then, if I recall correctly. So its good to see there may be something in it after all.

Improbable research

Speaking out | eG weekly | EducationGuardian.co.uk

From the article:

In the 1990s, daring researchers finally tackled a question that was discussed everywhere except in formal academic settings. When someone's speech "sounds gay", what makes it sound that way?

Not exactly crucial to the advancement of the human condition, but it's good to see that I am not the only person to have wondered why (some) gay men sound so gay.

Sex and children

I’m single, I’m sexy, and I’m only 13 - Times Online

This article from The Times is a week old, but worth reading.

It's all about the ridiculously early sexualisation of young girls, especially young teenage girls.

It does cite some odd research, though, such as this:

The APA report also featured a 1998 study, in which the same researchers asked college-aged girls to try on either a swimsuit or a sweater, assess their appearance, then perform mathematical tests. The girls asked to wear swimsuits performed significantly worse.

“This is how sexualisation fragments consciousness,” says Dr Lamb. “These girls were so hung up on their appearance they literally didn’t have room in their heads to do maths. They learn that preoccupation from the women they look up to in the media.”

One psychologist explains the problem this way:

Though Dr Wilson believes flirtation and exhibitionism are natural for young girls, he says that clear lines must be drawn. “Children want to be looked at, but wearing items like thongs and revealing clothes sends the message that they are sexually available. It also implies knowledge of sexuality that just isn’t there,” he says.

As to the group think of girls, it also points out this:

But while criticism of the media is the answer Dr Lamb hopes for, it is girls criticising each other that is beginning to change attitudes among some groups. “There is a backlash beginning,” she says. “Girls quickly go from being popular to being derided for their slutty behaviour. It’s sad because they do all these things to fit in, but go too far and they are soon turned against.”

I wonder if anyone has looked at the comparative "early sexualisation" behaviour of girls from mixed gender schools and girls only ones.

Drive more and save the planet

Walking to the shops ‘damages planet more than going by car’ - Times Online

This is possibly the funniest thing Tim Blair would ever have read about greenhouse gases (with considerable justification , I might add), and he's missing out on blogging about it 'cos he's off on holiday somewhere.

Short version: raising cows makes so many greenhouse gases, you are better off driving the car to the supermarket than walking and having to replace those calories with extra intake of beef or milk.

But there's more:

Mr Goodall, Green Party parliamentary candidate for Oxford West & Abingdon, is the latest serious thinker to turn popular myths about the environment on their head.

Catching a diesel train is now twice as polluting as travelling by car for an average family, the Rail Safety and Standards Board admitted recently. Paper bags are worse for the environment than plastic because of the extra energy needed to manufacture and transport them, the Government says.

Makes me feel so much better.

As for flying, there seems to have been a bit of a backlash against the "the world must fly less" views of George Monbiot and others, and a good article in The Observer a couple of weeks ago talked about the difficulties of comparisons between different modes of transport.

And now for something completely different

Found by accident, here's some very innovative looking stage magic with (what looks like) laser light.



Very, very cool!

Things you never knew about whaling

This is one of those New Yorker book reviews of very pleasing length, where you end up up feeling that you have learnt a lot of things you didn't know before, with the added benefit that it seems hardly necessary to buy the book now.

The book in question "Leviathan", is a history of American whaling.

One thing it has taught me is that there was a fair bit left out of the movie version of Moby Dick:

Nor is there anything like skinning the whale’s penis, “longer than a Kentuckian is tall,” and wearing it as a tunic while you slice up the fat harvested from the rest of its body. Melville’s narrator, Ishmael, claims that the mincer of blubber usually wore such a tunic, in a clerical cut that made him look like “a candidate for an archbishoprick.” For “Moby-Dick,” Melville drew on scientific, historical, and journalistic accounts of whales, but he had a reputation for blurring the line between fact and fiction, and scholars have noted that for this chapter “none of Melville’s fish documents was particularly helpful.” In other words, he may have made the tunic up, for the sake of the archiepiscopal pun and perhaps, too, as a symbol.

It's a really interesting read. Go to it.

Revenge of the dolphins

Taiji officials: Dolphin meat 'toxic waste' | The Japan Times Online

Letting nothing get between them and a school of fish, the Japanese residents of Taiji kill hundreds of dolphins each year in a particularly gruesome fashion. Foreign Correspondent had a story about it in 2005. It was noted there that some of the dolphin meat is eaten locally.

The Japan Times story at the top says that this is a bad idea, because testing indicates it contains a very high level of mercury. All very unfortunate for the local school kids too, who have had dolphin meat put in the school supplied lunches.

The Japanese Fisheries bureaucracy remains hard to convince. God forbid that anything, even human health, should stop them killing and munching on whatever sea creature they like:

Tetsuya Endo, a professor and researcher at Hokkaido Health Science University's faculty of pharmaceutical sciences, affirmed the other doctors' condemnation of small-cetacean food products.

In a terse e-mail sent to this correspondent, Endo said, in reference to dolphin meat, "It's not food!"

In 2005, Endo published the results of a three-year study on random samples of cetacean food products sold throughout Japan, and concluded all of it was unhealthy because of high levels of mercury and methylmercury.

However, Hideki Moronuki, deputy director of the government's Far Seas Fisheries Division of the Resources Management Department, in an interview with The Japan Times, maligned Endo's study, calling it "misleading information." When pressed, though, he failed to substantiate his accusation.

The Japanese obsession with fish is a problem. As another Foreign Correspondent report (this one on massive Japanese overfishing of tuna off Australia and elsewhere) noted:

Japan has only two per cent of the world’s population yet Japanese eat a chunky ten per cent of the global fish catch. The national appetite seems almost insatiable.

Looking at Iran

Is Iran paranoid or does it really have something to hide? | Guardian Unlimited

This is a fascinating report on a recent attempt at PR by the Iranians for its nuclear industry.

It really sounds like a crazy government:

Petrol costs about 10p a litre, so Tehran is usually one continuous traffic jam. On Friday there is gridlock at midnight. And electricity is 70% subsidised. Seen from the air at nights, the capital burns as bright as any American metropolis. Because petrol is sold so cheaply, it makes no economic sense to build refineries in Iran, but because of the absence of refineries there is actually a petrol shortage. Rather than raise prices, the government has introduced rationing, handing out smart cards that limit most users to 100 litres a month. There was an initial wave of protests a month ago when the scheme was first introduced but those have since faded. The lull may be an illusion though. Many people have burned through much of the four-month ration on their initial smart card in just over 30 days. When the cards run out and people can no longer get to work, there is likely to be another bout of anger and frustration.

Geo engineering risks

'Sunshade' for global warming could cause drought

Read the linked story for some scepticism of one of the more plausible geo-engineering ideas against global warming (using sulphur particles high in the atmosphere).

Necks and blood pressure

How a pain in the neck could be bad for your blood pressure

This is an interesting little story about the possible connections (at least for some people) between the neck and high blood pressure.

I recall reading years ago in a Discover magazine (perhaps as far back as the 1980's) about some cases where experimental surgery on (I think) a nerve on the neck seemed to cure some cases of high blood pressure. I thought it interesting at the time, because of a relative of mine who has had high blood pressure from a relatively young age, yet has always led a healthy, active life style.

After that, I don't recall seeing anything about necks and blood pressure anywhere. Of course, it is not something I go out of my way to look for.

Homer's brain on display

Doh!

Very amusing to see that Homer Simpson's brain somehow made it onto a serious Chinese media report.

No one believes the Courier Mail?

Haneef caught in Groundhog Day, says lawyer | The Courier-Mail

Yesterday, the Courier Mail reported on what may have been in the undisclosed evidence that Minister Andrews has referred to in his Dr Haneef visa revocation decision.

It's pretty major stuff: that Haneef had come to the attention of MI5 because he was in contact with radicals they were monitoring. The Courier Mail repeats it briefly today (see link above).

I heard this mentioned on Radio National Breakfast yesterday, not in the "news" but in the "what's in the papers today" section.

Yet, that is absolutely the only reference to the story I have heard anywhere else. Instead, the dodgy , just created Indian "dossier" got all the attention, and even Keelty seems to dismiss that as not very important.

Why would this story be being ignored? Does no other journalist in Australia trust the Courier Mail? Why has no one mentioned it to Keelty?

I find this very puzzling....

UPDATE: a Google news search confirms that this story is getting virtually zero attention. It seems to me that there has to be a reason for this.

Annabel's fun

Tortuous treats of old Silver Tongue - Opinion - smh.com.au

Since returning to Australia, journalist Annabel Crabb's brief appears to be to write as Fairfax's version of Matt Price. (Always humorous, but still insightful, political commentary.) She's doing a pretty good job too.

More questionable than I expected

Angry Toxicologist : Fluoride - it's not just for teeth anymore!

The anti-fluoridation crowd usually sound a little too much like cranks to me to pay them too much attention. Surely I can trust all those dentists who want the water fluoridated, can't I?

Brisbane's water supply is still not fluoridated, (I think), and the post above at a Seed science blog makes me think those against it may have more going for them than I expected.

A viral mystery

Effect Measure

See the link for an interesting article about how little is actually known about the details of flu virus transmission.

Interesting way to kill time?

Digital archive casts new light on Apollo-era moon pictures

There's a project underway to get extremely high quality scans of the Apollo era film photographs of the Moon on line. From the article:

....the grain of the original film is visible when scans are fully enlarged. The most detailed images from lunar orbit show rocks and other surface features about 40 inches (1 meter) wide.

I wonder just how carefully these photos have been looked at already (there's 36,000, after all.) What's the bet that some people might will be spending hours looking at them for an alien artefact that been missed so far.

Steinophilia

The Cornish giant | Food and drink | Life and Health

I have always liked Rick Stein's TV shows, and in particular, loved his last series set about a canal trip through France. He has always struck me as the most likeable of the British TV cooks, even though his recipes still often seem to follow an English tradition of involving either significant amounts of fats and oils, or types of fish you don't get here.

(His recipes are, however, nothing to compare with the amazingly dangerous food of the Two Fat Ladies. I wouldn't mind betting that a large part of their audience were people who watched simply in order to be amusingly appalled at how much lard, butter, duck fat, cream, etc they could cram into every single dish. Certainly, that was the main fun I got out of watching it.)

Anyhow, the link above is to an article in The Guardian about him, and it informs us that another TV series is on the way. Great.

Dr Haneef Part V

I've been busy fighting the good fight over at Larvatus Prodeo's latest thread about Dr Haneef, concerning the evidence disclosed yesterday that, to my mind, will convince a lot of people to give the government the benefit of the doubt about the decision to revoke Haneef's visa. (And remember, there is more evidence not disclosed.)

I don't think the fact that Haneef tried to contact the British police is at all conclusive on the issue of removing "reasonable suspicion". It would certainly help in a defence of a criminal charge, where all you have to do is raise a reasonable doubt, but that's not what we are talking of here.

I don't want to repeat the various points I have made over at LP; you can read the "Steve from Brisbane" posts if you like.

But I will repeat a couple of points here. My remaining criticism of Andrews is this: it seems to me that he could have avoided the "overriding the magistrate" criticism if he had been able to show that he made his decision before the Magistrate made her bail decision. As it was indeed a parallel process, I see no reason why he could not have made it beforehand, and put in place some form of proof as to when he made the decision, but then not announced it until after the bail decision. (To announce it beforehand would have invited criticism that he was seeking to prejudice the case before the Magistrate.)

This is still, I think, a relatively minor criticism in the scheme of things, and it is more about appearances than substance. The Australian is completely over the top in its editorial about this today, seemingly deciding that having put the boot into Andrews previously, it would look too embarrassing to now admit that maybe he was on solid grounds after all.

I am also thoroughly sick of the attitude that there must be strong criticism of the government to be found somewhere in all this. Now, some commenters and even papers have suggested "well, why did the government let him go. He could have been released into the community and watched." Surely this is forgetting that we are talking a non citizen here (admittedly one who was doing us a favour by working in our health system.) There are high costs involved in monitoring someone, and inherent risk involved that terrorist action may be attempted and not prevented.

The critics are the same ones who wanted to see him released into the community completely exonerated. Now it's "OK, maybe there was reason to suspect him, but you should have kept him here anyway."

Maybe, various critics, the answer is that you never knew enough about this to be making such confident judgements. And there is considerable hypocrisy in complaining about Andrews not disclosing all information when, in other circumstances, people would be complaining about breach of privacy if the Minister was releasing all "protected information" that led him to not issue (or revoke) a work visa.

UPDATE: the argument moved from LP to Club Troppo, where Ken Parish seems to have surprised most of his mates by siding with the Minister (while, like me, being fairly mildly critical of the timing of his decision.)

Iraq optimism for real this time?

TigerHawk

In all the kerfuffle within Australia about a certain Indian doctor, it may have gone unnoticed that there is some pretty serious revision of prospects of success in Iraq underway in American at the moment. Tigerhawk's post linked to above has extract from a New York Times article by a couple of Brookings Institute analysts who have been there recently. It's interesting reading.

In fact, even within The Guardian there have been a couple of cautiously optimistic reports from within Iraq in the last couple of weeks.

Problem is, car bombs against civilian targets are extremely hard to stop, and while ever you have a couple of them going off and killing scores of Iraqis every week or fortnight, it's hard to convince us in the West that things are improving overall in the country.

Still, it would be rather interesting politically for Australia if, by our Federal election, the belief in progress in Iraq as a result of the surge has actually caught on.

Why dutch?

From 'Dutch wives' to old wives | The Japan Times Online

The Japanese call sex dolls "dutch wives". The link above mentions a recent exhibition of this product in Japan.

As to why "Dutch wives", Wikipedia offers an explanation, but I am not sure it makes sense:

Silicone dolls are quite popular in Japan, where they are known as "Dutch Wives" ('datch waifu'). Their name originates from the term, possibly English, for the thick rattan or bamboo bolster, used to aid sleep in humid countries by keeping one's limbs lifted above sweaty sheets.

I just thought that maybe it was internationally recognized that the Dutch were the world's first perverts.

But back to the Japan Times link, talking about the exhibition in Japan:

A completely bald man with a cane, who appeared to be in his 70s, entered the gallery and, after fondling a fake female, chuckles and remarks, "Their hair's black — I like that. These days young women all dye their hair."

The gent fired a series of questions at the staff, apparently hoping they would ship a doll to him disassembled so he could sneak it into his house. The man was encouraged to visit Orient Industry's sales showroom in Ueno, but he settled onto a nearby couch and wistfully gazed at the dolls.

So, if you are in Japan and see some old codger bringing into his house what looks like a series of dismembered limbs, there may be a perfectly innocent explanation. (Depends how you define "innocent", too, I suppose.)

OK, now that I have brought this to your attention, you can go back to work.