4/17    Just a thought.  Say we select a small percentagle of the population
        (e.g. 100000 people) with representations from all walks of life
        (scientists, engineers, doctors, chefs, plumbers, nannies, ...) except
        bad guys, transport them to a distant earth-like planet with abundant
        natural resources, and take away all man-made objects (machines,
        clothes, books, medicines, all tools, ...)  How long will it take for
        them to re-build a civilization when all they have is the knowledge
        stored in their brains?
        \_ Less than 100 years, IMO.
           \_ history proves that mankind almost always self-destructs
              in a large scale until the advent of nuclear weapons. Also,
              more likely than not, a new disease will come out and wipe
              out a large % of the population. Without the continued production
              and research in diseases, those 100,000 people will be reduced
              really quickly.
              \_ But that hasn't happened since we learned about germs and how
                 diseases are actually transmitted, which these 100k would know.
                 \_ you underestimate the amount of resources (man + hours)
                    to setup a lab, which can only be done in a very stable
                    country with abundance of resources.
                    \_ All you need is soap, clean water and a good way to
                       dispose of human waste. But even getting that going
                       is pretty hard, as anyone who has been to a 3rd
                       world contry can attest to.
                       \_ try to find vaccine for H1N1 or drugs for AIDS with
                          100,000 people, most of which will not be doing
                          research or making microscopes and computers
                          and such. It takes just one new strand of disease
                          to wipe out huge populations.
                          \_ I would be more worried about the ancient killers:
                             cholera, tyhpus, typhoid ferver and dysentary. It
                             is possible that they 100k could be screened, but
                             soemthing would most likely slip through.
                             something would most likely slip through.
        \_ I don't think they would in any reasonable amount of time. They
           might get to the bronze age before they forgot everything but that
           would be about it. Getting to the steam engine from scratch is
           just too hard. Most of them would die off pretty quickly unless
           you included lots and lots of people who were experienced hunters,
           fishermen and farmers. In subsistance economies, almost everyone
           has to focus on just generating enough food.
        \_ as pointed it, its goign to depend alot on the availability of
           natural resources.  Worst case you drop them in an inhospitable
           desert and they all die in a few days.   How fast they advance
           is going to be a huge function of how much of their time is spent
           spent surviving.
        \- It is also possible 100k people isnt enough genetic diversity
           to avoid interbreeding -> propagating bad recessive traits.
           I dunno if there are any good examples of island/isolated
           populations of this size with reasonable medical care [so you're
           not getting people dyning of simple infections etc]. --psb

12/17   "Whoa: Physicists testing to see if universe is a computer simulation"
        http://www.csua.org/u/yp3
        Will you take the red pill or the blue pill?
        \_ which pill ends up with me in a universe where physicists and/or
           people writing about them aren't deluded about the abilities of
           physicists?  -phuqm

4/16    "The K-E Diet: Brides-to-Be Using Feeding Tubes to Rapidly Shed Pounds"
        http://www.csua.org/u/w2x (gma.yahoo.com)
        I can't help noticing in the video:
        - how the doctor stayed standing up while examing this Jessica
          Schnaider sitting down,
        - how often he checked her heartbeat with his stethoscope, while
          standing up,
        - how convenient for her doctor the way she wore her button shirt was
          when she walked in to the office.
        \_ Why does her doctor need to listen to her heart so much? She isn't
           there for her heart disease.
           \_ Exactly.  I think she's building up a media presence to pave her
              way to a reality show.  And I think the doctor is knowingly in
              it.

12/29   "Venezuela's Chavez: Did U.S. give Latin American leaders cancer?"
        http://www.csua.org/u/v3q
        Looks like Chavez has more faith in US technology than Americans do.

12/19   "Comic superheroes perform breast self exams"
        http://www.csua.org/u/v19 (news.yahoo.com)
        Whatever the title may say, I say this is superhero porn.
        \_ Boob Guy, are you back?

9/16    "Chinese condoms too small for South Africans: report"
        http://www.csua.org/u/ua8 (news.yahoo.com)
        "A South African court has blocked the government from buying 11
        million Chinese condoms, saying they are too small, a newspaper
        reported Friday."
        What an embarrassment.
        \_ too small, made from the wrong material, and not approved by the
           World Health Organisation. Embarrassing, indeed!
        \_ Related news: "Condoms 'too big' for Indian men"
           http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/6161691.stm
        \_ Aren't these female condoms? Too small might not be such
           a bad thing then.
           \_ It's still an embarrassment for Chinese men that these aren't too
              small for them.

8/15    Do LCD monitors emit cancer-causing radiation like CRTs in the old
        days?  Wikipedia doesn't mention it.  Thx.
        \_ CRTs didn't emit cancer-causing radiation either.
           \_ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cathode_ray_tube#Ionizing_radiation
              "CRTs can emit a small amount of X-ray radiation ... The amount
              of radiation escaping the front of the monitor is widely
              considered unharmful."
              Oops.  Never mind.  In the old days I actually asked my employer
              to buy me a Polaroid grounded screen filter which supposedly
              filtered out the radiation on my 20" CRT.

5/20    CDC issues zombie apocalypse prepareness advice!
        http://emergency.cdc.gov/socialmedia/zombies_blog.asp

3/21    what are these virus phages? Can they be repurposed?
        \_ are you <b>insane?</b> you really want to start messing with
           recombinant <ul>rna</ul> crap when we don't even understand
           the normal virus lifecycle?

1/6     Study linking vaccine to autism was not flawed but fraud.
        http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110106/ap_on_he_me/eu_med_autism_fraud

12/21   Placebos work even when the doctor tells the patient that they
        are sugar pills:
        http://blogs.forbes.com/robertlangreth/2010/12/22/sugar-pills-work-even-when-people-know-they-are-fake/?partner=yahootix
        \_ "Harvard Placebo Study Was Seriously Overhyped"
           http://blogs.forbes.com/robertlangreth/2010/12/28/harvard-placebo-study-was-seriously-overhyped

9/13    http://www.cracked.com/article_18654_6-ways-your-office-literally-killing-you.html --linkpusher

5/25    http://www.aolnews.com/health/article/study-many-sunscreens-may-be-accelerating-cancer/19488158
        Sun Screens may be accelerating cancer. Ok, so plasticware in
        microwaves gives cancer. Cellphone gives cancer. Too much
        chlorine in the water gives cancer. What else is next,
        wearing cotton and eating wheat/corn gives cancer?
        \_ Eating too much soy gives you cancer. -dans
        \_ I wonder if KY Jelly gives people cancer.
        \_ I wonder if KY Jelly gives people cancer.  Not only is it applied on
           mucous membranes, it's also vigorously rubbed against the membrane
           mucous membranes, it's also vigorously rubbed against the membranes
           which further increases absorption.
           \_ keep your day job.
        \_ Everything causes cancer.  I'm not joking.  We've set the bar so low
           on this that everything does.
           \_ not knowing what causes cancer causes cancer -- Mdme Curie