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A Veil of Strangeness

James Keye
Dissidentvoice.org
Tue, 13 Oct 2009 13:23 UTC
High Strangeness
© High Strangeness Video Game
A veil of strangeness is settling over our world; it is becoming more and more a feature of every day. By the 'strangeness' I mean incongruous events, Orwellian language, dramatic disconnectedness: Examples: there is great clarity that humans have a massive impact on the biospheric living space, from physical occupation to changing the chemistry of life sustaining biophysical cycles - and yet people who revel in the immediate consequences of our powers often actively refuse to consider that they any responsibility, at all; that the great middle has been, and continues to be, robbed by the economic elite is transparent, yet is ignored by media and government alike; and of course, there is the utter distortion of all things war and peace.

I am not speaking of simple irrationality; although such strangeness rides irrationality as a surfer might ride a wave. This is beyond irrationality: this is the human capacity trying to work in a design and with "responsibilities" well beyond its powers. We could think of movies where a 'primitive' is thrust into the present. We have, small step by small step, made the details of our world in such a way that they integrate into a whole that is beyond our comprehension and our powers of adaptation. We are all 'Encino Man.'
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Shingles in the Brain

John Fauber
Journal Sentinel
Thu, 08 Oct 2009 02:00 UTC
Shingles may cause more than a painful skin rash.

A new study found that in the year after a shingles flare-up, there was a 30% increased risk of suffering a stroke, a risk that is even greater if the infection involved the eyes.

The study involved 7,760 people in Taiwan aged 18 and older who were treated for shingles, also known as herpes zoster. Shingles is caused by the varicella zoster virus, which causes chickenpox. The virus can lie dormant in body and reappear years later as shingles.

The shingles patients were compared with a group of 23,280 people with an average age of 47 who were not treated for shingles.

After a year, strokes had occured in 1.7% of the shingles patients and 1.3% of the controls, a 31% increased risk. For those whose shingles involved the skin around the eyes or the eye itself, the risk was 4.3 times greater.
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A Cure for Jet Lag? Scientists Identify Brain Cell which Keeps Us Awake


Daily Mail
Tue, 13 Oct 2009 01:21 UTC
Sleepy Head
© Daily MailThe discovery of the brain cell which determines our sleep patterns could pave the way for the introduction of a pill to beat jetlag
A pill that cures jet lag is a step closer today, after scientists discovered how signals from the brain control our biological clocks.

Tests on mice suggested the human body clock - controlled by a region of the brain called the suprachiasmatic nuclei - does not constantly fire electrical pulses to regulate our sleeping patterns, as was previously thought.

Instead, it fires at dusk and remains inactive during the night, then stirring back to life at daybreak.

The British and American team, whose research is published in the journal Science, say it could lead to treatments for illnesses that are influenced by the body clock, such as cancer and Alzheimer's, as well as perking up frequent flyers or nightshift workers.
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Brain Wave Surge Explains Near-Death Experiences

Irene Klotz
Discovery News
Tue, 06 Oct 2009 00:00 UTC
Brain Surge
© Discovery NewsBrain Surge
A study of seven terminally ill patients found identical surges in brain activity moments before death, providing what may be physiological evidence of "out of body" experiences reported by people who survive near-death ordeals.

Doctors at George Washington University Medical Faculty Associates recorded brain activity of people dying from critical illnesses, such as cancer or heart attacks.

Moments before death, the patients experienced a burst in brain wave activity, with the spikes occurring at the same time before death and at comparable intensity and duration.

Writing in the October issue of the Journal of Palliative Medicine, the doctors theorize that the brain surges may be tied to widely reported near-death experiences which typically involve spiritual or religious attributes.
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Study Links Epilepsy to Brain Protein

Randy Dotinga
HealthDay News
Thu, 17 Sep 2009 05:05 UTC
Brain
© Unknown
Research on mice points to possible cause of seizures

New research has uncovered possible causes of epilepsy related to signals in the brain that go haywire.

It suggests that when a certain protein is missing in the brains of mice, the animals have epileptic seizures. The protein appears to be important to the brain's ability to calm and fine-tune itself.

The researchers, who report their findings in the Sept. 18 issue of Cell, found that neural connections in the brain were excitable in the mice even though connections appeared normal.

When the protein was restored, the brains of the mice began acting normally again.

The specific protein referred to is one encoded by plasticity related gene-1 (PRG-1) and is found only in the brain, according to the researchers. Its calming effect depends on how the protein interacts with lipids that provide a signaling function in the brain.
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Brain's Response to Seeing Food may be Linked to Weight Loss Maintenance


ScienceDaily
Wed, 16 Sep 2009 00:00 UTC
Salad and tomatoes
© iStockphoto/Elena ElisseevaSalad and tomatoes.
A difference in brain activity patterns may explain why some people are able to maintain a significant weight loss while others regain the weight, according to a new study by researchers with The Miriam Hospital.

The investigators report that when individuals who have kept the weight off for several years were shown pictures of food, they were more likely to engage the areas of the brain associated with behavioral control and visual attention, compared to obese and normal weight participants.

Findings from this brain imaging study, published by the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, suggest that successful weight loss maintainers may learn to respond differently to food cues.
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Red Wine Chemical may One Day Treat Diabetes

Salynn Boyles
WebMD Health News
Fri, 09 Oct 2009 06:00 UTC
Resveratrol Lowers Blood Sugar Levels in Mouse Study

The much touted compound resveratrol shows some promise as a future treatment for type 2 diabetes, but drinking wine or taking resveratrol supplements isn't likely to do diabetic people much good, researchers say.

Resveratrol, found in red wine, was found to lower blood sugar levels and improve insulin levels when injected directly into the brains of mice fed very high-calorie diets in a study conducted by researchers at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center (UTSW).

The finding suggests that the brain plays a key role in resveratrol's beneficial effect on diabetes and that the benefits may occur independently of diet and body weight.

If this is true, new type 2 diabetes treatments targeting the brain may be possible, lead researcher Roberto Coppari, PhD, tells WebMD.
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Gene Mutation May Speed Learning

Amanda Gardner
HealthDay News
Mon, 12 Oct 2009 05:00 UTC
Finding might yield insights into diseases like Parkinson's, experts say

People with a specific genetic mutation seem to be "smarter," in the sense of being able to adapt to changing situations and continue to make correct decisions quickly, a new German study suggests.

And people graced with this genotype showed more activity in the prefrontal cortex of the brain, activity that is probably linked to metabolism of the brain chemical dopamine.

"Dopamine is related to reward so perhaps some individuals can make quicker decisions because they have more dopamine in the prefrontal cortex," said Paul Sanberg, a professor of neurosurgery and director of the University of South Florida Center for Aging and Brain Repair in Tampa.

The findings, reported this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, raise the hope of one day helping people with disorders such as Parkinson's disease that involve dopamine irregularities.
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3,400-Year-Old Epidemic Still Plagues Humans Today: Study

Tom Spears
Canwest News Service
Sun, 11 Oct 2009 00:00 UTC
About 3,400 years ago, a mysterious plague is believed to have spread across Europe, killing vast numbers of people.

No written records of the unknown disease survive today.

But scientists at the University of Ottawa Heart Institute have helped to uncover another piece of evidence in the genes of modern Caucasians.

A small cluster of genes protected part of early Europe's population against a disease that must have been horrific, perhaps on the scale of the Black Death.

But there was a cost: those genes, still carried by many today, raise the risks of heart disease, diabetes and hypertension.
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Self-Sacrifice Among Strangers has more to do with Nurture than Nature

Maria C. Zacharias
National Science Foundation
Mon, 12 Oct 2009 07:00 UTC
Group
© Zina Deretsky, National Science FoundationResearchers have found that in groups with diasporas, behavior is not necessarily genetically handed down, but rather it is something culturally absorbed.
Culture is more important than genes to altruistic behavior in large-scale societies

Socially learned behavior and belief are much better candidates than genetics to explain the self-sacrificing behavior we see among strangers in societies, from soldiers to blood donors to those who contribute to food banks. This is the conclusion of a study by Adrian V. Bell and colleagues from the University of California Davis in the Oct. 12 edition of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Altruism has long been a subject of interest to evolutionary social scientists. Altruism presents them with a difficult line to argue: behaviors that help unrelated people while being costly to the individual and creating a risk for genetic descendants could not likely be favored by evolution, at least by common evolutionary arguments.

The researchers used a mathematical equation, called the Price equation, that describes the conditions for altruism to evolve. This equation motivated the researchers to compare the genetic and the cultural differentiation between neighboring social groups. Using previously calculated estimates of genetic differences, they used the World Values Survey (whose questions are likely to be heavily influenced by culture in a large number of countries) as a source of data to compute the cultural differentiation between the same neighboring groups. When compared they found that the role of culture had a much greater scope for explaining our pro-social behavior than genetics.
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