Quote of the Day

"Why would we spend countless taxpayer dollars on a Death Star with a fundamental flaw that can be exploited by a one-man starship?" - Paul Shawcross, Chief of the Science and Space Branch at the White House Office of Management and Budget, responding to a petition calling for the United States to build a Death Star. (h/t, Greenlee Gazette)

Making the most of the opportunity to trumpet the technological accomplishments of our military, Shawcross goes on to brag about "the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, which is supporting research on building Luke's arm, floating droids, and quadruped walkers."

Elon Musk: Hero or Villain?

I always assumed Elon Musk was more of a Bond villain, but a website makes a clever comparison between Musk and Tony Stark:
Created by: OnlineGraduatePrograms.com

Gloves will be a popular accessory this year

I predict that we'll soon start seeing the return of gloves as a fashion accessory for men, with padding to lengthen the ring finger.

This is why.

Life Line Screening Scam in Town

If you are a Madisonian of a certain age, you may have received a brochure in the mail from a company called Life Line Screening.  They are bringing their medicine show to town (for one day only!) at St. Peter's Catholic Church (I assume the church merely rented them a meeting hall and is not actually promoting this snake oil).

For about a hundred and fifty bucks, they will do several unnecessary ultrasound tests to check for a variety of ills. After they have had time to review the images, they will send you a letter telling you whether you should follow up with your doctor.

There are good reasons why Medicare and most health insurance policies do not cover such screening tests in individuals with no symptoms needing diagnosis. Not only is it an unnecessary expenditure, but such screenings do not improve the odds of living a long and healthy life. Yes, you may detect clogged arteries, but if you had no symptoms, there is a good chance that the treatment will be worse than the disease.

This is a good example of what is wrong with our for-profit health care system. Aggressive marketing techniques convince people (and their doctors) that they need procedures that will do little good and may do harm. How many of the fools who pay $150 out-of-pocket for the screening will learn that they have clogged arteries?  The letter will convince them that their money was well-spent, and they will go to their doctor (on their insurance carrier's dime) for further tests. A few of them may have unnecessary surgery; a larger number of them will start taking a cholesterol-lowering drug (which works by damaging the liver to suppress its production of cholesterol). Doctors are way too quick to prescribe those drugs, since their education about their safety and efficacy has been provided entirely by the drug companies.

Caveat emptor.

She Swallowed the Spider to Catch the Fly...

The Wisconsin DNR plans to introduce three species of Chinese wasps in an attempt to control the Emerald Ash Borer.

Bringing in new invasive species to control an invasive pest -- what could possibly go wrong?

I heard the buzzing of a crop-duster overhead a few days ago, reminding me that gypsy-moth-spraying season is upon us.  I guess my neighborhood is among the lucky places in Dane County to receive a bath of soil bacterium that is supposed to kill the caterpillars.  I suppose it's better than the toxic soil vapors that folks near the Madison-Kipp plant have to deal with.

The joys of Spring in the Midwest.

Does Life Begin at Conception?

For the last half-century, the Catholic Church has actively taught that life begins at conception. They did not always advance that argument. In the middle ages, priests developed texts known as "penitentials" that were designed as guides in the confessional. They provided standard penances for a wide variety of confessed sins. The penitentials provided different punishments for women who had an abortion depending upon whether it was before or after "the quickening" (the point at which fetal movement can be felt by the mother). If it occurred after the quickening, the woman was assigned far longer penance than for an early abortion. This seems to indicate that, earlier in the history of the church, life was considered to begin at the quickening, not at conception.

Jewish tradition teaches that the soul enters the child at birth. Even today, many Orthodox Jews will not address an unborn child by name or even set up a nursery in anticipation.

The tricky thing about Catholic Church doctrine is that, according to the Church, it does not change over time. When a new doctrine is developed in response to a change in society, the Church claims to be simply clarifying and articulating something that was always true. For many centuries, there was no need to worry about the Virgin Mary being a carrier of original sin, because the mother was believed to be just the vessel for the father's seed. She may shape her offspring, as a plant's roots grow in the shape of the pot, but she does not pass on her nature. Gregor Mendel's studies of genetic inheritance, however, made people aware that Jesus must have inherited genes from his mother. Thus, the Catholic Church developed the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception, whereby Mary was the product of a specially-blessed union and was miraculously conceived without inheriting original sin from her parents.

When birth control pills became available, women had the ability to control their reproductive destiny far more effectively than ever before. The pills prevented pregnancy before it ever happened by suppressing ovulation and possibly also by preventing implantation if a woman did ovulate. Since medical science recognizes pregnancy as beginning at implantation (since a great many fertilized eggs are naturally expelled by the body for a variety of reasons), conventional birth control pills do not end a pregnancy.

It was after the pill became available that the Catholic Church began teaching that life begins at conception, not implantation nor the quickening. Many Protestant churches followed their lead. This doctrine is logically problematic for a couple of reasons.

First, the Church condemns hormonal birth control for the stated reason that it can prevent a fertilized egg (which the Church now says is a human life) from implanting in the womb, and thus the pill kills babies. However, the Church encourages breast feeding, even though lactation causes hormonal changes similar to the pill and also can prevent a fertilized egg from implanting in the womb. Why does breast-feeding get a pass when birth control pills are condemned?  If the Church is more concerned with making a woman's body subordinate to a baby than with saving the lives of fertilized eggs, the difference makes sense.

Secondly, prior to implantation (and even for a short while afterward), it is still undetermined whether that fertilized egg will grow into one baby or two or three (or even five, in the case of the famous Dionne quintuplets). If the soul enters at conception, does it split when the zygote does?  Do twins each possess only half a soul?  Also, twins sometimes merge during the course of a pregnancy. This even happens with fraternal twins, who grew from two separate fertilized eggs. Some people are born with different DNA in different body parts as a result of such in-utero mergers.  Do these people have two souls?

My faith does not require me to believe that life begins at conception, and my knowledge of science and of church history does not allow me to believe it. Therefore, in my opinion, any legal restrictions on first trimester abortion are based entirely on the desire of some people to impose their religious beliefs on others.

I Hope Jenny McCarthy Is Proud of Herself

Whooping Cough is sweeping the U.S. in a way that hasn't been seen in decades. In California, nine babies have died. Indiana has more cases than it's seen since 1986.

The most vulnerable victims are babies too young to be fully vaccinated, like the ones who died in California. In the past, they were protected by a firewall of vaccinated people around them.  That is why public schools require vaccinations -- not just to keep your kid from getting sick and missing school, but to keep your kid from spreading contagious diseases to those who are too young or too immune-compromised to be vaccinated.

In recent years, a discredited quack has spread misinformation blaming vaccines for the rise in autism diagnoses.  D-list celebrity Jenny McCarthy, whose son has autism, has bought into the quackery and used her celebrity soap-box to brainwash other parents into not vaccinating their kids.

Taking medical advice from Jenny McCarthy is a lot like letting Viscount Monckton influence energy policy.

An Explanation for Near-Death Experiences

Doctor Jeffrey Long, in his new book Evidence of the Afterlife: The Science of Near-Death Experiences, claims that near-death experiences cannot be culturally determined, because they transcend age and culture.

From this he concludes that they must be evidence of an afterlife.

Many years ago, I read a great deal about accounts of near-death experiences. The common elements (the ones which transcend age and culture) are a moving through a dark tunnel toward a bright light, being surrounded by (usually deceased) family members and (according to some sources), a vague buzzing noise that suddenly ceases.

I am amazed that no one seems to conclude that these experiences are influenced by long-buried memories of our birth. We start in a dark place, surrounded by the sound of our mother's heartbeat and intestinal gurglings. We move through a dark tunnel and emerge into a bright light, surrounded by family members.

Of course the images transcend culture and age. Being born is a universal human experience.