Study shows skin creams cause tumors on mice

In the article, "Study shows skin creams cause tumors on mice", Maggie Fox mention about a research that was conducted by Allan Conney and colleagues at Rutgers University in New Jersey. The research discovered by accident that several moisturizers are related to an increased skin cancer risk while they were testing that caffeine could prevent skin cancer. However, there are no reason for people to panic because the research did in mice that its skin is very different from human skin. Moreover, the mice were pre-treated with a lot of UV radiation which is enough to develop skin cancer. Finally, the mice developed a very curable type of cancer called squamous cell carcinoma, which is not the lethal skin cancer.

In my opinion, I think we should not panic because there are somethings in the research that is not clear and want to prove it in the next time. For example, researchers cannot indicate that which chemical substance relate to skin cancer. Furthermore, UV radiation can affect to development of skin cancer, so cancer that found in mice skin may not link to skin cream.

Reference
Maggie Fox(2008,Aug 15). "Study shows skin creams cause tumors on mice". Reuters UK. Retrieved August 26, 2008 fromhttp://uk.reuters.com/article/reutersEdge/idUKARO54518420080815?pageNumber=1&virtualBrandChannel=0

'Gone With The Wind' Tarleton twin dies

In the article, “Gone With The Wind Tarleton twin dies” in online CNN, ATLANTA, Georgia (AP) tells us Fred Crane, former actor, 90 years died by side effect from diabetes in Barnesille on last Thursday. He was bone in Orlenans and got a chance to cast the movie when he followed his cousin who wanted to be actor. Therefore, he became a famous actor due to the movie which is called Gone with the wind even though he played two movies in his life; however, after that he acted TV series in the 1960s and introduced a classical music radio program. Also he was running Tarleton Oaks which is his family business. “Crane was married five times and is survived by four children, eight grandchildren and one great-grandchild.”


I've never finished to see the movie, and read book about Gone with the wind but I've knew that this movie is one of the most famous movie. Therefore, although I didn't know many about him, he was a famouse movie star and he will be remember in many people all over the world.

Reference
ATLANTA, Georgia (AP) (2008, august 26). "Gone With The Wind Tarleton twin dies". CNN online news. Retrived august 26 from http://find.netpia.com/lookup/lookup.phtml?com=freechal_plugin&type=&isp=etc-net&q=gone+with+the+wind+tarleton+twin+dies

500,000 to 2 Million Children in U.S. Are Homeschooled

In this article, “500,000 to 2 Million Children in U.S. Are Homeschooled”, Faiza Elmasry tells us that there are many parents who teach their children themselves at home. They bring their kids to lake and let them experience what they can study in science class, such as what trout look like. They also take kids to the park and make them gather some substance which they have studied at home such as making a leaf pack. At home, they also have many activities, in the kitchen, while they bake, they learn math as well, like measure weights, fractions. However, there are some rules which they have to follow. They have to inform local school’s supervisor their children’s lesson plan and present children’s progress evidence or let them take exam which public students take. Homeschooling parents arrange many activities with internet, other families in her community and other organization. The population of students who is taking homeschooling is reckoned 500,000 to 2 million across the U.S.. The reason they choose this way is mostly religious reason, the other reasons are academic reason and social reason.

References

Faiza Elmasry (2008, March 20). “500,000 to 2 Million Children in U.S. Are Homeschooled”. VOA News. Retrieved August 26, 2008 from http://www.voanews.com/english/archive/2008-03/2008-03-17-voa24.cfm

Carving the roast beast

According to “Carving the roast beast” of The Xmas Files, the philosopher Stephen Law presents the ideas that humans should not be treated to other animals. Law shows his ideas through Gemma and her family. Gemma thinks it is a prejudice for the separation of black and white and man and woman, but Mrs. Wilson opposes that it is not prejudice. Like children, they are not clever enough to do or decide something. Gemma debates her why we not kill babies that have a problem with brain because they not smarter than turkeys? Mr. Wilson says that because babies are human that is sacred. These make Gemma think they are prejudices. Mr. Wilson agues that human have the social relationship and animal can enter into. Furthermore, human have an obligation or duty to care their children. Ellen support her father that turkeys is not socially bonded to us, so it dose not matter to kill and eat it. Grandmother claims that in Bible “Every moving thing that liveth shall be meat for you” (p.137). Gemma contradicts that Bible is not always true such as the slave owners that everyone disagree with it. After that, Mr. Wilson says protein need for heath, but Gemma argue that Buddhists, Jains and Hindus have perfectly healthy with out eat meat. In finally, Ellen support his father with the fact that animal kill and eat animals, so the killing and eating turkeys is fine. Gemma contradicts to Ellen for 2 reasons. First animal have to eat each other to survive, some animal can’t survive on grass such as, the tigers. Seconds, animal have no sense of right or wrong. They can not be blamed for what they do like the children do. Overall, Gemma does not eat meat. In the contrary, other members in her family still eat it.

From this dialogue, I agree with some Gemma’s reasons and I also agree with other members in her family. And I also eat meat because I think human need protein for repair or improve some parts of body that are damaged. Protein is an importance substrate for cell and brain. Protein is the source of energy for body burning. You do not kill animal by yourselves, but you can buy it from the market. Overall I prefer to receive protein from meat than other sources because the test is very delicious and I think if I do not have to kill them by myself, it is fine to eat them.

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Reference:
Law, S. (2003). Carving the roast beast, The Xmas Files. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson.

Do you know someone with an addicion?

It is my one of uncle’s story I heard this from my mom. He passed away 15years ago because of alcoholism. He started drinking after married because he was not happy with his wife. He was a eldest his family and he had lots of responsible for family; therefore, even though he had a lot of stress from family, especially his wife, he suffered. Anyway, he didn’t do anything without alcohol and felt severe anxiety. Also he looked very unstable and shook his hands. When he was in hospital end of his life, he didn’t distinguish people and situation and even he is dying. He wanted to drink again and again. At the moment, he was in step 6 of addiction to alcohol of course.

Britney Spear’s addiction

Britney Spear is a pop star who has drinking problem. She seems to be at step 6 because after, she divorced with her ex-husband Kevin Federline. Britney go out to drink with her friend every night. This problem is become worse and it effect to her life. Britney lost her custody of her children. She was in hospital because she almost suicide herself ; “Britney on suicide watch she’s lost the plot and the kids” and “Britney Spears probed for child abuse” after divorced, she has frequently exhibited erratic behaviors. Moreover, this problem is a cause of her car crash and her mental illness.

References
- Britney Spears on suicide watch, By Fiona Cummins, Showbiz Reporter (5/01/2008) from http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/top-stories/2008/01/05/britney-spears-on-suicide-watch-89520-20275088/- BRITNEY SPEARS PROBED FOR CHILD ABUSE, from http://www.pattayadailynews.com/shownews.php?IDNEWS=0000003714

The Most Abused Substance in Australia

Australians, like many other people, are big alcohol users, and alcohol is the addictive substance most abused in Australia. The reading in Quest says that tobacco is the most used drug of addiction, and that was probably once true in Australia, but over the last twenty years or so, the number of smokers has decreased dramatically, so alcohol is now the most popular drug and the most abused in Australia. As in many other countries, alcohol is also the drug that causes the most damage to individuals and to society. It seems odd that this one should be legal when other, less harmful drugs, are illegal, but again, that is the same in many countries. There seems to be very little reason and zero critical thinking behind most nations' drug laws.
Some effects of alcohol on Australian society are: deaths, directly from alcohol caused illnesses and over doses, and also from alcohol related car accidents and other accidents; violence, in which alcohol is commonly a factor, especially domestic violence against women and children by drunken fathers and husbands; lost productivity due to absences caused by drinking, and alcohol related accidents at work; and so on. These were the ones that I thought of as I was writing, but there are more.
Of course, like most drugs that people get addicted to, alcohol also has some benefits. After all, people don't use it because they want problems! Alcohol helps people relax, a glass of wine makes a great meal even better, a drink or two helps people to socialise, it even has some health benefits, and the very long history of alcohol in almost every culture (every?) suggests that it is natural for human beings to use it along with the other drugs that have been popular for thousands of years.
Although I personally never drink, and don't much like being around drunk people, I don't think it would be a good idea to make alcohol illegal, and I'm glad my government has not made that mistake.

"Yaa Baa" effect on the society

In Thailand, "Yaa Baa" is the most popular drugs that effect on the society. When the addicts take its, they lose themselves-control. They always make the problems that you can see in the TV, radio and newspapers. The addicts harm to himself and to others. The addicts catch a hostage or cause a disturbance, so these are the popular topics on the newspapers. Maybe, The children around them imitate their behaviors. The consequence of drug taking is not affect only themselves, but it affect their family, their neighbour and society.

Do you know someone with an addiction? What step?

I know someone with an addiction who is at step 6. He was efficient and sometime drank alcohol with his co-works after work. But he began to drink a lot and couldn’t stop and couldn’t go to work. He always forced his family to bring some alcohol, even hit them if they refuse to bring. It lasted few months; finally, he began to suffer form hallucination. According to him, he always stayed with his older brother who was death and his brother wanted to take him somewhere, so his family called a shaman to perform an exorcism, because they believed that the shaman would take his older brother away. Of cause, it didn’t work and he was carried and pronounced severe inflammation of the liver. For being treated it, he was hospitalized and isolated form alcohols. Now he recovered provisionally, he never drinks even small because he is afraid of relapses.

Drug abuse and its effect on the society

What is one substance that is abused in your country? What is its effect on the society?

In Thailand, Amphetamine is the most widely used psychoactive substance. It makes users be increased energy, confidence and a strong feeling of happiness. Amphetamine is extremely addictive. Abusers lose a lot of weight very quickly, can be irritable paranoid, and even violent. There are many problems are causing by Amphetamine. For example, if some abusers who is addicted and no money to buy drugs, they 'll steal money from other people and they may hurt or killed other people even their relatives or their parents; as a result, they go to jail or is killed by police. Moreover, when we consider its effect on the society. There are many effects which are happened. First, the society loss of money to prevent and overcome amphetamine abuse problem instead use money to develop somethings that are more useful for society. Second, Drug abuse problem lead to increasing criminal rate that makes people in society worry about their safety. Finally, if many people in society are addicts, it'll obstruct development of society or country.

How should life end?

We've all finished reading Steinbeck's novel now, and you can probably think of several reasons why it has been very controversial ever since it was published in 1937. The Wikipedia entry reports that it "has been a frequent target of censors for what some consider offensive and vulgar language" (Of Mice and Men, 2008, ¶ 3), which may be misleading, if not actually wrong. Many people have been upset not merely by Steinbeck's language, but more so by the ideas he presents in the novel, such as his favourable presentation of George shooting Lennie at the end of the novel, which exactly parallels Carlson's shooting of Candy's dog earlier in the novel.

At least one person brought up the issue of euthanasia, the killing of people to end their suffering, in her recent essay about the death of Candy's dog, and a report on the BBC News website last Friday discusses the same issue. "How should the end come?" briefly discusses the history of failed attempts to change the law in England to allow people to tell doctors or others to kill them, and it argues that cultural norms may have changed enough that such a law could, and should, now succeed.
______________

These are a few questions that it occurred to me might be worth considering in a response:

What do you think, either about George shooting Lennie in Of Mice and Men, or the wider question raised in the BBC article?
Should people be killed to end a life of misery? Under what circumstances?
Did George do the right thing? Was Steinbeck right to present it as the act of a caring and true friend?
Should the law in your country be changed to allow mercy killings? Why? Why not?
Would your culture accept such a change in the law? Why? Are the reasons commonly given for or against such a change in the law strong or weak?
____________

References

• How should the end come? (2008, August 15). BBC News. Retrieved August 17, 2008 from http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/7564061.stm
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• Of Mice and Men. (2008, August 17). In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved 13:39, August 17, 2008, from http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Of_Mice_and_Men&oldid=232480946
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Do facts matter in public policy?

As I reread the New Scientist editorial, "Scientific testing can prevent policy disasters", I was reminded of Michelle's recent post about GTA and other violent video games. Many people have ideas that they are sure will help make society better, such as bans on violent video games, not allowing under 20s into clubs, and so on, but they rarely present any evidence that their proposed "solution" will work as intended. For example, many car accidents are caused by new drivers, so won't giving them driving lessons at school reduce accidents? Sounds like a good idea? I agree. The trouble is, it's wrong. When the study was done, it showed that driving lessons in school increased the number of car accidents (Muir, 2008)!

The problem that Michelle's post and the articles in New Scientist raise seem to me to be very common. Can you think of other examples of government policy that sound good, but are based on zero factual research and evidence? Why is this so common? Do you think it's common? What can be done to improve things? And I guess it also needs to be asked, why do you think your solution to this problem will be effective?

___________

References

• Muir, H. (2008, May 21). Science rules OK: Running societies the rational way [Electronic version]. New Scientist. Retrieved August 14, 2008 from http://www.newscientist.com/channel/being-human/mg19826571.900-science-rules-ok-running-societies-the-rational-way.html [full access to this article requires a subscription]
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• Scientific testing can prevent policy disasters (2008, May 21). New Scientist [Electronic version]. Retrieved August 14, 2008 from http://www.newscientist.com/channel/opinion/mg19826574.000-editorial-scientific-testing-can-prevent-policy-disasters.html

Young Thief in Iran Punished by Running a Truck Over His Arm! Fact or Fiction?

I have got forwarding email about a starving Iranian child who had stolen some bread from the marketplace and they punished him by a truck running over the arm of young boy in public place, In the name of Islam! His arm will be crushed and will lose its use permanently.

Is this Fact or Fiction? Who will benefit from this matter?

It’s really difficult to distinguish between fact and fiction about this matter. Many people believed it without knowing all the fact. I tried to check from the internet and I found a lot of opinion. Someone believed that this is a particularly nasty piece of anti-Islamic. The images are taken from a street show. A clever trick performed by a father and son who tried to discredit Islamic or Iranian. However, many people believed in this picture and they try to against this act of inhuman by forwarding an email to their friends without confirmation that something is true or accurate.

If we check on the image carefully, we will see the man in the picture is holding a microphone surrounding by people if this had actually be a public act of punishment, it would have been carried out by a uniformed officer.

What do you think about this?

Teenager imitates online game, kills taxi driver

One week ago, a teenager killed a taxi driver in order to get money for online game. He stabbed a taxi driver about 10 times with knives and it imitated online game. Nowadays there are a lot of crimes related with online game and offenders' age is getting younger. Moreover, they don't recognize their behaviors are good or bad. Also, some people don't distinguish between actual world and cyber world sometimes. It's not only gamers' fault, but aslo company which make game. Many online game showing crime such as shot gun or stab with weapon and many teenager is under many kind of crime. some of them also are experienced psychological problem. Some countries which have same crime problem have made related law and way to solve this problem. However, the crimes are increasing.

Facial expression

A facial expression results from one or more motions or positions of the muscles of the face. These movements convey the emotional state of the individual to observers. Facial expressions are a form of nonverbal communication. They are a primary means of conveying social information among humans, but also occur in most other mammals and some other animal species.
Humans can adopt a facial expression as a voluntary action. However, because expressions are closely tied to emotion, they are more often involuntary. It can be nearly impossible to avoid expressions for certain emotions, even when it would be strongly desirable to do so; a person who is trying to avoid insult to an individual he or she finds highly unattractive might nevertheless show a brief expression of disgust before being able to reassume a neutral expression. The close link between emotion and expression can also work in the other direction; it has been observed that voluntarily assuming an expression can actually cause the associated emotion (Freitas-Magalhaes, 2007).
Some expressions can be accurately interpreted even between members of different species- anger and extreme contentment being the primary examples. Others, however, are difficult to interpret even in familiar individuals. For instance, disgust and fear can be tough to tell apart.
Because faces have only a limited range of movement, expressions rely upon fairly minuscule differences in the proportion and relative position of facial features, and reading them requires considerable sensitivity to same. Some faces are often falsely read as expressing some emotion, even when they are neutral, because their proportions naturally resemble those another face would temporarily assume when emoting.

Why Do Women Live Longer Than Men?

http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1827162,00.html
Everybody already know that women live longer than men.
According to this article, among people over 100 years old, 85% are women. There are several scientific reasons. But, in general, there are three things, theses are smoking, eating more and stress. Personally, I want to add one more thing-drinking. As a breadwinner, they work very hard and suffer from stress. Besides, they have more oppotunity to have meal outside and eat more and more. It also leads to high cholesterol.

Korean men are well known as hard worker. People say, starting time to work is fixed-it's around 8-9am,depend on company-but there is no time to go home. They work very hard without enough taking a rest, drink, smoke. Recently, the percentage of men's death about forty increased.
Do you agree that these reason lead men's death earlier?
How about men in Thailand?

5 Ways to Synchronize Your Body's Clock

Are you wake up by yourself, without alarm clock, at the same time everyday?

When I read the article "5 Ways to Synchronize Your Body's Clock". I think the human body is very amazing. The heman body can adjust itself like a controller or computer. We just train our bodys to know the time.

In last summer, I make up from sleep by myself at 8 AM. everyday, but I never train my body like the steps that show in the article.

What do you think about body's clock??
Is it good or bad??
Why??

How does a number have an effect on people's life?

I saw this article about Chinese believe in lucky number 8 on the CNN, I thing it's interesting topic to think about this. From this article,I learned that number infuence Chinese people to do many things:for example, the opening ceremonies for the Olympic Games begin at 8:08:08 p.m. on 8/8/08, many people try to deliver their baby on 8/8/08, there are many couples have a plan to get a marraige on 8/8/08, and an airline pay a lot of money to get telephone number 8888-8888 because they believe in lucky number 8 which can make them have prosperity.

In Thailand, we believe in lucky number 9 that is linked to success and number 6 linked to failure. Do you think the number can affect on people's life?Do you have some experiences about lucky or unlucky number which affect your life? What is the lucky number in your country?

Is Apple's iPhone 3D really hit?

When I read from the article about Apple's iPhone 3D (http://www.nationmultimedia.com/search/read.php?newsid=30079633&keyword=iPhone) on the Nation. It told that Apple produced new product which is iPhone 3D. Moreover, iPhone 3D has big benefit about high internet access speed, navigator and program download. However, it still has some weak points which are touch screen keyboard and battery life. Do you think iPhone 3D be popular in your country? Why? and if not what is a important factor which taster wants?

Actually, I do not know much about high technology but I want to know more. Because technology is important ans useful for our life now. I think that the price of iPhone is expensive ,but sale of iPhone dramatically increased during this year. iPhone 3D may be useful for some jobs such as business man, lawyer, investor so it can be popular in Thailand.

Is this a cultural thing?

I saw this article about biscuits and business on the BBC, and although it isn't very serious, it was fun and interesting to read. We've just been reading about and discussing cultural influences on psychological disorders, and I was wondering if this is also something that is determined by culture. Do businesses serve clients biscuits in your country? What kind? What else? How important are they?

Personally, I don't like digestives very much, but I love shortbread. And that seems odd to me, because the best short bread is a bit crumbly, and the article says that shortbread is popular, but that crumbly biscuits are not popular! It sounds confused.

And this report is both very short and easy to read - it isn't by Steven Pinker.