tagged w/ Arcticspirit's Darkside of LIfe
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One of my friends sent me a link...
http://www.iamanatheist.com/ I didn't read the rest of the post, I just clicked.
It said the following:
By visiting this Web site you have announced to the world that you are an atheist! This announcement is permanent and irrevocable -- our automated system has already sent notification of your godlessness to both the Library of Congress and your mother. We will mention you to the Pope the next time we see him.
Remember: as a moral atheist, you are bound by the list of Atheistic Rights & Responsibilities.
Want to ask about your new philosophy or read hate mail from unwilling converts?
Visit the IAmAnAtheist Blog.
If you visited this page in error, we're sorry -- what's done is done.
My mother will kick my ass.One of my friends sent me a link...
http://www.iamanatheist.com/ I didn't read... more
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You are a pretty pretty princess. But which one? Disney will tell you!
Sarah Haskins looks at the ladies of Mulan, Snow White, Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, Aladdin, Little Mermaid and Pocahontas.
For more Sarah Haskins http://current.com/topics/88794117/sarah_haskins/new/0.htm
For more Target Women http://current.com/topics/88813968/target_women/new/0.htm
Target Women is a recurring segment on Current TV's weekly television show, infoMania. In each episode of Target Women, Sarah Haskins takes a look at the often-ridiculous way the media reaches out to women.
infoMania is a half-hour satirical news show that airs on Current TV. The show puts a comedic spin on the 24-hour chaos and information overload brought about by the constant bombardment of the media. Hosted by Conor Knighton and co-starring Brett Erlich, Sarah Haskins, Ben Hoffman, and Sergio Cilli, the show airs on Thursdays at 10 pm Eastern and Pacific Times and can be found online at http://current.com/infomania. And make sure to check out our facebook profile for special features at http://infomaniafacebook.com.You are a pretty pretty princess. But which one? Disney will tell you!
Sarah... more
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"YPM, a group hired by the GOP, allegedly deceived Californians who thought they were signing a petition. YPM denies any wrongdoing. Similar accusations have been leveled against the company elsewhere."
It seems that a large amount of recently registered Republicans have said that they were duped into switching parties in California. Many have said that they thought they were signing a petition for a law against child molesters. One of the victims, Karen Ashcraft, is a currently a former Democrat that got duped into registering as a Republican."I am not a Republican. I certainly...won't sign anything in front of a grocery store again." Other complaints involved voters who received absentee ballots when they had not registered absentee.
A small company called Young Political Majors (YPM) was hired by the Republican party operates in several states, including California. Both YPM and Republicans have said that they had done nothing wrong because when asking people to register, they were wearing Republican shirts with the elephant logo.
Election officials and lawmakers are launching an investigation against YPM in Florida and Massachusetts and prosecutors in Los Angeles and Venture county are investigating complaints against the company."YPM, a group hired by the GOP, allegedly deceived Californians who thought they... more
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Why is God so weak and feeble? I wish he were more capable of doing his will and the things that he deems necessary. I fear for him and his ability to withstand all that is not done and the repercussions of the same. Heaven literally quakes when mankind cannot fulfill God’s needs and wants as designed. I am so glad that we have all of the Bible thumpers, religious zealots, and last but not least “God’s warriors” that can dredge out of the bible, the Quran, and most if not all other like minded books what God’s will truly is for the rest of us. Oh if God were just more capable and powerful!
I do often wonder, what if by some chance it were more simple perhaps as simple as God putting us here to see what we will do with our free agency. Maybe his true desire is to see if we can ever figure out that he loves us all and wants us to all just get along and treat each other with love, respect, charity, compassion, and dignity in spite of our race, creed, color, geographical location or sexual preference. I can’t believe that he has ever caused anyone to die by his hand, not now, not ever! Natural disasters happen; they are not an act of God; we live in a hostile environment. People die all the time because bad things happen. It is not because he needs them more in heaven and can’t do with out them, or that it was necessarily their time to go. Sorry, I know that “belief” is comforting! Things just happen; often we are given promptings or impressions as to better choices which often go un-heeded. Thus we pay or suffer the consequences of our choices. Such has been my experience.
The curse of mankind is that there is always someone that wants to stand up and tell the rest of us what God’s will or plan is; they proceed to take his sheep, “literally,” to fulfill this will, “God’s will.” Unfortunately for so many, this journey often leaves a bloody trail of bodies strewn along the way of any who stood in their path; one needs only to review any period of history to see this. Of course this is always done in the name of God as if he were impaled upon their backs, clinging on for dear life hoping and praying man can pull it off since he is incapable of doing it for himself. In time, we find that it was just another man or woman’s agenda being fulfilled at the expense of the misfortune of others. Think about it! Seriously, is God that lame, vindictive or murderous? Probably not! Just us…, you know the ones that have differing preferences, agendas, jealousies, envies, and intolerance to others that are different to the point of hatred. In turn this inspires their destruction by what ever means is necessary cloaked in what we call God’s wrath! Well carry on… For the impatient I am sorry for the length. No, not really.
The link to information on "Helix Nebula."
http://urbanlegends.about.com/gi/dynamic/offsite.htm?site=http://www.noao.edu/outreach/press/pr03/stsci%2Dprc03%2D11.htmlWhy is God so weak and feeble? I wish he were more capable of doing his will and the... more
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Obese people expect to enjoy food more than lean people do, but when they eat, they enjoy it less, a brain study shows.
And that's a problem. To make up for the missing enjoyment, obese people eat more high-calorie food. Overeating further dulls food enjoyment and locks people in a vicious circle.
The finding comes from real-time brain-imaging studies in obese and lean women by Eric Stice, PhD, of the Oregon Research Institute, and colleagues.
"We originally thought obese people would experience more reward from food. But we see obese people only anticipate more reward; they get less reward. It is an ironic process," Stice tells WebMD.
Stice's team showed women a picture of a chocolate milkshake and a picture of a glass of water. The heavier the woman, the more active the pleasure center in her brain.
Then the women actually tasted a chocolate milkshake or a neutral solution. Heavier women had less activity in their brains' pleasure centers.
"Probably this is related to downregulation of the brain's reward circuit. The more you do things that are rewarding, the less reward you see," Stice says. "The more you eat an unhealthy diet, the more you see this blunted pleasure response to high-energy foods."
Tufts University neuroscientist Emmanuel Pothos, PhD, has seen the same thing in mouse studies. He was not involved in the Stice study.
"Obesity is not only a function of brain systems that regulate body weight, but a function of brain systems that regulate eating for pleasure," Pothos says. "In mice, the central dopamine system -- the system that underlies pleasure from eating -- is defective. The animals have a very low response to stimuli that release dopamine. And food is one of those stimuli."
Obese people expect to enjoy food more than lean people do, but when they eat, they... more
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The more alcohol you drink, the more your brain shrinks, a new study has found.
"The take-home message is that, if you drink a lot, you're going to hurt your brain," said Rajesh Miranda, an associate professor of neuroscience and experimental therapeutics at the Texas A&M Health Science Center College of Medicine. "This is something we knew, but this is a huge study that quantifies that."
"It's not surprising that alcohol would cause shrinkage of the brain. That kind of thing has been observed in animal models and smaller studies," Miranda added. "The surprising thing is that they [the study authors] showed that even low levels of drinking are not protective, as people had seen in other cases."
The findings are published in the October issue of theArchives of Neurology.
Brain volume decreases naturally as people age, at a rate of about 1.9 percent per decade. At the same time, the brain acquires white matter lesions as it gets older. Both of these changes also accompany dementia and cognitive decline, according to background information in the study.
Moderate levels of alcohol consumption have been linked with a decreased risk of cardiovascular disease, leading researchers to hypothesize that restrained tippling might also slow declines in brain volume. Previous studies have also found that drinking alcohol in moderation is associated with improved cognitive function and a decreased risk of Alzheimer's disease.
For the new study, led by Carol Ann Paul, of Wellesley College in Massachusetts, researchers conducted magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and health exams on 1,839 adults (average age 60) participating in the Framingham Offspring Study between 1999 and 2001. None of the participants had evidence of clinical dementia or had suffered a stroke.
The men and women were asked how much alcohol they drank each week, then were classified as abstainers, former drinkers, or low (one to seven drinks per week), moderate (eight to 14 drinks per week) or high consumers of alcohol (more than 14 drinks a week).
Most participants (almost 38 percent of men and more than 44 percent of women) fell into the "low-consumption" category. Men were more likely than women to report being moderate or heavy drinkers.
Alcohol had no protective affect on the normal, age-related shrinkage in brain volume, the researchers found.
To the contrary, the more a person drank, the more their brain volume diminished. This relationship was somewhat more pronounced in women, although women tended to be lighter drinkers.
The gender difference could be explained by biological factors, namely that alcohol is absorbed faster in women and they tend to feel the effects of alcohol more than men, the researchers said. The more alcohol you drink, the more your brain shrinks, a new study has found.... more
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