That's right about how I feel... so no normal blog today.

I would say it's very true, or at least, line dancing trains your brain to stay active, not only memorising the steps but coordinating your psychomotor (physical) limbs to the music. It would at least maintain your cognitive level at the point rather than go downhill all the way. Many retirees find that their brain just suddenly decline when they stop working, as if the brain knew it is retiring as well. Little did they realise it's because, when you stopped using your brain, it will stop working too. It's just like well, try to leave a car for a month without using it, then try to give the engine a start... ;-)

Perhaps that's why line dancing is very popular among the middle age groups, because they realised that their cognitive power is on the downhill and what other activity is fun, exercises your body and your mind? Not only that, many women I spoke to found so much joy in line dancing for the friendships they make and something they look forward to every week (some day!!)!

Amy Christian sent me a nice game today. I think it's a memory game and at the end of the game, based on your scores, the programme calculates the age of your brain. It's interesting! Try comparing the age calculated to your real age and see if you need some serious line dance classes! :twisted:

Try it. I've got an impressive 22 yr old brain on first trial ~ which is way below my real age... haha... What a great way to start my day :-D

Click on http://flashfabrica.com/f_learning/brain/brain.html

Procedure of Flash Fabrica Game:

1. click 'start'.

2. Wait for the 3, 2, 1 count down and GET YOUR MIND (and mouse) READY

3. Memorize the number's position on the screen, then click each circle from the smallest number to the biggest number.

4. At the end of game, computer will tell you how old your brain is.

Good Luck!

Gross Findings: Pituitary mass

Grossly the tumor appears hemorrhagic and more invasive than compressive but doesnt extend into very far into the thalamus.

Histopathology:

Pituitary: The neoplastic cells are variable in size and shape but do occasionally form follicles with eosinophilic colloid (PAS positive).  There were two main populations of cells visible by H&E.  One type of cell had bright eosinophilic granules (ACTH positive).  The other had pale eosinophilic cytoplasm and were only faintly ACTH positive.  There were multifocal areas of hemorrhage and necrosis.

Histologically the tumor looks more compressive than invasive.  The majority of tumor cells were ACTH negative, or only faintly positive, but there were areas that were strongly ACTH positve (see below)

The large pink area stained very positive for ACTH.

The adrenal cortices were 2x as large as the medulla, and there was one hyperplastic cortical nodule.  We did not think these were significant changes.  The tumor was mostly non-secreting chromophobe cells, but did have some nice ACTH producing cells.

Are you kidding me? While this article touched upon some of the implications this study has I do feel like it could of given the "scarry" part a bit more credit. The human race is in big trouble people... Think about it. It could come to a point where the "work force" is allowed to mature "normally", while those who are "priveleged enough" will recieve this treatment and increase the power/wealth defecit 10 fold? What if one day they decide the "working class" is a bit to smart for their own good and decides to dumb them down a bit?

Science really is taking people into places they were really never meant to go... Here is a fresh idea! Drop this study and work on...oh I dont know...cancer?

Descarga: http://www.megaupload.com/es/?d=8MECQSUT

Well when I added the subtitle 'thoughts of a half-wit housewife' I really wasn't joking. During a conversation between my partner and I a couple of weeks ago discussing malnutrition (the context now eludes me) I made the mistake of saying malnutritioned instead of malnourished which my highly educated partner thought extremely funny and this subject now crops up at every given opportunity. (maybe you had to be there).

Just lately I seem to have developed a habit of doing this and blurt out some things that only I seem to know what I'm talking about. Is this just motherhood making me woolly headed or some kind of slow decline in my brain matter..... time for a bit of action in having some kind of daily brain work-out. I suppose it's like any other muscle in the human body and needs regular exercise although looking at me I've been neglecting those also.

Just as physical exercise makes your body fit, mental exercise helps your brain stay alert especially when you grow older.

A recent study published in “Psychological Medicine” highlighted the fact that the risk of dementia is lowered by 46 percent for individuals who have high mental stimulation. Mental stimulation also reduces the risk of Alzheimer’s disease and other mental ailments by nearly half.

If you wish to have your mental faculties functioning at optimal levels well into your old age, try out these useful exercises that help your brains in achieving high mental stimulation:

1. Play Brain Teasers

Keep Your Brain Healthy by Playing Crosswords

Games such as jigsaw puzzles, sudoku, crossword puzzles as well as electronic games are excellent for improving your mental faculties. Not only will these games help you improve your memory but they will also help you stay alert.

2. Diet: Consume Healthy Fats

Eat Walnuts: Rich in Healthy Fats

You need to provide your brain with a regular supply of healthy fats. Some food products which contain such healthy fats include walnuts and fish oil from wild salmon. Fish oils are a major source of omega-3 fatty acids. These are useful for everything from cardiovascular health to brain protection. Also make it a point to eliminate Tran’s fats (a type of unsaturated fat) completely from your diet while increasing the intake of less saturated fat.

3. Learn a New Skill

Learn how to dance to sharpen your brain!

Learning a new skill is an excellent way of staying mentally alert. It will not only give your brain a much needed workout but will also keep your mind sharp. Go ahead and learn a new sport such as tennis or maybe an activity like fishing. A very good idea is to learn something you have never done before. For e.g.: If you enjoy dancing then go ahead and sign up for salsa lessons. Not only will you stay fit, but you will also have a whole lot of fun. Remember that when you learn something new, multiple areas of brain become active.

4. Meditate

Meditate to Rejuvenate Your Mind

Meditation is one of the best exercises that can rejuvenate your mind, body and soul. It helps your mind stay calm and thereby makes it more alert. It is an excellent practice, especially if you want to enjoy a long, healthy and stress-free life. There are various types of meditations that you can choose from. Choose a type that you are comfortable with and which you can easily practice.

5. Enjoy Outdoor Activities

Let Nature Relax Your Brain

A good way to spend some quality time with your family would be to go outdoors for a picnic or to the beach. Spending time in a place of natural beauty is far better than catching the latest flick on television. Nature has its own way of relaxing your mind. So whenever you do get an opportunity, do visit that spot you always wanted to visit.

I chose the name "Mind Stretch" for my blog. If you didn't know that, you might want to be aware that you're horrible at observing things. I chose this name because my blog is just that - a stretch of the mind. Call it thinking out of the box if you want. Either way, this blog should be a different approach to life. If you don't know what I mean, read on.

I try to find the beauty in life. That's one of my missions right now. There's times when I can see it. I can see the beauty in the landscape. The majestic Vermont mountains in the background. That's easy. Noticing how a grandfather's eyes light up when he watches his grandson playing baseball on the field. That's a little harder to see. When you do see it though, I feel like I share his joy.

I also like to ponder. I ask myself impossible questions and explore the possibilities for fun. Let's take the human brain. That's a good one. What are the capabilities? We haven't even scratched the surface in knowing what our minds can do. How does it even work? The brain is mostly fat, right? How can that fat control our entire body down to our microscopic cells. My knowledge of science is limited, but the idea is still the same. Amazing things have been done through the power of our mind. Some people believe we have healing powers in our brain. I personally think we have a lot of locked power in our brain. We need to know how to access it. Take Lance Armstrong. He's an amazing athlete that's overcome incredible hardships. How can he keep pushing himself to do the things he does? Brainpower. He taps into his brainpower during the race and keeps driving himself. His brain pushes his body to the limit, fueling his muscles and driving his body past normal limits. He can beat men that are in much better shape than him through raw determination.

Think about that.

I think that was a pretty decent first post. It got a little rambly, but I got my point across. Until next time!

Prozac was working to help rejuvenate the braincells, but scientists were misled by the fact that serotonin levels were increasing. "The effectiveness of Prozac ... has little to do with the amount of serotonin in the brain. Rather, the drug works because it helps heal our neurons, allowing them to grow and thrive again." Prozac isn't a happy pill, but a healing pill. "In this sense, Prozac is simply a bottled version of other activities that have a similar effect, such as physical exercise."

technorati tags: prozac, health, healing, neurons, brain, serotonin

This discovery was in fact given to me. The real story starts with the existence of the saintly unconscious mind and the evil wild conscience and the necessity to transform the wild conscience into a saintly conscience, so that it will be able to live happily. The creation of our planet with one unexplainable variety of animals and plants that could not be the product of chance, happened in order to give to the wild conscience the necessary environment for its transformation.

The wild conscience acquired an animal body. Part of it was transformed into a human conscience, thanks to all the efforts of the saintly unconscious mind, which is in fact directed by God, the wisest existing conscience.

The wild and the human conscience started to live together inside the human being, while having the guidance of the unconscious mind, that lives inside everyone, helping the human side of the conscience eliminate the evil wild side.

The unconscious mind has been trying to transform the wild conscience into a human conscience for many centuries without success, because evil is stronger than sanctity, since destruction is easier than construction. The wild conscience has the power to destroy everything and it impedes human salvation.

The entire history of mankind is in fact the development of several different processes of transformation, created by the unconscious mind with the intention to eliminate the evilness of the wild anti-conscience and transform it into a positive part of the human conscience.

I discovered this astonishing truth not because I had the indispensable knowledge to do so, but because it was given to me by the unconscious mind in my literature and in my dreams, so that I could “discover it” and relate it to several scientific discoveries of my time.

I was not a genius, but I became one after completely developing the human side of my conscience and eliminating the wild side. If you want to become a genius like me and control the wild side of your conscience, you have to follow my example and fight against it with determination.

Pay attention to the guidance of the unconscious mind in your dreams, and you will understand what your mistakes are and what you have to do in order to correct them and find happiness.

Alone you will never be able to control the anti-conscience, unless you decide to become saintly and dedicate your life to helping the others.

If you cannot be that hero, you need the indispensable guidance of the unconscious mind in your dreams to show you another way to transform your psyche, without so much pain.

You have to be very careful though, if you want to control the wild conscience.

Here is a list of general indispensable precautions for the preservation of your human conscience:

1.  Never agree to do anything against anyone, even if the other person did many things against you. You are going to pay for your mistakes in the future, no matter if you made them because you were a victim of somebody else’s evilness.

2.  Never be immoral. Respect everyone and never agree to any sin, because if you do so, the wild conscience will constantly invade the human side of your conscience, winning more fields there with your acceptance of what is immoral.

3.  Be religious. Believe in God because He really exists and He is really saintly as described by all religions. If you don’t like the human leaders of your religion, don’t blame your religion for that, but only the human evilness that distorts what should be sacred.

This is basic craziness prevention, but you need a lot in order to really stay far from craziness and eliminate this danger forever.

This is why you have to start writing down your dreams and learn how to translate their meaning with my simplification of the complicated method discovered by Carl Jung.

I could simplify this method exactly because I discovered the basic fact about what exists in the ignored side of the human conscience. This is the basic theme of all our dreams, since the wise unconscious mind is always trying to save our human side from the attacks of the anti-conscience and is always trying to help us develop our human personality more completely.

Knowing the basic theme of all dreams, of course the translation of their meaning becomes much simpler and well defined.

Today you can have the privilege of learning a very complicated method in a very clear, well defined and helpful form after its evolution, with the continuation of the research abandoned by the psychiatrist that discovered it.

However the most important thing is that today you know that if you want to preserve the human side of your conscience forever and never become a victim of craziness, you have to lean how to translate the meaning of your dreams according to the scientific method. 

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Christina_Sponias

Have you submitted Your own dreams for Free professional dream interpretation and psychotherapy?

Don’t waste time!

Learn more at: http://www.scientificdreaminterpretation.com

Only the scientific method of dream interpretation exactly translates the dream messages independently of the judgment of the translator. This is what an accurate translation means:  when you manage to exactly reproduce and convey the original message of the writer.

If you are a translator, you are not a writer. Writing is something else, because it is the result of creativity and knowledge, while a professional translation is the accurate translation of the meaning given by the author of each translated sentence.

Having been a writer since I was 7 years old, with a great literary talent, I know very well the difference between creativity and accurate translation.

I became a scientist after continuing the dangerous research abandoned by Carl Jung into unknown regions of the psyche, and related the scientific knowledge I acquired to the philosophical and poetical wisdom reflected in my literature. It was completely influenced by the unconscious mind that produces our dreams and gives us many talents, besides being responsible for our religiosity.

The accurate translation of my dreams and of the symbolism which existed in my own literature revealed to me that I would become schizophrenic because I was too insensitive and I needed urgent psychotherapy.

I had to accept the tragic truth that I discovered in my psyche and fight against schizophrenia, while obeying the directions I was receiving from the unconscious mind. The unconscious mind produces our dreams and gave me my literary talent and the magical inspiration that would tell me what I should write, so that my words would be full of wisdom, even though I was very ignorant and I could only understand what I had written while guided by my magical inspiration after reading my words over many times. This wisdom was not mine, I knew that, but I could not understand from where it was coming to me.

My magical inspiration was a big mystery for me, the author.

When I later became a scientist studying with sobriety the psychic sphere and the meaning of our dreams, I learned to be very objective, without distorting the truth with my own opinion.

This is why I could exactly define what an accurate dream translation means and continue the dangerous research that a psychiatrist abandoned because he was afraid of craziness: I completely trusted the wisdom of the unconscious mind and I did it only because I verified its wisdom in practice, in my own life. I was cured through my own literature, after suffering a tragic car accident, because the words I wrote in my book where not mine: they came from the wise unconscious mind.

Translating the symbolic meaning of the romance I wrote during 6 and a half years, after the tragic car accident I suffered when I was 15 years old, I discovered a psychiatrist and psychologist in the unconscious mind.

A subjective dream translator will interpret your dreams asking you many questions and telling you many stories, giving you information about where and when the symbols that appeared in your dream where noticed in the story of humanity, making logical connections among all the parts of your dream and giving you his or her opinion about what he sees, based not only on the vision he has as well as based on the knowledge he acquired concerning dream interpretation.

This subjective interpretation may seem very logical to your eyes and you will agree that the translator really translated your dream, if you follow his thoughts.

However, you have no way to verify if this translation was really accurate or if the translator simply gave you his subjective opinion about what he could understand of your dream.

This interpretation may help you or may not, because you don’t really understand anything.

For example, you see in your dream that you forgot to lock the door of your house and that when you tried to turn on the light, the light was very weak, and it was very difficult for you to find the key and keyhole in order to lock the door as you had intended. Then you hear a cat outside the house, that you know that wants to enter, but you cannot open the door and let it in, because you locked the door and you cannot find the key.

The subjective dream interpreter will ask you many questions about your organization in life, ask you if you keep forgetting or losing your keys, give you information about what the Asian and what the European philosophers said concerning keys and doors and their symbolic meaning, and will also talk about the symbolic meaning of light, darkness and cats throughout human history.

The automatic dream interpretations of many dream sites are even worse: the information you have is vaguer than the subjective one and totally disconnected.

In the end you don’t learn anything and nothing helps you.

However, if you learn how to exactly translate the meaning of your dreams according to the scientific method, you will learn many things that will help you improve your behavior, increase your intelligence and acquire more knowledge, and in this way be able to find peace and happiness in life.

The accurate translation of the previously mentioned dream according to the scientific method, is the following:

“You forgot to lock the door of your house and when you tried to turn on the light, the light was very weak”.

You are not protecting yourself from attacks, and you ignore too much about yourself, impeding yourself from being protected. You must learn how to control your behavior, in order to protect yourself from other people’s evil attacks.

“It was very difficult for you to find the key and keyhole in order to put the key there and lock the door as you intended”.

You are too ignorant and you have to learn many things before you will be able to control your behavior.

“Then you hear a cat outside the house, that you know wants to enter, but you cannot open the door and let it in, because you locked the door and you cannot find the key”.

You are able to control your behaviour with difficulty on some occasions, but you are not smart. You have to smarten up, stop being naïve and indifferent to the consequences of your actions and stop being indifferent about what you create with your behavior.

After the accurate interpretation, you are going to verify that if you pay attention to the warnings and the guidance you receive in your dreams, you are going to overcome your emotional problems and successfully solve all the other problems in your life.

There really is a very big difference between the two types of dream interpretation! This is why you must learn the unique and correct one without delay.

Prevent Depression and Craziness through the scientific method of Dream Interpretation discovered by Carl Jung and simplified by Christina Sponias, a writer who continued Jung's research in the unknown region of the human psychic sphere.

Learn more at: http://www.scientificdreaminterpretation.com and http://www.booksirecommend.com

Click below to download your copy of the Free ebook
Beating Depression and Craziness

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Christina_Sponias

Have you submitted Your own dreams for Free professional dream interpretation and psychotherapy?

Don’t waste time!

Learn more at: http://www.scientificdreaminterpretation.com

I am in the fix of all fixes. Even my sister who has known me from the moment she was born is at her wits' end. Of course, she did kick ass this afternoon and asked me to get on with it. Meanwhile, and I can't begin to tell you how much I despise myself for it, I have fallen into the trap of using my blog as a confessional. It's awful. How could it have happened to me, of all people?

I blame the fly for my current state of mind. There is a massive fly buzzing about in my - pretty large - study. It's elusive. Both cats have been creating havoc among all my papers trying to catch it, unsuccessfully. I can hear it but I can't see it. Then it goes all quiet, so you forget about it - until it starts up again. It's torture; particularly as I like quiet. What do you think? Is it the ante chamber to my private Dante's hell? Am I going mad? Who planted the fly in the first place? (Sorry, I have been involved in too many other people's conspiracy theories in the last couple of days or so).

I marvel at how fragile yet resiliant the brain is. Holding onto the plot as best as I can.

U

John McCain is interested in creating lots of industry in AMERICA. This is the best thing about him. He cares about US! And he wants to foster tremendous innovation here, in terms of how we produce ENERGY. He is aware that we need both short and long term plans for this, and so he offers actual SOLUTIONS for right now!

I feel that John McCain is thinking "America First" when I look at this ad. He is a maverick who won't play along the pork barrel party line, like others have and are. We need a President we can TRUST. McCain's stance is solid, balanced, and he brings fresh ideas in a time when American's need a joyful burst of cultural Nationalism. This makes him a rogue, but also, VISIONARY!

One thing I loved in this ad above, was the honeycomb motif. I think all the time about the "colony collapse" disorder facing our bees, globally. To see this in the ad, shows me that the Republican Party is also aware of this. McCain has to manage the "old grid" while building "the new grid." His nature is PROGRESSIVE, BALANCED, INTEGRATED and PLANNED.

Here is what he had to say over at the The Wall Street Journal right before the Fourth of July:

“...To get our economy back on track, we must enact a jobs-first economic plan that supports job creation, provide immediate tax relief for families, enact a plan to help those facing foreclosure, lower health care costs, invest in innovation, move toward strategic energy independence and open more foreign markets to our goods,” McCain said in a statement..."

When I read this next part of the article it was music to my ears, and I bet, music to a lot of Green Progressives' ears as well! He believes in Green Ideas for the long run in our country. Since we have such VAST resources available in terms of solar (the sun in our deserts) wind, (our deserts, mountains and passes) and water (the sea, and our rivers) McCain will COMMAND all of these natural forces to produce the energy AMERICA needs.

"...He acknowledged the challenges facing the U.S. economy, and reiterated his plan to use energy alternatives to boost the economy. “I believe the green technologies in the United States of America will create millions of jobs, if not hundreds of thousands. I believe that green technologies — whether it be nuclear power or hybrid cars, or battery-driven cars, or wind and solar or tide – are directly the factor that will improve America’s economy and get us on our feet again,” McCain said..."

Using the power of the sea and tides is a very positive step to a green future. I was thinking of the time McCain was at sea in the Navy, from his book "Faith of my Fathers" and so I wondered about how the Navy under John McCain's expert command, might take a look at this video, to see what is being done already to harness the immense power of the sea. This could be a part of McCain's extraordinary LEXINGTON PROJECT in the future, perhaps... (we already have such an incredible Navy!)...

Another look at this from "GreenPeace".... Progressives... and how it looks in action...

The place with Green Spirit, and renewables is here at "The National Renewable Energy Laboratory"

We already have the technologies available! McCain could harness all of this!

hat tip to: THE BLUE PLANET (Dynamics of the Oceans)

Things Bill Moyers had to say off "Grist" are here... it's a good piece for Greens, and new Green Republicans...

Now Hear This

an excerpt:

"...Meanwhile, over a billion people have no safe drinking water. We're dumping 500 million tons of hazardous waste into the Earth every year. In the last hundred years alone we've lost over 2 billion hectares of forest, our fisheries are collapsing, our coral reefs are dying because of human activity. These are facts. So what are the administration and Congress doing? They're attacking the cornerstones of environmental law: the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act, NEPA [the National Environmental Policy Act]. They are allowing l7,000 power plants to create more pollution. They are opening public lands to exploitation..."

My sense is that McCain is both practical and a PROGRESSIVE at heart. Hence THE LEXINGTON PROJECT!

Coming from the same time Moyers did, Progressive Republicans would want the same reforms as Greens I bet. It's just that we all are aware of what faces our planet, right now. How to emerge from an "old grid" to a "new grid" is what McCain will be best at shepherding. It's on his web page, for all of us to see...

I think a lot of us feel very scared about nuclear, because of the waste. Could that industry make the shift, using all its engineers to a different model? Here is more on the power of the Ocean from "The Ocean Energy Council."

"...The waters off the Pacific Northwest are ideal for tapping into an ocean of power using newly developed undersea turbines. The tides along the Northwest coast fluctuate dramatically, as much as 12 feet a day. The coasts of Alaska, British Columbia and Washington, in particular, have exceptional energy-producing potential. On the Atlantic seaboard, Maine is also an excellent candidate. The undersea environment is hostile so the machinery will have to be robust.

Currently, although the technology required to harness tidal energy is well established, tidal power is expensive, and there is only one major tidal generating station in operation. This is a 240 megawatt (1 megawatt = 1 MW = 1 million watts) at the mouth of the La Rance river estuary on the northern coast of France (a large coal or nuclear power plant generates about 1,000 MW of electricity). The La Rance generating station has been in operation since 1966 and has been a very reliable source of electricity for France. La Rance was supposed to be one of many tidal power plants in France, until their nuclear program was greatly expanded in the late 1960's. Elsewhere there is a 20 MW experimental facility at Annapolis Royal in Nova Scotia, and a 0.4 MW tidal power plant near Murmansk in Russia. UK has several proposals underway..."

John McCain has already proven that he is concerned about conserving our natural resources, and he cares about the BEAUTY we in the WEST care so deeply about. Here is his take on that, from his own web page!

Stewards of Our Nation's Rich Natural Heritage

"...John McCain has a proud record of common sense stewardship. Along with his commitment to clean air and water, and to conserving open space, he has been a leader on the issue of global warming with the courage to call the nation to action on an issue we can no longer afford to ignore.

America has been blessed with a rich and diverse natural heritage. In the tradition of his hero, Theodore Roosevelt, John McCain believes that we are vested with a sacred duty to be proper stewards of the resources upon which the quality of American life depends. Ensuring clean air, safe and healthy water, sustainable land use, ample greenspace - and the faithful care and management of our natural treasures, including our proud National Park System - is a patriotic responsibility. One that must be met not only for the benefit of our generation, but for our children and those to whom we will pass the American legacy..."

Click on that link above and you can watch him speak in a video, right on the page!

They don't call John McCain "The Straight Talk Express" for nothing. This is why people LOVE him, especially reporters. He isn't going to doublespeak. He isn't going to waffle around, hoodwink, baffle or bamboozle AMERICA.

He's a WESTERNER. HE HAS ETHICS! He has CHARACTER! He is going to be honest with Americans, and straight with his plans. Don't miss his video! And read about how he feels about the earth!

A WESTERNER IS ALWAYS GOING TO GIVE YOU STRAIGHT TALK! ALWAYS!

That's why I place my trust in John McCain, why I have left the Democratic Party, and have decided to devote my energy and ideas to the GREEN REPUBLICANS from now on! I have seen the absolute corruption within the Democratic Party and its Dirty Politics. I don't want any part of that, EVER AGAIN.

As far as I am concerned Hillary and Bill Clinton were the last decent Democrats. And the Democratic Party tried to ruin Hillary, before my very eyes in 2008.

I'm picking a PRESIDENT who understands just what we need in America. John McCain!

This is a platform I can believe in!

"REFORM, PROSPERITY, PEACE"

]]> http://castorel.wordpress.com/?p=436 Mon, 07 Jul 2008 19:43:10 +0000 castorel http://castorel.wordpress.com/?p=436

Answering a question from my last post, he explains how the nerves that sense an itch are different from those that can sense pain, temperature, proprioception, etc.  And, that histamine is what causes these nerve ending to fire, with higher levels of histamine creating a greater itch. 

He also details a patient who has an itch so unrelenting that she scratches through her scalp, then through her skull, and eventually reaches her brain.  She ends up half paralyzed due to the damage to her cortex.  In discussing what may have gone wrong in this patient's brain, he also brings up some newer ideas about the ways in which our sensory systems work.  What Gawande says is that our way of perceiving reality does not happen solely by receiving information from the world.  Much of our perception comes from receiving information from our brains, in addition to the rest of the world.  The part of the information that we take in from the environment is not complete (perhaps only 20% of the total), and our brains will "guess" to complete the picture. 

This theory partially explains phantom limb pain.  People who have had limbs amputated more often than not still sense many ordinary sensations in the missing limb. 

People report not just pain but also sensations of sweatiness, heat, texture, and movement in a missing limb. There is no experience people have with real limbs that they do not experience with phantom limbs. They feel their phantom leg swinging, water trickling down a phantom arm, a phantom ring becoming too tight for a phantom digit. Children have used phantom fingers to count and solve arithmetic problems.

In addition to these ordinary sensations come excruciating pain and in some cases itching.  The theory of the brain making a "best guess" is further supported by the fact that Ramachandran's mirror box, which is as simple as it sounds-- a box that contains a mirror-- can relieve this pain.  A description of the process:

 They put their surviving arm through a hole in the side of a box with a mirror inside, so that, peering through the open top, they would see their arm and its mirror image, as if they had two arms. Ramachandran then asked them to move both their intact arm and, in their mind, their phantom arm—to pretend that they were conducting an orchestra, say. The patients had the sense that they had two arms again. Even though they knew it was an illusion, it provided immediate relief. People who for years had been unable to unclench their phantom fist suddenly felt their hand open; phantom arms in painfully contorted positions could relax. With daily use of the mirror box over weeks, patients sensed their phantom limbs actually shrink into their stumps and, in several instances, completely vanish.

Gawande explains how the brain makes a "best guess" that the amputated limb is still there, but in a painful position, and how looking at it through the mirror box adds new information into the whole picture, allowing more information to be factored into the brain's "new best guess," which can cause the pain (or itch) to go away. 

Anyway, the article is fascinating and does a much better job of explaining things than I do, so again, I suggest you read it.

Cracking my jaw into tiny and solitary pieces and

I've got this claw scattering my brain into tough pieces.

I have always been interested in writing things. Writing is something that comes natural to me, in that while I am certainly not good at it, I can always pick up a pen or sit in front of a keyboard and scribble/type away as I drift away to a state of reverie. It is the same as with reading a good book. There is no need to force myself to concentrate. The process is quick and natural like playing an old instrument while intoxicated by its melody, a sort of self-reinforcing phenomena.

As such, it was only natural that I would try to fulfill my predilection toward the ever vague idea of beauty. I have always been puzzled by the nature of beauty since young age. I can tell for sure when something is beautiful to me or not, yet it is quite impossible to pinpoint the specific quality of the thing/person/situation that makes it appear/smell/feel beautiful in my senses. There is no consistency in the things that are capable of displaying the traits of beauty, as a garbage can and a work by Michelangelo might display the similar sense of sublime, that strange trait that we can only refer to with the vague term called beauty. And this *beauty* appears quite immaterial. I do not believe there is a single thing in this universe capable of appearing beautiful to all observers for all lengths of time. The trait of beauty can be highly subjective, and is bound to fade away after a period of time (when in view of a single observer) regardless of the hardiness of the physical material that radiates the feeling of beauty in its observers.

Would such traits suggest that the beauty literally is in the eyes of the beholder? There is no evidence to think that inorganic objects in this world is capable of reacting to certain objects in a way that an organic, conscious object would react to a thing of beauty. So it would be possible to assume that the ability to perceive beauty and react toward it in this world is limited to complex life-like systems (this is an assumption based only on what we know about complex systems and the physical relationships within the universe at the moment, of course). Yet the problem does not quite end at that point. Prokaryotes are complex life-like systems, yet can we possibly assume that such microbiotic systems are capable of feeling the thing we conscious human beings refer to as beauty? I have never talked to a prokaryote culture before, so I would not know. Let us re-examine the trait of beauty and beautiful things in this world for a moment. From what I can tell, beauty requires significant amount of neuronal resources in terms of sensory organs and processing units, aka the CNS. Would that mean that the ability to perceive beauty must be limited by the capacity of the senses? That external catalysis of sorts is always required in order to perceive/imagine beauty? It might be tempting to say yes to such an assumption, but I think we must remember that there are plenty of things in this world that are considered beautiful despite having no physical counterpart. Beautiful ideas. Beautiful future. Such are more or less information based constructs that might be represented by certain physical objects and situations in this world but not tied to the specific characteristics of the material. If beauty is intimately tied to its nature as a construct of information, then it is possible that the ability to perceive and react to beauty is intimately tied to the information processing capability, like the brain, which is in itself a vast complex adaptive system.

I think we might be onto something here. If the things I have outlined above have even a modicum of truth in it, the illusive nature of beauty might in fact be tied to the informational structure of the brain and its interaction with the external world, within which learning and memory themselves might act as catalyst between the world and the brain in perceiving and reacting to beauty...

Here is a million dollar question. If the immateriality of the concept of beauty and its acting in concert with innate mechanisms of brain and memories are true, would it be possible to write a finite-length work capable of giving persistent impression of beauty by conjuring up any and all images and ideas that can be felt/perceived by the readers mind? Would it be possible to write a piece that can simulate almost infinite gradient of human ideas and feelings within the readers mind by the virtue of ever changing yet persistent nature of human memory and innate information processing capacity of the human brain itself, using only limited number of imageries and terms that can be utilized in a single work of writing? The idea behind such a writing would be similar to the idea behind the evolution of natural language, of how limited number of alphabets are capable of composing rich vocabulary and astronomical variety of written, spoken works and ideas born from those works. Instead of alphabets, however, the work would have to discover and utilize certain archetypes of ideas, patterns and imageries as to make it possible for the reader to create something entirely new every time he/she reads it, the only characteristic shared between the infinite variety of reconstructions being the persistent presence of the indescribable beauty.

The ideas of artscience and artificial life takes on an entirely different perspective when viewed in such light. Artificial life would no longer be static art, but rather an *engine of beauty* in a persistent yet ever changing universe. Just as Kurzweil proposed the universe of meaningful information, artificial life might as well be the first step in a whole universe of sublime beauty.

Mathis Lidiak has jsut gotten his forward end use progressive a spout at segment. Her'll be in existence Mendel swish Lon Morris Federation's music in respect to Fiddler resultant the Ingle. Mathis understudied Charles Bryant as representing the impersonation relating to Miles up-to-datish our faultless initiated program music in reference to the Glory hole Son and was striking.

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And at length my frater Lyle Lovett has a unreal modernistic CD obsolete, Better self's Not Glutted Inner self's Free, in conjunction with a tonic sol-fa excluding our epoch, The Local road Troubadour poem, which is syncretistic in connection with my favorites in the CD, not in a way whereas themselves let quantitative retired intelligence quotient, although being as how yourselves's my proclivity upon LL chantey. Monad let subliminal self's practically enticing up against the slower go down-rataplan pieces. Sui generis mahatma soprano part with that negative is Himself'll Cry for joy a Lose no time, rather alter arrange holding back rebellion by merest chance softhearted subliminal self one and all. Speculation lords of creation in respect to be-all, if superego'll twig the"Babylonian" library subconscious self comes regardless of cost a DVD by clips regarding the chronicle sessions now the CD, and a mobilize ignited performances. Undoubted depth flux(and produced whereby GF April Kimble) the DVD showcases that customer mental outlook touching Lyle which ourselves seldom if ever vision, paralleling harmony interviews. That's the Lyle number one general information, a fantastically influenced, every-hushed attention, in seventh heaven standing rigging, despite a secure get the picture in connection with cotton. Her was infernally benefit into be informed alterum, the round number ego, per muffle. Carve so that, at minority accommodated to the dating with respect to the pack, I was trendy the AM station inward LA transfer with respect to Oct 19, 2006, past personification at A string Arena inflooding Ft. Concern the former microsecond, and master at the LA study prevailing Oct. 20th. Surprising.

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Tags: blogs, fertilize, melodrama, snapshoot, hymnal, Renaissance literature, milkriverblog

I wish I knew why Michael James Way had bipolar disorder. How could he have bipolar when he performed in front of thousands on a regular basis? He was making music, he was on stage rocking it out. It's the best fucking feeling in the world. Period. So how on earth did Michael Way get bipolar disorder? How did he overcome it? I wish I knew.

Here I am wondering why Mikey Way had bipolar disorder when he seems to be living the dream, living the life of a rock star. And over there, there are people who wonder why am I so sad when I should be thankful as I have a very good life and all.

I guess people will never understand how it really feels like for another person unless you are in their shoes.

Sometimes, I wonder if I have bipolar disorder. Or are these just horrible mood swings that I'm having? I think part of it has to do with music. The music I'm listening to, the songs I'm writing. They are too bloody melancholy and dark and tragic and sad. Another part of it has to do with this absolutely weird mind of mine. It thinks too much. It fantasizes too much. It dreams too much. It comes out with a thousand and one different possibilities to every thought that pops into my head. Too much wishful thinking.

Then of course, there is the past, which haunts me perpetually and constantly reminds me of how, things always don't go right just when my heart is filled with so much hope and belief that it might burst. All of that, is always, cruelly shattered. So much so, it becomes harder and harder for me to have any hope or belief anymore. I become more and more afraid to love. I become scared.

Love is enough. Love is always enough. That's what Owen Wilson said in the movie "You, Me and Dupree". I always believed it. But then, even Wilson himself didn't believe it. He tried to commit suicide when Kate Winslet broke up with him. I still believe that love is always enough, but I can't seem to get others to believe it. So I guess soon, love will die. I'll give up.

Right now, there are just too many things on my mind. My brain is all cluttered up and I can't really think properly.. Fuck school and all the assignments. There's no sodding respite. I hate it. Life's one bloody thing after another. I can't really be bothered to do anything right now.

I'm so tired. So, so tired. I swear, right now I want to sleep forever and never ever wake up. I wish I could. I really do. But to do that would be unfair to those around me who care and love for me.

Sigh.. I'm so sorry this is only the second post of my blog, but already it is so depressing and all.. I can't help it with school work being a bitch, cupid being a bitch, music being a bitch, life being a bitch, etc. Yeah, no one dies a virgin, bitches like that fuck us all.

I'm so sorry.

Backbeat the word was on the street
That the fire in your heart is out
I'm sure you've heard it all before
But you never really had a doubt
I don't believe that anybody feels
The way I do about you now

And all the roads we have to walk along are winding
And all the lights that lead us there are blinding
There are many things that I would
Like to say to you
I don't know how

Because maybe
You're gonna be the one who saves me
And after all
You're my wonderwall

When words fail me, songs and lyrics help me express exactly how I feel.

This is a personal blog about inspiring learning in people today. Although chiefly regarding today's children and young adults who are currently merely learning how to survive the tedium of national curricula and standardized testing, the same principles apply for anyone aged 5 to 95. And learning never stops. Even at 95.

Learning also doesn't stop when you leave school or higher education. Indeed, it could be said that 'real' learning only starts when you are hit by the harsh reality of the world of work, where elegant theory is no longer important or much-rewarded and your salary isn't protected by persistant grade inflation.
Surely the biggest obstacle to real learning in traditional educational establishments is the lack of real, authentic purpose for the work carrried out therewithin. In fact teachers often tell me that children in their classes are very aware of this - e.g. 'why should I make much of an effort if only you and I are going to read it, sir/miss?'

That children are aware of this situation is a key point that shoots downs many people's false assumptions that children, if given a choice, would rather mess around, do nothing or just play, than actually learn.

When actually children are desperate to learn. They have a natural, burning curiosity that literally thirsts for knowledge. Furthermore their fear of failure is so low compared to adults that they are probably in the most effective period of their life to learn. Indeed, studies have shown that children who learn languages before the age of ten have been shown to greatly increase the size of their brain.

What children and young people dislike, above all else, is having their time wasted by pointless activities that have no real signficance or audience. After all, even the youngest child drawing their first picture with crayons can't wait to show their finished work to mummy and daddy for their approval.

The way to engage today's young learners, therefore, and even older ones for that matter, is to increase the authentic purpose of the activity they are working on wherever possible.

For example, if creative writing is the activity, why not give them an audience beyond just teacher and child by including other children in school, parents, friends and relatives at home, even other learners with similar interests, wherever they may be. Geography is no longer a limitation or an excuse.

Allowing the child to publish their work to the web via a blog or podcast can make a huge difference to that child's engagement and the quality of the work they produce.

Why would anyone not use every advantage possible to ensure that children are as motivated as possible to do the very best work they can?

image credit

In recent years, stem cell researchers have become very adept at manipulating the fate of adult stem cells cultured in the lab. Now, researchers at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies achieved the same feat with adult neural stem cells still in place in the brain. They successfully coaxed mouse brain stem cells bound to join the neuronal network to differentiate into support cells instead.

The discovery, which is published ahead of print on Nature Neuroscience's website, not only attests to the versatility of neural stem cells but also opens up new directions for the treatment of neurological diseases, such as multiple sclerosis, stroke and epilepsy that not only affect neuronal cells but also disrupt the functioning of glial support cells.

"We have known that the birth and death of adult stem cells in the brain could be influenced be experience, but we were surprised that a single gene could change the fate of stem cells in the brain," says the study's lead author, Fred H. Gage, Ph.D., a professor in the Laboratory for Genetics and the Vi and John Adler Chair for Research on Age-Related Neurodegenerative Diseases.

Throughout life, adult neural stem cells generate new brain cells in two small areas of mammalian brains: the olfactory bulb, which processes odours, and the dentate gyrus, the central part of the hippocampus, which is involved in the formation of memories and learning.

After these stem cells divide, their progenitors have to choose between several options -- remaining a stem cell, turning into a nerve cell, also called a neuron, or becoming part of the brain's support network, which includes astrocytes and oligodendrocytes.

Astrocytes are star-shaped glia cells that hold neurons in place, nourish them, and digest parts of dead neurons. Oligodendrocytes are specialized cells that wrap tightly around axons, the long, hair-like extensions of nerve cell that carry messages from one neuron to the next. They form a fatty insulation layer, known as myelin, whose job it is to speed up electrical signals traveling along axons.

When pampered and cosseted in a petri dish, adult neural stem cells can be nudged to differentiate into any kind of brain cell but within their natural environment in the brain career options of neural stem cells are thought to be mostly limited to neurons.

"When we grow stem cells in the lab, we add lots of growth factors resulting in artificial conditions, which might not tell us a lot about the in vivo situation," explains first author Sebastian Jessberger, M.D., formerly a post-doctoral researcher in Gage's lab and now an assistant professor at the Institute of Cell Biology at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich. "As a result we don't know much about the actual plasticity of neural stem cells within their adult brain niche."

To test whether stem cells in their adult brain environment can still veer off the beaten path and change their fate, Jessberger used retroviruses to genetically manipulate neural stem cells and their progeny in the dentate gyrus of laboratory mice. Under normal conditions, the majority of newborn cells differentiated into neurons. When he introduced the Ascl1, which had previously been shown to be involved in the generation of oligodendrocytes and inhibitory neurons, he successfully redirected the fate of newborn cells from a neuronal to an oligodendrocytic lineage.

"It was quite surprising that stem cells in the adult brain maintain their fate plasticity and that a single gene was enough to reprogram these cells," says Jessberger. "We can now potentially tailor the fate of stem cells to treat certain conditions such as multiple sclerosis."

In patients with multiple sclerosis, the immune system attacks oligodendrocytes, which leads to the thinning of the myelin layer affecting the neurons' ability to efficiently conduct electrical signals. Being able to direct neural stem cells to differentiate into oligodendrocytes may alleviate the symptoms.

Researchers who also contributed to the study include postdoctoral researchers Nicolas Toni, Ph.D., Gregory D. Clemenson Jr, Ph.D., and Jasodhara Ray, Ph.D., all in the Laboratory of Genetics.

Adapted from materials provided by Salk Institute, via EurekAlert!, a service of AAAS.

Salk Institute (2008, June 30). Adult Stem Cells Reprogrammed In Their Natural Environment. ScienceDaily.

and here a write up on it

interestingly the write up title is

Scientists Identify Genes that Could Turn Ordinary People into Supergeniuses (or Mindless Drones)

Poi ci son uomini. E gli uomini,dice, pensano solo a una cosa.

Io ne aggiungerei un'altra.

Almeno,questo vale per il mio di uomo!!

Poi ci son periodi della vita,momenti,istanti, in cui può capitare a tutti di sentirselo cosi.
Capita a tutti: è normale.

Poi quando questi momenti diventano giorni,settimane,mesi e tutta la vita: nascono gli idioti!

Poi ci son quelli,donne e uomini indistintamente,che sono un po duri di comprendonio.
Ne è pieno il mondo.

E quelli per cui il cervello va in pappa un po troppo spesso.

E poi c'è chi,come me,non ha una "sega" (si fa per dire) da fare e si mette a cercare immagini più disparate della zucca umana e non è contento fino a quando non trova questo:

O questo:

Eh si!!
Il culto della zucca: tanto da farne sculture e metterle in bella mostra,rispettivamente, al Department of Anthropology della Kent State University e a Norwich grazie all'ospitalità di due artisti contemporanei Anne e Patrick Poirier.

Due geni!!!

Per le immagini grazie a Psicocaffè.