Perverting science for politics

[jinx]

Reefer madness in the Economist.

Another reason the FDA statement is odd is that it seems to lack common sense. Cannabis has been used as a medicinal plant for millennia. In fact, the American government actually supplied cannabis as a medicine for some time, before the scheme was shut down in the early 1990s. Today, cannabis is used all over the world, despite its illegality, to relieve pain and anxiety, to aid sleep, and to prevent seizures and muscle spasms. For example, two of its long-advocated benefits are that it suppresses vomiting and enhances appetite—qualities that AIDS patients and those on anti-cancer chemotherapy find useful. So useful, in fact, that the FDA has licensed a drug called Marinol, a synthetic version of one of the active ingredients of marijuana—delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC). Unfortunately, many users of Marinol complain that it gets them high (which isn't what they actually want) and is not nearly as effective, nor cheap, as the real weed itself.

[xoxoxoBruce]

Unfortunately, many users of Marinol complain that it gets them high (which isn't what they actually want) and is not nearly as effective, nor cheap, as the real weed itself.

If a Marinol high isn't what they want, then real weed isn't for them either.

Originally Posted by xoxoxoBruce

If a Marinol high isn't what they want, then real weed isn't for them either.

That is not accurate at all, a very high percentage of people cannot take Marinol... it makes them very nauseous, oddly enough. I am one of them. I have read that the percentage is as high as 40%.
However, they can take marijuana just fine and have great effects.
Put a little bud on a cracker with some cheese, microwave it for a bit, it helps to activate the THC somehow, and eat it... the effects last much longer and you don't get the negative effects of the smoke.
You just have to keep the cracker down... otherwise you need to try to get an atomizer or large water-pipe to have less impurities and tar if you just can't keep the cracker down.
Another thing most don't know is that if you are in chronic pain you do not normally get "high". Your body is producing cannoids naturally and just uses the extra in the fight against muscle spasms and nerve damage. There are a lot of cannoids in mother's milk to help with the rapid growth of infants, such growth is painful.
BTW, I made plans for just such a large water pipe that takes three trays of ice cubes and a gallon of water. It cuts the amount of product you need to help with your pain in half if you are smoking. I made in in college for a friend who had asthma who was killing himself with smoking the stuff. As an added bonus it saved him a great deal of money in saved marijuana because he needed much less with the pipe. PM me and I will e-mail you the specs.

[richlevy]

Unfortunately, many users of Marinol complain that it gets them high (which isn't what they actually want) and is not nearly as effective, nor cheap, as the real weed itself.

So if a drug company can synthesize it and make a profit off of it, it can be legal. But if anyone could grow it in their garden and use it, then it should be illegal. I still don't understand why libertarians never made more noise about the drug war.

Heck, why stop at marijuana? Why not ban willow bark (aspirin)?

[9th Engineer]

I think you're missing the point. If the government legalizes medicinal Canibis then they effectively legalize it for recreational use as well. There's no good way to regulate it to those who really need it for pain. A medication however, can be controlled.

[richlevy]

Originally Posted by 9th Engineer

I think you're missing the point. If the government legalizes medicinal Canibis then they effectively legalize it for recreational use as well. There's no good way to regulate it to those who really need it for pain. A medication however, can be controlled.

And the real point is, who cares? Prohibition in the United States was a failure for alcohol and it is a failure for marijuana. Just concentrate on prosecuting DUI and DWI and leave people alone in their homes.

Originally Posted by rkzenrage

That is not accurate at all, a very high percentage of people cannot take Marinol... it makes them very nauseous, oddly enough. I am one of them. I have read that the percentage is as high as 40%.
However, they can take marijuana just fine and have great effects.
Put a little bud on a cracker with some cheese, microwave it for a bit, it helps to activate the THC somehow, and eat it... the effects last much longer and you don't get the negative effects of the smoke.
You just have to keep the cracker down... otherwise you need to try to get an atomizer or large water-pipe to have less impurities and tar if you just can't keep the cracker down.
Another thing most don't know is that if you are in chronic pain you do not normally get "high". Your body is producing cannoids naturally and just uses the extra in the fight against muscle spasms and nerve damage. There are a lot of cannoids in mother's milk to help with the rapid growth of infants, such growth is painful.
BTW, I made plans for just such a large water pipe that takes three trays of ice cubes and a gallon of water. It cuts the amount of product you need to help with your pain in half if you are smoking. I made in in college for a friend who had asthma who was killing himself with smoking the stuff. As an added bonus it saved him a great deal of money in saved marijuana because he needed much less with the pipe. PM me and I will e-mail you the specs.

BTW, if you are going to do the Leary Biscut... slang for the cracker, do use the cheese. The protein and fat help with the delivery, keeping it down, and helping the effects last longer. It is a lot of fiber and you need those fats and proteins to ease the transition and for the cannoids to "adhere" to while working their way through your digestive system and the rest of your body.

Originally Posted by 9th Engineer

I think you're missing the point. If the government legalizes medicinal Canibis then they effectively legalize it for recreational use as well. There's no good way to regulate it to those who really need it for pain. A medication however, can be controlled.

Those who care about people in pain care.
But if that is not something one cares about, then I guess you have a point.

[tw]

Adding to a long list of science intentionally destroyed or left to die, the Hubble Space Telescope, numerous satellite and other science (to promote a totally useless man to Moon and Mars program), more than 50% reduction in government software research, an obvious loss of major science laboratories such as Bell Labs and Xerox Palo Alto Research, stem cell research, and of course what promises to be as important to the future as a transistor was to my generation - quantum physics. The Economist only adds to what has happened in America. From The Economist of 27 Apr 2006 entitled The collider calamity:

Near Waxahachie in Texas, there is a hole in the ground. Not just any old hole. This one is almost 23km long and curves in what would be, if it were extended, a circular loop. It is the site of what was intended to be the world's biggest and best particle accelerator, a machine capable of unlocking some of the fundamental secrets of nature itself. Ever since the project to build it was cancelled in 1993, after nearly $2 billion had been spent on construction, America's lead in particle physics has been shrinking. This week, a report by the country's National Research Council (NRC) outlined what America can do to regain its pre-eminence.

The outlook is grim. After decades of making discoveries about the fundamental building blocks of nature, America's particle-physics colliders are to close. The Tevatron at Fermilab, near Chicago, is the world's highest-energy particle-smasher. ...

America's other accelerators are in trouble, too. Work at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Centre is moving away from particle physics and into generating high-energy X-rays. Funding for the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider at the Brookhaven National Laboratory is so tight that the machine managed to keep running only after a philanthropist intervened.

The New York Times continues on 30 Apr 2006:

Science Panel Report Says Physics in U.S. Faces Crisis
But just as things are becoming exciting in particle physics, support for such work in the United States has stagnated, and many large projects are closing down. Last winter, scientists at the Brookhaven National Laboratory on Long Island kept a major experiment going only after James Simons, an investment manager and mathematician, raised $13 million for the laboratory. ...
The most powerful accelerator now operating, the Tevatron at the Fermi National Laboratory outside Chicago, is scheduled to shut down in 2010, leaving Fermilab with an uncertain future.

Welfare for fundamental science research? Appreciate why. Three years ago we discussed the difference between basic research and application research; and why the two must be separate operations. How can science prosper in a nation where so few understand even basic science concepts (and are therefore so easily deceived using spin such as intelligent design). Even Leigh University - nickname the Engineers - changed their name to "Mountain Hawks" and now graduates more business majors than engineers. Why is this remembered? The last person seen wearing a Lehigh sweat shirt; I asked him what his major was: business.

A previous discussion demonstrated a problem: Wanted: A Gravedigger for NASA?
Many did not understand a difference between basic research (that once was done in Bell Labs) and application research (that was forced upon the Labs by AT&T MBAs).

Again from The Economist:

Many American particle physicists have switched their attentions to the LHC. And while physicists dream of shiny new machines, none is scheduled to be built in America.

No science planned in this subject? A science so fundamentally essential that quantum physics is even why disk drives store so much data.

From where did America gets its science leadership? Hitler literally stripped Europe of science and technology - driving so many famous scientists to America when one could become an immigrant within days: Fermi and Sklar (nuclear fission), von Brahm (rocketry), Einstein, Schrödinger (without his cat), Edward Teller (father of American hydrogen bomb), Pauli (uncertainty principle) ... just some of the more popular ones. Germany is estimated to have driven out about 25% of their physicists alone. Gottingen university was once one of the most famous centers of mathematics. A Nazi minister asked a famous mathematician David Hilbert about the state of mathematics "now that it is free of Jews." Hilbert replied, "Mathematics in Gottingen? There is really none any more." Why did America become world leaders in math?

From 1901 to 1932, Germany had 14 Nobel laureates in chemistry; America had 2. From 1932 to 1982, America had 24 Nobel laureates; Germany only 10. Do you think Americans are just naturally better innovators? Science and technology must be nutured by a society and leaders that understands what science is - and why immigrants are so important. Current president is an MBA - with all the knowledge that is to often found in MBA types.

Today, even stem cell research must move overseas because religion (what some adametly worship when educated in myths rather than reality) is imposed on science. Even a completely brain dead woman becomes a religous vendetta. We are even refighting battles over creationism - with some fancy title so as to confuse our uneducated: intelligent design. This because so many Americans have so little grasp of technology - also called reality.

Superconductivity was discovered in lead in about 1910. It took till 1950s to eventually get a theory as to how superconductivity works. But since we don't understand the underlying subatomic principles behind it, then superconductivity has been about 'lets try this one to see what it does'. Science by using a roulette wheel in a desperate hope that we may finally understand why it works and then get a useful superconductor. Only recently has anyone finally explained why so called high temperature superconductors work - and why they are completely different from low temperature superconductors. Where was this work done? Where basic research in quantum physics is moving. Europe - where science is fleeing America for so many reasons - including fear, security, and funding.

American universities have already warned of a 20% reduction in overseas science students - a major source of American science. Fatherland Security requirements are cited as a major reason. Posted previously was a Chinese delegation for a new possible WiFi (developed in China) that were suddenly and at the last minute denied visas to the Orland IEEE conference for this technology. These Chinese were security risks, according to George Jr's administration?

Cited are many reasons why science is slowly diminishing. It does not help that our government is now so science adverse and so wants to fix the world with military solutions (as religous extremists have attempted all through history). Why are the French now world leaders in space launches?

But most damning have been my meetings with so many engineers and programmers. I now routinely ask, "Would you want you child to be an engineer?" A question asked because EDN also asked that question. Literally everyone said no. As two programmers from India today told me, they are amazed at how many students taking software engineering don't even know how to program; don't even know at least one programming language. But then one (so called) software engineer recently graduated from U of Indiana only knows how to write scripts. Ask her about sorting algorithms? She need not know that 'stuff'.

So why would we want a super collider?. That $8billion was better spent on ISS - that does zero science - and has now cost more than $80billion. The ISS is probably the most visible spacecraft circling the earth at dawn or dusk - therefore it promotes America? More than 10 super colliders and increasing; and ISS still does nothing useful. But to George Jr, that is science. Yes, even the DoD software research budget has been decreased by well over 50% in the past three years. He withholds money for things that don't promote the invasion of Iran? Or did god tell him to do it? It explains why so much science is diminishing.

[richlevy]

I enjoyed you post, TW. The only thing I would caution you against is your use of superlatives.

So why would we want a super collider?. That $8billion was better spent on ISS - that does zero science - and has now cost more than $80billion.

Zero science? You may not agree with the goals or choice of experiments, but you should not ignore what is being done. Since you are an engineer, I expect you to be very careful with the use of 'zero' and '%100', realizing that such concepts do not always translate well into reality.

It is true that many of the experiments they mention have to do with long term healh issues related to zero gravity, as well as issues related to equipment exposure to solar radiation, things that would mostly be useful for long term space missions.

I agree that I do not see collider research being done in space, but I do see some physics experiments.

On Earth, the BCAT-3 colloids aren't very surprising -- they just sink to the bottom of the container. But in the absence of gravity, they behave like slow atoms, allowing scientists to model all sorts of atomic behavior.

According to the BCAT-3 scientists, studying colloids in space could lead to revolutionary advances in technology, such as computers that operate on light, new pharmaceuticals, clean power sources and unique propellants for rocket engines.

BCAT-3 focuses on two frontiers of science: critical points and crystallization.

You could argue that money spent on physics on earth can provide more answers for less resources, in other words be a better value, but to say that zero science is being done on the space station weakens your argument by demonstrating bias.

[xoxoxoBruce]

And he forgot to say "mental midget".
Just kidding TW, good post.

[tw]

Originally Posted by richlevy

I enjoyed you post, TW. The only thing I would caution you against is your use of superlatives.

When something is 0.007 inches, then how many inches are measured by a ruler? Zero. Once something is that near zero, then it is zero. Engineers deal in significant digits. Signifcantly - ISS does zero science.

There is science ongoing on the ISS. So much science as to be zero. ISS required three people just to maintain it. Only a fourth crewman provideds sufficient labor to do any science. No superlatives. If doing well less than 1% of science intended, then that is zero science.

Much of the human duration science that can be done well protected by earth's environment is done. ISS was considered for mothballing until the Shuttle could start flying again because it has no purpose. Russian opposed that decision quite strongly due to lessons learned from Mir. The only reason two spacemen remain in ISS - to keep it operational. No practical science exists in ISS until it can support a fourth crewman. It is a money pit.

Why was Columiba carrying Space lab? Space Lab was the only place where manned science could be performed. Why not on ISS? Insufficient resources to do any science in ISS. $80 billion is a lot of science better performed by satellites, robots, - and a rescued Hubble Space Telescope.

ISS does zero science. No superlative. Ongoing science is mostly show stuff - such as throwing out a space suit with a radio inside. As noted before, I would get NASA's Tech Briefs. Almost all NASA budget is for manned space. And yet most all science in those Tech Briefs came from unmanned science - that now dimishing to less than $3billion in a budget of $80billion annually. Where is all this ISS science? It does not exist.

Do we believe the propaganda? Or do we first demand numbers? ISS does virtually zero science.

Meanwhile notice what those NY Times and Economist reports say - no new sub atomic particle research machines planned and existing ones are closing in America - even for lack of money.

Also IEEE Spectrum reported on a large meeting to learn how to send men to Mars. Only way known considering our knowledge of materials, was to surround those astronauts with something like five feet of water. Not economically feasible. Cosmic rays - not a problem to ISS astronauts - would all but kill an astronaut to Mars. The final conclusion: every known means of protecting Mars astronauts does not work. We still have too much research to do here before we can send men to Mars. And what is happening to that research? It is dying in America - in places such as ISS.