Messages

Thats very goofy. I like where he punches the guy out. 

I think Kai was referring to how Buddhism was set up, not what its become now.

I think Kai is fully capable of speaking for himself.

How do you think Buddhism was set up?

Did you not note where I said Classical Buddhism? I meant the teachings of Siddhartha Gautama taken in their original contexts, not the esoterica of modern followings, not the reincarnation of Lamas or tantra or even Zen Koans.

Someone smart points to the moon and people look at his finger, and then their own fingers, and then they start killing or discriminating against anyone whos fingers look different. Its the general progression of any philosophical path in history.

Links, pls.

Because all I see in buddhism is a bunch of people claiming their sect is the true contextualization of Gotama's teachings.

What makes your claim more valid?

Thats the rub isn't it? I can't really back it up. In fact, it would have been smart of me to never have replied in this thread. However, I also  have no plans to go out and start a monestary set up under the true realizations in the original context as I have been personally inspired to see it. Yes, there are filters to the information I can obtain about Gautama's teachings. The Pali cannon, what is considered the oldest lineage of the Dhamma, was remember verbally for centuries before it was written down. By that point, only one monk remembered the whole of the teachings, and he was very arrogant about it. You might say that this is not a good source for a philosophical path, but its the closest thing we have to the original. And even then, you have to study carefully, in context, because who knows who changed what to suit their wants at some time in the past. It it seems off, it might be. Thats why Gautama said you have to test his teachings, find them to be true from experience or discard them. That /really/ doesn't sound like something someone trying to start a religion to get followers would say, "question your faith, and if it seems wrong, don't follow it".

But I guess it must seem impossible to a misanthrope such as your self that someone would ever genuinely want to help people relieve their suffering, find a way to do it, and then share it with people without selfishly expecting a return in goods, services, or simply control/power, right?

I genuinely want to help people, actually, but this doesn't mean what I do will be beneficial. Even Scientologists truly believe they are helping people.

I just don't subscribe to the belief that Gotama's way is the only way to relieve suffering, or the best way for most people. There's certainly something to it, but things such as vegetarianism, devaluing ego, and this fixation on maintaining a neutral affect just don't sit well with me to put it lightly.

I've tested various techniques and philosophies of buddhism and kept what resonates. The rest seems dogmatic, based on tradition and asks for too much faith in a fallible and dead primate. Sure, Gotama was clever and said to test his teachings and reject what doesn't line up with your experience, but that gets such little emphasis and development that it's not considered a core buddhist idea as far as I know.

Thanks for taking the time to share this, though. I'll look into the Pali canon. Are there any authors, historians or scholars that you recommend?

On veganism, I don't believe that Siddhartha said that you /must/ follow it. From what I remember, he said that over time you will find yourself disliking eating meat because you see the suffering it causes, and thus will stop doing so. He never mandated vegetarianism as far as whats in the pali cannon, not even for monks I believe. I don't believe I've ever heard anything about ego devaluing, or maintaining a neutral effect. The teacher I like most is Thich Nhat Hanh, because he tends to cut through the bullshit that has been tacked on. I don't really trust the Dalai Lama because of his ties to the esoterica of tibetan buddhism, which seems to be alot of useless ritual, and that isn't to say that all ritual is useless either. I don't like pure land because it strikes me of being a buddhist version of christianity. I don't like Zen because enlightenment isn't just something that hits you, you have to work at it, and it requires alot of deep looking. I don't like any type of buddhism that demands fealty to its teachings, or puts too much hold in studying esoterica or chanting with gongs or whatev. I don't hold any stock in traditions that don't hold to the base of the noble truths, the eightfold path, and the four establishments of mindfulness. In any type of buddhist community I might pursue being a part of, I would make sure that mindfulness, above all, is the focus. This also tends to be the focus of Nhat Hanh and his teachings have been very useful to me, so I follow them because experience in things working have lead me to believe he's got a pretty good idea of what need doing. He also advocates social action, which is pretty important as well. I have also read a book by Noah Levine, Against the Stream, its a very nice modern approach for younger people. Levine was a punk rocker that came into buddhism after losing his life to violence and drugs and was institutionalized, and then he started meditating and it gave him his life back. Either of those two authors are good because they reject the sectarianism that goes on in buddhism. I believe Nhat Hanh has actually done quite a bit of Christian-Buddhist dialogue, and was even nominated for the Nobel Peace Price by MLK Jr.

So, I suggest Nhat Hanh's Heart of the Buddha's Teachings, and actually, I suggest Anger: Wisdom for cooling the flames, because its a book that really helped me understand how to care for my anger, and the methods are useful for any powerful emotion really. I've read other stuff but I don't find any other teacher nearly as candid, straightforward, or helpful.

Hm, a person who takes up an activity/hobby merely for amusement...

isn't that the very definition of what being a troll is, 'for the lulz'?

Kai, while I can appreciate why this may be a sensitive topic for you, I do think reacting about an Austin Powers reference (especially one where, if you have seen the film, it turns out he is WRONG) is not necessary when it is nothing more than a lighthearted pop culture nod.

We don't exactly tiptoe around other subjects, unless a person is being purposively denigrating and bigoted, and I see no evidence of that here.  I may be wrong, perhaps you can point to something otherwise, but as far as I can see, Vene's only crime is that of carefree thread naming.

Nahh, I'm just a bit too sensitive. Sorry to everyone here. No one should have to tiptoe around me.

Sorry Vene.

I think Kai was referring to how Buddhism was set up, not what its become now.

I think Kai is fully capable of speaking for himself.

How do you think Buddhism was set up?

Did you not note where I said Classical Buddhism? I meant the teachings of Siddhartha Gautama taken in their original contexts, not the esoterica of modern followings, not the reincarnation of Lamas or tantra or even Zen Koans.

Someone smart points to the moon and people look at his finger, and then their own fingers, and then they start killing or discriminating against anyone whos fingers look different. Its the general progression of any philosophical path in history.

Links, pls.

Because all I see in buddhism is a bunch of people claiming their sect is the true contextualization of Gotama's teachings.

What makes your claim more valid?

Thats the rub isn't it? I can't really back it up. In fact, it would have been smart of me to never have replied in this thread. However, I also  have no plans to go out and start a monestary set up under the true realizations in the original context as I have been personally inspired to see it. Yes, there are filters to the information I can obtain about Gautama's teachings. The Pali cannon, what is considered the oldest lineage of the Dhamma, was remember verbally for centuries before it was written down. By that point, only one monk remembered the whole of the teachings, and he was very arrogant about it. You might say that this is not a good source for a philosophical path, but its the closest thing we have to the original. And even then, you have to study carefully, in context, because who knows who changed what to suit their wants at some time in the past. It it seems off, it might be. Thats why Gautama said you have to test his teachings, find them to be true from experience or discard them. That /really/ doesn't sound like something someone trying to start a religion to get followers would say, "question your faith, and if it seems wrong, don't follow it".

But I guess it must seem impossible to a misanthrope such as your self that someone would ever genuinely want to help people relieve their suffering, find a way to do it, and then share it with people without selfishly expecting a return in goods, services, or simply control/power, right?

I think Kai was referring to how Buddhism was set up, not what its become now.

I think Kai is fully capable of speaking for himself.

How do you think Buddhism was set up?

Did you not note where I said Classical Buddhism? I meant the teachings of Siddhartha Gautama taken in their original contexts, not the esoterica of modern followings, not the reincarnation of Lamas or tantra or even Zen Koans.

Someone smart points to the moon and people look at his finger, and then their own fingers, and then they start killing or discriminating against anyone whos fingers look different. Its the general progression of any philosophical path in history.

*facepalm*

This is why I should keep things to myself.

August 18, 2008
Windmills Split Town and Families

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

LOWVILLE, N.Y. (Associated Press)—"Listen," John Yancey says, leaning against his truck in a field outside his home.

The rhythmic whoosh, whoosh, whoosh of wind turbines echoes through the air. Sleek and white, their long propeller blades rotate in formation, like some otherworldly dance of spindly-armed aliens swaying across the land.

Yancey stares at them, his face contorted in anger and pain. He knows the futuristic towers are pumping clean electricity into the grid, knows they have been largely embraced by his community. But Yancey hates them. He hates the sight and he hates the sound.

http://snipurl.com/3hdek

Dr. Doom

from the New York Times Magazine (Registration Required)

On Sept. 7, 2006, Nouriel Roubini, an economics professor at New York University, stood before an audience of economists at the International Monetary Fund and announced that a crisis was brewing.

In the coming months and years, he warned, the United States was likely to face a once-in-a-lifetime housing bust, an oil shock, sharply declining consumer confidence and, ultimately, a deep recession.

He laid out a bleak sequence of events: homeowners defaulting on mortgages, trillions of dollars of mortgage-backed securities unraveling worldwide and the global financial system shuddering to a halt. These developments, he went on, could cripple or destroy hedge funds, investment banks and other major financial institutions like Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. The audience seemed skeptical, even dismissive.

http://snipurl.com/3hdel

The Newest Generation of Drugs: Who Can Afford Them?

from the Seattle Times

Sally Garcia, a 53-year-old lawyer disabled by multiple sclerosis, was torn. A new-generation medication, Copaxone, was really working for her. After two decades of being in and out of hospitals, Garcia was taking steps to work again.

Her wallet, though, was in severe distress. Under her Medicare prescription plan, Garcia's share of the expensive drug was $330 per month. All together, medications were taking a third of her disability payments—her only income—and she couldn't swing it.

Copaxone, Enbrel, Remicade: For some patients, such new-generation drugs, often called "biologicals" or "bioengineered" when they are created by genetically modified living cells, have performed magic. In some cases, they work when other drugs have failed, or for diseases that previously had no drug treatments at all. But they cost a lot—often $2,000 to $3,000 per month.

http://snipurl.com/3hdeo

Progress Against Toxins in Toys Takes Small Steps

from the Chicago Tribune (Registration Required)

When a nationwide ban on hormone-disrupting chemicals in soft plastic toys and cosmetics takes effect early next year, it will mark an important turning point in efforts to remove toxic compounds from consumer products.

The ban on a group of chemicals known as phthalates is part of a major overhaul of the nation's consumer safety system brokered last month by Congress. It reflects growing concerns among parents and public health advocates that children are absorbing a vast array of harmful substances, sometimes merely by sucking on a rubber duck, drinking from a plastic bottle or playing on treated carpet.

Indeed, new health concerns seem to be raised every month or so about some oddly named chemical that has been used for decades in toys, cosmetics and consumer products.

http://snipurl.com/3hdeq

Pluto Is Part of Hot Debate

from the Baltimore Sun

It was billed as a debate over the 2006 decision by the International Astronomical Union that kicked Pluto out of the family of planets, leaving just eight.

But in the end, after a jocular and noisy tussle before scientists and educators gathered at the Johns Hopkins University's Applied Physics Laboratory, both debaters agreed that the IAU's definition only muddied the waters, and that more time is needed for science to sort out the increasingly complex range of objects circling our sun and other stars.

"Get the notion of counting things out of your system," said Neil deGrasse Tyson, director of New York's Hayden Planetarium. "The more we learn about anything, the more we have to tune the vocabulary we use to describe it."  The two debaters also expressed delight that a scientific debate has captured so much public attention.

http://snipurl.com/3hdew

F.B.I. Will Present Scientific Evidence in Anthrax Case to Counter Doubts

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON—Growing doubts from scientists about the strength of the government's case against the late Bruce E. Ivins, the military researcher named as the anthrax killer, are forcing the Justice Department to begin disclosing more fully the scientific evidence it used to implicate him.

In the face of the questions, Federal Bureau of Investigation officials have decided to make their first detailed public presentation [this] week on the forensic science used to trace the anthrax used in the 2001 attacks to a flask kept in a refrigerator in Dr. Ivins's laboratory at Fort Detrick, in Maryland. Many scientists are awaiting those details because so far, they say, the F.B.I. has failed to make a conclusive case.

"That is going to be critically important, because right now there is really no data to make a scientific judgment one way or the other," Brad Smith, a molecular biologist at the Center for Biosecurity at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center. "The information that has been put out, there is really very little scientific information in there."

http://snipurl.com/3hdf0

Controversial Chemical Bisphenol A Is Safe, FDA Says

from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

A draft document released Friday by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration declares that a chemical commonly found in baby bottles and aluminum can linings is safe.

The document comes on the heels of several conflicting reports by national and international agencies released this year on the safety of the chemical, bisphenol A.

It was immediately embraced by industry scientists, who commended the federal agency's "thorough analysis," and condemned by environmental groups that questioned the timing of the report's release and its reliance on industry funded studies.

http://snipurl.com/3hdfb

Summit Targets World Water Issues

from BBC News Online

While global attention has recently focused on energy and food, a global summit this week in Stockholm, Sweden, will tackle the key issue of water.

The World Water Week meeting starts on Sunday and will hear renewed calls to solve growing challenges of sanitation, climate change and drinkable supplies.

Sanitation in particular is one of the most important global issues. The organisers say lack of adequate sanitation is a scandal that costs the lives of 1.4m children every year.  Investing in this area, say scientists, is the most cost effective health intervention the world could make.

http://snipurl.com/3hdfh

Archaeologists Get a Glimpse of Life in a Sahara Eden

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

The tiny skeletal hand jutted from the sand as if beckoning the living to the long dead.

For thousands of years, it had lain unheeded in the most desolate section of the Sahara, surrounded by the bones of hippos, giraffes and other creatures typically found in the jungle.

A chance discovery by a team of American scientists has led to the unearthing of a Stone Age cemetery that is providing the first glimpses of what life was like during the still-mysterious period when monsoons brought rain to the desert and created the "green Sahara."

http://snipurl.com/3gd5t

The 2003 Northeast Blackout—Five Years Later

from Scientific American

On August 14, 2003, shortly after 2 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time, a high-voltage power line in northern Ohio brushed against some overgrown trees and shut down—a fault, as it's known in the power industry. The line had softened under the heat of the high current coursing through it. Normally, the problem would have tripped an alarm in the control room of FirstEnergy Corporation, an Ohio-based utility company, but the alarm system failed.

Over the next hour and a half, as system operators tried to understand what was happening, three other lines sagged into trees and switched off, forcing other power lines to shoulder an extra burden. Overtaxed, they cut out by 4:05 P.M., tripping a cascade of failures throughout southeastern Canada and eight northeastern states.

All told, 50 million people lost power for up to two days in the biggest blackout in North American history. The event contributed to at least 11 deaths and cost an estimated $6 billion. So, five years later, are we still at risk for a massive blackout?

http://snipurl.com/3g21o

Buddhism is essentially an atheistic religion; at least it's one where believing in gods is not a part of the mainstream belief.

Buddhism is not athiestic. An athiestic religion would require nonbelief in gods. Instead, Buddhism is nonthiestic, meaning that the Buddha had nothing more to say about gods than that they were unable to help us with our enlightenment. He actually encouraged people to practice their own religions along with his teachings (told someone who asked what they should do to be with Brahma(god) when they die, and he gave the teaching of the Bramhavadas, the four immesurable minds). In fact, I don't even consider classical Buddhism a religion, because religions by nature contain some sort of dogma that must be followed. In Buddhism there are several warnings against teachers, and one is taught to examine the teachings in order to understand if they work or not. The Buddha didn't require anyone to believe anything, that wasn't what he was trying to achieve; rather, he wished to free all beings from suffering, found a way to do that, and found a way to share that message with people.

Why haven't you gone away yet?

Putting aside the somewhat rude title of this thread, the olimpic games made the right choice about this issue. Gender and sex discrimination against the intersexed is no new issue.

he's like a human Cthulhu.

even if you're his right hand man, it just means that he'll eat you last.

I thought he wanted to be killed first?

I am so going to start using the word yankee to refer to pirates now.

[mate selection is not random]

Holy shit, YES, we have a live one here and they can take my snark! 

Okay, to your first point, yes, they are different. Why? Because in sexual selection (a subset of natural selection), mate selection is not random. Natural Selection is not a random process. Genetic Drift, however, IS a random process. The greatest controversy in evolutionary biology is which of those two are more important? Most biologists agree that both natural selection and genetic drift occur in some amount, but very few agree as to what proportion each occur. Are there situations where one is irrelevant?

Natural selection, at least when we speak of it including sexual selection, does not deal with probabilities, as I said. Darwins thesis was that individuals with favorable traits are more likely to reproduce because they are A. more fit with the environment (environmental selection) and b. more attractive to a mate (sexual selection), and that these traits are passed on to the offspring and become a larger precentage of the population. This is counting, however, only for traits that are visible and would be considered detrimental or favorable. The other traits, hidden or neutral, will change according to probability. This change is called genetic drift. Like I said above, biologists argue alot about which one is more important in evolutionary change.

Now, compairing that to chemicals is like compairing apples and oranges. The biological process is a combination of random and deterministic elements with billions of variables. The chemical process is relatively simple. You can't compare the two because they are completly dissimilar. The reduction in allele frequency (I'm guessing you are reffering to peppered moth populations) occured because of a thousand different variables coming together at once, habitat selection for the moth, prey selection and availability for the birds, climate and human population effects. Its such a mixture of complex random and deterministic events that comparing it to chemical processes is oversimplfying to the point where it bears no resemblance to the truth. Its too unpredictable.

When you talk about probability of continued existance, I believe you are talking about variables, whereas with evolutionary biology you are talking about alleles within a genepool. Mixed metaphors, different processes, too many variables.

Also, unnatural selection is a bad misspelling, a satyrical meme, and has nothing to do with the scientific theory of natural selection.

random? do you think that molecular stability is random? which is easier to degrade starch or ethanol and why? these processes are not even nearly random, it strongly depends on their surroundings just as mate selection. it depends partly on properties of the molecule itself (for example the strength and number of its covalent bonds) and partly on properties of its surroundings/environment (the presence of enzymes, temperature, pH)

Is 'more likely' not equal to increased probability?
as to chemical processes being dissimilar, this is of course true but if you think of the effects of the environment on the subject(organism or otherwise) as a black box then the output of said black box is the probability of continued existence(regardless of the processes inside the black box or what it is acting on). Now when i talk about continued existence i do not mean physical existence but the continued existence of this particular bit of information wether this information is encoded in DNA or in the presence of the actual subject does not matter. it does not matter if your genes survive to 2050 inside your body or inside the bodies of your onyl surviving offspring, as long as they can still interact with the other genes in the genepool.

Don't forget that selection takes places at the genetic level and that genes are molecules.

PS i'm really enjoying this

PPS i'm not attacking the theory of natural selection, i just do not understand why it is stil called natural selection when natural implies that it is not influenced by human industry while the theory has the same predicting power when the selection is not natural.
hmmm just had a thought: maybe 'natural' was simply used to set it apart from supernatural i.e. divine, or just used as we use the world 'real' in this day and age.

PPPS my reasoning skills are deteriorating under the influence of beer and exhaustion so i am going to sleep, goodnight Kai.

I'm sorry but, while I can see some similarities between chemical "selection" and natural evolutionary processes, I still don't believe they make a good comparison. I'm glad you are enjoying this; at the moment I am exausted from a 1000 mile/24 hour drive which I haven't slept yet from. Natural Selection is called that because that is the name that Charles Darwin gave the process when he outlined the main details  more than 100 years ago. Natural selection was most likely used to set the processes outlined apart from a divine order. Christianity was the main force against which Darwin fought to publish and make widely known his findings.

Kai, I knew there was a reason I liked you.

August 15, 2008
Screen Wars: Stealing TV's 'Eyeball' Share

from the Christian Science Monitor

Is this the summer that the Internet finally kills television as we once knew it?

Most industry observers are stopping short of that prediction, citing some significant hurdles still in the way. But the growing number of new deals and new devices being announced suggests that a profound change in the way people watch video—and what video they watch—is under way.

The line between "television" and video via the Internet already has blurred and may disappear in coming years. At least one industry analyst has declared "TV is dead" and welcomes Americans to a new age of video everywhere. Increasingly, Americans are watching video when they want to, and on the screen that suits them at the time.

http://snipurl.com/3g1v4

Infant Transplant Procedure Ignites Debate

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Surgeons in Denver are publishing their first account of a procedure in which they remove the hearts of severely brain-damaged newborns less than two minutes after the babies are disconnected from life support, and their hearts stop beating, so the organs can be transplanted into infants who would otherwise die.

A detailed description of the transplants in [yesterday's] issue of the New England Journal of Medicine has ignited an intense debate about whether the first-of-their-kind procedures are pushing an already controversial organ-retrieval strategy beyond acceptable legal, moral and ethical bounds.

The doctors who performed the operations as part of a federally funded research project defended the practice, and some advocates for organ donation praised the operations as offering the first clear evidence that the procedures could provide desperately needed hearts for terminally ill babies.

http://snipurl.com/3g1ok

The Old Motor Roars Back

from the Economist

Small cars sometimes struggle to climb steep hills. But a converted Chevrolet Lacetti has something special to help it along. Instead of having to keep changing down and revving harder to ascend a winding Alpine-type test track, the engine can cruise almost to the summit in top gear.

This is because the car benefits from one of the developments that in these more economical and greener times promises to give the petrol engine a new lease of life. Old technologies have a habit of fighting back when new ones come along. This is not surprising because they often have an enormous amount of design, engineering and production knowledge invested in them—especially so in the case of car engines.

So new hybrid systems, fuel cells and electric motors will be chasing a moving target. The internal combustion engine will be getting better too. The Lacetti is just one example. It gets its extra oomph from a supercharger forcing more air into the combustion chambers of its engine. This is an old idea that used to speed up 1920s racing cars ...

http://snipurl.com/3g20k

Giant Prehistoric "Kangaroos" Killed Off by Humans

from National Geographic News

Humans, not climate change, were responsible for the extinction of giant "kangaroos" and other massive marsupials in Tasmania more than 40,000 years ago, according to new research.

Hunting on the Australian island exterminated several prehistoric animals, including the kangaroo-like beasts, marsupial "hippopotamuses," and leopard-like cats, a team of scientists announced.

The giant kangaroo-like Protemnon anak, a long-necked leaf browser, survived on Tasmania until at least 41,000 years ago—much later than previously believed and up to 2,000 years after the first human settlers are believed to have arrived—according to new radiocarbon and luminescence dating of fossils, some of which were accidentally found by cavers.

http://snipurl.com/3g1az

Hope for Arthritis Vaccine 'Cure'

from BBC News Online

A single injection of modified cells could halt the advance of rheumatoid arthritis, say UK scientists. The Newcastle University team is about to start small-scale safety trials of the jab, which will hopefully stop the immune system attacking the joints.

The Arthritis Research Campaign, which is funding the project, said if successful, the treatment would be "revolutionary." It could be fully tested and available within five years.

Rheumatoid arthritis is one of a family of "autoimmune" diseases, in which the body's defence systems launch attacks on its own tissues. In the case of rheumatoid arthritis, this means painful inflammation and progressive damage to the joints, eased only slightly by courses of painkillers and immune dampening drugs.

http://snipurl.com/3g1rr

To Protect Whales, Navy Will Limit Use of Low-Frequency Sonar

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

The U.S. Navy will restrict the use of low-frequency active sonar during training to prevent possible harm to whales and other creatures, under an agreement reached with environmental groups Tuesday.

The accord, approved by a federal court in San Francisco, would restrict the use of a type of sonar in areas in the Pacific Ocean that are known to be whale breeding grounds and key habitat, such as the Humpback Whale National Marine Sanctuary off Hawaii.

The Navy and environmentalists have been jousting in court for several years over the risk to whales and other marine life posed by underwater noise from sonar exercises. A separate lawsuit, not involved in Tuesday's announcement, involves mid-frequency sonar. That case is pending at the U.S. Supreme Court.

http://snipurl.com/3g1i1

Breast Cancer: Risk of Relapse Low After Surviving 5 Years

from USA Today

Women who survive five years after being diagnosed with breast cancer have a good chance of remaining cancer-free, a new study shows. In the most detailed study of its kind, the report shows that 89% of such patients remain disease-free 10 years after diagnosis, and 81% are cancer-free after 15 years.

Authors of the study, published online Tuesday in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, say their findings may reassure breast cancer survivors, many of whom assume their odds are much bleaker.

"Patients often ask me, 'Now that I've survived my breast cancer, what is my future risk of a recurrence?' " says author Abenaa Brewster, an assistant professor at Houston's M.D. Anderson Cancer Center. "This is an answer we've had a hard time giving. They remain really terrified about their risk."

http://snipurl.com/3g1q6

Venomous Lionfish Prowls Fragile Caribbean Waters

from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (Registration Required)

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (Associated Press)—A maroon-striped marauder with venomous spikes is rapidly multiplying in the Caribbean's warm waters, swallowing native species, stinging divers and generally wreaking havoc on an ecologically delicate region.

The red lionfish, a tropical native of the Indian and Pacific oceans that probably escaped from a Florida fish tank, is showing up everywhere—from the coasts of Cuba and Hispaniola to Little Cayman's pristine Bloody Bay Wall, one of the region's prime destinations for divers.

Wherever it appears, the adaptable predator corners fish and crustaceans up to half its size with its billowy fins and sucks them down in one violent gulp. Research teams observed one lionfish eating 20 small fish in less than 30 minutes.

http://snipurl.com/3g1vz

Drugs Treat Heart Pain Nearly as Well as Stents, Study Says

from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Common heart drugs worked nearly as well in treating chest pain in patients with stable heart disease as a more invasive and expensive procedure known as stenting, according to a study, suggesting that many of the hundreds of thousands of such procedures done each year may be unnecessary as a first-line treatment.

Those who got stents and drug therapy had only a small additional benefit in pain relief and that disappeared within two to three years, compared with those who got drug therapy alone.

The finding, which was published Thursday in the New England Journal of Medicine, is the latest piece of research to question the need for the large numbers of elective angioplasties to open blocked coronary arteries. It's estimated that several hundred thousand of the elective procedures are performed each year in the United States.

http://snipurl.com/3g1xm

Rapid Growth Found in Oxygen-Starved Ocean 'Dead Zones'

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Many coastal areas of the world's oceans are being starved of oxygen at an alarming rate, with vast stretches along the seafloor depleted of it to the point that they can barely sustain marine life, researchers are reporting.

The main culprit, scientists say, is nitrogen-rich nutrients from crop fertilizers that spill into coastal waters by way of rivers and streams.

A study to be published Friday in the journal Science says the number of these marine "dead zones" around the world has doubled about every 10 years since the 1960s. About 400 coastal areas now have periodically or perpetually oxygen-starved bottom waters, many of them growing in size and intensity. Combined, the zones are larger than Oregon.

http://snipurl.com/3gbvl

Is better?

Yes, that Tettagoniid would be underage.