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Aug 27, 2011
Sciencewatch.com Pays Tribute to Mark A. Smith Special Topic of Alzheimer’s Disease, June 2011
Posted by George Perry in categories: biotech/medical, life extension
Aug 27, 2011
Calorie Restriction: A Cell Signaling Diet!
Posted by Paul McGlothin in categories: biological, life extension
Some people say that a calorie restriction (CR) diet is difficult to follow. It used to be. But things have changed: Thanks to great work by leading scientists, current approaches to calorie restriction are just as much about cell signaling as about limiting calories.
It is known, for example, that serious long-term CR dramatically lowers insulin levels.1 Another hormone, with a similar molecular structure, insulin-like growth factor one (IGF-I), shares the same pathway with insulin and is downregulated by CR in animal studies and by calorie restricted humans who do not follow high protein diets.2
And there’s the rub. For if you hope to benefit from calorie restriction and do not pay attention to the special properties of macronutrient intake, individual foods, and food preparation, you may get an unpleasant surprise: excessive stimulation of the insulin/IGF-I pathway. For example, in a study using healthy volunteers, just 50 grams of white potato starch sends glucose and insulin soaring3 to levels associated with increased risk of cancer, heart disease and diabetes.4
Back in the 1930s, when the term calorie restriction was first applied to Dr. Clive McCay’s rat and mouse experiments,5 it was entirely appropriate because the focus was on calories since he was looking at growth retardation. Of course, little was known about the signals involved in the life-extending effects of the diet. All that changed as scientists discovered important cell-signaling patterns that produce the phenomenal life-transforming effects.6
In 2008, The CR Way took the latest CR science and crafted it into a holistic lifestyle that makes following a CR diet easier by transforming it into a happy, positive lifestyle that focuses on living better now and quite possibly living longer. Recipes, food choices, and lifestyle are deliciously and strategically planned to reduce the insulin / IGF-I pathway activity – making disease risk plummet, while increasing the probability of a longer life.
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1. Fontana L, Meyer T.E., Klein S, Holloszy J.O. Long-Term Calorie Restriction Is Highly Effective In Reducing The Risk For Atherosclerosis In Humans. Proceedings of the National Academy of Science USA 2004;101(17):6659–6663.
2. Fontana L, Klein S, Holloszy J.O. Long-term low-protein low-calorie diet and endurance exercise modulate metabolic factors associated with cancer risk. American Journal of Clinical Nutrition. 2006;84:1456–62.
3.Brand-Miller JC, et al. Mean changes in plasma glucose and insulin responses in 10 young adults after consumption of 50g carbohydrates from potato (high-glycemic index; GI) or barley (low-GI) meal. American Journal of Clinical Nutrition. 2005 Aug;82(2):350–4
4. Guideline for Management of Post-meal Glucose, International Diabetes Federation, 2007 ISBN 2−930229−48−9
5. McCay CM, Crowell MF, Maynard LA. Journal of Nutrition. l0:63–79, 1935
6. McGlothin PS, Averill MS. Advances in Calorie restriction. Antiaging Medicine. 2009 Aug;4(4):440–441
Aug 26, 2011
The Technological Catalyst behind the Frequent Financial Market Capitulation
Posted by James Felton Keith in categories: economics, finance
I got this tweet today, as a part of a larger conversation that technological breakthroughs could help predict disruptive economic times. During the past 10 days or so, the US and global financial markets have taken a deep plung, as a result of, well, according to the CIOs (chief investment officers) and politicians, we don’t know. The new industry pins the almost unanimous economic decisions of sell sell sell, to the latest new is geo-political interactions and/or financial specific news.
We see headlines like “Downgrade Ignites a Global Selloff” at the Wall Street Journal, referring to the Standard & Poor’s downgraded credit rating of US treasuries, which by the way soared during the selloff of equities, because of their relative strength.
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Aug 25, 2011
Open Letter to the Dalai Lama
Posted by Otto E. Rössler in categories: existential risks, particle physics
No other high-ranking personality on the planet is paying attention to the fact that a scientific proof of danger stays un-refuted for 3 years: That the planet will be shrunken to 2 cm (a black hole) in about 5 years’ time with a probability of 3 percent if the currently running grandiose LHC experiment is not halted immediately.
Since your mind is a unique bridge between the Eastern and the Western world view, you are the only institution on the planet which with authority can demand the necessary scientific safety conference. Even though this particular now and this particular existence is not everything, the sparing of suffering is a holy vocation.
Allow me to convey to you cordial greetings from your friend John S. Bell.
In deep respect
Sincerely yours,
Otto E. Rossler, chaos researcher
Aug 24, 2011
Why Do My Alarmist Results — One Percent Armageddon — Not Cause a Stir?, Says Gandhi
Posted by Otto E. Rössler in categories: existential risks, particle physics
Answer: the media. They have – much as in an authoritarian society – voluntarily decided to keep a lid on it all. This is fine as soon as one cannot do anything about it anymore. But this “hurrying-on-ahead obedience” has the consequence that the experiment is presently running with a vengeance, raising the danger by a factor of three in the coming ten weeks. Imagine: 3 percent Armageddon.
After 4 years of waiting in vain, I still hope that someone will find a fault in my deductive chain no matter how unlikely. Therefore I still request nothing but the “scientific safety conference” asked-for by the Cologne Administrative Court on January 27, 2011.
Someone outside the big CERN umbrella reading this near-inaudible cry for help ought to be able to sneak through the media curtain to publicize the content of this Samizdat. Anyone who has children anywhere on the planet. Or do you want to see the terror in their eyes in a few years’ time? We all are the horn of Africa.
The request to have a second look at the European Nuclear Experiment is a most decent request – absolutely nonviolent. To deny it is a manifest crime. Even a court is on my side. Why not join the new Gandhi movement since this is what Gandhi would say today?
Aug 22, 2011
How Can I Convince the World That It Is Reasonable to Double Check?
Posted by Otto E. Rössler in categories: existential risks, particle physics
Despite some nominations I am just a stupid scientist who found evidence that the currently running LHC experiment in Geneva jeopardizes the planet with a probability of 3 percent, with the largest part of this number still avoidable if the LHC is stopped immediately.
No one in science or the media believes me, only a court in Cologne did but they since also have become nonpersons. This appears to be a unique phenomenon in history since not a single scientist has a counter-proof to offer. All I am and ever was asking for is to double-check: a scientific safety conference. The latter has become the best-heeded taboo of history.
Why is it a sin to see farther? The youngest sailor who can climb the crow’s nest possesses the right and the duty to tell the crew what no one else sees. No one is allowed to shout him down. The same holds true in science: The most reasonable consensus of yesterday is scrap paper in the face of a new finding. My finding bears the name of a young man, Telemach.
The T stands for time, l for length, m for mass and ch for charge (the vowels being for better pronunciation). T,l,m,ch all change by the same factor in gravity, the first two go up, the last two down. Einstein 104 years ago focused on the T but the other three letters are implicit in his later equation. Nevertheless the young man got overlooked for nine decades. Now in the absence of a counter-proof, the specialists are unable to rejoice. Maybe it is because it was not one of them who found the news?
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Aug 20, 2011
The Nature of Identity Part 3
Posted by Alexander MacRae in categories: neuroscience, robotics/AI
The Nature of Identity Part 3
(Drawings not reproduced here — contact the author for copies)
We have seen how the identity is defined by the 0,0 point – the centroid or locus of perception.
The main problem we have is finding out how neural signals translate into sensory signals – how neural information is translated into the language we understand – that of perception. How does one neural pattern become Red and another the Scent of coffee. Neurons do not emit any color nor any scent.
As in physics, so in cognitive science, some long cherished theories and explanations are having to change.
Perception, and the concept of an Observer (the 0,0 point), are intimately related to the idea of Identity.
Aug 20, 2011
Which Country’s Veto in Security Council Enables the Current Planetary Suicide Attempt?
Posted by Otto E. Rössler in categories: existential risks, particle physics
Germany refused the scientific safety conference asked-for by a Cologne court seven months ago. Now a country with veto power blocks the initiative put before the United Nations Security Council to impose a double-check before it is too late.
The fact that Germany still refuses to take back having declared the scientist now responsible for the warning insane 15 years ago for having withstood police in his lecture hall for months in a row after revealing a new obedience law without knowing it was a secret, may contribute to the lacking world response. I therefore repeat my request for an apology from the part of Germany and for an answer why she illogically refused the safety conference.
Please, dear citizens of the planet: do not let traditional European obedience kill you and your families and unborn descendants. Black holes are not a joke but the worst danger of history. German-led CERN continues its attempt at producing them even though it knows that its machines cannot detect them.
Why refuse having a look at an un-disproved danger? I count on your love, mothers and fathers of all countries: ask the same question.
Aug 20, 2011
More on Problems of Uploading an Identity
Posted by Alexander MacRae in categories: neuroscience, robotics/AI
The vulnerability of the bio body is the source of most threats to its existence.
We have looked at the question of uploading the identity by uploading the memory contents, on the assumption that the identity is contained in the memories. I believe this assumption has been proved to be almost certainly wrong.
What we are concentrating on is the identity as the viewer of its perceptions, the centroid or locus of perception.
It is the fixed reference point. And the locus of perception is always Here, and it is always Now. This is abbreviated here to 0,0.
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