Category Archives: Science/Medicine

Whisky 'helps fight cancer'

Drinking malt whisky may help prevent cancer, a scientific conference has been told.

The medicinal properties of antioxidants in red wine are well known, but delegates at a biochemistry conference were told that whisky offered “even greater health benefits”.

Dr Jim Swan, a consultant to the drinks industry, said: “There has been much in the news about the health benefits of antioxidants in red wine. By contrast, very little has been said about malt whisky distillery science.

“However, research has shown that there are even greater health benefits to people who drink single malt whiskies. Why? Single malt whiskies have more ellagic acid than red wine.”

But is there more ellagic acid in a small whisky or a large glass of red wine?

And does that I mean I can deduct the Laphroaig if I just drink it for, um, medicinal purposes? Especially given what it's selling for these days.

And, of course, there's always a killjoy somewhere:

However, Dr Lesley Walker of Cancer Research UK, pointed out that the same acid was found in fruit, and said she was “very concerned” that whisky was being promoted as a cancer prevention agent without data to support the claim.

“On the contrary, there is considerable data documenting the link between drinking excess alcohol and the increased risk of a number of cancers, particularly in smokers,” she said.

I don't smoke, so that should be no obstacle.

If the tax break thing doesn't work out, maybe I'll just eat more raspberries.

Chris Ambler, a veteran of the DNS wars, throws cold water on my plans to attend MIT's upcoming time travel convention at a later date to be announced. It seems that I will also need to perfect my FTL transport in order to get back here in a reasonable time from wherever the Earth has gone, cf. Ambler On The Net, An Aside… The Future Is Now… and Then.

On the other hand, I was always under the impression that the light-speed barrier is tied to our inability to travel in time, as doing so could mean that some information had traveled faster than light. Even so, the navigation issue looks substantial.

Which actually brings me to a serious question I've wondered about for years: given the movement of the galaxy, the solar system, our galactic cluster and all the other things rushing and spinning, about how fast is everyone on Earth actually moving relative to frame of the universe's center, if there is one? I suspect that's not as meaningful a question as it feels, given what I dimly recall about theories of expansion of the universe, and the serious possibility that there is no there back there, but I'd like to know anyway.

Birds May Be Behind Exploding German Toads.

Please note that this is filed under “Science” not humor, because it's apparently true.

I'm doomed.

Emails 'pose threat to IQ':The distractions of constant emails, text and phone messages are a greater threat to IQ and concentration than taking cannabis, according to a survey of befuddled volunteers.

Doziness, lethargy and an increasing inability to focus reached “startling” levels in the trials by 1,100 people, who also demonstrated that emails in particular have an addictive, drug-like grip.

Respondents' minds were all over the place as they faced new questions and challenges every time an email dropped into their inbox. Productivity at work was damaged and the effect on staff who could not resist trying to juggle new messages with existing work was the equivalent, over a day, to the loss of a night's sleep.

…The average IQ loss was measured at 10 points, more than double the four point mean fall found in studies of cannabis users.

The most damage was done, according to the survey, by the almost complete lack of discipline in handling emails.

I'm so doomed.

Via Cosmic Iguana – Voice of the Evil Doers comes news that there is now “overwhelming” (well, at least very substantial) evidence that Bisphenol A, aka BPA, a chemical found in plastics, is likely leaching out of plastic bottles and into our bodies. Each bottle may add only a trace amount, but the cumulative of this estrogenic compound effect might, the Iguana suggests, explain radically dropping sperm counts in the US.

Are we living an unintentional evolutionary experiment in which we select strongly for resistance to an estrogenic compound? Perhaps…but only if the effect is real, large numbers of people don't have diets that avoid the plastics, and — most importantly — only if this is is something to which some part of the population actually has a resistance.

You'd think they'd know if they have a black hole or not. But apparently it's only speculation. BBC : Lab fireball 'may be black hole'. Or you can read the rather mathy paper, The RHIC fireball as a dual black hole.

I'm presuming it's not going to eat the earth up because in tiny fractions of a second it doesn't get big enough to be stable and thus flies appart when they turn off the juice.

Anyway, while we wait for the earth to collapse, there's a highly amusing Slashdot discussion of the alleged phenomenon.