A U.S. cage fighter ripped out the heart of his training partner while he was still alive after becoming convinced he was possessed by the devil, it was alleged today.
Some questions: -What are your thoughts about legalizing drugs? -If drugs were legal do you think more incidents such as this would increase or decrease in occurrence? -Do you think that Jarrod Wyatt deserves the death sentence for his actions or should he be given a lighter sentence given the fact he was under the influence of drugs? -How can crimes such as this be prevented?
One million heart attacks, 700,000 strokes and 900,000 miscarriages -- U.S. public health officials want Americans to know these will happen every single year with or without a swine flu vaccine campaign.
Yet this year, they know a significant number will be blamed on the H1N1 vaccine, which will roll out within weeks, and they are struggling to be ready.
A warning that the new swine flu jab is linked to a deadly nerve disease has been sent by the Government to senior neurologists in a confidential letter.
The letter from the Health Protection Agency, the official body that oversees public health, has been leaked to The Mail on Sunday, leading to demands to know why the information has not been given to the public before the vaccination of millions of people, including children, begins.
It tells the neurologists that they must be alert for an increase in a brain disorder called Guillain-Barre Syndrome (GBS), which could be triggered by the vaccine.
GBS attacks the lining of the nerves, causing paralysis and inability to breathe, and can be fatal.
The letter, sent to about 600 neurologists on July 29, is the first sign that there is concern at the highest levels that the vaccine itself could cause serious complications.
It refers to the use of a similar swine flu vaccine in the United States in 1976 when:
More people died from the vaccination than from swine flu.
500 cases of GBS were detected.
The vaccine may have increased the risk of contracting GBS by eight times.
The vaccine was withdrawn after just ten weeks when the link with GBS became clear.
The US Government was forced to pay out millions of dollars to those affected.
Some questions: -Does this hold merit or do you think it is just a scare tactic? -Does this affect your opinion of getting the Swine Flu vaccine? -If a senior neurologist would not get the vaccine would that affect your decision to get the vaccination? -Did you know about the vaccination debacle that took place in the U.S. under Gerald Ford's presidency?
***** As a note to my readers, I don't intend on turning this blog into a blog about vaccinations. However, it is a topic that is very real to me and my family at this time and we are trying to work through it in a logical and ethical manner. *****
Sorry for not posting in a while, my wife and I had our son and I have been enjoying a few weeks at home with them. Being a father is truly a blessing from the Lord.
Now, since having the little guy, we have been trying to do our homework on things we didn't necessarily give much thought to on the front end- namely doctor visits, shots, vaccines, well-baby visits, etc.
I have since read a couple of books (information at the bottom of this post) on the above that are against the established regimen. What I mean is, they do not favor the above. Instead, they promote allowing the immune system to develop as nature intended and to stay away from vaccines, vitamin K shots, etc.
In the process of reading those books, I have grown tremendously in my understanding regarding the vaccines, alternatives and how to interact with my pediatrician and her cohorts at our child's clinic. What is more, I found something very interesting and it poses a dilemma for me... and I believe every Christian.
Here is that dilemma: Would you take something that, in all probability, will do more harm than good that is derived from a voluntarily aborted fetus, and inject that into your child? I cannot. Throw every other reason for not getting vaccinated out of the window (Death, paralysis, autism, brain damage, and a host of other side effects) and let's say there are no side effects. Every person who is vaccinated will be perfectly normal and the vaccine will do exactly as it is marketed to do- vaccinate. Now, the only issue left on the table is that the vaccines are derived from human fetuses that were aborted back in the 60's and 70's... would I be willing to inject the vaccine in my child? For the good of the rest of the children (herd mentality)? No.
Here is a quote in a letter written in response to a concerned parent regarding state law regarding vaccines and the Catholic Church's stance on vaccines being derived from aborted babies: If someone rejects every form of voluntary abortion of human foetuses, would such a person not contradict himself/herself by allowing the use of these vaccines of live attenuated viruses on their children? Would it not be a matter of true (and illicit) cooperation in evil, even though this evil was carried out forty years ago?Citation.
However, later in the letter, it is stated that if there is a great threat to society as a whole, then it is okay to take such vaccines temporarily, for the good of mankind.
From what I have been reading (written by doctors who work in the field and in pediatrics), no vaccine can be accredited for wiping out or drastically diminishing infections. Every disease that there is a vaccination for was already in decline (and most were drastically declining) by the time the vaccinations were put on the market. So, there would appear no moral obligation to take a vaccine derived from human fetuses that were aborted.
It also stands to reason that most outbreaks tend to occur in those that have been vaccinated. One study even showed that there was a population that was 100% vaccinated against measles and they still had an outbreak.
For me, the risks outweigh any perceived or marketed benefit. Now, what do we do about schooling? Homeschooling is one option and another is to reject vaccines based on religious grounds (a sample letter can be found here) and see if we can still place our child(ren) in public/private schools.
There are a lot of responsibilities that come with children- however, the benefits/blessings of having them outweigh the responsibilities and over time we may not always make the right decisions, but we will make informed decisions.
Some questions: -Have you given any thought to vaccines? -Does this little bit of information at the very least cause you to want to look into this more? -Can a Christian knowingly accept vaccinations for themselves or for their children if they are derived from aborted fetuses? ---------------------------------------------------------
Another book i've read is: Vaccine Alternatives It is written by Ervin Davis, M.D. (A review of the book) This is the only book that I can find he has written, but it is thorough and full of cited material that is not dated. The book was written in 2008 and very current. He cites lots of studies and every stat that he gives, he backs it up with studies. I found this to be a great book that caused me to pause and give more thought to this entire medical issue. He also gives information on how the immune system works and why injecting viruses may not be the best method for building immunity to viruses that are commonly contracted through the air. What is more, he doesn't just leave you with what is wrong, he gives you some information on how to live a healthy lifestyle that will aide you in building your immune system to fight off diseases and viruses naturally.
Here is a link to the CDC and what they have to say about the MMR vaccine.Updated Link as the CDC moved it. They state just a little way down why the vaccine is made from aborted fetal tissue (cell linings) and towards the bottom, risks are discussed in short order. Once on the page, just do a search (CTRL+F) for the word Aborted.
Here are some video discussion between doctors on the issue of mandatory vaccinations. These are very one sided and seem to be overly emotional for the most part.
A new set of health laws that could be proposed by the government sometime in the next few weeks has women's health activists steaming. If the laws are implemented, they claim, women will have a harder time getting access to contraception.
The legislation, a draft of which was leaked last week to the New York Times, stokes the debate over when human life begins by taking the position that birth control that prevents the implantation of a fertilized egg actually results in abortion.
Late last week, Sen. Hillary Clinton called the planned rules (which could be imposed without congressional approval) "damaging" and a "dire threat to women" and warned that contraceptive coverage would "disappear overnight" if enacted.
Some questions: -Why do you think the legistlation states life begins at fertilization? -What are your thoughts on birth control? Is it abortion? If not, when does life begin? -Should this be legislated to the general public? -What did women do before the invention of "the pill" to ensure they did not get pregnant- chastity? -Do you agree with the proposed legislation? If so why? If not, why not? -Do you see further ethical ramifications stemming from this legislation if passed? -Has contraception been a good thing for us culturally? Spiritually?
Joseph Patrick Dwyer, 31, died of an apparent overdose in an ambulance on the way to the hospital. After breaking down the door to Dwyer's home, officers found him surrounded by empty cans of aerosol-gas dusters and prescription pills.
Dwyer, a private first-class medic, became an image of the Iraq war after a picture showing him carrying an injured Iraqi boy away from a fire fight ran on the front page of several newspapers in 2003, just after the invasion of Iraq by coalition forces.
"He was just never the same when he came back, because of all the things he saw," Matina Dwyer said. "He tried to seek treatment, but it didn't work."
Some questions: -Is this the government's fault? Our society's? His? -Should military who served in wars have more mental care available to them? -Is he responsible for his own death or do others share in the blame? -Is he a symbol of America in more ways than one?
A cancer patient has made a full recovery after being injected with billions of his own immune cells in the first case of its kind, doctors have disclosed.
The 52-year-old, who was suffering from advanced skin cancer, was free from tumours within eight weeks of undergoing the procedure.
The case could be a landmark in cancer treatment After two years he is still free from the disease which had spread to his lymph nodes and one of his lungs.Doctors took cells from the man's own defence system that were found to attack the cancer cells best, cloned them and injected back into his body, in a process known as "immunotherapy". After two years he is still free from the disease which had spread to his lymph nodes and one of his lungs.
Experts said that the case could mark a landmark in the treatment of cancer.
Some questions: -Would you be opposed to this type of treatment? -What are your thoughts concerning cloning cells? -Do you see hope in this treatment? -Are there any ethical "red flags" attached to such a treatment?
Below are three quotes taken from Boys Adrift, written by Leonard Sax.
“Forty years ago, even thirty years ago, there was no shame in a young man choosing a career in the trades. Beginning in the early 1980s-and particularly after publication of the Nation at Risk report in 1983-a consensus grew in the United States that every young person should go to college, regardless. “Vocational education” lost whatever prestige it had, and came to be viewed in some quarters very nearly as a dumping ground for the mildly retarded.”
“Traditionally, one of the factors driving Western society has been the fact that women prefer successful, affluent men over men who are less successful. Because men understood that women would be reluctant to marry men who couldn’t comfortably support a wife and children, men were motivated to be successful. That simple mechanism has suffered a double whammy in the past forty years. First, sex has been divorced from marriage. Second-and here’s what’s really disturbing to those of us in the over-thirty crowd-sexual satisfaction has been divorced from women altogether.”
“Thirty years ago, if a boy cursed his parents and spit at his teacher, the neighbors might say that the boy was a disobedient brat who needed a good spanking. Today, the same behavior from a similar boy might well prompt a trip to the pediatrician or the child psychiatrist. And the doctor is likely to ‘diagnose’ the boy with Conduct Disorder (DSM-IV 312.82) or Oppositional-Defiant Disorder (DSM-IV 313.81). The main criterion for both these ‘disorders’ is disobedient and disrespectful behavior that persists despite parental efforts.’ Is there really much of a difference between a neighbor saying ‘That boy is a disobedient brat,’ and a doctor saying ‘That boy has oppositional-defiant disorder’? I think there is. If another parent whom you trust and respect suggests that your son is a disobedient brat who needs stricter discipline, you just might consider adopting a tougher parenting.”
Tim Challies has written a full review on the book, which can be read here (I recommend you read it).
Some questions: -Have times changed? -What is "success"? -Does it appear that society has become a "drug-addicted" society? I.e. Responsibility is not expected because you have a disorder (not your fault) that can be medicated. -How do we "fix" these issues personally? Culturally? -Do you even view this as a problem or is it a step in the right direction for culture as a whole?
Some questions: -So, would you sprinkle dried up pig bladder on your open wound in hopes that whatever is lacking will return? -Would your regrowth be less-than-human? -Are there any moral hurdles to this "treatment"?
Albert Hofmann, the Swiss chemist who discovered the hallucinogenic drug LSD, has died aged 102.
Born on January 11 1906, Hofmann discovered LSD - lysergic acid diethylamide, which later became the favoured drug of the 1960s counterculture - when a tiny quantity leaked on to his hand during a laboratory experiment in 1943. He noted a "remarkable restlessness, combined with slight dizziness" that made him stop his work. "At home I lay down and sank into a not unpleasant intoxication-like condition, characterised by an extremely stimulated imagination," Hofmann wrote in his book LSD: My Problem Child.
"In a dreamlike state, with eyes closed (I found the daylight too unpleasantly glaring), I perceived an uninterrupted stream of fantastic pictures, extraordinary shapes with intense, kaleidoscopic play of colours. After some two hours this condition faded away."
A few days later, Hofmann intentionally took a dose of LSD and experienced the world's first "bad trip".
"On the way home, my condition began to assume threatening forms. Everything in my field of vision wavered and was distorted as if seen in a curved mirror," he said.
"My surroundings had now transformed themselves in more terrifying ways. A demon had invaded me, had taken possession of my body, mind, and soul. I jumped up and screamed, trying to free myself from him, but then sank down again and lay helpless on the sofa. The substance, with which I had wanted to experiment, had vanquished me."
Some questions: -What are your thoughts concerning his recounting of his first bad trip as noted above? -Do you think the 60's would have been what they were if it had not been for LSD? -Do you think this drug should be made legal? If so, why? -Do you think LSD could serve a legitimate medical purpose? If so, what?
As doctors struggle to eradicate polio worldwide, one of their biggest problems is persuading parents to vaccinate their children. In Belgium, authorities are resorting to an extreme measure: prison sentences. Two sets of parents in Belgium were recently handed five month prison terms for failing to vaccinate their children against polio. Each parent was also fined 4,100 euros ($8,000).
Some questions: -Do you think this to be fair? -Is it an issue of the greater good? -Should the government be able to force anyone to inject substances into their children where long term effects are unknown (long term as in multiple generations)? -What would you do in the above situation?
JUST as the dispute over whether vaccines cause autism was dying down at last, a US government decision has added fresh fuel to the fire. Last week it emerged that the federal government is to compensate a couple who say that the regular childhood vaccines, given to their baby daughter in 2000, caused her to develop autism. Damages have not yet been set, but could exceed $1 million.
Significantly, the government's decision says nothing about whether vaccines cause autism. Instead, government lawyers concluded only that vaccines aggravated a pre-existing cellular disorder in the child, causing brain damage that included features of autism. Nonetheless, anti-vaccination campaigners are claiming vindication. "It's official," wrote one autism blogger. "The sky has fallen. The fat lady has sung. Pigs are flying."
Some questions: -Does this settlement undermine the studies put forth by the government showing no links between autism and the vaccines? -Do you think this will cause other families to line up expecting payouts due to their children being affected by autism? -Why do you think this payout occured if there is nothing to link the two together?
High on Mount Sinai, Moses was on psychedelic drugs when he heard God deliver the Ten Commandments, an Israeli researcher claimed in a study published this week.
Such mind-altering substances formed an integral part of the religious rites of Israelites in biblical times, Benny Shanon, a professor of cognitive psychology at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem wrote in the Time and Mind journal of philosophy.
"As far Moses on Mount Sinai is concerned, it was either a supernatural cosmic event, which I don't believe, or a legend, which I don't believe either, or finally, and this is very probable, an event that joined Moses and the people of Israel under the effect of narcotics," Shanon told Israeli public radio on Tuesday.
Some questions: -Just because you don't believe something, does that make it not true? -Just because something seems improbable, does that make it not true? -What evidence is there that Moses was high? -What evidence is there that Moses actually heard from God? -What do you think of Benny Shannon's opinio0n on the matter? Does his personal experience validate his conclusion?
A new IRC survey has found that 5,400,000 people have died from war-related causes in Congo since 1998 – the world’s deadliest documented conflict since WW II. The vast majority died from non-violent causes such as malaria, diarrhea, pneumonia and malnutrition—easily preventable and treatable conditions when people have access to health care and nutritious food.
1.5 million of those deaths were in the past 2 years. Approximately 40,000 die each month.
Some questions: -What is the responsibility of Christendom concerning issues of this nature? -What, if any, Biblical responsibility lies on the shoulders of individual Christians who live in the United States? -Can you grasp losing the entire state of Colorado in less than a decade? That is equal to the death toll in the Congo currently. -Should we neglect those around us in order to fund or help those there? What does scripture say?
A drug used for arthritis can reverse the symptoms of Alzheimer's "in minutes". It appears to tackle one of the main features of the disease - inflammation in the brain. The drug, called Enbrel, is injected into the spine where it blocks a chemical responsible for damaging the brain and other organs.
A pilot study carried out by U.S. researchers found one patient had his symptoms reversed "in minutes".
Some questions: -Seeing how this report only involves 15 people's results, do you think it wise to release such information when it has not been approved for Alzheimer's treatment? -Do you think that releasing information like this is more helpful to the public or more harmful? Why? -If you have a loved one who is affected by this disease and the FDA has yet to approve the treatment, would you find a way to get this treatment administered to your loved one?
A sheriff in Collier county, Florida has released a report detailing a new inhalant that has found favor amongst the teens in his area. It is known officially as Jenkem but called "Butthash" as well as "fruit from the crack pipe" and "dutch air freshner". It is made by fermenting a mixture of feces and urine and inhaling the gas. It is reported that the sewagey taste can last for days in the mouth of the inhaler. It is currently unconfirmed if this is a legitimate new drug or if the sheriff has been duped. I wonder who the inventor of this concoction was.
Some questions: -Why would anyone inhale the fumes of sewage for a high you can get without tasting sewage for days? -Is this drug illegal? -Do you think it is a hoax? -What would you do if you caught your child inhaling fumes from their own bodily waste?
"[Marijuana] is not a drug. It's a leaf," Schwarzenegger told GQ. "My drug was pumping iron, trust me."
The above is an excerpt from California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger when asked whether he ever used drugs by the British edition of GQ. The Governor's publicist says that it must remain in the context in which it was said, a light-hearted interview.
Here is another excerpt from the same interview where Schwarzenegger is asked about other politicians who would not disclose current or past drug use, he says: "What would you rather have? A politician taking stuff and not saying, but making the best decisions and improving things? Or a politician who names all the drugs he or she has taken but makes lousy decisions for the country?" Schwarzenegger was quoted as saying.
Some questions: -In context, out of context, is there ever a good time to jest concerning illegal substances when you are in a position of authority? -What do you think of the Governor's comments? -Is marijuana a drug? -Marijuana is to leaf as Opium is to flower as Meth is to under-the-counter house products. Are those correct parallels?
Lingner suspects this RNA may interact with telomerase. If so, disabling the RNA with a drug might block this process and prevent cells turning cancerous.
The layperson can read more here. The scientifically unchallenged can read more here.
Shouting, "This is YouTube material!" a 27-year-old British man [Anthony Anderson] urinated on a dying woman [Christine Lakinski] who had collapsed on the street, the BBC and local Hartepool Mail and Northern Echo tell us. He also doused her with a bucket of water and covered her with shaving cream.
Some questions: -What does this say about our moral depravity? -What would be a fitting punishment for this action? -What if this was your mother? Your child?
