<![CDATA[Atheist Forums - Life Sciences]]> https://atheistforums.org/ Fri, 22 May 2026 12:04:05 +0000 MyBB <![CDATA[Life isn't about survival]]> https://atheistforums.org/thread-66631.html Thu, 05 Mar 2026 03:17:52 +0000 https://atheistforums.org/thread-66631.html
Maslow's hierarchy of needs debunks this myth, showing that we prioritize higher needs above merely physiological and reproductive needs, and while basic material needs may have to be met in order to fulfill higher needs, some people choose to forgo ones like reproduction in favor of higher ones.

So I'm not sure why it's popular to say that life is about survival and reproduction, since this is completely false, and even in the animal kingdom, this isn't always true. (e.x. There are species such as ants in which members of the colony forego their reproductive needs in lieu of filling other roles).

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Link removed per 30/30 rule.
]]>
Maslow's hierarchy of needs debunks this myth, showing that we prioritize higher needs above merely physiological and reproductive needs, and while basic material needs may have to be met in order to fulfill higher needs, some people choose to forgo ones like reproduction in favor of higher ones.

So I'm not sure why it's popular to say that life is about survival and reproduction, since this is completely false, and even in the animal kingdom, this isn't always true. (e.x. There are species such as ants in which members of the colony forego their reproductive needs in lieu of filling other roles).

Administrator Notice
Link removed per 30/30 rule.
]]> <![CDATA[Why there is no reason to believe in evolution]]> https://atheistforums.org/thread-66630.html Thu, 05 Mar 2026 03:12:04 +0000 https://atheistforums.org/thread-66630.html
I mean, sure, there are evolutionary biologists who've spent time studying it, and people who've actually read science books on their own, but the average person likely hasn't. Not to mention that much popular information about evolution may be outdated and unreliable, possibly dating as far back as the Victorian era, and wouldn't even be up to the level of cutting edge information about evolution and physical sciences anyway, so what little information about evolution that they possess may be entirely unreliable.

Therefore, my conclusion is that there is no reason for many people to believe in evolution, unless they're merely a sheep and mindless believe and parrot everything that they were taught as a child.]]>
I mean, sure, there are evolutionary biologists who've spent time studying it, and people who've actually read science books on their own, but the average person likely hasn't. Not to mention that much popular information about evolution may be outdated and unreliable, possibly dating as far back as the Victorian era, and wouldn't even be up to the level of cutting edge information about evolution and physical sciences anyway, so what little information about evolution that they possess may be entirely unreliable.

Therefore, my conclusion is that there is no reason for many people to believe in evolution, unless they're merely a sheep and mindless believe and parrot everything that they were taught as a child.]]> <![CDATA[Life on Mars]]> https://atheistforums.org/thread-66536.html Thu, 18 Sep 2025 18:34:50 +0000 https://atheistforums.org/thread-66536.html
Here's the NASA press briefing on it

https://youtu.be/HTcQwnSimk8]]>
Here's the NASA press briefing on it

https://youtu.be/HTcQwnSimk8]]> <![CDATA[Ancient Lost World Discovered]]> https://atheistforums.org/thread-66457.html Fri, 13 Jun 2025 17:55:55 +0000 https://atheistforums.org/thread-66457.html Buried under 1.2 miles of Antarctic ice, scientists discover a 34-million-year-old lost world

Ecabildo]]> Buried under 1.2 miles of Antarctic ice, scientists discover a 34-million-year-old lost world

Ecabildo]]> <![CDATA[Scifi Eyes]]> https://atheistforums.org/thread-66451.html Sat, 07 Jun 2025 15:22:10 +0000 https://atheistforums.org/thread-66451.html Nanowire Retinal Implant Restores Vision and Sees Infrared

Neuro Science News]]> Nanowire Retinal Implant Restores Vision and Sees Infrared

Neuro Science News]]> <![CDATA[Consciousness as a brain function]]> https://atheistforums.org/thread-66437.html Sun, 25 May 2025 11:34:55 +0000 https://atheistforums.org/thread-66437.html
According to the book Consciousness and the Brain by Stanislas Dehaene, a professor of experimental cognitive psychology, scientists studying conscious access to information, by comparing brain scans with subjective reports from experiments playing with threshold conditions, came to the following conclusions.

* Certain "patterns of neural activity are exclusively associated with conscious processing."  Others are unconscious stimuli processing.
* The signatures of consciousness include:
1) "a sudden ignition of parietal and prefrontal circuits" which is similar to a phase transition between unconscious and conscious processing, 
2) a P3 wave, a late slow wave, 1/3 to 1/2 second after a stimulus,
3) "a late sudden burst of high-frequency [gamma band] oscillations,"
4) "a synchronization of information exchanges across distant brain regions."
* To compensate for the lag-time of consciousness per the second signature, much of our behavior works on autopilot and many of our perceptions work in anticipation of what we will perceive.
* A huge amount of unconscious processing of information occurs in our brains without becoming conscious.
* Information can register and stay in an unconscious buffer temporarily, but can be erased by distractions.
* Humans make terrible witnesses.  We suffer from inattentional blindness and change blindness to what we haven't attended to properly.
* Information can be readily available in the brain without becoming conscious, due to the rivalry for conscious access.
* Paying attention therefore plays a big role in what information becomes conscious.
* "Conscious perception relies predominantly on the higher-level association cortex."
* Most all the brain's regions can participate in both conscious and unconscious thought. 
* Emotional appraisals are made quickly and unconsciously by the amygdala.
* Unconscious priming speeds up processing.  "Repetition leads to facilitation even when it goes totally undetected."
* "What we experience as a conscious visual scene is a highly processed image, quite different from the raw input that we receive from the eyes."
* Consciousness requires attention, but attention can operate independently of consciousness.  Unconscious attention is constantly monitoring.
* Assigning values can be unconscious and can guide behaviors, so we constantly overestimate the role that consciousness plays in our lives.  
* Still, unconscious hunches require conscious verification.
* Subliminal perceptions exist and mental processes can be launched without consciousness.  In most cases, they do not run to completion.  
* Just about any brain process can operate unconsciously.
* "Unconscious information remains confined to a narrow brain circuit, while consciously perceived information is globally distributed to the vast majority of the cortex for an extended time."  Or as Daniel Dennett said, consciousness is "fame in the brain."  It is brain-wide information sharing.  This additional functionality enables certain unique information-processing abilities.  It allows us to keep information in mind, imprint it on our memories, and process it in various ways by routing it to different specialized brain functions.  This is the global neuronal workspace hypothesis.

"Equally fundamental to the global neuronal workspace is its autonomy.  Recent studies have revealed that the brain is the seat of intense spontaneous activity.  It is constantly traversed by global patterns of internal activity that originate not from the external world but from within, from the neurons' peculiar capacity to self-activate in a partly random fashion."  "The outcome, I argue, is a  'free-willing' machine that resolves Descartes's challenge and begins to look like a good model for consciousness."  "Stimulus-evoked activity accounts for only a very small amount of the total energy consumed by the brain, probably less than 5 percent.  The nervous system primarily acts as an autonomous device that generates its own thought patterns."

"Our belief in free will expresses the idea that, under the right circumstances, we have the ability to guide our decisions by our higher-level thoughts, beliefs, values, and past experiences, and to exert control over our undesired lower-level impulses."  About such decisions, the author considers "their fundamental indeterminacy (a dubious idea) and their autonomy (a respectable notion)."  "Autonomy is the primary property of the nervous system."  Through "purposeful exploratory behavior ... during brain development, the relevant patterns are preserved while the inappropriate ones are weeded out" in a Darwinian selection process.  Variations are followed by selection.

Consciousness performs an executive role, like the spokesman for a large organization.  Unconscious processes are fast and parallel.  Conscious processes are slow and serial.  "Consciousness gives us the power of a sophisticated serial computer."  "Complex strategies, formed by stringing together several elementary steps what computer scientists call  algorithms' are another of consciousness's uniquely evolved functions." "The capacity to synthesize information over time, space, and modalities of knowledge, and to rethink it at any time in the future, is a fundamental component of the conscious mind, one that seems likely to have been positively selected for during evolution."  Effectively, we possess "a hybrid serial-parallel machine" to process information.

My additional comments: So consciousness is an evolved brain function, and not, in fact, our self -- though it is an important part of our self.  This important research demonstrates that the separable-soul theory of consciousness is nonsense.  Consciousness seems like something other than physical only because it works by information processing, but that processing is entirely dependent on the brain as the research above demonstrated.  In fact, our bodies are our selves and are much older evolutionarily than the more recent development of human-level consciousness as an additional brain function.]]>
According to the book Consciousness and the Brain by Stanislas Dehaene, a professor of experimental cognitive psychology, scientists studying conscious access to information, by comparing brain scans with subjective reports from experiments playing with threshold conditions, came to the following conclusions.

* Certain "patterns of neural activity are exclusively associated with conscious processing."  Others are unconscious stimuli processing.
* The signatures of consciousness include:
1) "a sudden ignition of parietal and prefrontal circuits" which is similar to a phase transition between unconscious and conscious processing, 
2) a P3 wave, a late slow wave, 1/3 to 1/2 second after a stimulus,
3) "a late sudden burst of high-frequency [gamma band] oscillations,"
4) "a synchronization of information exchanges across distant brain regions."
* To compensate for the lag-time of consciousness per the second signature, much of our behavior works on autopilot and many of our perceptions work in anticipation of what we will perceive.
* A huge amount of unconscious processing of information occurs in our brains without becoming conscious.
* Information can register and stay in an unconscious buffer temporarily, but can be erased by distractions.
* Humans make terrible witnesses.  We suffer from inattentional blindness and change blindness to what we haven't attended to properly.
* Information can be readily available in the brain without becoming conscious, due to the rivalry for conscious access.
* Paying attention therefore plays a big role in what information becomes conscious.
* "Conscious perception relies predominantly on the higher-level association cortex."
* Most all the brain's regions can participate in both conscious and unconscious thought. 
* Emotional appraisals are made quickly and unconsciously by the amygdala.
* Unconscious priming speeds up processing.  "Repetition leads to facilitation even when it goes totally undetected."
* "What we experience as a conscious visual scene is a highly processed image, quite different from the raw input that we receive from the eyes."
* Consciousness requires attention, but attention can operate independently of consciousness.  Unconscious attention is constantly monitoring.
* Assigning values can be unconscious and can guide behaviors, so we constantly overestimate the role that consciousness plays in our lives.  
* Still, unconscious hunches require conscious verification.
* Subliminal perceptions exist and mental processes can be launched without consciousness.  In most cases, they do not run to completion.  
* Just about any brain process can operate unconsciously.
* "Unconscious information remains confined to a narrow brain circuit, while consciously perceived information is globally distributed to the vast majority of the cortex for an extended time."  Or as Daniel Dennett said, consciousness is "fame in the brain."  It is brain-wide information sharing.  This additional functionality enables certain unique information-processing abilities.  It allows us to keep information in mind, imprint it on our memories, and process it in various ways by routing it to different specialized brain functions.  This is the global neuronal workspace hypothesis.

"Equally fundamental to the global neuronal workspace is its autonomy.  Recent studies have revealed that the brain is the seat of intense spontaneous activity.  It is constantly traversed by global patterns of internal activity that originate not from the external world but from within, from the neurons' peculiar capacity to self-activate in a partly random fashion."  "The outcome, I argue, is a  'free-willing' machine that resolves Descartes's challenge and begins to look like a good model for consciousness."  "Stimulus-evoked activity accounts for only a very small amount of the total energy consumed by the brain, probably less than 5 percent.  The nervous system primarily acts as an autonomous device that generates its own thought patterns."

"Our belief in free will expresses the idea that, under the right circumstances, we have the ability to guide our decisions by our higher-level thoughts, beliefs, values, and past experiences, and to exert control over our undesired lower-level impulses."  About such decisions, the author considers "their fundamental indeterminacy (a dubious idea) and their autonomy (a respectable notion)."  "Autonomy is the primary property of the nervous system."  Through "purposeful exploratory behavior ... during brain development, the relevant patterns are preserved while the inappropriate ones are weeded out" in a Darwinian selection process.  Variations are followed by selection.

Consciousness performs an executive role, like the spokesman for a large organization.  Unconscious processes are fast and parallel.  Conscious processes are slow and serial.  "Consciousness gives us the power of a sophisticated serial computer."  "Complex strategies, formed by stringing together several elementary steps what computer scientists call  algorithms' are another of consciousness's uniquely evolved functions." "The capacity to synthesize information over time, space, and modalities of knowledge, and to rethink it at any time in the future, is a fundamental component of the conscious mind, one that seems likely to have been positively selected for during evolution."  Effectively, we possess "a hybrid serial-parallel machine" to process information.

My additional comments: So consciousness is an evolved brain function, and not, in fact, our self -- though it is an important part of our self.  This important research demonstrates that the separable-soul theory of consciousness is nonsense.  Consciousness seems like something other than physical only because it works by information processing, but that processing is entirely dependent on the brain as the research above demonstrated.  In fact, our bodies are our selves and are much older evolutionarily than the more recent development of human-level consciousness as an additional brain function.]]> <![CDATA[Open AI answer to my question "how old is life on earth?"]]> https://atheistforums.org/thread-66421.html Mon, 05 May 2025 13:27:38 +0000 https://atheistforums.org/thread-66421.html
ChatGPT said:
Life on Earth is estimated to be about 3.5 to 4 billion years old.
Here's the timeline in a nutshell:
  • 🌍 Earth formed: ~4.54 billion years ago
  • 🧫 Earliest evidence of life: ~3.5 to 3.8 billion years ago
    • These were simple, single-celled organisms like bacteria
  • 🌿 Complex life (multicellular organisms): ~600 million years ago
  • 🦖 Dinosaurs: ~230 to 66 million years ago
  • 🧠 Humans (Homo sapiens): ~300,000 years ago
Life started very simply and gradually evolved over billions of years into the complexity we see today.]]>
ChatGPT said:
Life on Earth is estimated to be about 3.5 to 4 billion years old.
Here's the timeline in a nutshell:
  • 🌍 Earth formed: ~4.54 billion years ago
  • 🧫 Earliest evidence of life: ~3.5 to 3.8 billion years ago
    • These were simple, single-celled organisms like bacteria
  • 🌿 Complex life (multicellular organisms): ~600 million years ago
  • 🦖 Dinosaurs: ~230 to 66 million years ago
  • 🧠 Humans (Homo sapiens): ~300,000 years ago
Life started very simply and gradually evolved over billions of years into the complexity we see today.]]> <![CDATA[Human Nature]]> https://atheistforums.org/thread-66411.html Thu, 17 Apr 2025 16:56:05 +0000 https://atheistforums.org/thread-66411.html
In the last decade or two, because of ongoing brutal wars, the election and reelection of Donald Trump, the repeatedly absurd rationalizations of theists, and our continued neglect of climate change among other reasons, my opinions of human nature have become much darker and more misanthropic.  I don't really know whether I am becoming more realistic or just worn out with old age.

I assume other atheists will be much more reasonable than most people would be about such a question.]]>
In the last decade or two, because of ongoing brutal wars, the election and reelection of Donald Trump, the repeatedly absurd rationalizations of theists, and our continued neglect of climate change among other reasons, my opinions of human nature have become much darker and more misanthropic.  I don't really know whether I am becoming more realistic or just worn out with old age.

I assume other atheists will be much more reasonable than most people would be about such a question.]]> <![CDATA[Upcoming Punctuated Equilibria Quote Mines]]> https://atheistforums.org/thread-66275.html Sun, 05 Jan 2025 11:16:53 +0000 https://atheistforums.org/thread-66275.html
Page 26: “Ah the stony silence of fossil species that didn’t change much throughout their history”. The next sentence though is “\the way out was realizing that there are changes, marked changes that lead to new species, themselves going on to become stable hallmarks of descendent species, showing up laterally (geographically). That’s “punctuated equilibria”…”

Page 27: “The incompleteness of the fossil record cannot explain stasis; incompleteness was used to explain away the absence of gradual change and the seeming suddenness of change between species sometimes preserved in the fossil record. But an incomplete fossil record just means that there is even more stasis than we’re in fact seeing” then further on “Species or their parts are always changing or always moving, yet overall species don’t seem to “get anywhere”…”. Just a tiny bit on though on the same page “Notable scientists like Mark Pagel and Chris Vendetti from the University of Reading in England have shown that modifications of the genome do fit the punk eek pattern, with molecular changes concentrated at speciation events, such that molecules mirror morphology”


Here is a recent paper I was pointed to that has Niles Eldridge as a co-author and deals with punctuated equilibria focussing though on evolutionary systems rather than the fossil record (punctuated evolution is the term they use for this) so that the above quotes can be further put in the context of Eldridge’s more academic work
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/pala.12731

I am sure there will be other quote mine worthy statements in this book and will happily add them to this thread as I find them if there is any interest]]>
Page 26: “Ah the stony silence of fossil species that didn’t change much throughout their history”. The next sentence though is “\the way out was realizing that there are changes, marked changes that lead to new species, themselves going on to become stable hallmarks of descendent species, showing up laterally (geographically). That’s “punctuated equilibria”…”

Page 27: “The incompleteness of the fossil record cannot explain stasis; incompleteness was used to explain away the absence of gradual change and the seeming suddenness of change between species sometimes preserved in the fossil record. But an incomplete fossil record just means that there is even more stasis than we’re in fact seeing” then further on “Species or their parts are always changing or always moving, yet overall species don’t seem to “get anywhere”…”. Just a tiny bit on though on the same page “Notable scientists like Mark Pagel and Chris Vendetti from the University of Reading in England have shown that modifications of the genome do fit the punk eek pattern, with molecular changes concentrated at speciation events, such that molecules mirror morphology”


Here is a recent paper I was pointed to that has Niles Eldridge as a co-author and deals with punctuated equilibria focussing though on evolutionary systems rather than the fossil record (punctuated evolution is the term they use for this) so that the above quotes can be further put in the context of Eldridge’s more academic work
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/pala.12731

I am sure there will be other quote mine worthy statements in this book and will happily add them to this thread as I find them if there is any interest]]> <![CDATA[Fentanyl topic split off election thread.]]> https://atheistforums.org/thread-66177.html Sun, 27 Oct 2024 13:45:57 +0000 https://atheistforums.org/thread-66177.html Indeed RFK is a poor retard (nothing to do with the worm, just not the smartest boy in class), but as European I can definitely state that a lot is wrong on the approach to health in US.
You have such a long list of food additives that are forbidden in the EU that I wonder why is that (I know why, the bog food lobby).
Moreover, I am impressed by the Fentanyl: you got a lot of Fentanyl addicted that just started taking it as painkiller for things here in the EU you receive ibuprofen or way milder solutions.
I remember a friend of me when she moved in the US, fellow scientist, with her boyfriend also scientist (mathematician, not pharmaceutical chemist like her). He got his ligament broken and reconstructed, in the hospital he got Fentanyl as painkiller for the surgery and she stopped it and prevented him for taking it, giving instead high dosage Ibuprofen. Result? Very little pain for 3 days and then pain gone with zero chance of becoming Fentanyl addicted. Look now in your circle (for the ones of you in the US): how many slipped in Fentanyl addiction for uses of Fentanyl that could have been substituted with other drugs?
And this is just one small example, I can go on for hours with examples on differences where on "big food" and "big pharma" we fade better as EU (conversely in many other fields we fade way worst than US).]]> Indeed RFK is a poor retard (nothing to do with the worm, just not the smartest boy in class), but as European I can definitely state that a lot is wrong on the approach to health in US.
You have such a long list of food additives that are forbidden in the EU that I wonder why is that (I know why, the bog food lobby).
Moreover, I am impressed by the Fentanyl: you got a lot of Fentanyl addicted that just started taking it as painkiller for things here in the EU you receive ibuprofen or way milder solutions.
I remember a friend of me when she moved in the US, fellow scientist, with her boyfriend also scientist (mathematician, not pharmaceutical chemist like her). He got his ligament broken and reconstructed, in the hospital he got Fentanyl as painkiller for the surgery and she stopped it and prevented him for taking it, giving instead high dosage Ibuprofen. Result? Very little pain for 3 days and then pain gone with zero chance of becoming Fentanyl addicted. Look now in your circle (for the ones of you in the US): how many slipped in Fentanyl addiction for uses of Fentanyl that could have been substituted with other drugs?
And this is just one small example, I can go on for hours with examples on differences where on "big food" and "big pharma" we fade better as EU (conversely in many other fields we fade way worst than US).]]> <![CDATA[How would you improve the human body?]]> https://atheistforums.org/thread-65970.html Mon, 27 May 2024 22:59:26 +0000 https://atheistforums.org/thread-65970.html <![CDATA[I am having fun learning about DNA structure.]]> https://atheistforums.org/thread-65952.html Wed, 22 May 2024 23:33:09 +0000 https://atheistforums.org/thread-65952.html
Adenine
Thymine 
Guanine 
Cytosine

Uracil replacing Thymine in RNA 


I still get confused sometimes over the difference between purines and pyrimidines. 

Purines have two rings in the nucleotide and pyrimidines have one ring in the nucleotides. But fore fucks sake purine is a shorter word, it should denote the one ring, and pyrimidines should denote two because it is a longer word. For that reason I always get confused. I demand a recount! 

The other thing that was slipping me up until today was 5 prime to 3 prime and 3 prime to 5 prime. The 5 and 3 refer to the position of carbon atoms in the sugar. The phosphate is basically the backbone, along with the sugar, and the base being like the rungs of a ladder. The inversion part was slipping me up, but now I get it. 

I also now know how to read a codon chart. 

I wish I had been more focused on this as a kid and teen rather than trying to fit in with bullies. I really felt dumb as a kid. This would have intimidated me as a kid. It seems so basic now, but I also don't have the performance anxiety of having to try to please teachers and my parents and feeling dumb when I failed. 

Looking at the cartoon representations of the structures really makes it easy to understand. But back then you didn't have the internet and it was more of a sink or swim attitude when it came to learning science. But now that I am not under any  pressure, I have learned that learning just about anything is nothing more than learning patterns and the language that describes those patterns, much like one would learn the parts of a car and how they interact.]]>
Adenine
Thymine 
Guanine 
Cytosine

Uracil replacing Thymine in RNA 


I still get confused sometimes over the difference between purines and pyrimidines. 

Purines have two rings in the nucleotide and pyrimidines have one ring in the nucleotides. But fore fucks sake purine is a shorter word, it should denote the one ring, and pyrimidines should denote two because it is a longer word. For that reason I always get confused. I demand a recount! 

The other thing that was slipping me up until today was 5 prime to 3 prime and 3 prime to 5 prime. The 5 and 3 refer to the position of carbon atoms in the sugar. The phosphate is basically the backbone, along with the sugar, and the base being like the rungs of a ladder. The inversion part was slipping me up, but now I get it. 

I also now know how to read a codon chart. 

I wish I had been more focused on this as a kid and teen rather than trying to fit in with bullies. I really felt dumb as a kid. This would have intimidated me as a kid. It seems so basic now, but I also don't have the performance anxiety of having to try to please teachers and my parents and feeling dumb when I failed. 

Looking at the cartoon representations of the structures really makes it easy to understand. But back then you didn't have the internet and it was more of a sink or swim attitude when it came to learning science. But now that I am not under any  pressure, I have learned that learning just about anything is nothing more than learning patterns and the language that describes those patterns, much like one would learn the parts of a car and how they interact.]]> <![CDATA[Human Case of H5N1 Bird Flu in Texas]]> https://atheistforums.org/thread-65887.html Mon, 01 Apr 2024 18:19:10 +0000 https://atheistforums.org/thread-65887.html https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/01/healt...=url-share

Cattle rancher tests positive for bird flu. Symptoms are conjunctivitis. Infected cattle appear to have minor illness and "thick discolored milk" Eeeew

The link will expire at some point. Apologies for that.]]> https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/01/healt...=url-share

Cattle rancher tests positive for bird flu. Symptoms are conjunctivitis. Infected cattle appear to have minor illness and "thick discolored milk" Eeeew

The link will expire at some point. Apologies for that.]]> <![CDATA[What's your stance on bringing back extinct species?]]> https://atheistforums.org/thread-65847.html Thu, 07 Mar 2024 21:37:21 +0000 https://atheistforums.org/thread-65847.html <![CDATA[Do octopi feel remorse for tentacle porn?]]> https://atheistforums.org/thread-65845.html Thu, 07 Mar 2024 02:16:57 +0000 https://atheistforums.org/thread-65845.html
Answers expected.]]>
Answers expected.]]> <![CDATA[Do fish feel pain?]]> https://atheistforums.org/thread-65843.html Wed, 06 Mar 2024 12:03:51 +0000 https://atheistforums.org/thread-65843.html
Administrator Notice
Content deleted per spamming rule against posting an abundance of content that was for use on other forums.

I was wondering what people on this forum think.]]>
Administrator Notice
Content deleted per spamming rule against posting an abundance of content that was for use on other forums.

I was wondering what people on this forum think.]]> <![CDATA[Should I cut back on salt since I have high blood pressure?]]> https://atheistforums.org/thread-65723.html Tue, 26 Dec 2023 20:20:28 +0000 https://atheistforums.org/thread-65723.html Now, the evidence that beta-blockers are safe, if not beneficial, is overwhelming: I have read somewhere (I think it was on ScienceBasedMedicine) about a study that was preventatively giving beta-blockers to people without measuring their blood pressure (so, we can assume most of them had normal or even low blood pressure), and there turned out to be no difference in all-cause mortality between people who were receiving beta-blockers and people who were receiving placebo. So I started taking them.
However, I don't know how much science the recommendation to eat less salt is based on. I know WHO recommends people not to take more than 6 grams of salt per day, and that the standard American diet includes around twice that amount. However, there doesn't appear to be a correlation between salt intake and heart disease. For example, a typical Japanese diet includes around 40 grams of salt per day, yet Japanese have significantly lower mortality from heart disease than Americans do. And I really like salty food. So, what do you think, should I try to eat less salt?]]> Now, the evidence that beta-blockers are safe, if not beneficial, is overwhelming: I have read somewhere (I think it was on ScienceBasedMedicine) about a study that was preventatively giving beta-blockers to people without measuring their blood pressure (so, we can assume most of them had normal or even low blood pressure), and there turned out to be no difference in all-cause mortality between people who were receiving beta-blockers and people who were receiving placebo. So I started taking them.
However, I don't know how much science the recommendation to eat less salt is based on. I know WHO recommends people not to take more than 6 grams of salt per day, and that the standard American diet includes around twice that amount. However, there doesn't appear to be a correlation between salt intake and heart disease. For example, a typical Japanese diet includes around 40 grams of salt per day, yet Japanese have significantly lower mortality from heart disease than Americans do. And I really like salty food. So, what do you think, should I try to eat less salt?]]> <![CDATA[Abortion and Population]]> https://atheistforums.org/thread-65693.html Sat, 09 Dec 2023 17:15:27 +0000 https://atheistforums.org/thread-65693.html
(December 8, 2023 at 10:33 am)Ahriman Wrote: Uh, maybe I used the wrong word. I'm suggesting a hypothetical scenario in which too many people get abortions (perhaps because it's too accepted) and this jeopardizes human survival.

There are countries like China, Italy, Spain and India whose population is or soon will be declining. For China it is in large part because of their one-child policy, which included forced abortions for pregnancies after the first. Now they have removed the policy and are trying to get people to have more children.

In India, the number of children peaked more than a decade ago and is now falling.

Currently, the demographics research says that the population is expected to continue to grow for the next few decades, but one site (Our World In Data) says that it will peak by the end of this century. Where there is growth, it will be (according to the UN) “concentrated in eight countries: the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Egypt, Ethiopia, India, Nigeria, Pakistan, the Philippines and the United Republic of Tanzania.”

The reason for this is lower fertility rates. (In case someone doesn’t know, the fertility rate is the number of live births per woman. The replacement fertility rate is the number of births per woman needed to maintain a population’s size.) Here’s a quote from a UN report.

Quote:In recent years, fertility has declined in nearly all regions of the world. Even in Africa, where fertility levels are the highest of any region, total fertility has fallen from 5.1 births per woman in 2000-2005 to 4.7 in 2010-2015.

Europe has been an exception to this trend in recent years, with total fertility increasing from 1.4 births per woman in 2000-2005 to 1.6 in 2010-2015.

More and more countries now have fertility rates below the level required for the replacement of successive generations (roughly 2.1 births per woman), and some have been in this situation for several decades. During 2010-2015, fertility was below the replacement level in 83 countries comprising 46 % of the world’s population. The ten most populous countries in this group are China, the United States of America, Brazil, the Russian Federation, Japan, Viet Nam, Germany, the Islamic Republic of Iran, Thailand, and the United Kingdom (in order of population size).

Is this lower fertility rate tied to abortions? Not entirely. But by definition abortion reduces the fertility rate. Except in China, this lower fertility rate has been voluntary. People, countries, agencies have bought into the Malthusian lie that our population will outrun our resources. According to them, my gas-based car should be a terrarium.

So, you can be for abortion if you want. But don’t argue based on population levels.]]>
(December 8, 2023 at 10:33 am)Ahriman Wrote: Uh, maybe I used the wrong word. I'm suggesting a hypothetical scenario in which too many people get abortions (perhaps because it's too accepted) and this jeopardizes human survival.

There are countries like China, Italy, Spain and India whose population is or soon will be declining. For China it is in large part because of their one-child policy, which included forced abortions for pregnancies after the first. Now they have removed the policy and are trying to get people to have more children.

In India, the number of children peaked more than a decade ago and is now falling.

Currently, the demographics research says that the population is expected to continue to grow for the next few decades, but one site (Our World In Data) says that it will peak by the end of this century. Where there is growth, it will be (according to the UN) “concentrated in eight countries: the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Egypt, Ethiopia, India, Nigeria, Pakistan, the Philippines and the United Republic of Tanzania.”

The reason for this is lower fertility rates. (In case someone doesn’t know, the fertility rate is the number of live births per woman. The replacement fertility rate is the number of births per woman needed to maintain a population’s size.) Here’s a quote from a UN report.

Quote:In recent years, fertility has declined in nearly all regions of the world. Even in Africa, where fertility levels are the highest of any region, total fertility has fallen from 5.1 births per woman in 2000-2005 to 4.7 in 2010-2015.

Europe has been an exception to this trend in recent years, with total fertility increasing from 1.4 births per woman in 2000-2005 to 1.6 in 2010-2015.

More and more countries now have fertility rates below the level required for the replacement of successive generations (roughly 2.1 births per woman), and some have been in this situation for several decades. During 2010-2015, fertility was below the replacement level in 83 countries comprising 46 % of the world’s population. The ten most populous countries in this group are China, the United States of America, Brazil, the Russian Federation, Japan, Viet Nam, Germany, the Islamic Republic of Iran, Thailand, and the United Kingdom (in order of population size).

Is this lower fertility rate tied to abortions? Not entirely. But by definition abortion reduces the fertility rate. Except in China, this lower fertility rate has been voluntary. People, countries, agencies have bought into the Malthusian lie that our population will outrun our resources. According to them, my gas-based car should be a terrarium.

So, you can be for abortion if you want. But don’t argue based on population levels.]]> <![CDATA[New Method for Heart Donation - Ethical Mess]]> https://atheistforums.org/thread-65636.html Wed, 22 Nov 2023 14:33:35 +0000 https://atheistforums.org/thread-65636.html
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/22/nyreg...=url-share]]>
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/22/nyreg...=url-share]]> <![CDATA[Bizarre things my mind conjures up]]> https://atheistforums.org/thread-65651.html Sun, 19 Nov 2023 22:36:49 +0000 https://atheistforums.org/thread-65651.html
Once, during my squatting days, when I was somewhat stoned. I saw another young squatter "turn into" a middle-aged woman. When I described her he said I was "describing his mother"...who had been dead for years. The experience rather freaked him out.

There are psychics who use their clairvoyant and clairaudient talents for criminal purposes.

I do on occasions see colours on people that appear to be related to their health and emotional state.

Despite these experiences I'm 100% convinced that there is no God, no afterlife. When I'm dead I'll"cease to exist"

One thing I did not think possible was psychokinetics the ability of the mind to directly effect the material world. Telepathy? Yeah! But scientifically psychokinetics is impossible! Then, one day when I was in a state of "deep concern" about the well-being of a friend I switched my computer monitor on and it went "BANG". Coincidence? Later that day my tape recorder did the same thing ... again when I was thinking about her. Of course both events could be merely "coinicdence" ... but maybe not?]]>
Once, during my squatting days, when I was somewhat stoned. I saw another young squatter "turn into" a middle-aged woman. When I described her he said I was "describing his mother"...who had been dead for years. The experience rather freaked him out.

There are psychics who use their clairvoyant and clairaudient talents for criminal purposes.

I do on occasions see colours on people that appear to be related to their health and emotional state.

Despite these experiences I'm 100% convinced that there is no God, no afterlife. When I'm dead I'll"cease to exist"

One thing I did not think possible was psychokinetics the ability of the mind to directly effect the material world. Telepathy? Yeah! But scientifically psychokinetics is impossible! Then, one day when I was in a state of "deep concern" about the well-being of a friend I switched my computer monitor on and it went "BANG". Coincidence? Later that day my tape recorder did the same thing ... again when I was thinking about her. Of course both events could be merely "coinicdence" ... but maybe not?]]>