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Mice that ROAR
Saturday December 31, 2005
EEEEEEK! Squeak, squeak! GrrrrrrrrrROArrrrr!
Help! They’re coming to get me! I’m gonna try and take the cheese and run!
“They”
are researchers who created mice with small amounts of human brain
cells. Their purpose is to “…make realistic models of neurological
disorders such as Parkinson’s disease,” according to a December 12,
2005, Associated Press article.
Grrrrrr! How did I miss this news for so long?
“Led
by Fred Gage of the Salk Institute in San Diego, the researchers
created the mice by injecting about 100,000 human embryonic stem cells
per mouse into the brains of 14-day-old rodent embryos,” the article
states.
While
Gage assures us that the addition of extra stem cells neither
restructures the mouse brain nor comes anywhere near “humanizing” us
little squeaky creatures, there apparently is some worrying going
around.
And not just from mice!
“The
worry is if you humanize them too much you cross certain boundaries,”
said David Magnus, director of the Stanford Medical Center for
Biomedical Ethics. “But I don’t think this research comes even close to
that.”
But how close is too close?
Hmmmmm.
Mice are 97.5 percent genetically identical to people, and while human
cells have been injected into lab mice and other species for years,
fiddling around with brain tissue poses concerns that human minds could
get “trapped” in animal heads!
Last
April, the National Academies of Science issued a report stating,
“Human diseases, such as Parkinson’s disease, might be amenable to stem
cell therapy, and it is conceivable, although unlikely, that an
animal’s cognitive abilities could also be affected by such therapy.”
Oh
great! Just when Mouse One gets comfortable living in the abode of man
-- even creating a blog on his computer -- man’s brain cells mix in,
and now the “hum/mouse” brain takes on too many human neurons and
decides that mice must be exterminated!
(Run for your lives, pals, while you still can!)
Now I
find out that the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office this year rejected
an application that would cover humanzees (human-chimpanzee chimeras),
the humouse (human-mouse chimeras), other human-animal chimeras and
other human-animal embryonic chimeras.
Reason for rejection?
The office was “unable to determine how ‘human’ an organism must be
before it is protected by the anti-slavery prohibitions of the 13th Amendment!
Many thanks from MOUSE ONE!
| | Posted by MOUSE ONE at 9:44 AM - | |
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Well, the merry holidays are almost over, and back to school the kids
doth go! When it comes to education, my family has “been there and done
that,” and without exception there is a big difference.
We have “done”
public and private preschools, public elementary and middle schools and
public and private high schools. Having “done” all that, we can look
back and compare the educational value of each. I realize that quality
education varies from teacher to teacher, school to school and
community to community. So I can only state our case. Here goes:
Preschool for our
eldest began at age 3. Twice a week, he attended a church school for
three hours in the morning. He learned letters and their sounds,
numbers, colors and how to print his name. Activities included coloring
and art, music and outdoor recreation. Learning was presented in
thematic units, and Thanksgiving was the biggest celebration. All the
children from age 2 through kindergarten learned several songs and
presented a full-fledged musical and recitation service in the church
sanctuary.
Our eldest loved it, and we decided to send him to kindergarten there.
He started kindergarten the third week of September and graduated the third week of May.
He attended three
hours per day, five days a week. I dropped him off at 9 a.m., and he
was home for lunch. Most afternoons, he took a nap.
Upon completing
kindergarten, he had finished the first reader, knew simple addition
and subtraction, and had begun to identify and count money.
Those three hours
per day also included 20 to 30 minutes of music as well as playtime. He
had participated in the Thanksgiving service, a Christmas pageant and
learned several songs for the graduation program.
He was more than ready for first grade.
Child 2 also
attended the church preschool, but he began at age 2. While he did well
and was coloring and printing neatly by age 4, this child disliked
sitting still for even two minutes.
Realizing
his high level of activity, and because he quit taking naps at age 2.5
and was still wide awake at 10 p.m. despite playing outdoors a lot, we
also enrolled him in gymnastics. Aha! We thought we had found a way to
tire his little hyperactive body out! Twice a week, he left preschool
with some of his peers and went to the YMCA to do somersaults and
trampoline bounces. Other parents said their children were worn out by
the time they got home. But ours? He came home and bounced on his bed!
Settling him down was even more impossible.
So we enrolled him
in the full-day public kindergarten at the same elementary school that
Child 1 now attended. Obviously, he could handle a lot of activity for
a long period of time!
He started kindergarten the second week of August and graduated the end of May.
He boarded the bus at 6:30 a.m. and returned home at 3:30 p.m.
Upon completing kindergarten, he had finished the first reader, knew
simple addition and subtraction, and had begun to identify and count
money.
He had no music other than learning simple nursery songs in class and a
couple of songs for the graduation ceremony. During the first nine
weeks, his coloring and printing abruptly changed from neat to messy.
Neither was ever to be neat again.
During that time, everything he had learned in preschool was introduced
for the children who had never been to preschool. That meant that for a
solid week at a time, everything he colored could only be one color.
The purpose was to teach the children their colors through exaggerated
repetition. And they colored a lot, a whole lot!
That’s when his coloring turned messy, and his papers were filled with upside-down smiley faces. Not good!
Highlight of the year was a chartered-bus trip to the circus. That was fun!
In the end, he was more than ready for first grade.
CONCLUSION: Allowing for different learning styles, Child 1 and Child 2
both entered first grade at the same level, reading and otherwise. The
difference? Public kindergarten was free, but Child 2 was away from
home five hours more per day than Child 1, and his school year was a
whole month longer.
Instruction was accomplished during the morning, an hour of which was
spent playing and eating lunch. Afternoons in his full-day kindergarten
were spent napping, snacking and playing.
Were the long days worth it? Looking back, he says, "No!" He
would rather have been home in the p.m. playing in his own back yard
with his Tonka trucks and sanded blocks of wood.
(To be continued with public vs. private special education preschool for Child 3)
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Wednesday December 28, 2005
British author J.K. Rowling plans to start writing her seventh and
final Harry Potter book in 2006. After that, will life without Harry go
on?
The series has sold more than 300 million copies worldwide, and like
me, many adults enjoy the novels right along with their “wild about
Harry” kids. My boys were in elementary school when the first Potter
book took children’s literature to a whole new level, and we have first
American editions of every one.
Parents and teachers were thrilled that their children actually wanted
to read. Not only that, they read several hundred pages of magic that
transformed an unwanted, abused and neglected child into the world’s
most famous boy wizard. The books had well-constructed plots and
subplots and even better, lessons in morality. That’s why I never
understood why some people tried so hard to malign the books.
Harry Potter, I am certain, is much less a misguided conjurer that the muggles…er, people, who tried to tarnish his reputation.
After reading a couple of the books and watching the first movie, I had
to wonder if Harry’s detractors had done likewise. The moral values
that naysayers said were threatened by this fiction actually do the
opposite, and I know of no recent children’s fiction that better
supports the Christian worldview.
The plots focus on good versus evil and the importance of making wise
decisions. The aim of Harry and his friends was not to break school
rules for the “brattiness” of it as some critics alleged, but to defend
against the evil Voldemort. Voldemort, of course, is the powerful, dark
wizard who killed Harry’s parents and tried to kill Harry.
The series begins with the weakened Voldemort seeking to regain power.
He craves immortality so that he can terrorize the world forever. Harry
and his friends risk their lives to try and stop him. While the stories
rely on the occult, so do other highly regarded children’s fiction such
as “The Chronicles of Narnia,” “The Lord of the Rings,” and Aesop’s
Fables.
In fact, both “Potter” and “Rings” portray similar plots. Potter and
friends try to save everybody from the evil influence of the sorcerer’s
stone, while Frodo and the Fellowship try to save everybody from the
dark lord of Mordor and the evil influence of the Ring.
Even subplots in the Potter series favor Christian values. When the
Magical Sorting Hat is placed upon Harry’s head in the first novel,
Harry begs the Hat not to place him in the hall of Slytherin (whose
residents are known for dark magic). The Hat notes that Harry has
leanings both for Griffendor (the good residents) and Slytherin, but
because Harry specifically shuns Slytherin, the Hat honors his
wishes.In real life, we make the same choices. We either shun Satan and
choose to follow God or we shun God and choose to follow Satan.
In “Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire,” Harry competes in the
Tri-Wizard Tournament. Competitors must use their knowledge of magic to
solve extremely difficult situations. In one contest, Harry had the
opportunity to win, but he thought his friends were in danger of death,
so he chose to stay behind and save them.
The books emphasize that truth, loyalty, and the willingness to stand
against evil are the real prizes in life just as the Bible encourages
us to store our treasures in heaven. So write on, Rowling. I am ready
to read.
| | Posted by MOUSE ONE at 4:36 PM - | |
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Monday December 26, 2005
Who needs or has time to listen to 15,000 songs?
That’s
the storage capacity of some digital music players otherwise known as
Ipods or MP3 players, and the logic of it all is one of the things I just
don’t get.
Here’s a for instance. Suppose someone out there actually has time to
download 15,000 songs. How much time would that take? I don’t even want
to know. But consider how long it would take said person to listen to
all that music.
Hmmmmm. Let’s multiply and divide.
15,000 x 2 minutes (average per song) = 30,000 minutes.
At 60 minutes per hour, 30,000/60 = 500 hours.
500 hours/24 hours per day = 20.8333 or almost 21 days or three weeks!
God help their eardrums!
OTHER THINGS I JUST DON'T GET:
- Americans who are willing to “fight to the death” for freedom of religion but cop out on the right to keep and bear arms.
A
crime is a crime is a crime. If you kill somebody, they are still dead
and you are still guilty whether you killed them due to jealousy, a
gambling debt, drug deal gone bad, or if you happened to dislike the
color of their hair or skin, their proclaimed sexuality or political
leanings. When some crimes are labeled “hate crimes,” then those crimes
tend to become more criminal than others. I have to wonder if freedom
of speech or even of thought will soon be abridged. When will the
Thought, Speech and Hate Crimes Police abridge freedom of religion and
arrest ministers who preach against immorality?
- The racetrack mentality of interstate highway drivers.
I
once enjoyed driving interstates. No more! When the speed limit is
maxed at 70 mph, the minimum speed actually traveled must be at least
75 just to keep from getting run over. Most people drive 80, and many
do 90, and I have yet to see any of those reckless speeders pulled over
by the cops. Where are these folks going that they have to risk their
lives and my life to get there so fast?
- The
perception by school officials that they must randomly search students,
their lockers and their backpacks, then submit them to drug tests in
order to assure the public of a safe and drug-free environment.
What
I’d like to know is this: Has any student anywhere ever tested positive
for drugs during school hours? This includes the kids who were known by
peers to be doing drugs the night before. And when it comes to backpack
searches, why does it seem that the packs of kids who earn good
citizenship certificates are the ones most likely to be checked?
Why
do otherwise intelligent human beings tend to accept the beliefs of
others without first questioning and studying those beliefs themselves?
I think the most likely answer is that they are just plain lazy. In
today’s fast-paced world where some had rather download and listen to
15,000 songs rather than investigate the tenets of their religious
faith or the mishmash of the latest false prophet, they simply decide:
If it sounds good, then it must be true. I enjoy reading books by Lee
Strobel. A former atheist and investigative journalist, he takes issues
of faith and tests them with journalistic principles. In “God’s
Outrageous Claims,” Strobel asks what might have happened if followers
of David Koresh and Jim Jones had doubted their teachings before being
lured to their deaths? Even God does not expect humans to have faith in
“blind faith.” The Apostle Paul advised to “Test everything.”
| | Posted by MOUSE ONE at 3:36 PM - | |
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Saturday December 24, 2005
"And,lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shown round about them: and they were sore afraid.
And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people.
For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, which is Christ the Lord."
Luke 2: 9-11 (KJV)
| | Posted by MOUSE ONE at 3:54 PM - | |
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