If ET Calls, Would We Be Told?

If a verified message from aliens is ever received, would the public be told about it? SETI – the Search for Extra Terrestrial Intelligence - does have an international protocol that if an alien signal is ever received, it would be disseminated among the astronomical community and made public. And of course, says Mac Tonnies at the SETI Blog, “international cooperation might be necessary in order to distinguish a legitimate alien signal from any number of phenomena capable of generating false alarms.” But what if the signal is more than just extra-terrestrials saying hello? Tonnies believes SETI’s plans for full disclosure only makes sense if the message is fairly benign. If the signal was a notice of impending doom from a black hole, supernova, or alien invasion – something we on Earth had little power to do anything about – Tonnies questions whether governments would choose to make such information public. But could something of this magnitude really be kept under wraps?

If ET issued a warning that our planet was doomed, it would be nice if they also included some directions on how to move it to another location. Oh, and of course it could be kept secret. Some big government secrets have been kept for over 50 years before the public finds out. Others like what happened at Roswell, NM in 1947 are still kept. (I’ve had some amazing luck in stumbling by chance into people who gave me true bits of the Roswell puzzle I’ve heard nowhere else… so we may get some clues, but not the whole picture.)

I was given a young man’s heart - and started craving beer and Kentucky Fried Chicken.

Yesterday, the Mail told the extraordinary story of how a heart transplant recipient in America committed suicide - just like the man whose heart he had received 12 years previously. In another extraordinary twist, it emerged that the recipient had also married the donor’s former wife.

So can elements of a person’s character - or even their soul - be transplanted along with a heart?

One woman who believes this to be the case is CLAIRE SYLVIA, a divorced mother of one.

She was 47 and dying from a disease called primary pulmonary hypertension when, in 1988, she had a pioneering heartlung transplant in America.

She was given the organs of an 18-year-old boy who had been killed in a motorcycle accident near his home in Maine.

Claire, a former professional dancer, then made an astonishing discovery: she seemed to be acquiring the characteristics, and cravings, of the donor.

Here, in an extract from her book A Change Of Heart, Claire tells her remarkable story…

During my final lucid moments before my heart-lung transplant, I was told that a medical team would soon be leaving to “harvest” the organs that would save my life.

My surgeon, Mr John Baldwin, would remain with me, ready to begin the operation as soon as he was notified that the donor’s heart and lungs had been removed. But by this time I was far too groggy to focus on these details, which was probably just as well.

Eventually, Mr Baldwin said to me: “We’re going to put you under now, Claire.

“I have to remind you that it is always possible that something could go wrong, and the organs don’t arrive in good condition.

“This sometimes happens with the lungs, which are very fragile. They could be damaged during transit. Sometimes, at the last minute, things don’t work out.” I looked up at him and said: “That’s OK. Do what you have to. It’s in God’s hands now.” After that, I don’t remember anything until slowly becoming aware of a buzz of voices calling my name: “Claire, wake up. It’s over.” I awakened gently, feeling no bodily or physical sensation - nothing but pure consciousness and a cacophony of voices.

I couldn’t speak, but managed to wiggle my fingers.

Someone brought me a pen and paper, and I scribbled my question: Did I get them? “Oh yes,” the voice said. “Everything’s fine.”

Then I lapsed back into unconsciousness.

The Skypephone- Call for free with this new hand phone.

This is a new revolutionary in the world. Whatever this handphone looks like, I don’t care because the most important is.. I can use it for FREE. This handset will operate both as a conventional 3G mobile phone and a VOIP - Voice Over the Internet Protocol - handset.

Now do you think all the telco vendor will going bankcrupt?
Yes, definitely because this 3G handset will have the usual voice calls, internet roaming, email and video downloads, which will use the conventional mast system. Even your kids also know how to use it. According to what they said, it will have a Skype button that will direct calls via a mast into the internet telephony system of cables and satellite dishes, which is much cheaper to use.

Calls and instant messages to other Skype members anywhere in the world will be absolutely free. Man… I wonder when they want to launch this hand phone because I really wan to have it! - omw

More Pyramids in Sudan than Egypt

They loom from a distance, a congregation of pyramids on both sides of the road, a living history that bears witness to the greatness of the Kushite Civilisation; these are the Pyramids of Meroe, made up of three groups — western, southern and northern. The northern is the best preserved, containing more than 30 pyramids. Though inspirationally Egyptian, there are differences.

World’s first Tyrannosaurus rex footprint.

This is the most amazing footprint fossil that have been been found so far. Dr Phil Manning, of Manchester University, believes the 29 inch long mark was made by the flesh-eating giant as it stomped over a prehistoric floodplain more than 65 million years ago.He found the print last year during a field trip to the Hell Creek rock formation in Montana. Two other partial dinosaur footprints lie close by. - omw

Portland doc flips on big pharma and reveals its “dirty little secret.”

Ten percent of Americans—children, teens and adults—take antidepressants. Whether it’s Prozac, Paxil, Lexapro, Effexor or Cymbalta, 30 million of us take a pill daily in hopes it will keep dark moods at bay. Antidepressants are the most prescribed family of drugs in America, an $11.9 billion market in the U.S. in 2007.

In January, Erick Turner, a professor of psychiatry at Oregon Health & Science University and a clinician at the Portland VA Medical Center, shook up the medical community, provoked the pharmaceutical establishment and, perhaps, disappointed millions of depressed Americans. He published a paper in the New England Journal of Medicine that revealed antidepressants are not as effective as we’ve been led to believe. For years, he implied, pharmaceutical companies such as Pfizer (maker of Zoloft) and Forest Laboratories (Celexa and Lexapro) have vastly exaggerated the performance of their drugs.

Turner calls it the “dirty little secret” of the psychiatric world.

It was a disclosure that was felt ’round the medical world, and for the past two months Turner has fielded press inquiries by the dozens.

Turner’s “is the kind of a paper that makes you wonder why someone didn’t do it a long time ago,” says S. Nassir Ghaemi, an associate professor of psychiatry and public health at Emory University School of Medicine and a leading researcher on bipolar disorder.

“It’s damaging” to the reputation of antidepressants, says Peter Kramer, author of Listening to Prozac and a psychiatry professor at Brown University School of Medicine.

The paper has given Turner not rock-star status, perhaps, but at least a level of notoriety in a profession where physicians typically labor in anonymity. Since the paper’s publication, Turner has become a go-to source for reporters writing about depression and antidepressants.

But more important for Turner is how his work has shaken up the industry and raised questions about the integrity of the pharmaceutical industry and the weakness of the federal regulatory agency that’s supposed to protect the public from drugs that are dangerous or ineffective.

Periodic Table: Nuclear Scientists Eye Future Landfall On A Second ‘Island Of Stability’

Modern-day scientific Magellans and Columbus’s, exploring the uncharted seas at the fringes of the Periodic Table of the Elements, have landed on one long-sought island — the fabled Island of Stability, home of a new genre of superheavy chemical elements sought for more than three decades.

‘Regional’ Nuclear War Would Cause Worldwide Destruction

Think you might escape the aftereffects of a limited nuclear war that happens on the other side of the globe from you? Think again.

Imagine that the long-simmering conflict between India and Pakistan broke out into a war in which each side deployed 50 nuclear weapons against the other country’s megacities. Karachi, Bombay, and dozens of other South Asian cities catch fire like Hiroshima and Nagasaki did at the end of World War II.

Beyond the local human tragedy of such a situation, a new study looking at the atmospheric chemistry of regional nuclear war finds that the hot smoke from burning cities would tear holes in the ozone layer of the Earth. The increased UV radiation resulting from the ozone loss could more than double DNA damage, and increase cancer rates across North America and Eurasia.

“Our research supports that there would be worldwide destruction,” said Michael Mills, co-author of the study and a research scientist at the University of Colorado at Boulder. “It demonstrates that a small-scale regional conflict is capable of triggering larger ozone losses globally than the ones that were previously predicted for a full-scale nuclear war.”

The boneheads to say we should just “nuke Iraq” need to realize that we’d also be nuking ourselves if we did that. The effects just take longer to reach us.

Baby born in India with two faces is worshipped as goddess Durga

A baby has been born with two faces in a northern Indian village, where she is being worshipped as the reincarnation of a Hindu goddess, her father said today.

The baby, Lali, was born last month with an extremely rare condition known as craniofacial duplication, where a single head has two faces. All of Lali’s facial features are duplicated except for her ears - she has two. Otherwise, she has two noses, two pairs of lips and two pairs of eyes.

She is otherwise healthy and said to be doing well.

“My daughter is fine, like any other child,” said 23-year-old Vinod Singh, a poor farm worker.

Lali has caused a sensation in the dusty village of Saini Sunpura, 25 miles (40km) east of New Delhi. Villagers flocked to see her when she left the hospital, eight hours after a normal delivery on March 11, said Sabir Ali, the director of Saifi Hospital.

“She drinks milk from her two mouths and opens and shuts all the four eyes at one time,” Mr Ali said.

Rural India is deeply superstitious and the little girl is being hailed as a return of Durga, the Hindu goddess of valour, a fiery deity traditionally depicted with three eyes and many arms. Up to 100 people have been visiting Lali at her home every day to touch her feet out of respect, offer money and receive blessings, said Mr Singh.

“She is the reincarnation of a goddess,” said Lakhi Chand, a 65-year-old farmer who came to see Lali from neighbouring Haryana state. “Lali is God’s gift to us,” said Jaipal Singh, a member of the local village council. “She has brought fame to our village.” Daulat Ram, the village chief, said that he planned to build a temple to Durga in the village.

“I am writing to the state government to provide money to build the temple and help the parents look after their daughter,” Ram said. Lali’s condition is often linked to serious health complications, but the doctor said she was doing well. “She is leading a normal life with no breathing difficulties,” said Mr Ali, adding that he saw no need for surgery. Lali’s parents were married in February 2007 and she is their first child.

Mr Singh said that he took his daughter to a hospital in New Delhi where doctors suggested a CT scan to determine whether her internal organs were normal, but Mr Singh said he felt it was unnecessary. “I don’t feel the need of that at this stage as my daughter is behaving like a normal child, posing no problems,” he said. -times

It is much healthier for the parents to see their daughter as a goddess than as a demon, but the truth is neither. A person is simply the result of a code and in the case of this girl, the code was damaged, probably by something in the environment. She may actually be twins fused into one person like the Hensel twins. Readers of this site will note that this happens with pigs, cows, and cats too. It will be very interesting to see what her one brain (I’m guessing) does with her multiple faces as she grows up. It would be great if she were able to sing harmony with herself by singing different notes with her two different faces. I’d like to see a diagram of how everything is connected. Wild. I wish her luck.

G108 Watch Phone, Now China is Serious

Who knows that the G108 Watch Phone came from China, nobody knows except a few. Unlike its well known copy cat behavior, this time they showing off a unique watch phone, thats so cool. Working on GSM QuadBand, the G108 sports external LED display, built-in camera, media player, Bluetooth, and USB.Regarding storage, the G108 Watch Phone equipped with 512 KB built-in memory and memory card slot for expansion. - tg