Author Archives: Ponderer

About Ponderer

Ponderer also writes science fiction and science-inspired rhyming poetry. Check her out at katerauner.wordpress.com/ She worked at Rocky Flats for 22 years - you may know her as Kathy London.

Happy to Be a GMO

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We’ve posted about GMO foods on this site, but some of the most interesting genetic engineering is happening in medicine. I’ve just found this story from last fall:

Gene silencing: The first Huntington’s Disease patients have been successfully dosed with gene silencing drugs targeting the HD gene. These brave volunteers are the first HD patients to ever be treated with drugs designed to attack HD at its root cause. hdbuzz

Scientists are changing genes – or, at least, gene expression – inside living human beings.

Huntington’s is caused by a mutated version of a gene that was inherited. You, I and everyone has two copies of the HD gene, one from mom and one from dad. If one of these copies has a repetitive bit of code near one it changes the way this gene does its job. Science doesn’t yet understand the details, but this fairly simple variation causes a horrible disease.

‘Gene silencing’ drugs, also known as ‘antisense’ drugs, are designed to reduce production of a chosen protein by attaching to the mRNA ‘message molecule’ that’s made whenever a gene is activated. medicalxpress

There’s a drug, pumped directly into the brain’s fluids, that targets the mutant gene and curtails production of a damaging protein. After trials on mice the technique has been used on human volunteers with early symptoms in a test of safety. There have been no complications over several months, but subjects will be evaluated in 2016. If the drug is deemed safe, trials of its effectiveness will proceed. A terrible disease could be cured.

You may ask,
What’s this got to do with Golden Rice or Arctic Apples?

It reinforces my opinion that knee-jerk reactions make no sense on either side. I doubt the Frankenfolk rendered disease free (if the drug pans out) will mind becoming GMOs.

Techniques vary, risks-to-benefits must be evaluated, and you may feel differently about genetic changes that effect only one organism or can be passed on to offspring. But GMOs are a growing part of our lives and seem to be responsibly researched. I wish the Huntington’s researchers luck and am still looking forward to my first Arctic Apple.

http://en.hdbuzz.net/204
http://medicalxpress.com/news/2015-10-patients-dosed-gene-silencing-drug.html
and other outlets

If Wishes Were Horses… and Merry Christmas

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christmas-wreath-mdThis was one of my grandmother’s favorite sayings:

If wishes were horses, beggars would ride.

According to wikipedia, it comes from a 16th century nursery rhyme and “is usually used to suggest that it is useless to wish and that better results will be achieved through action. It has a Roud Folk Song Index number of 20004.” Who knew there was a Roud Folk Song Index?

An early version was recorded in Remaines of a Greater Worke, Concerning Britaine, printed in 1605. “The modern rhyme was probably the combination of two of many versions and was collected by James Orchard Halliwell in the 1840s.”

Here’s the whole rhyme:

If wishes were horses,
Beggars would ride.
If turnips were watches,
I’d wear one by my side,:
If Ifs and Ands were pots and pans,
There’d be no work for tinkers’ hands.

There are lots of these sorts of phrases:

If ‘if’ was a skiff we would all take a boat ride.
If we had some ham, we could have ham and eggs, if we had any eggs.
If a frog had wings, he wouldn’t bump his ass a-hoppin’.

I think people enjoy making them up. I’m reminded of one that goes like this:

If Ands and Buts were fruits and nuts
We’d all have a Merry Christmas.

Some versions use “candy and nuts” or “ifs and buts.” I saw it attributed by stackexchange and Phrase Finder bulletin board to Don Meredith (football player and commentator.)

Since the phrase has been used popularly of late – by John Boehner and Sheldon Cooper for example – a google search for the origin is rather overwhelmed by pop references. I’d rather do something else today.

So – Don Meredith- you get the credit!

Merry Christmas.

Measure Twice, Cut Once

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This phrase means “think before you act.”

idiomation.wordpress.com says

While the expression measure twice, cut once is an English proverb, the Russian proverb is measure seven times, cut once. But in the book “A Collection of Gaelic Proverbs and Familiar Phrases Based On MacIntosh’s Collection” (1785), it states that the idiom is based on the older Gaelic expression: Better measure short of seven, than spoil all at once. For those who familiar with kilts, a kilt for a grown man takes seven yards and so it’s easy to see why it would be important to measure the yardage twice lest an unfortunate situation arise.

Even earlier, Benvenuto Cellini wrote in 1558…

we must mark seven times and cut once,

which hardly seems like instructions to Scottish tailors.

bookbrowse.com has a reference from John Florio in Second Frutes (1591), Alwaies measure manie, before you cut anie, or measure many times.

Whichever source you prefer, clearly in modern times we are becoming impatient, willing to only measure twice.

Drop the Battle Lines and Solve Problems

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RF_alum and I often bemoan the difficulty of extracting facts from contentious debates. From the Rocky Flats Plant to GMOs, ideologues are ready to abandon facts in their battle with long-standing opponents.

I’m an engineer but that doesn’t make me an expert in anything outside my field. I can’t read and evaluate primary sources from scientific journals – where I expect facts to arise. I don’t have the background, and life is short.

Like most people, I look for sources that seem trustworthy. I try to avoid ideologues, or at least listen to all sides, and use several fact-checkers. But I despair when our national dialogue is dominated by Red Team/Blue Team talking heads who just want to count coup.

What if the rhetoric changed?
What if the people you and I look to for leadership decided to solve problems and not just score points?

I ran into two hopeful interviews recently (links are at the bottom), where proposed changes in rhetoric could allow us to actually solve problems. In both these cases, partisans on all sides would have to open their hearts and minds to new ideas.

Climate Change
Republican Bob Inglis served six terms in the House, representing the very conservative 4th district of South Carolina.

I was my first six years in Congress saying that climate change was hooey, Al Gore’s imagination… All I knew was he was for it, and therefore, I was against it.

Based on viewing some of the evidence (on trips most of us can’t take) he says to fellow conservatives, be

…climate realists and energy optimists. We should be realistic about the science. And then let’s also be energy optimists, realize the power of free enterprise to fix this problem. If we would just put the cost on the fuels, then the free enterprise system would sort this out. And also, at the same time, we should eliminate all subsidies for all fuels. Then the innovation that would come from the free enterprise system would be exciting.

Inglis appeals to me. Leftist ideologues are dour, misanthropic killjoys. I don’t want to live in their world. But I do want to deal with climate change. It’s a slow-motion problem that will eat away at quality of life – for old farts like me, but especially for future generations.

Inglis wants to break away from the current rhetoric, which has backed too many of us into a corner. Continue reading →

America’s First War With Islam

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Thomas Jefferson Tripoli PiratesBrain Kilmeade, of Fox News, working with Don Yaeger who receives co-author credit in a much smaller font and may be responsible for the large number of primary sources listed in the Notes, wrote this book about America’s first war as a nation to feature the “relatively unknown, unsung patriots” who fought and died to makes our famous founding fathers’ vision come true.

I’m glad I picked up the book and will, therefore, forgive him for using one of the most famous of those founding fathers in the title: Thomas Jefferson and the Tripoli Pirates, the Forgotten War that Changed American History.

From the halls of Montezuma,
To the shores of Tripoli…
Hymn of the US Marines

Around 1800, Tripoli (known today as Libya) was the most aggressive of the nations on the North African Barbary Coast: Morocco, Algeria, Tripoli, and part of Egypt, nations beholden to the Ottoman Empire. These nations, each with its own an absolute ruler, controlled the Mediterranean Sea and extended their reach into the Atlantic Ocean. They extorted protection money from nations trading in the Mediterranean, and mostly received whatever they demanded, even from powerful nations like Britain and France (which persisted in fighting each other through the period.) Ships not under the rulers’ protection were routinely captured by “pirates” working for these nations, their crews enslaved, and vast ransoms demanded. It was “a centuries-old practice of building economies around kidnappings, theft, and terror.”

US ships were easy targets
The newly formed United States, untried in the region, found “its status was lowly indeed,” but needed the economic boost from trade. At first, the US paid “tribute” like other nations did, but didn’t have the credit-rating to raise the increasing sums demanded and was still deep in debt from the Revolution. Eventually, the US fought the Barbary nations – especially Tripoli – and won the right to free passage in international waters.

I chose to title this review as a war with Islam, which is a bit hyperbolic.

  • At one point a Tripoli diplomat explained that “all nations which had not acknowledged the Prophet were sinners, whom it was the right and duty of the faithful to plunder and enslave.”
  • Later, however, when America supported an exiled prince against his brother who ruled Tripoli (regime change as a tactic is not new) the US emissary “touched upon the affinity of principle between the Islam and American religion. Both taught the existence…of one God… both enjoyed the universal exercise of humanity, and both forbade unnecessary bloodshed… the viceroy had to agree: indeed these were the maxims of his faith.”

Forgive my cynicism, but those seeking wealth and power seem to use religion when it suits their purpose. Continue reading →

It’s a Banana – Run for You Life – Or Not

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banana.svg.medOne of my favorite websites tackled the question “are bananas radioactive?”

The answer, of course, is “yes.”

Radiation is everywhere – all life, including you and me, evolved in a constant bath of radiation. Our bodies can handle a certain amount – though be careful what you google. There’s a lot of wacky stuff about alleged natural cancer cures on the internet.

There are variations in the amount of radiation present in familiar things.

[At] the nearest grocery… started by measuring the ambient radiation in the air at the store: eight microrems. (The rem is a unit of radiation dosage…) … radiation in the banana bin: 15 microrems. Progress at this point was interrupted by a store manager’s inquiry regarding the customer wielding the Geiger counter. Having justified her presence, Una broadened the investigation. Idaho potatoes? Eleven microrems. Kitty litter? A whopping 19. (We presume you’re not eating that.) straightdope

That’s all part of background radiation – “ubiquitous ionizing radiation that people on the planet Earth are exposed to, including natural and artificial sources.” wikipedia

Bananas are only one source. Background radiation varies by location and – especially pertinent for Coloradans – is higher at higher elevation. Radon is the biggest natural source, and is worth considering. I once rejected purchasing a house because of its way-high radon level. I’ve read of places where uranium mine tailings were used as aggregate in concrete for homes – that’s ridiculous. Sealing yourself in with a source is a foolish risk.

Medical procedures are the largest contributor to artificial radiation and obviously that varies a lot from person to person. We expect the benefits of procedures to far outweigh the risks, but whether certain screenings – mammograms, for example – are worth the risk is an interesting debate. Continue reading →