Stories tagged death
The day we all die: September 10, 2008
in Earth and Space Science, Physical Science, Structure of Matter, Math, Scientific Enterprise, and Forces of Nature
Ask not...: It tolls for thee, bro, it tolls for thee.
Courtesy carl.jonesJust messin’, y’all!
Only some of us will die on September 10th! And that’s only because we were going to die anyway. There will be sudden heart attacks, tragic car accidents, hilarious full-body prolapses, and possibly some mysterious cases of spontaneous combustion, and none of that will have anything to do with the Large Hadron Collider turning on on the tenth of September.
That’s right, everyone, you can stop holding your breath, and start crossing your fingers, because the LHC now has a date for its first proton collision.
Some people have raised concerns that turning on the LHC could lead to the destruction of the earth in one of several very sciencey ways. Other people have shouted down these jokers, however, because they are very, very, very probably wrong.
And if the world doesn’t end, well, we’ll probably learn all sorts of rad things about the nature of the universe. We might even get some visitors from the future. But I might put a larger bet on the destruction of the solar system (but, you know, fingers crossed).
So, Buzzketeers, on September 10, do your best to protect yourself from the everyday dangers of existence. Wrap your head in packing foam, fill your tummy with starch-based peanuts, and keep yourself wet and/or naked to prevent sparks catching in your clothing and hair, because you probably won’t want to miss what’s coming out of the LHC.
Tags : Hundreds of dead baby penguins: you know, for kids!
A baby penguin: Enjoy it while it lasts.
Courtesy Ben CooperNature is playing a funny joke on the world. It involves cute, baby penguins, and the tropical beaches of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
The punch line: the baby penguins are dead, and the beaches of Rio are covered in them.
You’ve all heard of the Circle of Life, I’m sure, and dead baby penguins are a beautiful part of that process, but this year something seems awry—namely that there are tons more dead baby penguins in Brazil than you’d normally expect.
The cause of the baby penguin die off is still unclear, but local zoo officials (the only authorities quoted in this article) believe that it may have to do with pollution, or over fishing causing the penguins to swim further for food than they normally would. Baby penguins would not be as able to contend with stronger ocean currents further from shore, and they’d, you know, drown and die.
So it may not be totally accurate to say that it’s Nature’s fault that all the baby penguins died. But it seems like something Nature would do.
The devil incarnate: Of course it sings in the dead of night--that's when it feasts on HUMAN SOULS!
Courtesy Alternate:Words
I grew up in Chicago, and I must concur with this article – red-winged blackbirds are simply evil. Every year, the dive-bombing demons attack innocent passersby without warning, without provocation. Their lily-livered apologists, hiding behind such auspicious titles as "conservation ornithologist," try to explain away this behavior as "natural," "instinctive," "protecting their nesting territory." But one look into the coal-black eyes of these minions of Lucifer and you know that's poppycock. These birds have one instinct and one instinct only -- to devour the souls of the living, to rend asunder the very moral fabric of our civilization. Their very name conjures up the essence of iniquity, from the demonic colors to the unnatural oxymoronic name. The only way to get across Grant Park is with a tennis racket to swat the vile creatures away. They should not be conserved; they should be eradicated, and sent back to the pernicious depths from which they came. The fewer of these devil birds polluting our world, the better.
A story on CBS news claims that military veterans commit suicide at a much higher rate than the general population. However, blogger Bill Sweetman argues that the report is flawed. It fails to account for the fact that the vast majority of veterans are men, who have a higher suicide rate than average. Most veterans are also young, and young people commit suicide far more often than older people. Once you account for these two factors, the supposed difference in veterans’ suicide rates disappears.
My neighbor's tree dies a slow, agonizing, horrible death: Well, the leaves do, anyway. Photo by Gene
Oh, sure. Autumn looks pretty, with its big flashy colors and brilliant blue skies. But that’s just a mask it wears to disguise its true, evil intentions. Everything good in the world is dying, all around us, and there’s nothing we can do about it. In fall the nights grow longer, the days colder. Beaches close. Bicycles get packed away for the season. The two most perfect inventions of the mind of man – daylight saving time and baseball – both come to a close. It is the end of life as we have known it. And all we have to look forward to are endless months of icicle winds, lowering skies, and – worst of all – football.
The fiery colors of Autumn are the flames of a funeral pyre, a sign of death and decay. According to Susan Carpenter, native plant gardener at the University of Wisconsin-Madison Arboretum, leaves depend on the chemical auxin to keep open the tubes that supply water, sugar and nutrients. But the cooler temperatures and shorter days of Autumn shut off auxin production. The tubes are cut off, and the leaf strangles and dies. Chlorophyll, the green chemical that gives leaves their summer color, disintegrates, leaving behind two other chemicals: yellow carotene and red anthocyanin. Different tree species contain these chemicals in different amounts, resulting in the various colors we see.
Trees are at their most colorful when a cool, wet summer is followed by a sunny, dry fall. Rainfall promotes tree growth, and moderate temperatures prevent scorching in the summer sun. Extra sunlight in the fall allows trees to continue producing their chemicals right up to the end.
Here in Michigan, we had pretty much the opposite – a summer of drought and searing temperatures, followed by a fairly wet fall. The trees have been pretty brown since mid-September, though a few of them are making a late run at color. Don’t bother, boys. We’re depressed enough as it is.
Enjoy the photograph: photo by Benchilada on flickr.comAfter an “intensive survey of its natural habitat,” the Yangtze River dolphin has been officially declared extinct. So if, as a person, you ever wanted to see one alive, you’re out of luck. And if, as a Yangtze River dolphin, you ever wanted to be alive, also, you’re out of luck.
From a population of thousands in the 1950s, human activity reduced the Yangtze River, or Baiji, dolphin to just a handful of individuals by the turn of the century. Industrialization of the Yangtze River, unsustainable fishing practices, and mass shipping, rather than direct human persecution, placed the Baiji dolphins under extreme pressure, and now they’re all dead, forever. An article in The Guardian states that this is “the fourth time an entire evolutionary line of mammals has vanished from the face of the Earth since the year 1500.” Quite an achievement.
Scent of death?: A Providence, R.I., cat, (not pictured above) that lives at a nursing home has an uncanny ability to find and curl up by residents who are about to die. (Photo by grafwilliam)This has been the main topic of side conversations of floor staff members at the museum today.
Have you heard about this cat in a Providence, R.I., nursing home that has correctly identified the last 25 patients who were to die there?
Oscar, the cat, makes the rounds of the nursing home each morning, just like the medical staff. Some mornings, Oscar will then slip into a room, curl up next to an ailing patient. Within several hours, that patient dies. The cat is so accurate, nursing home staff members will call the family of a resident being visited by Oscar so that they can be present when their loved one passes away.
“He seems to understand when patients are about to die,” says Dr. David Dosa. “Many family members take some solace from it. They appreciate the companionship that the cat provides for their dying loved one.”
Before you get too creeped out by this, doctors at the nursing home say that most of the people Oscar visits are so sick, they’re not aware that he is there. And families, for the most part, seem to be pleased that their loved one got some special attention from Oscar before the death.
Is there science behind this phenomenon? After all, there are dogs that can sniff out oncoming epileptic seizures and there are rats that can sniff out buried land mines.
One theory is that Oscar picks up scents or reads something into the behavior of the nurses who raised him in being able to determine if a patient is going to die. One researcher points out that the only way to know for sure is to do a study of Oscar’s behavior when someone is dying compared to what he does when people aren’t dying.
What do you think is going on here? Share your thoughts with other Science Buzz readers.
Being one never to have a lot of trust in cats, especially after seeing the movie "Cats and Dogs, I’d like that investigation to go a little deeper. Cats can be a lot more devious than appears on the surface.
Rethinking CPR: New research is questioning if CPR does more harm than good. The thinking is that a sudden surge of oxygen into the body kills cells faster than a gradual return to normal conditions.The conventional wisdom has been that when someone has a heart attack or other catastrophic health problem, the quick revival of blood flow and breathing will return them to life.
Now, new research is questioning that conventional wisdom, and is even wondering if the process of CPR (cardiopulmonary resuscitation) could actually be leading to a quicker death. Hold on to your hat and read on.
The old thinking was that cells of the body would begin to die within four or five minutes of the stoppage of oxygen and nutrients coming to them through blood. The quicker a heart can be restarted and breathing can begin, the better the chances were for a body to go on living.
Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania have been studying heart cells under microscopes. What they’ve found throws all that stuff up into the air. What they found was that cells cut off from their lifeline of blood died hours later, not minutes.
Now here’s the real freaky part. The researchers think that the cells die faster when their oxygen supply is quickly returned.
So the quick surge of oxygen and energy into the body may be just the wrong thing do to someone whose breathing and blood flow have stopped. These researchers are thinking that hypothermia – extreme cold temperatures bringing the body’s core temperature to 33 degrees C – might be a better option. Then medical professionals would have time to adjust the blood chemistry for a safe, gradual return of oxygen and nutrients to the cells, keeping them alive.
University of California researchers have tried a slightly different approach of treatment at four hospitals. Cardiac patients received a blood infusion that would keep their hearts in a state of suspended animation. They were on a heart-lung device to maintain blood flow to the brain until the heart could be slowly restarted. The tests were conducted in just 34 patients, but 80 percent were discharged from a hospital okay. Under the old methods, the survival rate is 15 percent.
A lot more research has to be done, but the findings do shake up what we’ve traditionally thought about how to keep people living. Share your thoughts on this topic with other Science Buzz readers here.
New research is questioning if CPR does more harm than good. The thinking is that a sudden surge of oxygen into the body kills cells faster than a gradual return to normal conditions.
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U.S. population - 300 million
in Historic Perspectives and Biological Populations Change Over Time
U.S. population, 300 million: from Wikimedia As I entered college in the fall of 1967, the population of the United States reached 200 million. Now, 40 years later, it will hit 300 million (about Oct. 15).
Our population is effected by deaths, births, and migration. Here are the current rates for each:
- One birth every.................................. 7 seconds
- One death every.................................. 13 seconds
- One international migrant (net) every............ 31 seconds
- Net gain of one person every..................... 11 seconds
The U.S. Bureau of the Census has a website projecting the current resident population of the United States (click link for today's number). At 300 million, the United States is the world's third most populous nation, though it remains far behind the growing economic superpowers of China (1.31 billion) and India (1.09 billion).
Minority children become a majority
Now, according to the Population Reference Bureau, almost half of all children under age 5 are members of a racial or ethnic minority.
Other changes since 1970
- The suburbs share of the population grew from 38 percent to 50 percent (share of population living in central cities stagnated at around 30 percent).
- The population in the South and West grew from 38 percent to 48 percent of the nations total.
- Persons living alone rose from 18 percent to 26 percent. Households with five or more people almost halved, from 20 percent to 11 percent.
- Women in the workforce grew from 43 percent to 59 percent.
- Persons over 24 with high school diplomas soared from 55 percent to 85 percent.
Source: Population Reference Bureau, and RedOrbit
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