Robert Paterson's Weblog

As the Komen Foundation Caves, The Internet Wins Again

Just a few weeks after the tidal wave of internet-backlash postponed the controversial PIPA and SOPA legislation (in the Senate and House, respectively), the mighty Susan G. Komen for the Cure foundation has caved in to a mass influx of criticism following their decision on Tuesday to discontinue funding to breast-cancer screening done by Planned Parenthood.

The outcry was so intense that seven Planned Parenthood affiliates issued a statement of disapproval, 26 senators put pressure on the Komen foundation in one way or another, and New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg gave Planned Parenthood $250,000 to help make up for the money lost.

But the outcry was swiftest and harshest from (and one could argue what spawned the official criticism of the Komen grant restructuring) the general public, who took to the usual social media venues like Twitter, Facebook and Tumblr to express their disbelief and rally others behind them.

And just like with SOPA and PIPA, they successfully changed the national conversation. Komen insisted that the change in policy was for efficiency and had nothing whatsoever to do with politics, but even so, the campaign to stop the grant cancellation in its tracks proved successful, no matter the foundation’s reasoning. And in just a few days at that.

Sure, the impact of the internet is often overblown, but it is clear in these two cases that the internet was the vehicle that carried the public’s voice to Komen’s offices in accelerated fashion.

via wired.com

The push back continues!

Having a Super Bowl Party - Try this Epic Sandwich #bacon

 

These guys are truly epic - if you found this amusing then the sausage film is OTT - wait for the end - This is part of a series and while it looks just mad - there is a lot going on here - watch for the regulars!

 

3D Printing is here on PEI and your kid can learn all about it

20 years ago I spent $2,000 on Tandy Computer for my son James. It was a lot of money then. It’s a lot now! But it was the best thing I ever did for him. Aged 11 then James dived in and mastered what was going on. His life was transformed.

Those who are “naturals” in the use of computers now are in a favoured place in our economy.

This process is repeating itself with 3D Printers. Here is Tom Haan and Mauren Kerr who are working in our schools now to help your kids. I hope that we can get behind them and this so that most kids on PEI can learn how to use this exciting technology – where we can make things the make way that we can design 2D today.

So here is Tom and Mo – see how excited the kids are!!!!

 

via queenstreetcommons.org

Watch this space - working hard to make this available to as many kids as possible on PEI

Simple Weight Training and Strength Training Tips - Why Less is more

Research over the past several years has really revolutionized the way we look at exercise. Not only have researchers found that traditional aerobic exercise is one of the least effective forms of exercise, it's also one of the most time consuming, and could even be counterproductive. You're really getting the least amount of bang for your buck when you spend extended amounts of time running on a treadmill.

High intensity interval training on the other hand, has consistently risen to the top as the most effective and efficient form of exercise.

While the fitness industry divides exercise into categories such as anaerobic-, aerobic- and cardiovascular training, fitness experts like Dr. McGuff and Phil Campbell point out that in order to actually access your cardiovascular system, you have to perform mechanical work with your muscle—and can do that on an elliptical machine, on weight training equipment, or using free-weights. So truly, weight training isn't just strength training, it's a cardiovascular workout.

To better understand this, you need to know that your heart has two different metabolic processes:

1. The aerobic, which require oxygen for fuel, and
2. The anaerobic, which do not require any oxygen

Traditional strength training and cardio exercises work primarily the aerobic process. High-intensity interval training, such as Peak Fitness, on the other hand, work your aerobic AND your anaerobic processes, which is what you need for optimal cardiovascular benefit. You're actually getting MORE benefits from high-intensity training than you do from aerobic/cardio, in a fraction of the time—all because you're utilizing your body as it was designed to be used. You can literally be done in about 20 minutes, compared to spending an hour running on the treadmill.

Even more astounding, according to Dr. McGuff you only need 12 minutes of Super-Slow type strength training once a week to achieve the same growth hormone production as you would with Peak Fitness!

So truly, if you've struggled finding time for an effective exercise routine, this could be the solution you've been looking for. The key to make it work is intensity. The intensity needs to be high enough that you reach muscle fatigue. If you've selected the appropriate weight for your strength and fitness level, that would be somewhere in the neighborhood of just seven or eight repetitions.

Furthermore, when the intensity is high, you can also decrease the frequency of your exercise. In fact, in order to continue to be productive, the higher your fitness level, the more you can decrease the frequency without losing benefits. This is because, as a weak beginner, you can exercise three times a week and not put much stress on your system. But once your strength and endurance improves, each exercise session is placing an increasingly greater amount of stress on your body (as long as you keep pushing yourself to the max). At that point, you'll want to reduce the frequency of your sessions to give your body enough time to recover in between.

via fitness.mercola.com

I think that most of us give up on "Exercise" because it takes too much time. I think most of us give up on diets because we are hungry. "Exercise" and "Diet" as we have been sold do not work.

But if we look at "Activity" and exercise in the frame above and if we look at Diet as eating real food and not grains - then becoming healthy becomes possible.

Brian Stewart: America's 'prison nation,' must we follow suit? -

The statistics alone almost defy belief. Every day at least 50,000 men are locked in solitary confinement, while every year 70,000 are raped in chronically overcrowded facilities.

More than 60 per cent of all U.S. inmates are in for non-violent crimes, many for simple drug offences or minor crimes, the result of government-enacted "mandatory sentences" that take all discretion away from judges.

One in every 28 children in the U.S. has a parent locked up, and more than two-thirds of these absent parents are in for non-violent crimes.

"The scale and brutality of prisons are the moral scandal of American life," Gopnik concludes.

Following suit?

Many Canadians have started to pay attention to the horrors of the U.S. prison system ever since the Harper government set out to build more prisons and incarcerate more people in what almost seems a junior version of the American model.

Since 2005, Ottawa has jacked up spending on federal corrections by 85 per cent, from $1.6 billion under the former Liberal government to almost $3 billion last year.

Soon the passage of Bill C-10 will add new and tougher sentences for drug offences, increase mandatory minimums and curtail the use of conditional sentences such as house arrest.

New prisons, stricter sentencing rules and, likely, more stringent parole conditions guarantee Canada will be incarcerating more people than ever before in a seemingly bizarre attempt to ape the disastrous mistakes of our southern neighbour.

What will most puzzle future historians of course is that both the U.S. and Canada chose to lock up more and more people even as crime rates plunged to levels not seen since the 1970s.

via cbc.ca

Why are we doing this? What will be the outcome?

How massage aids muscle healing - AND what about the power of Touch?

Massage helps relieve pain in damaged muscles by sending anti-inflammation messages to muscle cells, Canadian researchers have found.

Athletes have long sought massages to relieve pain and promote recovery. Despite reports that long-term massage therapy reduces chronic pain such as back pain, the biological effects of massage on muscles weren't known.

Now scientists at McMaster University in Hamilton have found evidence at the cellular level that massage blunts muscle pain in a similar way to anti-inflammatory pills.

The study in Wednesday's issue of the journal Science Translational Medicine examined the effects of massage therapy versus no treatment on the quadricep muscles of 11 young men who were recreationally active.

Scientists studied samples from the men before they exercised to the point of exhaustion, just after and then 2½ hours afterwards.

Massage could also help the elderly, those suffering from musculoskeletal injuries and people with chronic inflammatory disease, although that idea still needs to be tested, cautioned the study's lead author, Dr. Mark Tarnopolsky of the pediatrics department at McMaster.

Massage seemed to blunt muscle pain using the same route that anti-inflammatory pain relievers do. (Jack Dempsey/Associated Press)

The study does offer evidence that massage is a safe and viable option to use in medical practice, he said.

via cbc.ca

What do primates do to calm each other and keep themselves healthy? What do all babies need or they will die?

The answer is touch.

I am wondering as I read this piece on massage whether most of us who lead a modern Western World are starved for touch? Maybe we have sexualized it too much?

So because we have made touch all about sex - we don't get touched. I winder what that means for our wellbeing and health?

How to get paid as a small business QSC FEb 8th

Lunch & Learn Wednesday February 08 at noon with Krista Walsh

Posted on February 2, 2012 by karenmurchison | Leave a comment | Edit

via queenstreetcommons.org

Being paid late or not at all is a nightmare for a small business Krista Walsh will help us find out how best to deal with this at a lunch and Learn at the Queen Street Commons on Feb 8

Comment on the post to book

With 5.6 Million People and Counting, the 'Move Your Money' Campaign Worked

According to the neutral research firm Javelin Strategy & Research, 5.6 million adults have changed banking providers in the last three months. Of those who switched, 11 percent (610,000 people) said they did so because of Bank Transfer Day. The number of transfers, Javelin says, is 300 percent as many people as moved during the same period last year.

Javelin warns that the mass exodus was "certainly not the massive departure banks might have feared." Still, if we assume that the average American family has $3,800 in the bank, and we assume that only 300,000 of the 5.6 million people who moved had even that much, that's more than a billion dollars divested from big banks. In the end, it won't stop them from chugging along, but it proves that a concerted effort to change the status quo can be worth a lot, literally and figuratively.

via good.is

People are waking up

The End of Health Insurance Companies - The Beginning of Accountable care

But thanks to the accountable care organizations provided for by the health care reform act, a new system is on its way, one that will make insurance companies unnecessary. Accountable care organizations will increase coordination of patient’s care and shift the focus of medicine away from treating sickness and toward keeping people healthy.

Because most physicians and hospitals today are paid on a fee-for-service basis, medical care is organized around treating a specific episode of illness rather than the whole patient. This system encourages overtreatment and leads to mistakes and miscommunication when patients are sent between their primary care doctors, specialists and hospitals. Indeed, under today’s payment system, investments in providing better care are doubly penalized. If a hospital hires a nurse to follow up with patients after they are discharged in order to reduce readmissions — for example, to help patients with diabetes improve blood sugar control — it must pay for the nurse, which is typically not reimbursed by insurance companies or Medicare, and it loses revenue by preventing the readmission.

In contrast, accountable care organizations will typically be paid a fixed amount per patient, along with bonuses for achieving quality targets. The organizations will make money by keeping their patients healthy and out of the hospital and by avoiding unnecessary tests, drugs and procedures. Thus, they will actually have a financial incentive to hire that nurse for follow-ups.

via opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com

This is the future! The focus of health care has to be HEALTH. Pay for HEALTH not to treat symptoms.

Drug-Resistant Bugs Found in Organic Meat - Or Why Grass Fed is the key

If you’re paying premium prices for pesticide- and antibiotic-free meat, you might expect that it’s also free of antibiotic-resistant bacteria. Not so, according to a new study. The prevalence of one of the world’s most dangerous drug-resistant microbe strains is similar in retail pork products labeled “raised without antibiotics” and in meat from conventionally raised pigs, researchers have found.

Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), a drug-resistant form of the normally harmless S. aureus bacterium, kills 18,000 people in the United States every year and sickens 76,000 more. The majority of cases are linked to a hospital stay, where the combination of other sick people and surgical procedures puts patients at risk. But transmission also can happen in schools, jails, and locker rooms (and an estimated 1.5% of Americans carry MRSA in their noses). All of this has led to a growing concern about antibiotic use in agriculture, which may be creating a reservoir of drug-resistant organisms in billions of food animals around the world.

via wired.com

If you feed a cow grain - you less with its gut flora and encourage bad bacteria. They are designed to eat GRASS not CORN. So it matters not if you feed a cow Organic Corn - you are still messing with its gut flora.

It's simple - feed animals what they are meant to eat and keep them in surroundings that fit their nature and they will be well - this applies to you and me too!

There is "School" and then there is this - You choose!

We think that learning is all about institutions. Hey we think that health is too. But how do we learn best? From a person. 

LEARN from Rick Mereki on Vimeo.

So if we give up all our learning to institutions such as schools - we miss the opportunity. If we give up our health to "health care" we get sick.

Children’s A.D.D. Drugs Don’t Work Long-Term - What about the cause?

Putting children on drugs does nothing to change the conditions that derail their development in the first place. Yet those conditions are receiving scant attention. Policy makers are so convinced that children with attention deficits have an organic disease that they have all but called off the search for a comprehensive understanding of the condition. The National Institute of Mental Health finances research aimed largely at physiological and brain components of A.D.D. While there is some research on other treatment approaches, very little is studied regarding the role of experience. Scientists, aware of this orientation, tend to submit only grants aimed at elucidating the biochemistry.

Thus, only one question is asked: are there aspects of brain functioning associated with childhood attention problems? The answer is always yes. Overlooked is the very real possibility that both the brain anomalies and the A.D.D. result from experience.

Our present course poses numerous risks. First, there will never be a single solution for all children with learning and behavior problems. While some smaller number may benefit from short-term drug treatment, large-scale, long-term treatment for millions of children is not the answer.

Second, the large-scale medication of children feeds into a societal view that all of life’s problems can be solved with a pill and gives millions of children the impression that there is something inherently defective in them.

Finally, the illusion that children’s behavior problems can be cured with drugs prevents us as a society from seeking the more complex solutions that will be necessary. Drugs get everyone — politicians, scientists, teachers and parents — off the hook. Everyone except the children, that is.

via nytimes.com

ADD etc for me represent the heart of the paradigm that is in our way. In our way for a healthier life.

As medicine is practised today, we all ignore why we get ill. Instead we call symptoms a disease and look for a pill.

Perversely we can accept that if we drank water contaminated with sewage that we woud get ill - but we cannot make the link to the reality that if we eat bad food, give up control of our lives, become isolated, and never use our bodies or go outside - that we will also get ill.

The next revolution in health is this. The simple fact is that we are designed to be healthy - so long as we live according to our design. We accept this in the physical realm of clean water but not the rest of how we live. If we stop eating processed food and in particular the all the sugar and grains - if we made our social world important and if we were more active we would be well.

All the vast costs and burdens of our health system woud fade away. But of course THEY don't want that and this is why THE constantly reinforce the myth.

I think all the time of the Church back in 1450 - THEY said that the only way to go to heaven was through the Church. Luther made the mad counter offer - that we could find God all by ourselves.

Today in 2012, we are faced with the same choice and the same pressures.

Bees - Don't take them for granted

 

Chart of the Day: The Baltic Dry Index - Fasten you seat belts

Statistics from the Office of National Statistics this morning showed that the UK went into reverse in the last quarter of 2011, when the economy shrank by 0.2% – but as the Baltic Dry Index shows, the global economy is looking even more worrying.

Chart of the Day: Shipping rates fall off a cliff

The index – often used as a proxy for the health of the global economy as it reflects the prices charged for shipping commodities such as metals, coal or grain around the world – has fallen by 61% since October.

The index was at 842 at yesterday’s close – down from its 12-month high of 2173 last October.

Nick Bullman, managing partner at risk consultant Check Risks, said the index is a good way of looking at the risks to the global economy, “as it tends to be where they hit first”.

via efinancialnews.com

2012 - a hard year ahead

How squeamish are you?

I took this survey to find out how easily I am disgusted. In essence the survey tests your response to the natural world.

Our reactions to odd food, odd people, odd situations that involve things not being as clean as they could be.

I am the green on the left - the blue is the average of "Liberals" - the Red the average of "Conservatives".

Here is the link to the survey. 

This illustrates that many people with strong Christian beliefs tend to see themselves as special and apart from nature and the natural world. The natural world tends to be disgusting to them. 

I worry that this is part of the challenge that we face as our understanding of the natural world and our place in it is the key to solving many of the problems today.

This leads me into an intuition that I will expand on.

That the modern machine world of the 1% is causing a reaction. On the one hand are people like me who look ahead to a new context based on nature and so on networks and on rediscovering our own nature. And on the other people who want to escape BACK into the simpler world that preceded the modern world where God is in his heaven and women know their place and where there is no science but only the BOOK.

So in North America we see the growth of religiosity and a rejection of science and of thinking. Much like in the medieval period. We see fundementalists in the west and also in the Moslem world and even in Israel. 

It helps to recall that in the 14th century the Moslem world was where all the wisdom, knowledge and enlightenment existed. But the advent of the fundementalists have put the Moselm world into a backwater since then.

There is a lot at stake with 3 global cultures fighting it out.

On Burns Day - My favourite song and singer

 

 And by my favourite band - The Black Dyke Mills Band

 

So wistful and so full of longing

Property tax freeze sought by seniors - What will we all do when most on low fixed income?

A senior couple living in Charlottetown is wondering where they will get the money to pay a property tax increase this year.

Homeowners across the Island are facing increased costs for municipal services in May, both on the tax bill — up 2.9 per cent — and in the charge for garbage collection from Island Waste Management — up 2.5 per cent.

"It makes me feel really disgusted," 64-year-old Donna DesRoches told CBC News Tuesday.

She and her 75-year-old husband Bob DesRoches live on seniors' pensions. The couple lives in their own home on a combined income of about $21,000 a year.

Charges on a $150,000 Charlottetown home

	2011	2012
Taxes	$2,704.85	$2,784.32
Waste Watch	$205	$210
Total	$2,909.85	$2,994.32

Bob DesRoches doesn't know where he'll find the extra cash.

"I'm not getting enough money to keep things going," he said.

"After I pay oil and food and lights and all the stuff like that there's not enough money coming in from the pension that I'm getting."

The DesRoches want the province to freeze taxes for seniors, rather than tie it to the consumer price index as the province does now, but Finance Minister Wes Sheridan said that is not possible.

"It makes no sense with regard to the market value versus the taxable value," said Sheridan.

Sheridan noted if a senior were to stay in their home for 20 years, the difference between the market value and the taxable value would become too great.

Sheridan said if seniors find it hard to pay their taxes they have the option of deferring payment until they sell their home.

via cbc.ca

I think that this is the thin end of the edge. In 10 years about half of Islanders will be over 60. Property tax is one of the greatest risks we face. If it is not thought through, it will mean that Islanders will be pushed out of their homes.

Where will they go? Into Manors? That costs today about $35,000 a year. Impossible.

We aslo know that the best way to keep seniors active and healthy is for them to stay in their homes.

So time to to sit down and think our way through this. It is surely possible to think our way into a better solution

The New House - Do what Jefferson did - start with a "Tiny House"

Jefferson did not start with a mansion but with a "Tiny House".

The black outline is the original home.

Now with house prices so high - wages low and job certainty low - do we need all the expense of a big house?

The Tiny House Movement is a response to this.

 

Now think about PEI. You could have oh 10 acres and a tiny house for $35 - 40K - Back to the Land II - On your 10 acres you could grow all your own food and enough to sell as well.

Another view

 

Or this - your Hobbit Home

 

Next Frontier in Piracy: Downloading Physical Objects to Your 3D Printer |

Getty Images

Exciting times, friends. While we’ve been cleaning up the proverbial ticker tape left behind by jubilant celebration over the recently-stalled antipiracy bills, the Pirate Bay – arguably the premier resource for pirating digital content – has already moved on to the next big thing.

The site has announced a new category called “Physibles” that houses digital files that can be downloaded and used in conjunction with 3D printers to print out actual, physical objects:

We believe that the next step in copying will be made from digital form into physical form. It will be physical objects. Or as we decided to call them: Physibles. Data objects that are able (and feasible) to become physical. We believe that things like three dimensional printers, scanners and such are just the first step. We believe that in the nearby future you will print your spare parts for your vehicles. You will download your sneakers within 20 years.

As of right now, the Physibles section of the Pirate Bay has only a few odds and ends – a 3D model of a camera lens, a model 1970 Chevelle hot rod and a whistle, to name a few – but as the prices of 3D printers continue to fall and people one day get used to the idea of, say, purchasing an otherwise tangible product from Amazon and then printing that object out themselves, you can see where a site like the Pirate Bay could really start to ruffle some retail feathers.

(MORE: What ‘Ownership’ Means for Digital Media)

The site spins the announcement with a more humanitarian outlook, however:

The benefit to society is huge. No more shipping huge amounts of products around the world. No more shipping the broken products back. No more child labour. We’ll be able to print food for hungry people. We’ll be able to share not only a recipe, but the full meal.

Such a future is still several, if not tens, of years off, but the ability to print relatively simple objects (even food) is already here and will continue to get more refined over time. Even questions about intellectual property as it pertains to 3D printing have already been raised.

You may recall last year that Shapeways.com, a site that lets users share 3D printer files with one another, found itself associated with a legal scuffle between one of its users and Paramount Pictures. The user had apparently recreated a prop from Paramount’s movie Super 8 and, according to Paramount, was offering to sell 3D printouts of it.

Now imagine a day when everyone has a 3D printer at home. We’ll surely be able to purchase 3D printer files from people and companies far more adept at creating models of printable objects than we are, and assuming these files will be relatively easy to duplicate due to their digital nature, we’re bound to witness plenty of litigation over what’s legal to copy and what’s not.

As Shapeways points out when commenting on the Pirate Bay news, “Being able to download product files is not new, Shapeways has had downloadable models for years, as has Thingiverse and Google Warehouse, but let’s see how this affects the 3D printing IP debate. “

(MORE: Roll Over, Movie Bootleggers: It’s All About 3D Prop Printing Now)

via techland.time.com

I don't buy CD's anymore - I download digital from Netflix or the cloud. I don't buy books much either. I use my Kindle.

Many objects will be in digital form. THIS will be the real revolution.

Imagine the fuss too. SOPA will be nothing on this

Autodesk Releases Free App That Brings 3-D Printing To The Masses

If you hear "maker culture" and instantly think of grease-stained weirdos who drone on about steampunk and "screws not glue"... well, you wouldn't be wrong. But when a giant software company like Autodesk throws its weight behind "makers," you know it's much more than a subculture. "There was this huge digital content generation that emerged, but now that 'Generation C' is turning into 'M,' the Make generation," Tatjana Dzambazova, Senior Product Manager at Autodesk, tells Co.Design. "They want to start physically fabricating the things that they create digitally." And now Autodesk is providing that power, in a free application called 123D that will let any maker, professional or amateur, design and 3D-print anything on demand from toys to turbines.

via fastcodesign.com

The Maker World is upon us - an even bigger breakthrough than the PC I think. Soon anyone will be able to make anything - mass production will go away - mass customization on is way.