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Jumat, 31 Desember 2010

How Food Affects Your Brain 10 Facts We Now Know

This entry was posted on Saturday, September 4th, 2010 at 10:10 am and is filed under Featured. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

This is republished by kind permission of Cindy Cullen of Culinary Arts College

You are what you eat. It’s an old adage that speaks volumes on what has become of the American lifestyle.

A focus on overly processed foods and a mere brush with fruits and vegetables have lead to an alarming rate in obesity and the detrimental diseases linked to it like diabetes. Documentaries filmed in public schools show children who have no clue what a real potato looks like!

Eating right takes some effort and here are the 10 foods that will make it worthwhile and turn on your brain.

1. Fish. You won’t get fat from it and it improves your immunity, which keeps you healthy and promotes collagen production which keeps you looking younger, longer. When it comes to how fish affects your brain, the results are amazing. The omega-3 fatty acids in fish ease signs of depression. Fish also keeps the memory portion of the brain alert and working well into old age. Incorporate fish into your diet 2-3 times a week to reap the health benefits. If you’re one that loads up on red meat regularly, you’ll notice the difference fish makes your health almost immediately.

2. Vegetables. Vegetables? Good for you? Who would have thought? Vegetables are good for nearly every part of your body (organs, digestive system and more), but they’re also fantastic for your brain. A study of over 3,700 women and men showed that those who consumed at least three servings of vegetables a day retained their mental abilities better than those who had fewer than three servings of veggies per day. The study was conducted over three years and showed the best mental results from those who focused on consuming dark, leafy greens. Case in point? Make a dark, leafy salad a part of every meal.

3. Red wine. Red wine started making headlines a few years ago when we heard it was great for the heart. Thanks to the rich antioxidants in red wine, it’s also the go-to beverage for protecting brain cells. In April of 2010, scientists discovered properties in red wine that help recovering stroke victims. The resveratrol component found in red wine is what protects brain cells from damage during and after a stroke. Researchers have not tested synthetic versions of resveratrol, which is available in health food stores alongside other vitamins, so for now, you’re better off consuming red wine daily to reap the benefits. One glass for women and 2-3 glasses for men is seen as moderate red wine consumption.

4. Strawberries. Feeling forgetful lately? Strawberries may be the answer. Researches have recently discovered an antioxidant in strawberries that helps preserve the memory and fight Alzheimer’s. It’s the antioxidant properties in strawberries called fistein and it’s said to improve the connection of neurons, leading to a stronger memory. Not only does fistein prevent existing cells from dying, it also contributes to new and strong cell growth. Fistein is also found in peaches, tomatoes, grapes, oranges and onions. Strawberries are also chock full of iodine, which is known to preserve the nerve and brain systems.

5. Walnuts. Walnuts are packed with lecithin, which fasten the transmitters between brain cells. This means you’re alert and ready to go when anything hits. Besides making you think on your toes, walnuts also improve memory and brain power. Lechitin also slows the aging process in the brain, which may prevent Alzheimer’s. Don’t think you have to put away bags of the nuts to benefit from the components. Having 2-3 walnuts a day will suffice, so stash a bag at your desk and use them as your pick-me-up snack when the mid-afternoon slump rolls around.

6. Pumpkin seeds. Pumpkin seeds should be a go-to snack in your household. Pumpkin seeds are packed with zinc, which is good for your brain in a myriad of ways. Zinc helps your short term memory take off and also improves your abilities to concentrate, especially during a high pressure situation. Just a small handful of pumpkin seeds per day will benefit your brain.

7. Blueberries. We know blueberries are fabulous for your skin and immune system, but what do they do for our brains? The antocianines are antioxidants that protect the brain from aging, warding off diseases like dementia and Alzheimer’s. They also improve your motor skills and learning capacity. Chowing down on blueberries improves your navigation skills, short term memory and coordination too. Wash blueberries and stash them in a bowl in the fridge for a quick, accessible snack or mix them into a smoothie on a daily basis.

8. Sage. This is a major brain food. Sage may not be in your regular diet, but it’s a pretty easy one to fit in when you’re working with proteins at home. Sage improves everything from your short term memory, improve your senses and helps the nervous system. Sage also inhibits the production of the amino acids known for memory loss. So how can you move sage from the produce aisle into your diet? Mince it and use it on pork, chicken or beef. You can also sprinkle it raw onto a salad or steam it in water to extract the oils and sip as a quick DIY tea.

9. Cacao products. Who doesn’t love chocolate? The unprocessed version of the cacao bean are best and will do much more for your brain than a Snickers bar. Cacao beans have flavonoids, which improve brain cell production and blood flow in the brain. The Theomobrine found in cacao beans also improve the “bliss” factor going on in our brains. However not all cacao is created equal. If you are seeking out the cacao that’s going to keep your brain going strong, you need to look for 100% organic non-alkalized cocoa powder. Mix this in with your coffee or a glass of organic or soy milk to get your cacao fill.

10. Olive oil. Like fish, olive oil is rich in omega-3 fatty acids. It curbs depression and serves as a healthy fat, which keeps your skin, hair and nails in tip-top shape. This fat is responsible for nerve transmission and cell membranes are comprised of fatty acids. Fatty acids also help build brain cells, making them an essential part of your diet. .

Making a few changes to your diet will create a serious difference in your brain activity and leave you looking and feeling better. If you had kids, these foods will typically help them be more alert and aware in school and also promote healthy eating habits for the long term.

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Kamis, 23 Desember 2010

How To Stay Energised In The Fall/Autumn

This entry was posted on Monday, September 27th, 2010 at 1:56 pm and is filed under Featured. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

3013537434_acb24aa477_mAs you have probably noticed it is starting to get towards winter the nights are getting shorter, and it is starting to get slightly colder as we start to get into the autumn/fall season.

And as we do head into winter you may be noticing that your energy levels are starting to dip in conjunction with this. So let’s look at how we can re-energise ourselves as we head towards winter.

Breakfast

There is nothing better especially at this time of the year to fuel your body by having a highly nutritious breakfast. I normally switch to eating porridge/oatmeal with some fruit added, one of my favourites is blueberries. Another particular favourite of mine is muesli, especially one’s that contain a lot of fruit such as raisins, etc.
Sleep

It is very important to make sure that you get the right amount of sleep otherwise this can lead to cravings for the wrong foods, which is something that you don’t particularly need. When you don’t get the required amount of sleep it can leave you craving simple carbohydrates like sugar filled cereals and things like croissants.

The problem with eating these type of foods is they will give you some energy, but it will be very short lived and you will soon start to feel tired again. To make sure that you get ample sleep make sure you eat your last meal quite a few hours before you go to bed so your stomach is rested while you sleep instead of digesting large amounts of food.

Stop slumps

Try and keep some fruit handy or nuts when you are on the go as this will keep your energy levels sustained such is the hectic pace of life these days we normally tend to eat at meal times, but sometimes we may be under so much pressure to get something done we can miss our normal meal time.

So at least if you do this particular tactic you will still maintain your energy levels throughout the day it is still important. However, though to make sure that you eat at certain times otherwise you are far more likely to eat too much food in one go.

Body booster foods

Try eating the following foods in order to give your body that essential boost, eat things like oily fish, vegetables that are dark green examples being broccoli, spinach, kale, brussels sprouts. Eat lean meat, which has very little fat on it and baked beans. The main reasons for eating these particular foods is they will give you a boost in iron.

It’s a well-known fact that 40 percent of women who are aged 30 do not get enough iron in their diet. If you don’t particularly want to eat these foods like meat, for instance. Then go for some iron supplements instead or a multivitamin which contains it.

You may or may not have noticed that your energy levels have started to dip as we head into autumn and towards winter. If you feel that there is something else wrong, which could be the case such as depression try taking some St John’s Wort this is known as the sunshine herb. Other than that some people need to use a lamp that replicates the suns rays, they suffer from something called (SAD) seasonally adjusted disorder, which can affect a lot of people.

If you’re not sure whether you have it pay a visit to your GP and get some advice.

Drink plenty of fluids, if you don’t it can leave you feeling both mentally and physically drained. We do tend to drink more in the summer months, but we still need fluids even in the autumn season.

Try eating some fruits as these do contain water, also their smells can make you feel revitalised.

Daily energy boosters

Move around as much as you can during this time of the year, it’s very tempting to surf the Internet watch television and stay indoors. Which is all very well but when you sit still for a long time it can leave you feeling drained and tired.

Try doing some simple exercises first thing in the morning to give yourself a quick energy boost, do some simple ones like for instance 10 to 15 push-ups if you are able to do them.

If you have got some light weights do some arm lifts keep your legs slightly apart and raise your arms up and down until they are horizontal and slowly bring them down, do this for about 15 to 20 repetitions. During the afternoon, you can tend to have a bit of a slump, if you do experience this go for a walk it’s a well known fact that if you exercise for at least 10 minutes it can leave you feeling energised for two hours after.

When you are doing your exercise listen to some music it can make you want to work harder at least by 15 percent more.

If you don’t have any comedies on DVD then rent one out a good belly laugh can make you feel energised and overall very positive. This is something that can be missing when it is feeling dark and miserable and your mood starts to change.Have a bath before you go to bed this will help you relax and give you a much needed refreshing sleep.

Try to find 15 to 20 minutes within your day to meditate if you don’t do it already that it is, if you do this regularly for at least five days a week you will reap the benefits. Meditation has been known to help with the following lower blood pressure, help with concentration and focus, keeping you more in a moment, and helps with stress and depression.

I cannot recommend it highly enough once you start to do it on a regular basis you will feel a lot more calmer and happier. Have a happy and energised autumn/fall and get energised

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Selasa, 14 Desember 2010

The 20 Best and Worst Foods for Joint Health

This entry was posted on Thursday, September 2nd, 2010 at 1:12 pm and is filed under Featured. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

This is a repost by kind permission of Penny Thomas of How To Become A Physical Therapist

According to WebMD, there are over one hundred forms of arthritis. Common symptoms include inflammation, stiffness, and pain in the joint areas. Because medicine and health care are both getting more expensive, more people are looking to their diets.

With certain foods and supplements touting joint health abilities and others having negative effects, the only way to know for sure is to try.

To aid in your quest for better movement, we have gathered the 20 best and worst foods for joint health. We have even added a little bit on the vitamins and supplements that can be easily added to any diet for even more benefits.

10 Best Foods for Joint Health

Add these foods to your diet to help better joint health, lose weight, and/or even more.

1. Shrimp : Choose this shellfish as your next appetizer or entrée. Its shells contain high levels of glucosamine, a known vitamin to help combat inflammation of the joints. The same is true for shells of lobsters or crab. They also contain high levels of selenium and are a low fat source of protein.

2. Salmon : If unable to eat shellfish, check out this super food. A regular of “top foods” list, salmon is an excellent source of omega 3 fatty acids that have benefits for weight, heart health, and of course, joints. In fact, the fat composition of salmon has recently been evaluated as superior not only because of its rich omega 3 content, but also because of its great ratio of omega 3s to omega 6s and its health-supportive balance of saturated, monounsaturated, and polyunsaturated fats.

3. Almonds : If you are a vegan looking to improve their joint health, this is the food for you. Almonds are also high in the omega 3 fatty acids found in salmon. They also have loads of vitamin E and manganese. Adding manganese into your diet will help the glucosamine in your body, as well as speed up and increase its productivity. You can also switch out a jar of peanut butter for almond butter to make it easy to get into your diet.

4. Pineapples : The spiky fruit has long thought to have had healing powers. Containing an element called bromelain, it has remarkable healing properties. According to Boulder Natural Labs, bromelain and its ability as an anti-inflammatory is superior to that of a comparable drug. It can also help with sprains, cuts, bruises, and much more.

5. Extra Virgin Olive Oil : Because extra virgin olive oil is derived from the first pressing of olives, it has the most antioxidant benefits. These work to extract the free radicals in your body that can lead to inflammation and joint pain. As an added bonus, it also has the most flavor. Simply use it instead of butter or other oils when cooking or as a topping for salads.

6. Bell Peppers : All peppers are rich in vitamins A, C, and K, but red peppers are the best choice, including for naturally fighting joint pain. Antioxidant in peppers help to prevent cell damage, cancer, and diseases related to aging, and they also reduce inflammation like that found in arthritis and asthma. Peppers are also high in fiber and can help in weight loss.

7. Go Bananas : If weight loss is part of your quest to obtain better joint health, this is the fruit for you. One of nature’s best sources of potassium, bananas help you feel fuller on less calories. They also contain loads of the vitamins found in the above peppers.

8. Avocado : Good news for everyone who loves guacamole: it can help you joint health. In fact, it has been referred to as “the most nutritious of all the fruit.” It provides about twice as high a proportion of the daily needs for antioxidant vitamins as its calorie proportion. Avocados can also be useful for staving off cancer, heart disease, arthritis, and even eye cataracts.

9. Turmeric : This super spice is one of nature’s most powerful healers. Orange in color and often used in Indian cooking, it is long known for its anti-inflammatory properties. The site Health Diaries has 19 other reasons to add turmeric to your diet, in addition to fighting off arthritis. They include using it as a disinfectant, preventing cancer, and even improving mood.

10. Ginger : That garnish for your sushi might actually just be the key to better joint health. Denmark researchers have discovered that ginger can block the effects of prostaglandins. These are substances that cause inflammation of the blood vessels in the brain, which leads to migraines. Just a half teaspoon of ginger in your tea can lead to marked relief in arthritis pain.

Worst Foods for Joint Health

Now that you have a piece of salmon, cooked in extra virgin olive oil and topped with avocados, ginger, and turmeric, here is a list of foods to not add to your diet.

11. Red Meat : We all love a good steak, but did you know that it can lead to joint pain? According to British researchers, eating a diet high in red meats could actually lead to rheumatoid arthritis. The study linked the amount of protein taking in with higher risk. Other meats and too much protein also lead to similar results.

12. Dairy : In an entry from PCRM Health, they tell the story of a woman who was completely cured of arthritis after eliminating dairy products from her diet. With the theory that it has similar properties to the above, the protein found in dairy may have been the cause of her joint pain. If you suspect dairy may be causing your arthritis pain, try cutting it out of your diet or substituting for soy milk and other alternatives to dairy.

13. Saturated Fat : Because this is a main source of weight gain and has inflammatory properties, saturated fat can be a bad choice for those with joint pain. Butter, cheese, fatty meats, and more all contain high levels. It is also linked to high cholesterol and increased risk of heart disease. About.com has more on how reduce fat, cook better, and learn more about fats.

14. Caffeine : This stimulant may be doing more than help you get going in the morning. Like anything, taking in too much caffeine can have negative side effects, including in the joints. It can also interact badly with medication you are taking. Remember that caffeine is also found in colas, energy drinks, chocolate, and over the counter medicines.

15. Trans Fats : These fats increase the shelf life of food but unfortunately also lead to other more serious problems than spoiled food. According to The Examiner, trans fats are linked to belly fat, ADHD, cancer, diabetes, and arthritis. These fats are commonly known as hydrogenated or partially hydrogenated oils and can be found by reading the nutrition label. The article has more on what foods truly contain zero grams of trans fats.

Best Supplements for Joint Health

Can a pill help with joint health? The below have more.

16. Multi-vitamin : Everyone including those who suffer from joint pain should consider taking a multivitamin. They offer many essential nutrients in addition to other compounds that can be missing from the average diet. They include folic acid, vitamin B, D, A, and more. A doctor also weighs in on the downside to taking too many vitamins.

17. Fish Oil : If you can’t eat it every day, why not try taking it? The magazine “Arthritis Today” has a mini guide for all those wishing to learn more about it. Dosage, claims, and studies are all included.

18. Proteolytic Enzymes : These enzymes aid in the digestive process. Taken for both RA and Sjorgen’s syndrome, they reduce the level of circulating immune complexes and reduce inflammation. Because dosage and quantity varies with everyone, be sure and speak to your doctor before taking this one..

19. Vitamin D : A research project by Dr. Michael Holick and others has found a link between vitamin D deficiency and arthritis. It followed a group of older women and found that those who had the highest intake of vitamin D also had the lowest risk of arthritis. The vitamin has also been linked to helping preventing certain cancers, heart disease, diabetes, and more.

20. Glucosamine and Chondroitin : Both of these vitamins are part of the cartilage found in between the bones and joints. Both can be found in seafood or are available as supplements. Many sufferers of joint pain take one or both to aid, but according to WebMD, they may be doing it in vain. Three studies are linked to and have more. The good news is that if you are currently taking them or thinking about it, the main damage they do is to your wallet.

If looking to ease your joint pain, be sure to talk to your doctor before following any of the advice you have read in the above 20 best and worst foods for joint health. As illustrated in the dairy story, some choices work well for some, poorly for others, or not at all. Only a doctor can tell you if dietary changes can affect the medications you are taking or depriving you of a much needed food source.

Source site and article The 20 Best and Worst Foods for Joint Health

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Sabtu, 04 Desember 2010

The Grid

I had no idea how developed our historiography of the American power grid has become. That is, until, I finished reading this week's H-SCI-MED-TECH list-serv digests.

The highlight of the discussion is this beautiful little website, aimed an undergrad/general reader, courtesy of Wisconsin-Madison's Center for Culture | History | Environment.

I'll list below the other books or articles mentioned in the many valuable replies.

Read more...



(I'm aggregating quickly here and apologize for not crediting the contributors to this list, and for duplications---check out the h-net message archives for details):

Richard F. Hirsh, Technology and transformation in the American electric
utility industry (Cambridge, CUP, 1989)




Richard F. Hirsh, Power Loss: The Origins of Deregulation and Restructuring in the
American Electric Utility System (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1999
[paperback, 2002]).

Charles D. Jacobson, Ties that bind: economic and political dilemmas of
urban utility networks (2000) - for relations to other network industries.

Maury Klein, The Power Makers

Jill Jonnes, Empires of Light

Harold Platt, The Electric City

Paul Israel's bio of Edison

Forrest MacDonald's bio of Insull

Rudolph and Ridley, Power Struggle

James Goodman, Blackout

David Nye, When the Lights Went Out

David Nye, Consuming Power

David Nye, Electrifying America

Phillip Schewe, The Grid


Sharon Beder - Power Play: The Fight to Control the World's Electricity

Tobey, Ronald C. Technology as Freedom: The New Deal and the Electrical
Modernization of the American Home. Berkeley:  University of California
Press,  c1996

==On Niagara==

Edward Dean Adams, Niagara Power: History of the Niagara Falls Power
Company, 1886-1918, 2 vols (1927)

Steven Lubar, "Transmitting the Power of Niagara," IEEE Technology and
Society Magazine, March 1989, pp. 11-18.



==On Chicago and Insull==

William E. Keily, ed., Central-Station Electric Service: Its Commercial
Development and Economic Significance as Set Forth in the Public Addresses
(1897-1914) of Samuel Insull (1915)

William E. Keily, ed., Public Utilities in Modern Life: Selected Speeches
(1914-1923) by Samuel Insull (1924)

Forrest McDonald, Insull (1962)

John Hogan, A Spirit Capable: The Story of Commonwealth Edison (1986)

Samuel Insull, The Memoirs of Samuel Insull, ed. Larry Plachno (1992)

Harold Platt, Electric City: Energy and the Growth of the Chicago Area,
1880-1930 (1991)

Payson Jones, A Power History of the Consolidated Edison System, 1878-1900
(1940)

M.L. Ramsey, Pyramids of Power: The Story of Roosevelt, Insull, and the
Utility Wars (1937)



==On Rural Electrification==

D. Clayton Brown, Electricity for Rural America: The Fight for the REA (1980)

David C. Coyle, Electric Power on the Farm: The Story of Electricity, Its
Usefulness on Farms, and the Movement to Electrify Rural America (1936)



==Additional Suggestions==

R. H. Parsons, The Early Days of the Power Station Industry (1939)

Leonard Hyman, America's Electrical Utilities: Past, Present and Future
(1983)

Richard Hirsh, Technology and Transformation in the American Electrical
Utility Industry (1989) or anything by Hirsh

Richard Hirsh, Power Loss: The Origins of Deregulation and Restructuring
in the American Electric Utility System (1999)

William Hausman, Mira Wilkins, Peter Hertner, eds., Global
Electrification: Multinational Enterprise and International Finance in the
History of Light and Power, 1878-2007 (2008) or anything by Hausman

----
And the syllabus that resulted from this h-net discussion:

Course Objectives:  At the end of this course, the student should be
able to:

    * List the main elements of the theory of large technological
systems as developed by Thomas Hughes and others
    * Apply the theory of large technological systems to analyze
aspects the history of the electric grid
    * Outline the main features of the technological development of the
electric grid
    * Identify the significant personalities involved in the
development of the electric grid
    * Outline the historical evolution of electric utility companies
    * Outline the technological, social and political factors related
to rural electrification
    * Define the term “utility consensus” and describe its impact on
the development of the electric grid
    * Outline the impact of deregulation on the electric grid and its
operation

Textbook and/or Resources

    * Thomas Hughes, Networks of Power: Electrification of Western
Society 1880-1930, Johns Hopkins University Press, 1983
    * Richard F. Hirsh, Power Loss: The Origins of Deregulation and
Restructuring the American Electric Utility System, MIT Press, 1999
    * Readings Packet (on sale at OIT bookstore)

 Week 1: Introduction to Large Technological Systems

       Paul N. Edwards, “Infrastructure and Modernity: Force, Time, and Social
Organization in the History of Sociotechnical Systems,” from Misa, Bray
and Feenburg, Modernity and Technology, MIT Press, 2003. (Readings Packet)

       Thomas Hughes, Networks of Power, Chapter 1

       David Nye, “Chapter 1 – Grid” in When the Lights Went Out: A History of
Blackouts in America, MIT Press, 2010 (Readings Packet)

       Reference: National Academy of Engineering, Greatest Engineering
Achievements of the 20th Century, http://www.greatachievements.org/

Week 2: Inventing Electrification - Edison and His Competitors

       Thomas Hughes, Networks of Power, Chapters 2-5

       Reference: A CHE Primer on Energy – The Grid, Center For Culture
History Environment, University of Wisconsin-Madison,
http://che.nelson.wisc.edu/cool_stuff/energy/grid.shtml

Week 3: Implementing Electrification – Berlin, Chicago, London, and
California

       Thomas Hughes, Networks of Power, Chapters 6-10

Week 4: The Rise of the Grid – The Creation of Regional Networks

       Thomas Hughes, Networks of Power, Chapters 11-15

Week 5: Experiencing Electricity – Society and the Electric Grid

       David Nye, “Chapter 1 – Middletown Lights Up” and “Chapter 4 – What Was
Electricity” in Electrifying America: Social Meanings of a New
Technology, MIT Press, 1991 (Readings Packet)

       Raymond Arsenault, “The End of the Long Hot Summer: The Air Conditioner
and Southern Culture,” in Searching for the Sunbelt: Historical
Perspectives on a Region

Week 6: Rural Electrification

       David Nye, “Chapter 7 – Rural Lines” in Electrifying America: Social
Meanings of a New Technology, MIT Press, 1991 (Readings Packet)

       Robert Caro, “Chapter 27 – The Sad Irons” and “Chapter 28 – I’ll Get It
For You” in The Years of Lyndon Johnson: The Path to Power, Vintage
Books, 1990

Week 7: The “Utility Consensus” – Regulating the Grid

       Richard F. Hirsh, Power Loss, Chapters 1-7

       Reference: A CHE Primer on Energy – Regulation 101, Center For Culture
History Environment, University of Wisconsin-Madison,
http://che.nelson.wisc.edu/cool_stuff/energy/regulation101.shtml

Week 8: Conservation and Utility Operation

       Richard F. Hirsh, Power Loss, Chapters 8-11

Week 9: The Rise of Deregulation

       Richard F. Hirsh, Power Loss, Chapters 12-15

Week 10:  The Legacy of Enron

       David Nye, “Chapter 5 – Rolling Blackouts” in When the Lights Went Out:
A History of Blackouts in America, MIT Press, 2010 (Readings Packet)

       Bradford Plumer, “Drunk with Power: The Energy Villain in Your
Neighborhood,” The New Republic, October 2, 2009 (Readings Packet)

       Film "Enron: Smartest Guys in the Room" (excepts shown in class)


Dr. Mark Clark
Professor of History
Oregon Institute of Technology
Klamath Falls, Oregon, USA

Senin, 29 November 2010

Is Brown Rice Better For You Than White Rice

This entry was posted on Friday, June 18th, 2010 at 2:59 pm and is filed under Featured. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

What are your preferences regarding eating rice do you normally have white rice or have you thought about trying brown rice? If you haven’t then read on because this particular post will be of interest to you, especially if you want to stop yourself from getting diabetes or becoming prediabetic.

If you have more than two servings of white rice per week and switch this to brown rice instead you may there increase your risk of contracting type two diabetes by a factor of 16 percent which is quite substantial for a simple dietary change.

When white rice is made the outer shell is discarded when you keep the outer shell then you have brown rice so by keeping the discarded layer you keep the goodness of the rice.

The benefits of this are it contains insoluble fibre this will cause a dampening effect on your overall sugar levels keeping them more stable and stop sugar spikes. When you eat white rice it gets absorbed into your bloodstream far quicker in comparison to brown rice.

The main reason for this is white rice has a high glycemic index in comparison to brown rice, in a study which was conducted, which took data from 200,000 healthcare professionals and nurses. Five percent of those already had type 2 diabetes, this particular measurement went on for between 14 and 22 years.

For those people who had five servings of white rice per week they were said as having a 17 percent more chance of contracting diabetes where as people who ate brown rice at least two times a week had a 11 percent lesser chance of contracting diabetes. However, there is no need to worry if you do eat white rice because as one of the researchers stated this ,because brown rice is more nutritious than white rice it doesn’t necessarily mean that white rice will make you contract diabetes.

Overall brown rice is more nutritious but more than anything this highlights the importance of living a healthy lifestyle with a varied eating plan. Also it was noted from the study that the people who ate brown rice had an overall healthier lifestyle, and were very active and had no history of diabetes within their families.

Source http://news.health.com

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Selasa, 16 November 2010

How Water Helps You Lose Weight

This entry was posted on Thursday, September 2nd, 2010 at 12:24 pm and is filed under Featured. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

1695650382_989846bf18_m

This guest post is contributed by Maryanne Osberg, who writes on the topic of RN to MSN Online.

We all know that water sustains life, but how many of us know the many ways that it helps you lose weight as well? It’s a truly miraculous liquid in many ways – not only would we be dead without water, we would also invite disease and illness into our lives.

Exercise and diet are important aspects of weight loss no doubt, but the secret to really easy and effective weight loss is water. If you want to know how water helps you lose weight, read on:

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email mary.anne579(AT)gmail(DOT)com.

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Jumat, 29 Oktober 2010

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Kamis, 30 September 2010

An Act of Curation: HSS 2010

Below (after the "read more" bit), you will find a listing of all papers from the upcoming History of Science Society's Annual Meeting that have something to do with American history, broadly construed. I'm working off of titles here, so I may have missed some or added too many.


Please don't interpret this as a plea to be too parochial. We can and ought to cross national borders in our study of the history of science.


This is an act of curation, meant to show off the diversity of Americanist work at HSS and to bring your attention to panels and papers that you might otherwise miss.



Friday 9-11:45

Genes and Mechanisms in the Case of Cystic Fibrosis: Philosophical, Historical and Social Perspectives. Chair and Commentator: Miriam Solomon, Temple University Organizer: Susan Lindee, University of Pennsylvania
1.    A Disease About to Disappear, Susan Lindee, University of Pennsylvania
2.    Mechanisms, Mutations, and Rational Drug Therapy in the Case of Cystic Fibrosis, Lindley Darden, University of Maryland
3.    Examining Problems with Using ‘Mechanistic’ Evidence for Managing Cystic Fibrosis, Jeremy Howick, University College London
4.    Is My Sick Child Healthy? Is My Healthy Child Sick?: Changing Parental Experiences of Cystic Fibrosis in the Age of Expanded Newborn Screening, Rachel Grob, Sarah Lawrence College (Child Development Institute)

Science and Popular Culture: Making and Communicating Natural Knowledge
Chair and Commentator: Lynn Nyhart, University of Wisconsin, Madison Organizer: Lukas Rieppel, Harvard University
1.    Genres of Synthesis, and the Works of George Gamow, Nasser Zakariya, Harvard University
2.    The Only Real Skeleton in Europe. Diplodocus, Andrew Carnegie, and German Rivalry, Ilja Nieuwland, Huygens Institute of he Royal Netherlands Academy of Sciences
3.    Zen and the Art of Textbook Writing, David Kaiser, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
4.    Collectors for Hire: Charles Sternberg and the Commercial Fossil Trade, 1870–1930, Lukas Rieppel, Harvard University


The War of Guns and Mathematics: Miltary-Scientific Collaborations and Methods in Ballistics from Euler to World War II Chair and Commentator: Matthew Jones, Columbia University Organizer: David Aubin, Université Pierre et Marie Curie, Paris
3.    Mathematicians and Exterior Ballistics in America, 1880–1940, Alan Gluchoff, Villanova University
4.    Trajectories After Aberdeen: Exploring Effects of the WWI Experience on American Mathematicians, Deborah A. Kent, Hillsdale College


Rethinking Science and Race: Darwin, Boas, and Dobzhansky
Chair: John Beatty, University of British Columbia Organizer: Lisa Gannett, Saint Mary’s University
2.    Racial Science and the Burden of Proof in the Work of Franz Boas, John P. Jackson, Jr., University of Colorado, Boulder
3.    Franz Boas’s Interest in Human Genetics, Evolutionary Biology and Physical Anthropology, Veronika Lipphardt, Humboldt University of Berlin

Creating and Crossing Disciplines
Chair: TBD
1.    “Balkanizing Physics”: Division vs. Unity and the Establishment of American Solid State Physics in the 1940s, Joseph Martin, University of Minnesota
3.    New Disciplinary Dynamics in Post World War II Brain Research: The Case of Francis O. Schmitt’s Neurosciences Research Program at MIT, Tara H. Abraham, University of Guelph



Friday 1:30-3:10

Museums and Popularization of Science
Chair: TBD
2.    Science in Action: the New York Museum of Science and Industry and the Politics of Interactivity, Jaume Sastre Juan, CEHIC- Univeristat Autònoma de Barcelona
3.    From Science to Propaganda: The Americanization of Otto Neurath’s Pictorial Statistics (1929–1945), Loic Charles, University of Rheims and National Institute for Demographic Studies


Science in a Canadian Context
Chair: TBD
1.    Drawing Canada Together: the Geological Survey of Canada and the Formation of the Canadian Visual Imagination, Peter Hodgins, Carleton University
2.    The Hospital of the 20th Century: Folk Taxonomies and Contested Ideals, David Theodore, Harvard University
3.    “Just a Theory”: The Atomic Theory Debate and Ontario’s High School Chemistry Textbook, 1905–1909, Michelle D. Hoffman, University of Toronto
4.    Negotiated Landscapes: Land Grants and Surveying in Upper Canada, 1826–1841, Sarah-Jane Patterson, University of Toronto

Mathematics in the 20th Century
Chair: TBD
2.    Problems of Abstraction: Defining an American Standard for Collegiate Mathematics Education at the Turn of the 20th Century, Andy Fiss, Indiana University, Bloomington
3.    Calculating Empire: How Mathematics Education Standards Define Nationalism in 20th Century U.S., Emily T. Hamilton, University of California, Berkeley
4.    Place and Space in the History of Mathematics: A Comparative Study of the University of Göttingen and New York University’s Mathematical Institutes under the Leadership of Richard Courant, Brittany Shields, University of Pennsylvania

Science, Politics, and Agriculture in Vietnam and China During the Long 20th Century Chair: Fa-ti Fan, The State University of New York, Binghamton Organizer: Michitake Aso, University of Wisconsin, Madison
4.    Insect Control in Socialist China and Corporate America: A Transnational Tale of Science and Politics through the Eyes of Three Entomologists, Sigrid Schmalzer, University of Massachusetts, Amherst



Friday, 03:30–05:30 PM

Mutations
Chair and Commentator: Angela Creager, Princeton University Organizer: Jim Endersby, University of Sussex
1.    Mutation and Utopia: America’s (evening) Primrose Path to the Future, Jim Endersby, University of Sussex


Environmental Histories of Science: Knowing Nature, Transforming Nature
Chair: Christine Keiner, Rochester Institute of Technology Organizer: Jeremy Vetter, Dickinson College
1.    Adaptation, Divinity, and the Agricultural Landscape in New York, 1825–1850, Emily Pawley, University of Pennsylvania
2.    Capitalist Nature: The Sciences of Development in the American West, 1860– 1920, Jeremy Vetter, Dickinson College
3.    Assuring Uncertainty: Metals, Biology, and Knowledge in the Deer Lodge Valley, Montana, 1880–1920, Kent Curtis, Eckerd College
4.    What Is Habitat?, Peter Alagona, University of California, Santa Barbara

Discourse and Discovery: Colonial and Atlantic Encounters and Ideologies of Modern Science Chair and Commentator: Neil Safier, University of British Columbia
Co-Organizers: Christopher Parsons, University of Toronto; Matthew Crawford, University of California, San Diego
1.    Botanical Discovery in a Not So New World: French North American Folk Taxonomies in the Seventeenth and 18th Century, Christopher M. Parsons, University of Toronto
2.    Cataloging Discovery: Tobacco and Encounter in Sixteenth Century Virginia, Kelly Wisecup, University of North Texas
3.    Transatlantic Hispanic Baconianism as a Tool for Understanding Spanish Contributions to Modern Science, Margaret Ewalt, Wake Forest University

Objects of Science, Objects of Culture: Models and Specimens in 19th Century Natural History Chair: Liba Taub, University of Cambridge Organizer: Margaret Olszewski, University of Toronto
2.    Displays of Distinction and Decorum: Dr. Auzoux’s Botanical Models In The Growing Educational Marketplace of Late 19th- Century America, Margaret Olszewski, University of Toronto
3.    It’s a Giant... It’s an Elephant... It’s a Mammoth!, Taika Dahlbom, University of Turku, Finland
4.    Tusks at Tufts, Ruthanna Dyer, York University


Friday, 7:30–9:00 PM

Techniques and Instruments for Science
Chair: Dana Freiburger, University of Wisconsin, Madison
1.    Mastering “the Play of Light and Shadow”: Retinoscopy and the Quest of Optometry in Early 20th-Century America, He Bian, Harvard University

Travelling and Collecting in the 18th and 19th Centuries Chair: TBD
1.    The Growth of Collaborative Collecting:
Spencer F. Baird, Robert Kennicott, and the Hudson Bay Company, Matthew Laubacher, Arizona State University
4.    Tradition and Innovation in the Production of Natural Knowledge in Central America, c.1780–1800, Sophie Brockmann, University of Cambridge


Saturday, 9:00–11:45 AM

Thinking with Specimens: Collections- Based Research in the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology Chair and Commentator: Cathryn Carson, University of California, Berkeley
Organizer: Mary Sunderland, University of California, Berkeley
1.    Collections-based Research at the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, Mary Sunderland, University of California, Berkeley
2.    Taxon-Focused Research in Collections-Based Biology, James R. Griesemer University of California, Davis
3.    Collections and Analyses in Lab and Field: Some Problems with a Distinction, Elihu R. Gerson, Tremont Research Institute

The Science, Politics, and Publics of Climate Change
Chair and Organizer: Jessica O’Reilly, University of California, San Diego and Princeton University Commentator: Keynyn Brysse, Princeton University
1.    Climate Science, Truth, and Democracy, Evelyn Fox-Keller, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
2.    Neo-liberalism, Resistance to Climate Science, and the Legacy of the Cold War, Naomi Oreskes, University of California, San Diego
3.    The Public Role of Climate Scientists, Michael Oppenheimer, Princeton University
4.    The History of a Typo: Himalayan Glacier Predictions and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Jessica O’Reilly, University Of California, San Diego and Princeton University

Science and American Empire
Chair and Commentator: Paul Sutter, University of Colorado, Boulder Organizer: Christine Manganaro, University of Minnesota
1.    Sixty-one Years of Soledad: University and Corporate Science at Harvard’s Research Station in Soledad, Cuba, 1898–1959, Megan Raby, University of Wisconsin, Madison
2.    Baseline Archipelago: U.S. Insular Science and the Re-mapping of the Philippines, Scott Kirsch, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
3.    America’s Rubber Empire: Ecology, Disease, and Commerce in the Making of Firestone Plantations Company, Gregg Mitman, University of Wisconsin, Madison
4.    The Social Science of Assimilation in the Settler Colony of Hawai‘i, Christine L. Manganaro, University of Minnesota

Controlling Life in 20th-Century Biology: A Session Inspired by the Work of Philip J. Pauly Chair: Nathan Crowe, University of Minnesota Organizers: Rachel Mason Dentinger, unaffiliated; Nathan Crowe, University of Minnesota Commentator: Jane Maienschein, Arizona State University
1.    Recasting “Chemical Warfare” in the 1960s: Coevolutionary Studies and the Evolution of “Natural Insecticides,” Rachel Mason Dentinger, unaffiliated
2.    Science of Control?: A History of Nuclear Transfer Experiments, 1940s–1970s, Nathan Crowe, University of Minnesota
3.    “A Modified Kind of Man and a Modified Kind of Nature”: Charles Elton’s Vision of Millennial Conservation, Matthew Chew, Arizona State University
4.    “Live Animals in Museums: Reframing the Science of Life, From ‘The Watchful Grasshopper’ to ‘The Insect Zoo’, Karen Rader, Virginia Commonwealth University

Women as Subjects of Science
Chair: Sheila Faith Weiss, Clarkson University
1.    A Feminist Reproductive Health Coalition: Feminist Health Activists and Emergency Contraception in the United States, 1970– 2000, Heather Munro Prescott, Central Connecticut State University


Saturday 1:30–3:10 PM

Research at the Frontier: Scientific Practices and the Dynamics of Expansion Chair: Bruce Hevly, University of Washington Organizer: Tiago Saraiva, University of Lisbon
1.    Terrestrial Physics as Investment in Frontier Building, Bruce Hevly, University of Washington
2.    Malaria, Railroads and the Inner Exploration of Brazil, Jaime Larry Benchimol


Rethinking the History of Organicism: New Perspectives on Vital Science
Chair and Organizer: Phillip Sloan, University of Notre Dame
3.    Biophysics and Holism at the University of Chicago, 1928–1945: Resistance to Molecularization, Phillip R. Sloan, University of Notre Dame


Progressive Science? Embodiment and Reform in Progressive America
Chair: Jane Maienschein, Arizona State University Organizer: Robin Wolfe Scheffler, Yale University
1.    The Metaphysical Club, Pragmatism, and the Search for New Methods in American Biology, 1880–1910, Keith R. Benson, University of British Columbia
2.    The Fate of a Progressive Science: The Harvard Fatigue Laboratory, Athletes, and the Science of Work, Robin Wolfe Scheffler, Yale University
3.    Biological Analogies in History: Theodore Roosevelt, Nature, and National Character, Henry Cowles, Princeton University
4.    Female and Fowl: Eugenic and Euthenic Conflicts about the Body and Reproduction in Early 20th-Century America, Kathy Cooke, Quinnipiac University


Industry, Patronage and Science
Chair: TBD
3.    Negotiating Scientific and Industrial Management: The Micromotion Films of Frank and Lillian Gilbreth, 1912–1924, Arlie R. Belliveau, York University
4.    “Selling the Research Idea”: The National Research Council’s Promotion of Industrial Research, 1916–1945, Eric S. Hintz, University of Pennsylvania


Biology and Ideology
Chair: Marsha Richmond, Wayne State University
2.    ‘Falling in Love Intelligently’: Eugenic Love in the Progressive Era, Susan Rensing, University of Wisconsin, Oshkosh
4.    From ‘Passive Confidence’ to ‘Neo- Romanticism’? The American Socialist Left and Popular Evolutionary Theory in The International Socialist Review, 1900–1918, James Fiorentino, University of Massachusetts, Amherst

Science in America before 1900
Chair: TBD
1.    Electrical Debate: William Watson, Benjamin Franklin, Nature and God, 1745–1763, Christopher Baxfield, University of Leeds
2.    “What is the consensus of opinion as to...?”: The Age of the Earth Debates and the Meaning of Scientific Consensus at the End of the 19th Century in America, Sylwester Ratowt, American Philosophical Society
3.    Lester Frank Ward v. Othniel C. Marsh: Defining the Mesozoic, Debra Lindsay, University of New Brunswick
4.    Knowing Nature, Knowing Gender, and Eating Turkey: Agriculture and Natural History in 19th-Century America, Neil Prendergast, University of Arizona


Saturday 3:30–5:30 PM

Reexamining the Uneasy Partnership: Economics, the Nation State, and the Public Welfare, 1920s-1980s Sponsored by Forum for History of Human Science Chair and Commentator: Sarah Igo, Vanderbilt University
Organizer: Mark Solovey, University of Toronto
1.    Re-Imagining Markets: The U.S. Consumer Movement and Federal Economists, 1920- 1970, Thomas A. Stapleford, University of Notre Dame
2.    What Doesn’t Kill You Makes You Stronger: Patrons, Public Image, and Research in Economics, 1970–1985, Tiago Mata, University of Amsterdam
3.    To Measure, Monitor, and Manage the Nation’s Social Progress: U.S. Senator Walter Mondale’s Initiative to Create a Council of Social Advisers, 1967–1974, Mark Solovey, University of Toronto

Seeds of Change: Agricultural Production, Commercial Interests, and the Science of Breeding, 1850–1940 Chair and Commentator: Daniel Kevles, Yale University
Organizer: Helen Anne Curry, Yale University
1.    “Prolific”: Valuing Proprietary Staple Varieties in 19th-Century America, Courtney Fullilove, Columbia University
2.    From Farm to Can: The Canning Industry and Agricultural Production in the Early 20th Century, Anna Zeide, University of Wisconsin, Madison
3.    Breeding the Roentgen Regal Lily: Agricultural and Horticultural Research at the General Electric Laboratory, 1930–1940, Helen Anne Curry, Yale University

Taming the Information Beast
Chair: Staffan Müller-Wille, University of Exeter Organizers: Isabelle Charmantier, University of Exeter, and Bruno Strasser, Yale University
3.    Staying Afloat in the ‘Flood of New Information:’ Computers in America’s Cold War Scientific Data Crisis, Joseph November, University of South Carolina
4.    “The Fourth Paradigm?” Natural History in Silico, Bruno Strasser, Yale University

Industrial Food and the Biopolitics of Nutrition Science
Chair and Organizer: Helen Veit, Michigan State University Commentator: John Waller, Michigan State University
2.    The Cultural Algebra of Nutrition: Rational Eating & Dietary Substitution in the Progressive Era, Helen Veit, Michigan State University
3.    Killer Carbs? The Biopolitics of Amylophobia from Graham to Gluten-Free, Aaron Bobrow- Strain, Whitman College


Sunday 10:00–12:00 PM

Gendering the Human Brain: Science, Language, and Sex Difference in the 19th and 20th Centuries Chair: Carla Bittel, Loyola Marymount University Organizer: Kimberly Hamlin, Miami University of Ohio
2.    Helen Hamilton Gardener’s Brain: Contested Understandings of Brain Science and Feminist Applications of the Scientific Method, Kimberly A. Hamlin, Miami University of Ohio
3.    Silas Weir Mitchell’s Nervous Malady and its Influence on the Rest Cure, Anne M. Stiles, Washington State University

Computers as Scientific Instruments: Technologies, Scientific Practices, and Social Structures Chair: Adelheid Voskuhl, Harvard
Organizer: Ann Johnson, University of South Carolina Commentator: Andrew Russell, Stevens Institute of Technology
3.    A Not-so-Short History of Computational Science: Building a Scientific Discipline in the Digital Age, Ann Johnson, University of South Carolina

Science, Identity and Race
Chair: TBD
2.    Gender Conservatism and Racial Liberalism in US Psychiatry: Dr. Viola W. Bernard and the Community Service Society of Harlem, 1943–1945, Dennis A. Doyle, Mississippi State University
3.    Personalized Medicine or Scientific Racism? The Persistence of the Genetic Theory of Race and its Modern Day Tuskegee, Andrea Patterson, California State University, Fullerton
4.    A Brazilian Dilemma: UNESCO Studies in Brazil and the Retreat from Race in the 1950s, Sebastián Gil-Riaño, University of Toronto

Expeditions, Imperialism and Science
Chair: TBD
4.    “Botanical Monroe Doctrine” in Puerto Rico: Contours of American Imperial Scientific Expeditions and Research Stations, 1898– 1933, Darryl E. Brock, Fordham University

Knowledge and Politics of Climate in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries
Chair: Miruna Achim, Universidad Autonoma de Mexico Organizer: Jean-Baptiste Fressoz, Harvard University Commentator: Jean-François Gauvin, McGill University
2.    Hippocratism and Urban Reform: Mexico City and Lima, Late 18th Century, Miruna Achim, Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana

Manifesto (beta version, b/c that's what we do online)

One of my fondest hopes for this blog---and for the Forum for the History of Science in America generally---is that it will help us build a community of scholars. I recognize that this has long been the Forum's purpose. Yet I think our means of community building have been changing, out of necessity.


The "What's American about the History of Science in America" series of essays---a brilliant collection that you can peruse on this blog, thanks to the editorial work of my predecessor (and fellow Dan) Dan Goldstein---showcased the changing nature of the forum. Founded as an advocacy organization for Americanists trying to break into a field dominated by Europeanists, the Forum now finds itself surrounded by Americanist historians of science. The earlier forum sought to bring together Americanists to support one another in a difficult environment. It defined success as increased attention to the history of science in America. Forum policies were necessarily expansionary.

It's no longer clear that the Forum must actively drum up new research. I don't mean that anyone need oppose more research into the history of science in America. Far from it, I encourage it wholeheartedly. But the larger HOS field seems to be doing plenty of drumming on its own. In fact, the degree to which the Forum's original mission has succeeded leaves us with a new and familiar problem: how can we keep up with all of the new Americanist stuff out there. There appear to be too many new investigators, too many new directions.

That, I believe, may be where the Forum can step in. Expansion will take care of itself, but we all could use help managing that expansion.

To that end, Americanscience aims at a curationary policy. Yes, I just made that word up. But it's the best word for what I mean. This blog should curate our field's expanding cabinet of HOS curiosities. It should highlight new directions and new voices in the field and showcase the range and diversity of on-going investigation.

Thus ends the manifesto. What do you think, dear readers? Will you help?

Senin, 20 September 2010

You're Shirley Jackson!

I spent some time teaching elementary school before heading back to grad school. One of the favorite games at our after-school program was "Guess Who"---the game where each play selects an individual card and then has to ask yes or no questions about the appearance of the person on the other player's card in order to figure out who that person is.

Guess Who came to mind when I saw the layout for this terrific and informative site giving biographies of black scientists in the U.S., hosted by the HistoryMakers. Just imagine that game, using biography instead of appearance:

Was your scientist inspired by reading Benjamin Banneker's biography as a child?
--Yes.
Was your scientist a particle physicist?
--Yes.
Did your scientist ever become a high-level administrator?
--Yes!

You're Shirley Ann Jackson!
--That's right.

In all seriousness, though. This is a nicely done site that students and scholars alike can enjoy if they are looking for reliable sources of biography for important African American scientists.

Minggu, 19 September 2010

New to the HOS Blogosphere

There's a new arrival on the scene and it looks promising for our crowd. The Bubble Chamber traces the thought lines (and decay paths?) of a handful of historians and philosophers of science at the University of Toronto.

Here at Americanscience, we aim to talk to a pretty limited audience. We want to build a community of professor historians of science as it has developed in and around the United States. Still, we applaud the Bubble Chamber's ambitions to create a Web equivalent to the public lecture series.

Jumat, 03 September 2010

Stories of Ideas/Science in America

A colleague shared this podcast with me earlier this summer.

In it, Louis Menand gives the short version of his pulitzer prize-winning The Metaphysical Club. I've long been a fan of the book, but what struck me in hearing the short version was the centrality of Darwin and the comparative unimportance of what seems like the main argument (the impact of the Civil War). I've long felt that the Civil War argument---that the generation that experienced the war learned from its experience a deep distrust of universal truths and unwavering belief---did not hold up to much scrutiny. For one thing, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. seems to have remained quite a fan of martial valor, despite the horrors of war. I would expect someone so deeply scarred by war that he gave up belief in Truth to also be skeptical of war itself. Darwin, however, makes a very convincing predecessor to pragmatism. Don't take my word for it, though. Listen to the podcast.

I've also been thinking about the subtitle to Menand's book: "A Story of Ideas in America." Menand takes a nice, commonsensical approach to one of the key problems we face as either historians of science in America or historians of American science. How do we square a concern for a subject (science/ideas) that's usually transnational with a concern for integrating science/ideas into broader histories delineated by nation? We look locally and trace globally---at least that's what Menand does. He's looking at James, Holmes, Dewey, and Peirce---in the U.S.---but he's tracing the movement of ideas that traversed the globe---Darwin's Origin, to be sure, but also Quetelet's l'homme moyen and Agassiz's creationism. And the upshot---pragmatism---hardly respects national borders in its philosophical career.

What do you think? Look locally, trace globally. Too kitsch?

Selasa, 27 Juli 2010

HSS mentorship, for young scholars

For those young scholars among Americanscience readers, take note of the opportunity to benefit from HSS veterans' wisdom at November's History of Science Society Annual Meeting.

Seasoned scholars, take note that the mentorship programs needs your wisdom.

And everyone, take note that you have to get involved by September 15, 2010.

Rabu, 14 Juli 2010

What have you been reading this summer?

Historians of science in America, what have you been reading? What was worth the effort so far this summer?

Share some recommendations.

I just finished Louis Menand's _The Marketplace of Ideas._ Don't be fooled: this is really a book of lectures about the university only loosely tied to the "marketplace" or tied to one another. It did have its moments, however. Read more...



Chapter two struck me as most worth reading, especially for those who teach or research the Cold War university. Menand takes a story we know best for the sciences and applies it to the humanities. In the process, he provides a new way of thinking about the culture wars---or the "crisis of the humanities." His presentation rejects one structural explanation and posits another. First the rejection: a diversified student body did not force multiculturalism and deconstruction on the humanities. "It is wise to avoid the following narrative," writes Menand: "when more women and non-whites came into the system, traditional norms of scholarly constraint disappeared. The argument is not that this narrative is undesirable---although one sometimes hears proponents of diversity reiterating an upbeat version of it. The argument is that the narrative is incorrect."(91)

Menand argues instead that the Cold War university had built a model for the humanities---a "Golden Age" of the humanities---that could not be sustained. The humanities during the Cold War enjoyed unprecedented growth, especially in graduate studies, and devoted huge resources to "scientistic" research programs that promised access to the realm of value-neutral, objective knowledge to those researchers who stuck to firm disciplinary norms. Menand surprised me with how well this outline fit even for literature departments.

Scholars of Kuhn's generation (like Paul de Man in literature) challenged the Cold War humanities on intellectual grounds (with a little help from the Vietnam War). Only then did a diversifying student body come into play---student interest added fuel to an already burning fire. I think Menand underplays student agency in this story, but I understand he's fighting a narrative that has laid too much credit (or rather, blame) on students' shoulders.

As Menand summarizes, "Within the history of education, the Cold War university was the anomaly, and what are criticized as deviations and diffusions in the present system are largely reactions against that earlier dispensation. People may admire the old dispensation, or feel some nostalgia for it, but it was fundamentally untenable."(91)

Senin, 12 Juli 2010

"a symbol of American technological verisimilitude"

This may wrap up our "Scuttling the Shuttle" series. Historian Roger Launius puts in his two cents on his terrific blog. He's taking a Baltic cruise and giving a bunch of fascinating lectures for the Smithsonian Journeys program. Where do I sign up?

At any rate, Launius describes a lecture called "Whither the Space Shuttle?":
This presentation reviews the history and legacy of the Space Shuttle program after thirty years. It suggests that while the shuttle was not an unadulterated success, on balance it served a venerable role in spaceflight and deserves an overall positive assessment in history. Additionally, the Space Shuttle provided three decades of significant human spaceflight capability and stretched the nature of what could be accomplished in Earth orbit much beyond anything envisioned previously. Most significantly since the American human spaceflight program has always been focused in national prestige, the Space Shuttle served well as a symbol of American technological verisimilitude. Finally, this presentation discusses the retirement of the Space Shuttle and possibilities for the future of human spaceflight.

If you want a sense of how Launius answers those final questions, check out his earlier posts (here) and (here). He also has an extensive bibliography on the shuttle posted here.

Because Ether Doesn't Propagate Itself

Or who knows, maybe it does.

At any rate, our History of Science blogging friends at Ether Wave Propaganda are on vacation. That provides us the perfect opportunity to point back to a terrific, recent post on the history of science in America that you might of missed.

Will Thomas offers a vivid and engaging reading of Paul Lucier's 2009 Isis article, "The Professional and Scientist in Nineteenth Century America." I recall my own astonishment at learning (as a fresh graduate student) the recent origin of the label "scientist"---who could imagine a world without scientists, as such, I wondered. As Thomas relates in his post, Lucier gives us plenty more material about the recent origins of apparently natural labels and distinctions that should similarly astonish our students in years to come.

Historians of Science in America have probably already taken note of Lucier's 2008 book, Scientists and Swindlers. Forum steering committee member David Spanagel wrote a particularly useful review (but you need a subscription to see it) for the most recent Isis. I'm inspired by it to put on my syllabus for American environmental history either Lucier's chapter on the "technological science of kerosene" or the "rock oil report." Any other recommendations?


Sabtu, 26 Juni 2010

Laserfest!

Seriously, laserfest!

I'm digging this fantastic history of the laser, courtesy of the American Institute of Physics. You should too.

Lets
Amplify the press for this
Stimulating feature on
Emitting coherent beams of
Radiation for 50 years.

Senin, 21 Juni 2010

Science and Spills

While we anxiously await a closer telling of the geologists in Afghanistan tale, there are some fascinating moments of science in action to be found in this gripping tale of Deepwater Horizon's last hours and immediate aftermath.

I had no idea how ridiculously huge and complex these drilling rigs are. I know that the federal government pitched deep sea exploration as a kind of parallel to space exploration in the second half of the twentieth century: exploring inner space. Sean Flynn draws on a similar metaphor: "Deep-sea drilling is a risky and complicated process, of course—the oil industry's equivalent of a moon shot—and it's vulnerable to all sorts of delays."

The scientists, as opposed to the engineers and technicians, only make a cameo here and they are set up against BP's official pronouncements on the volume of the leak. The problem of knowledge becomes: how do we settle on a measurement of oil flow at a mile and one half (8,000 feet) below the Gulf's surface. I post the relevant passage after the break, but the entire story---for all its detail and pathos---demands to be read. Read more...

Via.



The Spreading Poison
7 Days After the Blast
A small armada of oil skimmers and service boats are puttering about the Gulf of Mexico, attending to what is, officially, a minor ecological untidiness. The wounded Macondo well supposedly is trickling a mere thousand barrels of crude into the sea every day.
That is a ridiculous number, and an obviously ridiculous one, albeit less ridiculous than the one announced four days ago, which was zero. "The blowout preventer," Coast Guard Rear Admiral Mary Landry announced at a press briefing on Friday, April 23, "appears to be working."
It is important to note that Admiral Landry was not obfuscating. Rather, she—indeed, everyone—was relying on BP for information. The BOP is under a mile of water, in a dark and murky place that can be seen only by remotely controlled submersibles, which the Coast Guard neither owns nor operates. Visibility is so poor and the water so deep, in fact, that it required two days of searching to locate the capsized wreckage of the Horizon, which had burned for thirty-six hours before toppling into the waves.
The Friday briefing was not, primarily, about the potential environmental impact but was instead to announce that the Coast Guard was suspending its search for Shane Roshto and the other ten missing men. After twenty-eight sorties by plane and boat and helicopter covering a swath of ocean the size of Connecticut, "we have reached the point," Landry said, "where the reasonable expectation of survival has passed."
So that left the oil, or the threat of the oil. By Tuesday, a week after the explosion, when the BOP has clearly failed and the well is purportedly leaking only 1,000 barrels a day, crude the color of dime-store chocolate streaks miles of the surface in long, ragged ribbons. Approaching from the north, even a mile out, before the stink begins to sting the eyes, the water is divided by a stark and clearly defined line, a border of oil.
Given the undeniable silliness of its initial estimate, BP soon quintuples it to 5,000 barrels a day, another egregious lowball that for weeks will be repeated religiously by reporters, a fragment of boilerplate—210,000 gallons a day—in daily news reports.
Meanwhile, other scientists—oceanographers, environmentalists, an assortment of professionals who share no culpability in having punctured a hemorrhaging wound in the earth's surface—calculate much higher figures based on satellite imagery and a basic understanding of how the ocean functions. Oil bleeding out of a hole a mile down, for instance, will get swept into sub-sea currents and dragged Lord knows where; deep-sea pressure will make it heavier, less likely to rise; thousands of gallons of chemical dispersants, a toxin in their own right, break the crude into droplets that linger at staggering depths. In mid-May scientists will discover plumes of oil, miles long and miles wide, spreading at 4,300 and 2,600 feet below the surface.
BP, for its part, maintains that measuring the flow more precisely isn't possible (not true, but whatever), and in any case, what's the point? If it can't clean up 5,000 barrels a day, BP seems to be saying, what difference does it make if Macondo is spewing 70,000? To BP, for right now, it makes no difference at all, except that 5,000 isn't nearly so catastrophic a number. BP can't unwreck the ocean, and the damage, environmental and economic ruin on a heretofore unimaginable scale, will become apparent in time, when the lawyers and public-relations people are better equipped to deal with it.

Sabtu, 19 Juni 2010

Bankrupted by Scientific Complexity?

I glanced over the scientific/medical dichotomy in my last post. Now I see that Atul Gawande has attacked it head on. Science has made medicine effective, he says. It's also made it into a budget-bending Frankenstein.

In Gawande's words:
When we talk about the uncontrollable explosion in the costs of health care in America, for instance—about the reality that we in medicine are gradually bankrupting the country—we’re not talking about a problem rooted in economics. We’re talking about a problem rooted in scientific complexity.

"Rare books on their way to the Internet Archive scanning pod"

That's right: we live in a world with scanning pods. How magical.

Those scanning pods are doing good work, too. The Center for the History of Medicine at Countway Library's terrific blog reports on the library's efforts to digitize their nineteenth century French works in obstetrics and gynecology. Those worried about corporate hegemony will be happy to hear that those books will land at the Internet Archive.

Lest our readers wonder what this has to do with "science" in "America," the Center's blog notes that "John Collins Warren, Oliver Wendell Holmes, and other Harvard Medical School luminaries completed post-graduate studies in Paris."I suppose we could quibble that medicine ≠ science, but does anyone really want to have that argument?

Kamis, 17 Juni 2010

Even the Canadians Claim Edison

Thomas Edison may have only come in ninth on the Atlantic's list of the top 100 most influential Americans, but amongst Victorians enshrined with their own museums or historical sites he takes the cake. Five North American sites, including Vienna, Ontario, lay claim to Edison's memory.

Check the full list of "shrines", which may serve many purposes, but clearly would serve well a geek planning her summer vacation.

Senin, 14 Juni 2010

US Geologists Discover Soviet Documents, Lithium Exploitation Ensues.

The New York Times gives the barest outline to a truly momentous piece of archival work, albeit one done by historians of another sort than usually reads here at Americanscience. This document digging will certainly raise the stakes for the US military, the Afghan government, and perhaps the Taliban as well. Cell phone battery manufacturers may be holding their breath too:


In 2004, American geologists, sent to Afghanistan as part of a broader reconstruction effort, stumbled across an intriguing series of old charts and data at the library of the Afghan Geological Survey in Kabul that hinted at major mineral deposits in the country. They soon learned that the data had been collected by Soviet mining experts during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan in the 1980s, but cast aside when the Soviets withdrew in 1989.

During the chaos of the 1990s, when Afghanistan was mired in civil war and later ruled by the Taliban, a small group of Afghan geologists protected the charts by taking them home, and returned them to the Geological Survey’s library only after the American invasion and the ouster of the Taliban in 2001.
US geologists used "an old British bomber equipped with instruments that offered a three-dimensional profile of mineral deposits below the earth’s surface" to confirm the earlier mineral findings. The Times calls it "the most comprehensive geologic survey of Afghanistan ever conducted."

Still, this data languished for two years until the Pentagon's business development task force translated those geological maps into dollar signs. The geologists and task force now think that Afghanistan may become a major producer of iron and copper, niobium, and perhaps lithium.

Now that's my kind of story: intrigue in the archives; field scientists flying retrofitted planes; international exchanges; lost opportunities; geopolitical significance.

Senin, 07 Juni 2010

Decentering National Narratives and Historicizing the Shuttle

Our Scuttle the Shuttle series continues with a fortuitous offering from Asif Siddiqi, whose wide-ranging, thoughtful historiographic essay in the most recent Technology and Culture speaks to a debate we've already witnessed on this blog: can and should historians write histories of space exploration that do not privilege national narratives or boundaries (here, and in the comments)?

It's fascinating to see historians of science innovating in the growing field of transnational history (especially in justifying such an approach in thinking about the last century and a half, where the great and growing power of the nation-state encourages nation-bound histories). This essay provides a fine example of such historiographical innovations.


The question remains, though: how would this advice give us a new way of thinking about the decision to scuttle the shuttle?
I include a few highlights from Siddiqi's piece in the extended entry.

In his essay, Siddiqi considers the dominant approaches to the history of space exploration and notes their national variations:
Both the United States and the Soviet Union, then, the two earliest spacefaring nations, produced narratives on space exploration that were deeply grounded in domestic cultural discourses that simultaneously couched their achievements as if they had universal import. This dichotomy runs through most of the historiography on both the Soviet and American space programs. The grand narratives of each nation—frequently utopian in nature—rely on the assumption that each is the normative history of space exploration.

Drawing on the historiographical problems posed by writing the history of space exploration in India, Siddiqi argues for a postcolonial approach to space history:
This new postcolonial vision of space exploration is as much part of the fabric of space history as the more well-known American and Soviet models grounded in the cold war. These multiple perspectives on space travel suggest that our view of the long history of spaceflight may benefit from a standpoint that no longer privileges borders—demarcations that create rigid analytical categories such as ownership, indigeneity, and proliferation. The Indian space program was at the intersection of multiple flows of knowledge from a variety of sources, including, of course, local expertise. Likewise, the history of spaceflight has been part of a consistent flow of knowledge and technology across (geographical) space and time—among Germans, Soviets, Americans, British, French, Chinese, Japanese, Indians, Israelis, Brazilians, and so on. By rethinking the relationship between modernity and the postcolonial state, postcolonial thought challenges us to rethink the connection between modernity and spaceflight, and, ultimately, to replace the “national” with the “global” when thinking of space exploration, an exercise that has become doubly important as dozens of developing countries in Asia, Africa, and the Middle East are now spending money on space exploration.

Heading off critics who will rightly point out how crucial nations have been and still are to these histories, Siddiqi makes his case for maintaining national narratives, but only alongside a host of other equally important considerations:
I am not suggesting that we should ignore nations, national identity, or vital indigenous innovation. But I believe that nation-centered approaches, useful and instructive as they were, occlude from view important phenomena in the history of space exploration. My hope is that by deemphasizing ownership and national borders, the invisible connections and transitions of technology transfer and knowledge production will be become clear in an abundantly new way. Such an approach would inform a project encompassing the entire history of modern rocketry and space exploration, from the late nineteenth century to the present, focusing on Europe, America, Russia, and Asia.

American Birds

The Lloyd Library and Museum in Cincinnati has posted a wonderful little exhibit full of illustrations from ornithological illustrators. It isn't unusual to see images from Audubon or Catesby, but it's refreshing to see a panoply of images of a single species from a variety of popular observers and illustrators. I think it would be a wonderful use of internet-space to construct a database of changing bird images over time. Check out the feature on the passenger pigeon for a hint of what I'm imagining.

Be sure to check out the "Birds for Children" section too. After all, as one steadfast supporter of the Forum could certainly remind us, a key to understanding science in America is understanding how it came to be taught. Also, the pictures look neat.

Selasa, 01 Juni 2010

Drivers of American Space Policy

We began our "Scuttle the Shuttle" series with the question: how can we use history to better understand the recent decision to end shuttle missions?

Robert MacGregor kicked us off with a long set of suggestions in an e-mail to me. He suggested we should think about the peculiarities of 1960s politics, about the jobs created by aerospace spending, and about the narrative of the "space race." Instead of exploring these bigger narratives, I chose to highlight a side note that Bob made, in which he attempted to explain how naive narratives of colonization with a decidedly progressive bent may encourage Apollo conspiracy theorists.

Erik Conway, historian at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, took a moment out of his well-deserved celebration over the release of Merchants of Doubt---co-written with Naomi Oreskes---to take me to task in the most productive of fashions. Erik shows exactly how many fascinating angles I passed over. Consider this bit from the end of his comment:

To historicize the Shuttle decision by comparing it to earlier colonization attempts is to impose a historical narrative that conceals more than it reveals. But the decisions made by several administrations to try to replace the Shuttle were shot through with conflicts over the militarization and / or weaponization of space, over whether we even need to continue putting humans into space given the growing capabilities of robotic explorers, over the proper role of government in space activities, and with interagency rivalry.  Too, there’s a large historical question hovering around the willingness of government agencies to misrepresent the true cost of space technology to Congress and the White House.

The Cold War, weapons platforms, and the growing grip of neoliberalism inside in the Beltway have been far more important drivers of American space policy. These are where the interesting historical questions about Shuttle replacement lie.

Wow. Keep reading for Erik's entire note, including a nice brief summary and analysis of the shuttle decision. It's worth reading.



The previous post suggested that we should frame the decision to replace the Space Shuttle, America’s space truck, in the larger narratives of white colonization of the non-Caucasian world.  I’m going to reject that set of narratives out of hand, because it was never the policy of the U.S. Government to colonize.  The Apollo program was approved by the Kennedy administration, and was continued in the Johnson administration, as a Cold War technical stunt, intended to demonstrate American technological mastery. While many people within NASA (Von Braun, of course) saw Apollo as a prelude to human expansion off Earth, that’s not why it was funded.

President Nixon cancelled Apollo in 1970, shortly before the flight of Apollo 13. He had campaigned as a fiscal conservative, devoted to balanced budgets, and Apollo made for a high-profile budget reduction. Apollo had only briefly found majority public support, for a few months around the Apollo 11 landing, and after that its public standing plunged. Less than half of all voting Americans thought Apollo was worth their money, presaging a long-standing political problem for space advocates. Americans often have grand space dreams, but aren’t willing to pay for them. Nixon saw a great deal of political risk in continuing Apollo, and little in killing it.

It took another 2 years, and, as Tom Heppenheimer has pointed out, a deepening aerospace industry recession, before Nixon approved Apollo’s replacement, the Space Shuttle. It was, quite famously, a Shuttle-to-Nowhere, because Nixon didn’t approve the companion space station. In fact, the Shuttle he approved was a politically compromised vehicle.  It was not the highest performance Shuttle concept; it also wasn’t the lowest operating cost Shuttle concept. It was the lowest development cost concept—in other words, Nixon accepted higher operating costs, knowing his own administration wouldn’t be the one paying those costs.

The Shuttle first flew in 1981. The first administration to decide to replace the Shuttle was Reagan’s. By 1984, it was already clear that the Shuttle’s high operating cost and unreliability was undermining that administration’s own space fantasies.   Reagan sold America on “strategic defense” from space—“Star Wars.” As both I and Andrew Butrica have already written, the Shuttle’s inability to deliver low cost space access set the Reagan administration off in search of cheaper launchers. The National Aerospace Plane was one of those proposed replacements. Sold at a $3 billion price tag, its cost estimate ballooned over $30 billion before it was cancelled.

But the effort to replace the Shuttle continued. The George H. W. Bush administration embarked on the “National Launch System” development, cancelled in the Clinton administration. The Clinton administration fixed on a program called “Orbital Space Plane,” cancelled early in the George W. Bush administration. And, of course, the George W. Bush administration set out on the Constellation program to return to the Moon.

It remains to be seen whether Constellation lives or dies, though I personally hope it dies. The Constellation architecture was a political design, intended to maintain the Shuttle’s own Congressional alliance. (Ask yourself “why do the Powerpoint pictures of the Constellation rockets have a big orange tank in the middle?” The orange foam was the result of a mistake in the Shuttle design having to do with the boil-off rate of the cryogenic fuels. Why keep it?? It’s a visible symbol of political continuity on Capitol Hill, that’s why). That alliance has kept the US going around in circles for the last thirty years, but seems incapable of propelling NASA beyond low Earth orbit. If there’s to be a human future in space, the Shuttle’s political alliance needs to be either expanded or replaced with one more powerful.

To historicize the Shuttle decision by comparing to earlier colonization attempts is to impose a historical narrative that conceals more than it reveals. But the decisions made by several administrations to try to replace the Shuttle were shot through with conflicts over the militarization and / or weaponization of space, over whether we even need to continue putting humans into space given the growing capabilities of robotic explorers, over the proper role of government in space activities, and with interagency rivalry.  Too, there’s a large historical question hovering around the willingness of government agencies to misrepresent the true cost of space technology to Congress and the White House.

The Cold War, weapons platforms, and the growing grip of neoliberalism inside in the Beltway have been far more important drivers of American space policy. These are where the interesting historical questions about Shuttle replacement lie.