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Drug companies 'inventing diseases to boost profits'
The practice of “diseasemongering” by the drug industry is promoting non-existent illnesses or exaggerating minor ones for the sake of profits, according to a set of essays published by the open-access journal Public Library of Science Medicine. “Disease-mongering turns healthy people into patients, wastes precious
resources and causes iatrogenic (medically induced) harm,” they say.
“Like the marketing strategies that drive it, disease-mongering poses
a global challenge to those interested in public health, demanding in
turn a global response.” More
Flying car? Not yet, but a Sky Cycle available now
It's not faster than a speeding bullet, nor more powerful than a locomotive. But Neal says the Butterfly is the first gyroplane designed for mass production. The gyroplane is sold as a kit. The two-seater Golden Butterfly can
reach an altitude of 7,000 feet, fly up to 95 mph and cruise at 75 mph
for 150 miles before refueling. More
A brief video news clip of the Sky Cycle in action: Watch
the Video Bush War on Science advances - Medical Marijuana
The FDA's statement is a contradiction of a review carried out by the
Institute of Medicine in 1999, which found marijuana to be "moderately
well suited for particular conditions, such as chemotherapy-induced
nausea and vomiting and AIDS wasting." More
Backyard Monorail
You can have your very own monorail in your backyard. At the Pedersen residence, located in the Niles historic district in
the City of Fremont, California, there is a monorail that runs around
the property. The monorail gets power from two 12-volt motorcycle batteries,
located in car two. More
Chinese lab to search for antimatter
"During the trial period, the AMS lab has detected signs of energetic particles from outer space which can help our understanding of the mysteries of astrophysics," said Nobel Laureate physicist Samuel Chao Chang Ting, who leads the international AMS experiment. Designed by Ting's research team, the AMS is a three-ton detector
which searches for the existence of antimatter nuclei. The search has
to be done in a space where there is much less "background noise" from
other particles, since antimatter, if it exists, will be extremely difficult
to detect reliably. More
Microsoft to delay launch of Windows Vista Allchin would not give specific reasons for Vista's delay, but he said that it involves a quality issue and that partners had requested the delay. He said that the partners wanted Microsoft to provide them with a clear date for release because Microsoft seemed unlikely to have the OS ready in time for them to ship it on hardware by late November. That is when the busy U.S. Christmas holiday buying season begins; Microsoft had originally targeted that time for the release of Vista PCs. PC users who do not wish to wait for the next major release of the
Windows operating system, or who do not like the licensing terms of
the software, have other options. Instead of waiting for Microsoft to
release Vista, a free
download of Ubuntu linux is available now. More
Pirate radio heard by airline pilots
Authorities pinpointed the source of the transmission: a stucco-and-brick, two-story warehouse in Opa-locka. Joseph Zeller, a state agent, discovered a large radio antenna mounted on a tower next to the building. Armed with a search warrant, he confiscated three computers, a monitor, a mixing board, a stereo compressor, a microphone, a two-deck CD player, a telephone, a DSL modem, two stereo speakers, three gray three-ring binders and 10 cases filled with CDs. But no radio transmitter. And no disc jockey. More
Ikea introduces the Fartfull
Features include: Storage space for games and accessories under the seat. Mouse pad both for right-handed and for left-handed people. Seat part with handle; castered to be easy to move about. The metal front doubles as a magnetic board. Ikea did not comment on how this item relates to flatulence. Have
a look U.S. Company Plans $265 Million Spaceport in U.A.E
The commercial spaceport would be based in Ras Al-Khaimah near the
southern end of the Persian Gulf, and the UAE government has made an
initial investment of $30 million, the Arlington, Va.-based company
said in a statement. More
Scientists seek to create rabbit - human hybrid embryo
If granted consent, the team will use the embryos to produce stem cells that carry genetic defects, in the hope that studying them will help understand the complex mechanisms behind incurable human diseases. Although made of rabbit cell material, scientists say the embryos would be controlled by human DNA. Legal experts say it is not clear whether the embryos would be regarded
in law as rabbit or human. The proposal drew strong criticism from opponents
to embryo research who yesterday challenged the ethics of the research
and branded the work repugnant. More
WalMart offers special iPod, made of meat
Rachel Cambra, a mom and an employee of that Wal-Mart store, gave her son a Christmas gift which she believed to be a Video iPod she had put on layaway. But when the big moment arrived on Christmas morning and the present
was ripped open, there was no iPod to be found. Just a wrapped-up piece
of meat, about as useful as a 10 gig tenderloin. More
Annoyed by company voice mail systems? Fight back! Navigating a company voice mail system can be annoying and frustrating. Some are so poorly designed that you can follow each menu around in the third circle of voicemail hell. Now you can take matters into your own hands and find a shortcut to talk to a real live human. Paul English has put up a web site where he shows shortcuts in voice
mail systems that turn your call over to a human. Experimenting with
systems not listed can lead to cracks in their system, which you may
share with others. Of course, cross your fingers and hope that the human
is not located in some far eastern call center. More
Korean scientists clone dog
Speculation is in the air about whether this will result in more pets,
scientific research, or a tasty way to have something to serve with
kimchi, a favorite Korean dish. More
Pirates thwarted by sound waves
Known as a Long Range Acoustic Device, or LRAD, it was developed for
the military after the 2000 attack on the USS Cole in Yemen. More
Moving island defies efforts to map it With roughly the dimensions of a football field, the island -- complete with nesting egrets, ducks, muskrats and a pair of tub-sized snapping turtles nicknamed Big Ben and Frankenstein -- has been cruising Island Pond for decades. For a few years it was tethered by cable to a pair of trees behind
a Roman Catholic high school at one end of the lake, but city conservation
commissioners, who have jurisdiction over the island -- classified as
a protected wetland -- ordered it freed. "We didn't want its uniqueness
altered by being tethered," Tenerowicz said. "It's really pretty neat."
More
Nasa admits space shuttle was a mistake
World's smallest "nanocar" developed It has four independently rotating axles, built-in suspension, and
oversized wheels. But don't be looking for it to show up in a dealer
showroom near you. More
Spooks invest in green energy
Now there is such a device - built by a small Virginia start-up - and
the federal government has taken notice. SkyBuilt Power Inc. has developed
solar and wind powered units that can be set up in remote places quickly.
More
Come on, we know what they are
The voices in my head sound like Fred A university research team says it has discovered why most people "hearing
voices" in hallucinations say they hear male voices. Among both men
and women, 71% of such "false" voices are male. More
Images of Nicholson Crater, located at the southern edge of Amazonis Planitia on Mars, show two pairs of perfectly sculpted female buttocks. Other sculpted structures suggest female breasts. The structure is huge, being 34 miles long by 23 miles wide, and rising over 2 miles from the crater floor. This suggests a massive engineering project by a society that existed in ancient times. It is still unknown if this structure has any connection to the complex of structures in the Cydonia region, other than being on the same planet.
Jose
Avila III moved to Tempe, Arizona with nothing more than clothes and
work essentials. Avila was still stuck in a lease on his California
apartment, and could barely afford his new apartment in Arizona. After
some frustration over not having furniture, Avila had an innovative
idea. Using hundreds of FedEx boxes and materials that he already had
lying around for shipping various items, Avila constructed every piece
of furniture in his apartment. A couch, bed, dining room table, and
desk were all custom-designed pieces. More
Microsoft's
new Internet Explorer 7 browser won't pass a stringent standards test
that rivals have embraced. In its browser blog, Microsoft acknowledged
that IE 7 would not pass the Web Standards Project's Acid2 test, which
examines a browser's support for W3C (World Wide Web Consortium) recommendations
including CSS1 (Cascading Style Sheets), HTML4 and PNG (Portable Network
Graphics). More
How a woman can lose her mind New
research indicates that parts of the brain that govern fear and anxiety
are switched off when a woman is having an orgasm. In the first study
to map brain function during orgasm, scientists from the Netherlands
also found that as a woman climaxes, an area of the brain that governs
emotional control is also heavily deactivated. More
Do you want dip with those chips? Tommy
Thompson, the Health and Human Services Secretary in President Bush's
first term and a former Governor of Wisconsin, is going to get tagged.
Thompson has joined the board of Applied Digital, which owns VeriChip,
the company that specializes in subcutaneous RFID tags for humans and
pets. To help promote the concepts behind the technology, Thompson himself
will get an RFID tag implanted under his skin.. More
Bush kept alive by LifeVest?
Questions swirled concerning the nature of the hidden wires and boxes
secretly worn by President Bush during one of his debates with John
Kerry. Given his reputation for being as dumb as a fence post, most
opinions leaned towards it being some kind of intercom to help him avoid
another dumbstruck "deer caught in headlights" episode. But
there is another possibility. He may be ill, and some medical technology
may be keeping him alive. More
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PHARMACEUTICAL companies are
systematically creating diseases in order to sell more of their products,
turning healthy people into patients and placing many at risk of harm,
a special edition of a leading medical journal claims today.
Carter,
Oklahoma - Leaping over road rage, rush-hour traffic and speed traps
in a single bound, it's the Butterfly, a new "flying motorcycle" devised
by Wise County pilot and mechanical engineer Larry Neal.
Washington, DC - The latest shot in the Bush War on Science has been
fired at studies supporting the medical use of marijuana. The U.S. Food
and Drug Administration has announced it does not support the use of
smoked marijuana for medical purposes.
Fremont, California -- You don't have to go to Disneyland or wait for
some future urban planners to modernize their transportation system
to get a ride on a monorail.
In Southeast University in Nanjing, capital of eastern Jiangsu Province,
the Thursday formal operation of China's sole laboratory with an AMS
(Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer) detector, called AMS-C, marked a significant
move forward in China's search for antimatter.
Broad
availability of the Windows Vista client operating system has been pushed
back to January 2007, according to Jim Allchin, Microsoft's co-president
of the Platform and Services Division.
It
began with airline pilots reporting hip-hop songs playing on two frequencies
from a station calling itself Da Streetz.
Ikea
furniture stores has an interesting product in their line, the Fartfull.
LOS
ANGELES — A day after Space Adventures announced it was in a venture
to develop rocket ships for suborbital flights, the company said Friday
it plans to build a $265 million spaceport in the United Arab Emirates.
British
scientists are seeking permission to create hybrid embryos in the lab
by fusing human cells with rabbit eggs.
If
you got a Video iPod for the holidays this year, you should be thanking
your lucky stars it didn’t come from the Hawaiian Keeaumoku Wal-Wart.
South
Korean scientists announced yesterday that they had created the world's
first cloned dog - an Afghan hound called Snuppy - by the same somatic
nuclear cell transfer method used to brew up Dolly the sheep.
A
recent attack on the luxurious Seabourn Spirit off another pirate hotspot,
the Somali coast, demonstrated how security on cruise ships has progressed.
As armed men in two inflatable boats peppered the ship with machine
guns and rocket-propelled grenades, security staff used high-pressure
water hoses and a sonic device that blasts an ear-splitting, directed
tone at targets.
The
space shuttle and International Space Station — nearly the whole of
the U.S. manned space program for the past three decades — were mistakes,
NASA chief Michael Griffin admitted. Griffin said NASA lost its way
in the 1970s, when the agency ended the Apollo moon missions in favor
of developing the shuttle and space station, which can only orbit Earth.
The shuttle has cost the lives of 14 astronauts since the first flight
in 1982. Roger Pielke Jr., a space policy expert at the University of
Colorado, estimates that NASA has spent about $150 billion on the program
since its inception in 1971. 
"You
couldn't build a smaller car," says Jim Tour, professor of chemistry
and leader of the Rice University research team. The Nanocar is built
of a single molecule, and it's impossible to assemble anything smaller
than an individual molecule.
What
if you had a power unit that generated substantial electrical energy
with no fuel? What if it were so rugged that you could parachute it
out of an airplane? What if it were so easy to set up that two people
could have it running in just a few hours? 
The
nuclear reactor containment buildings at the San Onofre nucleat power
plant are a prominent landmark. Their structure is designed to shield
the fission reactor inside and to keep the outside world safe from contamination.
But if anyone is not aware that they look like they could be supported
by the worlds largest brassiere, then they must be a real boob. 
In
the years since the Viking probes sent back photos of the surface of
Mars, some controversy has surrounded the images. Many believe they
show a humanoid face carved into stone on the Martian surface. Photos
taken since then by more advanced probes have not settled the question.
However, the most recent photos from the European Space Agency probe
showl in clear detail a large pair of buttocks sculpted on the Martian
surface.
