A.C. Flory's Blog, page 111
January 27, 2017
January 25, 2017
Glyphosate and autism…or is it?
I would very much like to believe that the glyphosate in Monsanto’s Roundup is toxic, but I’ve just found a comment that brings the current ‘proof’ into question. The comment, from Henry, is copy-pasted below.
I have to admit that the word “autism” troubled me a great deal when reading this piece. The whole debacle with vaccines and autism has been quite well-publicised as an example of bad science. The reason why autism spectrum disorder always seems to pop up should be clear.
Autism spectrum disorder affects children. And there are a lot of concerned and frightened parents in the world, who look things up on the internet.
It turns out Stephanie Seneff is quite infamous for a paper she co-wrote in 2013. Here are two links to articles debunking her paper at the time by people more familiar with the topic than I am.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/tamar-haspel/condemning-monsanto-with-_b_3162694.html
http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2014/12/31/oh-no-gmos-are-going-to-make-everyone-autistic/
Some of the main points in the articles are that:
– Correlation between glyphosate use and autism over time does not prove causality; indeed there is a similar correlation between organic food sales and autism.
– Showing that a compound affects an enzyme in gut bacteria is far removed from showing any link with any disease, let alone proving that the compound causes autism specifically.
– “Exogenous semiotic entropy”, a phrase used in the paper, is made-up.
– The paper contains no original research.
Now this is not to defend Monsanto as an organisation (the interplay of intellectual property and genetics is something I’m really not comfortable with). But please let’s not get into fearmongering. I really admire this blog because the information you throw light on is not just interesting, but also accurate.
Thanks for your consideration~
Henry
I have followed both links and read them. Honestly, I no longer know what to think. Please read Henry’s comment and let’s talk about this. I have someone with Ulcerative Colitis in the family so this is rather important to me.
As a lay person, I can’t speak for any of the facts, on either side, but the disruption of the shikimate pathway in gut bacteria does worry me. We do not know everything there is to know about either the human body or the bacteria that live in our gut and seem to have a symbiotic relationship with us. At the very least, I’d like to see some serious research into what effect, if any, the glyphosate has on our gut bacteria. All? Or just a few? Which ones? And does it matter to them? If it does matter, then I’d like to know if it affects us and in what ways.
I think these are valid questions, but as far as I know, the research hasn’t been done, and that is the problem with the correlation vs causation argument: until we can disprove any harmful connection between glyphosate and shikimate pathways and gut bacteria and humans, we cannot prove that there is no causation either. Examples off the top of my head include: smoking and lung cancer, asbestos and mesothelioma, h.pylori and stomach ulcers, thalidomide and birth defects, human papillomavirus and cervical cancer. I was tempted to mention agent orange but I have no idea where the research is on that one.
I’m not saying the glyphosate/shikimate pathways/gut bacteria situation is the same, but the question has been raised, and I’d hate to throw the baby out with the bath water. Whether the answer will have anything to do with autism [or ulcerative colitis] is irrelevant. This is something we need to know, and I, for one, do not trust Monsanto to provide a non-biased answer.
Please tell me what you think.
Meeks
Filed under: GM food, My soap box Tagged: Autism, bad-science? debunk, connection, glyphosate, Roundup
#Monsanto, Roundup and the spike in #autism
Like a lot of people, I’ve worried that GMOs would cause health problems down the track, but I assumed that Monsanto’s Roundup was just another weedkiller. Wrong. Roundup has been the villain of the piece all along. 
January 22, 2017
GMOs – currently in Australia
Some time ago, I sent a protest email regarding genetically modified wheat [via Change.org??]. To my great surprise, I was put on a database to receive notification of various field trials etc.
To my great shame, I did not look into these trials the way I should have. I guess I assumed others with more knowledge would ‘do something about it’.
DNA snippets for virus communications
Some of the greatest scientific discoveries have been accidental. To that list, Israeli scientists have added one more. They’ve discovered for the first time an instance of viruses leaving messages for other viruses. What makes the discovery remarkable is that scientists expect such communication systems to exist among other kinds of viruses. If true, we’ll…
This is quite astounding. Not quite the equivalent of dogs leaving scent markers so other dogs will know they’ve been there, but a form of communication nonetheless. From a virus. And there’s a good chance other viruses use a similar method to communicate as well. More amazing ‘accidents’. 
January 21, 2017
Eye-tracking for VR [virtual reality]
[image error]I just found a really interesting article in my Reader. It’s about eye-tracking technology and its use in [some] games.
The current interface requires a learning curve to use without, imho, much added value. That said, I have to admit I don’t play first person shooters, or the kinds of games where speed and twitch response are key.
There is one area, however, where I can see this technology becoming absolutely vital – and that’s in VR [virtual reality]:
Eye-tracking is critical to a technology called foveated rendering. With it, the screen will fully render the area that your eye is looking at. But beyond your peripheral vision, it won’t render the details that your eye can’t see.
This technique can save an enormous amount of graphics processing power. (Nvidia estimates foveated rendering can reduce graphics processing by up to three times). That is useful in VR because it takes a lot of graphics processing power to render VR images for both of your eyes. VR should be rendered at 90 frames per second in each eye in order to avoid making the user dizzy or sick.
A brief explanation is in order for non-gamers. Currently, there are two ways of viewing a game:
from the first person perspective
from the third person perspective
In first person perspective, you do not see your own body. Instead, the graphics attempt to present the view you would see if you were actually physically playing the game.
In third person perspective, you ‘follow’ behind your body, essentially seeing your character’s back the whole time. This view has advantages as it allows you to see much more in your ‘peripheral’ vision than you would if you were looking out through your character’s eyes.
In VR, however, the aim is not just to make you see what your character sees, the idea is to make you feel that you are your character. A vision system that mimicked how your eyes work by tracking your actual eye movements would increase immersion by an order of magnitude. And, of course, the computer resources freed up by this more efficient way of rendering would allow the game to create more realistic graphics elsewhere.
You can read the full article here:
https://wordpress.com/read/feeds/26908997/posts/1307290866
I predict that voice recognition and eye tracking are going to become key technologies in the not too distant future, not just for games but for augmented* reality as well.
Have a great Sunday,
Meeks
*Augmented reality does not seek to recreate reality, like VR. It merely projects additional ‘objects’ on top of the reality that’s already there.
Filed under: technology Tagged: AR, eye-tracking, foveated-rendering, future, games, perspective, technology, VR
January 20, 2017
The Communion of Saints – a review
I haven’t done a review in a long time, but I finished The Communion of Saints last night, and I simply had to review it.
But first a little background. Communion is the third novel in the John Ray series that began with Hope Road and continued with Father and Son. My reviews of Hope Road and Father and Son are here and here. It’s been a long time between drinks, but the wait was worth it. Here is the review I just posted on Amazon:
Like ‘Hope Road’ and ‘Father and Son’, the first two John Ray thrillers, The Communion of Saints is that rare beast: a character driven genre novel. And like its predecessors, Communion is brilliant.
The Communion of Saints can be read as a standalone novel because the author weaves enough prior knowledge into the story to make the character and motivation of the protagonist realistic and satisfying. Nevertheless, I highly recommend that you read the earlier novels first.
Why? Because all three novels are character driven thrillers, and it’s the character of John Ray, the protagonist, that sucks you in and keeps you turning the pages.
John Ray is the last surviving member of a crime family. He’s the white sheep, the one that broke away and tried to live a straight life. But it’s hard to remain divorced from your past when you see your brother shot to death in front of your eyes. It’s even harder to stay detached when the Law tries to lay every nasty crime at your door.
After the gruesome death of his father, the old crime boss, John Ray tries to start afresh. He gives his business away and takes a job as a lowly lecturer’s assistant, but he’s shrivelling up inside.
Enter Detective Chief Superintendent Shirley Kirk. She needs John’s help. Or, to be more exact, she needs the help of his historical links to the underworld because someone is making allegations of child abuse against an institution to which they both have ties.
In the process of unravelling truth from lies, John discovers yet more about his own past, none of it good. He also becomes a suspect in two murders, simply because of who he is.
The plot is tight, with no ‘what the…?’ moments, and the prose is elegant, painting a vivid picture of the characters and their world without ever being flowery or pretentious. But the true joy of Communion is in the characters. Not even the walk on/walk off characters are two dimensional. All of them possess a vitality that makes them feel real, no matter how minor.
As for John Ray and Shirley Kirk, they’re real people to me. I care about them. I’d like to meet them, talk to them, spend time with them. More importantly, they are people I will not forget.
I cannot think of greater praise for an author’s work.
Something I didn’t write in the review was that I wondered whether I’d still have a wee bit of a crush on the charming rogue, John Ray. The answer is yes. He’s still a bad boy with heart, and we know how women like them.
January 18, 2017
Pencil Drawings by Futaro Mitsuki (彌月風太朗)
Websites : Gallerykogure.com & Artpeoplegallery.com
Source: Pencil Drawings by Futaro Mitsuki (彌月風太朗)
Stunning fusion of traditional Japanese images and concepts with modern symbols. Just love it. Oops. For some reason no images came through. This is a screenshot only. Please click the link to see the other drawings:
[image error]
Filed under: Uncategorized
January 16, 2017
#Tweetdeck – how to filter columns for conversations
TweetDeck is an app owned by Twitter that helps make sense of your Tweets by allowing you to filter and display them according to your own needs. For example, I’m currently having a really interesting conversation with @YorgosKC and @DavidGaughran about politics and the birth of democracy in the ancient city-state of Athens. Trouble is, I’m missing half the conversation because there is no way of tracking a conversation in Twitter.
Enter TweetDeck. It won’t let you track conversations either…but it does have the smarts to create a workaround.
To start using TweetDeck, simply go to:
https://tweetdeck.twitter.com/#
The TweetDeck banner screen displays a button to sign in to Twitter. Do it. Essentially, you are in Twitter, but you’re viewing it through a ‘shell’ that has some special functions, such as the ability to display different types of information, side-by-side, in columns.
What you can see in the screenshot below, is my TweetDeck screen after I removed the default columns and replaced them with 2 Mentions columns:
[image error]
The reason for selecting the Mentions columns was so I could filter who mentioned whom. In the left hand column are tweets by David Gaughran in which he mentions Yorgos KC. [Users: By @DavidGaughran, mentioning @ YorgosKC]. As I am part of the conversation anyway, I don’t have to worry about him mentioning me.
In the right hand column, I’ve filtered the tweets so that I only see the tweets in which Yorgos KC mentions David Gaughran. [Users: By @YorgosKC, mentioning @DavidGaughran].
I admit that filtering the tweets this way is tedious, but at least I can see all the tweets of this three-way conversation in one place.
In case anyone wants to do the same thing, here’s a quick how-to:
[image error]Clicking this small icon at the top right of your column will open a kind of settings menu. At the bottom of the settings menu is the option to ‘Remove’ the column. I removed all the existing columns so I could force TweetDeck to display my new columns side-by-side.
To display new columns of your choice, click the ‘+’ button on the narrow menu pane on the left of the screen. The following popup will display:
[image error]
Each option is essentially a category of tweet. The ‘Mentions’ circled in red is for single Twitter accounts. If you have more than one account, select the ‘Mentions (all accounts)’ option.
Once you have your chosen column in place, click the settings button to display the menu options:
[image error]
Click the arrow as shown to select the ‘Users’ option. With the Users sub-menu displayed, click inside the ‘By’ box to display further options:
[image error]
The option we want is ‘specific user…’ Click. Now you can enter the Twitter handle of the person you’re interested in:
[image error]
Type in the name preceded by the ‘@’ symbol and hit ENTER on your keyboard.
Next, do the same thing for the person mentioned by your first…mentionee?
[image error]
Again, hit ENTER when you have finished typing in the name. Now the only tweets displayed in that column will be those in which person 1 mentions person 2.
Repeat the entire process to display the tweet in which person 2 mentions person 1.
As I said, it’s a workaround and not terribly elegant, but it’s better than giving a 3rd Party App access to your Twitter account. There are apps out there that will track conversations for you…but you have to give them access to your account and allow them to tweet in your name. As far as I’m concerned, that’s a no-no.
cheers
Meeks
Filed under: How-to guides Tagged: column, conversation, filter, Mentions, track, TweetDeck, Twitter
January 13, 2017
Science fiction on parade!
[image error]
I’ve never published a print book version of any of my books, but this wonderful graphic by Chris Graham is the next best thing. He just ‘whipped it up’ and sent it to me in an email. I have no idea how he put it together, but I love it. Thank you, Chris!
And while I’m at it, I’d like to thank everyone who left reviews on Amazon for Innerscape. You may not know this, but if you add up all the pages in all the episodes of Innerscape, they total about 1014 pages. I say ‘about’ because Amazon only displays page counts for episodes 2-5, so I had to guesstimate the page number for episode 1. Slight inaccuracies aside, that makes the story of Innerscape about 200 pages longer than George R.R. Martin’s ‘A Game of Thrones’ which comes in at 819 pages. So to all those brave souls who have read all the way through to the end…THANK YOU!
Now, I’m a polite girl, and polite girls don’t crow, but here are the reviews for Episode 1, including the 1 star by Austin Myers.
