Annastina

MarantZ: Here is a link 1 and another 2 and the best one 3. I'm not surprised you didn't find anything on Google. Adult stem cells and anything positive about them has been downplayed by the media worldwide. Stem cells are going to become the main focus of medical cloning. Not to make more people. But as the first step toward developing cures for diabetes, Parkinson's. In simplest terms Embryonic stem cells = more dead babies + don't work. Adult stem cells = No babies killed. + DO work. But is the media is in love with Embryonic Stem Cells or finding a reason to murder babies by the thousands? Pax.

Cloning people for organ replacement is more remote than for organ repair. Both are controversial, but there should be more demand for organ repair. Stem cell therapy, is being pursued as the best possibility for organ repair. Stem cells currently come from two sources. The favored source is Embryonic Stem Cells (ESCs) involving the mass killing of babies - about 20 to 50 for one "treatment". The other source is already in use outside the United States. Adult Stem Cells (ASCs) have spectacular results and do not require the taking of any lives. Well, for all the media hype about ESCs - there are huge pitfalls to them. Mainly, ESCs have been shown in laboratory tests to form tumors when injected into humans or laboratory animals. Add the risks of rejection. Even with costly immune-suppressing drugs (you will take these forever), you have no defence against these tumors metastaticizing (spreading). ASCs are actually misnamed, they come from umbilical cord blood. Research has shown that ASCs, when matched genetically to the patient, do not trigger attacks from the patient's immune system. This is in distinct contrast to ESCs which have severe side-effects. So why are ESCs, so clearly inferior, lauded as the only possible solution? There is a lot of money to be made in the harvesting of babies. There is even more money from immuno-suppressing drugs. ASCs are simply not as profitable. A woman in South Korea was recently cured of a severe spinal cord injury by ASCs. Her injury was very similar to Christopher Reeves. She had been told she would never walk again. Today, she can walk. Christopher Reeves is now dead. Their differences? Well, her injury was worse, she was older than him, and her injury was also older than his. But I think the US will eventually begin to pour $$ into ESCs and continue to ignore ASCs. Other countries are pursuing ASCs as more viable. Pax.

He asked me to post for him. Pax.

The problem is she is not 100% brain dead. She is partially brain dead. Her cerebral cortex has died, the dead cells were removed by her own body. She did have elevated levels of potassium I read somewhere that is what damaged her heart. Short term levels that high would have caused a noticeable dementia. I agree with Daxon... the husband is quite suspicious as far as I am concerned. I think we are being civilized here. Not at the point of flames, yet. I've been called a murderer by a grieving family. I am sure Daxon has been called a murderer from just by being a soldier. This case is important because it will set a precedent for a partially brain dead victim.. This will become another controversial subject like abortion and all the others. Doctors HAVE to follow the law, however. Even if they feel it is wrong. In this case, her husband has the right to decide wheter to continue life support. Pax.

Simple reflexes. A sensory neuron carries information about a stimulous from your skin, for example, to your spinal cord. In your spinal cord the information is passed to motor neurons that go to muscles in your arm or hand, You pull your hand away quickly. The reflex is so rapid it takes plae before information about the event reaches your brain. Once it does reach your brain, you experience pain. Some reflexes like this we are born knowing. Others are learned. Like saying ow, or ouch, or some curse word. Yes even a vocal expression can be triggered by motor neurons. People who are unconscious can often speak nonsense words. Word salad. Terri could even probably sit up. As long as her brain stem is functional. Pax.

Without knowing the particulars of her individual case, I can only restate medical facts here. Everything else is only my opinion. Medically, to pronounce her dead, she would have to be FULLY brain dead. The part of her brain that died and was resorbed by her body was her cerebral cortex. Her Cerebrum is not functioning. This area is where her body's most complicated mental and sensory functions are controlled - intelligence, reasoning, memory, emotions, vision, ability to feel things, etc. This is 85% of your brain's total mass. What makes this confusing is that she can respond to visual stimulation, for example. Quite simply that is a different part of the brain involved. She is not consciously seeing. Were she to wake in the next five minutes, she would be deaf and blind and beyond severely retarded. I am sorry to have to put it that way. Being bedridden for so long, even with intense physical therapy, her joints have stiffened. Rigor (not mortis). This is at least as painful as arthritis. And she has to be turned often to prevent bedsores. This would cause her excruciating pain. If anyone of us could feel what that is said to be like, we would be begging to die. If she can indeed feel the pain of starvation/dehydration, then she feels that as well. But the part of her brain that consciously feels pain has been determined to be gone. This is similar to when you are put under for surgery, you feel do feel pain but not consciously. I am not saying I think she should or should not be allowed to die. We could possibly gain a lot of medical knowledge by allowing her to live. I don't know if that is fair to her... Pax.

I agree that is a horrible way to die. There are 3 competing issues here: Medical, Moral, and Legal. Medically: She is likely unaware of her surroundings. She is also unlikely to feel pain at this point. She still should possess motor functons, and can look at people, possibly move, but without memory or cognition. If she can feel pain, then she is already in pain (and for a very long time), with or without feeding tubes. Previously, I mentioned it it is cruel to starve someone off and on. She is much worse off than having simple paralysis from what I have read and heard. Of course, I do not know her case as well as her doctors. I do not think she would last 2 weeks. She would die of dehydration, if the hospital withheld fluids, but I don't think that is what they proposed to do. Legally: States rights vs. Federal rights. This is now in the Federal Courts, because Congress and the President intervened. Right to Life vs. ummm... right to die. She cannot be given a lethal injection to stop her heart. Doctors can legally only remove her feeding tube. Legally, a spouse can give permission to do this. Morally: She is a human being and deserves our respect. God teaches us that the taking of our life or another's is wrong. vs. She can not survive on her own. Doctors are often forced to watched people die, while they can do nothing. Sometime despite our best efforts. This will be a tragedy no matter what. Pax.

I believe we were referring to two different gentlemen. I was referring to an unfortunate young man whose condition was incorrectly compared to hers, on my local news. After 19 years (I think) of coma, resulting from a motorcycle accident, he woke up. Calling this a PSV is correct, but this term covers a lot of ground. Every case is different. In her case, according to a CAT scan she has lost her cerebral cortex. Her brain tissue is simply not there, replaced by spinal fluid. People can and do recover from PSVs all the time. But from the facts around her case that I have heard, I would say recovery is about impossible. Without a cerebral cortex she will not have any perception of her environment. A simple error made during anaesthesia can trigger a Persistant Vegatative State, for example. As can a heart attack. Without oxygen your brain will die in about 4 minutes. Terri far exceeded this threshold. There is nothing medicine can do for Terri except keep her alive. Without some kind of directive, only her husband has legal right to decide her fate. He could for example take her home to die. Courts can argue the details of this. Her family does not want to give up hope on her and I can certainly understand that. I don't have an opinion as to whether she should continue being fed or not. I don't think she is capable now of feeling discomfort. A few years ago, perhaps so, but there is a lot about the brain we still do not know. It is possible that more of her brain will atrophy in her remaining years. Then she will require even more expensive care, just to keep her breathing and her heart beating. Her family will likely appeal to the 11th circuit. This may go back and forth for some time. There is a legal decision to be made here, which I am unqualified to answer. But unfortunantly as far as Medicine is concerned, it's already over for her either way. I am Catholic, Pro-Life. I just don't feel that stopping her feeding would be murder. I think she is already in with God in Heaven. Pax.

The truly sad thing is that she is being used in a tug of war. How would any of you like to eat every other week for the last six months. If they are going to let her die in peace, then they should do so. If they want to let her live, then it is wrong to starve her for days, then Without a Living Will, whatever Terri might have wanted is not legally binding. Doctors are not allowed to take life, in any event. (Abortion is a notable exception). A living will would have prevented "heroic measures", in this case artificial feeding. It is likely she will never "wake up". She is believed to be brain dead. Her brain went without oxygen for over 10 minutes. It only takes about 4 minutes to cause permanent brain death. The cases people like to qoute where people who are fortunate to wake up after 19 years or so in a coma do not apply here. Those were the result of brain injury. Injuries heal. There is apparently no swelling, just a lack of activity. Yes, I am a M.D. Pax.

[comments removed] Pax.

Someone said Ultima Inline and Dark Age of Camelot do not have forums. Someone mentioned already the UO one so I will add DAoC is adding one due to public demand. http://www.camelotherald.com/more/1598.shtml DAoC already had several unofficial ones. After rereading this thread, it is obvious then they all have or will have public forums. All MMORPGS do. Unless they are pre-beta. [edited by teh nazi Entropy to remove flamebaits]

I realize both of you, Ent and Leeloo, know what you are doing, moreso than I do. I learn something new about Linux everyday. Compared to either of you, I am probably a noob. I don't know if this will help. But there are some common mistakes I know I have made. Silly little things, I get a new kernal, then forget my video driver must be re-installed. I call them "blonde" moments - j/k. I think with the 2.6.10 kernel, however there are two settings which should be muted in alsamixer, if that is what you are using. Headphone jack sense and Line jack sense. I am always forgetting myself, and turning them on. Anyway, I just run alsamixer from a terminal. Using right/left arrows and hit M when they are selected. For some reason, if they aren't I won't have sound. And any changes I make with them enabled won't "stick", because they are wrong. I don't know if it is a kernal bug, or some kind of compatability thing. Also, I think kmix and alsamixer can conflict with each other, if both are somehow running. As for the video thing, I had to exit X and run the NVidia installer, twice, before it finally gave me all my video options. Not saying this applies in your case, however. XMMS ignores whatever sound settings I have, including mute,with the morestate plug-in. Won't otherwise change anything else about the system, so it won't un-mute system-wide, AFAIK. Pax

Well, if we are going to debate Windows versus Linux, we need to realize that even if we start with fresh installs of both, the windows user will have to re-install fresh, while the Linux user probably can go years running whichever distro. Assuming fresh installs of both. How to set the sound volume Windows: Click "Start" > Settings > Control Panel Click "Sound and Audio Devices Properties. Check "Place volume Icon on taskbar" Close the window. Close "Sound and Audio Devices Properties." window. Right click speaker icon in system tray. Choose open volume control. Adjust volume. If no device was found, look for driver disc that came with computer... or look on Internet. Linux (Gnome): Right click Panel Select add to panel (at the top) Choose volume control Close Window. Right click Speaker Icon, choose "Unlock" Drag Icon where you want on the panel. Right click Speaker Icon, choose Lock. Right click Speaker Icon Unmute start unmuting all the checkboxes, left to right until you get to PCM If any sliders are slid all the way to bottom. Uncheck the lock checkmark. Adjust volume If no audio device was found, download alsa-lib from wherever you download packages/source for distro. If that isn't the probem, go to soundcard vendor's website. Both Linux and Windows have hardware compatibilty guides. XP is crippled by NT's famous lack of drivers, Linux is hurt by hardware vendor's choosing not top provide Linux drivers. These steps will be repeated for windows user, because all windows installations eventually die from spyware, viruses (where are my mp3s and porn?), trojans, instability, etc. A careful user may prolong this time, but it is inevitable. Linux user in same amount of time has no need to to reinstall Linux, unless the kernal was badly bungled, perhaps. But this is unlikely because Linux is so very hard to break. What a Windows user has is Convenience at the cost of Power. A Linux user has Power, but at the cost of convenience. Regarding XMMS, I strongly suggest using the xmms-morestate plugin. It remembers its own volume setting, in spite of system volume control settings. Anyway, that is just my two cents, but these debates can go forever. Use whatever you feel comfortable with. Pax.

Aerowind, can you give us some more details, please? Like what kind of monitor/video card you have? Your computer specs? Anyway, as for the black screen, are you booting from the install CD? Have you run a MD5 checksum on it, to make sure it is not corrupted? (Or is this a store bought Novell Desktop Linux? Or evaluation?) Do you have an LCD monitor? (Sometimes the installation program needs to be set in text mode instead of graphical mode, if the LCD monitor isn't immediately recognized.) Lachesis, you left out fumbling with typing 36 characters long serial # (with all the tabs), phone call to microsoft to activate product. Pax.

I didn't vote, since I am casual player and I don't play as much as others. I rarely post, but I thought I might toss out a few things to keep ideas rolling. IMHO this will have a huge effect on game since I feel this is mostly a PK game. How about doing exactly what Roja proposes with random spawns, but also leave static spawns intact. The random spawns would be a little stronger than “static†spawns.Not a compromise, but the best of both. The random spawns could have different names such as rabid wolf. to show This would have the following effects, I think: Pros: -afk fighting. I don't afk fight, but it seems to me if you have the animals/monsters cry out for help, this could make it a LOT more dangerous. Just let people autoharvest a nonmoiving static spawn. Mods would never have to check if people are afk fighting, because other players wouldn't complain. This would save their time. -fighting becomes more of a challenge You could have the random spawns give more xp than the static ones do now. And you could have the “static†spawns give LESS xp than they do now. -no more fighting over spawn points The only players that would be camping spawns would be those who are “harvesting†animals. This would be like any other “harvesting†with several players sitting around the spawn which doesn't move or go away. Maybe even with random Mother nature effects. -more monsters on the maps Players who actively hunt will see their time rewarded with gains in xp. The monster AI could be enhanced to the point where animal groups (foxes and above) become “angry†with a character who hunts them. So when you pass near one, it may attack out of anger. They could also “aggro†against players wearing armor or weapons or using magic. -new skill or features- tracking & trapping could only apply to players actively hunting the random spawns. As for the cons Roja listed I think this would make creatures easy to find, but rewarding the effort spent looking. If you bother to search, you will skill up as fast or faster than before. This would make Power Players happy, as well as giving new players a chance (a risky one) to gain on the higher level players. Since i think a random spawn vs static spawns was also proposed for harvesting in a poll by Roja, you could do BOTH there as well. The random mineral/flower/ore could be superior to the static by being worth more to NPCs, and could count double in item recipes. For example, put 3 superior rabbit furs and 2 threads in manufacture window. If you successfully make, only a random 1 to 3 get used. The leftovers stay in your inventory.