Ideas, Insights,& Intuitions

1. Stem Cell Research

If you want to know what is happening in stem cell research, try tuning  in to EWTN, the Catholic TV channel. Last night, they had a Neuroscientist being interviewed on the subject. Although the man was a priest, he was also a scientist who understood both the moral issues and the medical applications. He explained that embryonic stem cell research is a long-term study that has no immediate applications, and is many years away from resulting in useful treatment techniques. Government funding is normally sought for this because of the huge expense involved.

Meanwhile, private enterprise is attracted to products and procedures that can be developed and applied in a few years. Treatments with adult stem cells are already being done, and it has been found that these cells are more adaptable than first thought. Patients are being treated with stem cells from their own bone marrow, for example. Moreover, it is not necessary to use human embryos, since pluripotent (adaptable) stem cells can be found in genes on mouse skin and the byproducts of birth–amniotic fluid, placenta, and umbilical cord blood. These sources are already being banked, either for a fee to provide exclusive use by the donor, or free of charge to be made available to anyone who is a good tissue match.

So while the anti-abortion people rage on about the moral issues of government research in embryonic stem cells, and stalling progress, people are being helped in real time by using stem cells from sources that have been discarded as medical waste until now.

2. Green Fuel

Not many people outside the state of Mississippi know about it, but Silverado Green Fuels broke ground on April 9, 2007 for a new lignite testing and processing plant at Red Hills Ecoplex, Ackerman, MS. Lignite is a low-ranking fuel source because of its high water content, and has been largely left in the ground while oil and higher-ranking coal types have been exploited. Silverado has developed an economical process for turning lignite into an efficient, clean-burning fuel for all purposes.

The USA has 25% of the world’s lignite deposits, much of it in the southern Gulf Coast states. Besides providing jobs at the facility, Silverado will be developing alternative fuel technology at a time when America vitally needs to become more independent in its energy resources.

This is interesting reading! Go to the Silverado site at www.silveradogreenfuel.com.

Update: Two years later, there is still a website with some information and resources, but I have not heard anything regarding what progress Silverado has made with this project. However,  this does not mean that there hasn’t been any. I am trying to find out. (Sept., 2009)

Silverado Green Fuels is a wholly owned subsidiary of Silverado Gold Mines, Ltd., a global corporation that is publicly listed and has been in business for almost 40 years.

“New Tampax Cardboard!–Our biggest upgrade ever!”–TV commercial.

The adperson(s) who wrote this may be too young to remember that Tampax started out with a cardboard applicator, before it was upgraded to a “new” smoother plastic applicator. I guess this cardboard applicator is new because now it’s environmentally friendly, and no one was making an issue of that 30 or 40 years ago.

“The thing that has been is that which shall be; and that which has been done is that which shall be done; and there is nothing new under the sun.” –Ecclesiastes 1:9, Holy Bible (Lamsa) Translation from ancient Aramaic.

There is currently a TV commercial on that portrays a paper road map as a huge monster preparing to attack. Somehow in the crumpled stages of attempted re-folding, the thing has begun to resemble a huge walking paper robot that is threatening the poor defenseless motorist on the road. And then the sleek, shiny electronic robot comes to the motorist’s rescue and destroys the Map Monster.

For decades, all we have had was the printed paper map that unfolds to about 24″ x 30″, and in a car, as the driver or his passenger-navigator opens out the map and tries to locate the section that shows where he is, the road ahead may be mostly obscured. Then as the map reader struggles to re-fold the map, either to its original size or to a more manageable section that can be traced and marked, the resulting mangled unyielding mass seems to resist all efforts to reduce it to a flat, obedient picture of the way to his destination. This can be very distracting, to say the least.

By contrast, the commercial would have us believe, if we shell out big bucks for one of the many electronic gadgets now on the market, we can simply tell it where we want to go, and it will talk us through every turn we should take, and even find the nearest gas station, restaurant, or motel. The small section of the road map that we need stays neatly “folded up” inside the gadget.

Now, I am one of the most directionally challenged people on the face of the earth. I have to turn the map upside down to read it when I am traveling south. In fact, sometimes I have to draw my own map to understand the directions I have been given. I am not sure I could use the electronic gadget if it did not talk to me, but only showed me a section of map to follow, since it would not work if I turned it upside down.

My solution is to find someone else to drive me to a large city or some place that I have never been. I am not so good at map-folding, either. I seem to recall that the last time I and a friend drove through the northeastern states, we had already driven through the entire state of Rhode Island border-to-border before I finished folding the map! I missed Providence completely.