Serendipity

Mondays are trash day at the dome, and my usual fridge cleaning opportunity. I was motivated when I got home last week. I had gone to the grocery store over the weekend but wasn’t thinking about color at the time. I found a large stack of white: tofu, shiratake noodles and rice cakes; and an equal array of mushrooms: shiitake, woodear, enoki...brown, white and beige. The dairy section was also white: yogurt and labne, white cheddar, blue and Parmesan cheeses. There was a variety of greens: a salad mix, basil, cilantro and mint, dandelion greens and broccolini. Red was scarce: in the drawer a tomato and a pepper, red miso paste, some old salsa... could the miso count as orange instead? Odds and ends included a bag of avocados, lemons and limes, garlic and green onions, blueberries, cheddar cheese and pickled ginger. It was an odd array. I haven’t ordered a meal kit or produce box in weeks. I was craving mushroom stew when I chose the Koreans Plaza to shop that week.  The freezer was...

Hello.  I'm Heather, and I have never taken a chemistry class. I went into a nursing program post secondary and missed the usual high school requirement, then transferred to a social work program at a university that didn't require it. I almost got away with it too!  O.o The reading today included a few concepts that I was pretty confident with, but the quick quiz proved me wrong.  Differentiating chemical and physical changes wasn't immediately as apparent as I had assumed. I remember discussing this idea in class last week.  I hope not to be one of the students comes out of their first chemistry classes with a misunderstanding of what it is. I don't have a bio to present so I'll just tell you a bit about me.  I am in my 4th year at ACCHS.  I've been progressing through second year curriculum, and am *finally* in my last trimester of working full time. In my work, I manage an SAP consulting firm in San Francisco covering the roles of AR/AP, Payroll...

I spent a lot of time listening to podcasts and videos on the topics for this post and I'm afraid I only succeeded in confusing myself.  Searching for uncertainty and causality led to some fun discussions of free will, which I didn't realize was such a debated topic! I learned that Einstein was a Determinist. His position was the everything has a cause, and therefore all actions are determined by a previous event. Looking at it this way, we have little to no free will but instead are palying... But the Uncertainty Principle threw a wrench in that too.  If we can change a particle by observing it, there must be a multitude of possibilities before us.  We then must be able to exert our own choice... Determinism = everything is a series of actions and reactions dependent on the last and within its set of circumstances.  There is no free will - everything lies withhin a set range. Causality = the principal that everything has a cause. There must be a reason. I lo...

I live in a dome.  It's not geodesic - it's made of laminate wood beams and plywood, shingles and sheet rock on a foundation of steel and concrete. The dome has 8 units. Its like an orange cut in half, cut in half again and then quartered. My apartment is a cocktail squeeze.  It's a mirror image of my neighbors place. I supposed when they designed it, it was perfectly symmetrical, but in reality, our apartments are quite different.  The angle of the walls varies from unit to unit, and our fireplaces are at oddly different distances from the door. In construction it's imperfect - asymmetrical. We live in an infinite universe that is constantly changing. **** CP Violation - The symmetry between matter and antimatter is imperfect.  Asymmetring being way more matter left than antimatter?  Ok so if every particle has its anti particle where did the anti particles go? c= charge conjugation (matter into anti-matter) p = parity transformation creates a mirror i...

When asked if I would support the development of a bionic person I am reminded of several movies in which the cyborg went rogue.  I am absolutely opposed to the development of a bionic human for military purposes, and have watched too much scifi to be comfortable with the its development otherwise.  AI always gets too smart and turn on humanity.   On the flip side, I am inclined to support the development of bionic parts.  I like to follow news coming out of the Transhumanist movement, the goal of which is the enhance human intellect, physical and psychological capabilities through technology.  Transhumanists are enthusiastic supported of developments in personal modification.    A list of top 10 transhumanist technologies includes cryogenics, gene therapy, virtual reality and cybernetics to name a few.  The cochlear implant and visual feedback devices that we read about are prime examples of the latter, as is the chip the vet placed in my cat...

As acupuncture students were introduced to the Huan du Nei Jing which defines qi as "life energy." As a student of TCM I have been experiencing the discovery of what acupuncture as energy medicine can be. In foundations were taught that qi flows through pathways in the body called meridians, and that disease can be the result of imbalances or blockages in this energy flow. We learn to identify the signs and symptoms of imbalances and disruptions along the meridian pathways, and to use specific points to influence the flow of qi so that we may restore balance in the body. We focus on the emotional correspondences as well as the physical manifestations. We're taught that we can use our own qi and intention to influence our patients outcomes. In these ways I experience acupuncture as an energy medicine. Kirlian photography is one imaging technique being used to try to demonstrate the presence and actions of this energetic body. Using high voltage contact print photography,...

I know a living system because it reacts, it changes and it grows.  In elementary school we learn that all living things also require water.      Last week we discussed research into states of consciousness, and the work of Matsuro Emoto was mentioned.  I was familiar with the work of Dr. Emoto, who discovered what they call structured water or energized water.  In this phenomena, crystals of water form differently based on the words used with it.  For example, a glass of water that is prayed to results in a beautiful and complex crystalline structure, while a glass of water that is cursed at results in unstructured dirty looking blobs instead of crystals.  Emoto’s work suggests that we can alter the state of vitality of water through the intention we apply to it with our words.  It also suggests that water has memory, which is also described as storing consciousness.     Another scientist who is looking at water ...