Evidence How FDA Thwarted Progress (1)

Posted: 2/28/2015

Prologue

This may become a series of blog posts. The U.S. Food And Drug Administration has for over a hundred years exercised way too much control over our food and drugs and excessively and unconstitutionally restricted individual freedom and responsibility.

Trigger

Just read Banned weight-loss drug could combat liver disease, diabetes. This news article is about 2,4 Dinitrophenol, a drug known since World War II to help people, in particular obese people, to lose weight.

To quote from the article:

“After further research [ca. 1920s] suggested the compound spurred obese people to shed pounds, drugmakers in the 1930s included DNP in diet pills that were available without a prescription. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) banned the compound at the end of the decade, however, because it caused side effects such as cataracts and was responsible for a handful of deaths.”

Prohibited By The FDA About 1938

“A drug the U.S. government once branded “extremely dangerous and not fit for human consumption”, see above article.

Because of the FDA prohibition it may have taken only several decades before researchers rediscovered  this drug.

From an article published in 1974 titled “Dinitrophenol and bioenergetics: An historical perspective” we learn:

“Several fatalities, a number of cases of cataract, and other reported toxic effects led to widespread concern about the use of dinitrophenol. The FDA could not take effective action against the drug, however, until after its powers had been expanded by the 1938 Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act. The use of dinitrophenol and related compounds for treating obesity was essentially discontinued after the 1930's.”

For reasons of excessive safety concerns, the all powerful FDA prohibited this promising drug! One can speculate that only was the use of this drug discontinued, but also further research into the potential of this drug.

During the most socialist era in U.S. history apparently the FDA was given more power to do harm with the Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act of 1938.

Desalination Is Salvation

Posted: 2/28/2015  Updated: 11/15/2017, 4/6/2017, 1/26/2017, 12/27/2015

Update Of 11/15/2017

Just read Graphene water filter turns whisky clear. It looks like progress is accelerating. Good news!

To quote (emphasis added): “Previously graphene-oxide membranes were shown to be completely impermeable to all solvents except for water. However, a study published in Nature Materials, now shows that we can tailor the molecules that pass through these membranes by simply making them ultrathin. … In the newly developed ultrathin membranes, graphene-oxide sheets are assembled in such a way that pinholes formed during the assembly are interconnected by graphene nanochannels, which produces an atomic-scale sieve allowing the large flow of solvents through the membrane. … This new research allows for expansion in the applications of graphene based membranes from seawater desalination to organic solvent nanofiltration (OSN).”

Update Of 4/6/2017

Just read Graphene sieve turns seawater into drinking water. If confirmed, this could be huge! Scarcity of drinking water is history!

“The Manchester-based group have now further developed these graphene[-oxide] membranes and found a strategy to avoid the swelling of the membrane when exposed to water. The pore size in the membrane can be precisely controlled which can sieve common salts out of salty water and make it safe to drink. … When the common salts are dissolved in water, they always form a 'shell' of water molecules around the salt molecules. This allows the tiny capillaries of the graphene-oxide membranes to block the salt from flowing along with the water. Water molecules are able to pass through the membrane barrier and flow anomalously fast which is ideal for application of these membranes for desalination.” (emphasis added)

Update Of 1/26/2017

Just read Graphene Solar Absorber Could Enable Cheap Thermal Desalination: “Now researchers … have developed a solar absorber material made from graphene oxide that enables a solar approach to desalinating water without the need for solar concentrators and thermal insulation.”

Update Of 12/27/2015

Just read:

1. Shocking Trick To Desalinate Seawater: “Engineers at MIT have come up with a new desalination system that uses a shockwave to get the salt out of seawater. It could be a practical and energy-efficient method for desalination; water purification in remote locations and emergencies; and for cleaning brackish wastewater generated from hydraulic fracturing, the researchers say.”
2. Molybdenum Disulfide Outperforms Graphene in Water Desalination: “MoS2 has inherent advantages in that the molybdenum in the center attracts water, then the sulfur on the other side pushes it away, so we have much higher rate of water going through the pore”

Trigger

Pardon my play on words in the title of this blog post. No blasphemy intended! On the contrary!

Just read Megascale Desalination The world’s largest and cheapest reverse-osmosis desalination plant is up and running in Israel. Desalination plants account already for 40% of Israel’s water supply. This is truly amazing.

Immediate, cheap, and reliable access to clean and sufficient water is perhaps one of the biggest, present challenges to humans all over the world.

It has recently been reported, that California is also looking into building new and reactivating shut down existing desalination plants.

Desalination out of Desperation Severe droughts are forcing researchers to rethink how technology can increase the supply of fresh water.

The Oceans - A Near Endless Source Of Water

We can only hope that human ingenuity will overcome this problem very soon. More money should be spent on this research.

Terrorism Is Not An Existential Threat Naivete

Posted: 2/28/2015

Trigger

Just read “Terrorism Poses No Existential Threat to America. We Must Stop Pretending Otherwise”. A commentary published by a senior fellow John Mueller of the Cato Institute and a professor, Mark G. Stewart.

The two authors never bother to define what an existential threat is, but mock those who claim it is one. I will argue here that taking terrorism too lightly is naive and myopic. To treat it as something as brutal acts committed by some deranged individuals with little resources as the authors suggest is certainly naive and myopic.

What I concede to these authors or others making similar arguments is that too many politicians use terrorism as a pretext for e.g. tighter than necessary domestic security.

Why Terrorism Is An Existential Threat

Perhaps, civilization is only a thin veneer!

First, terrorism in recent times and in our time is often promoted and supported by state sponsors (e.g. Iran, Hussein’s Iraq, former Soviet Union) as well. These are new forms of (asymmetric) warfare and means to gain control and power.

Second, terrorism when combined with an appealing totalitarian ideology could potentially become a spreading world menace. Communism and fascism were also forms of domestic and foreign terrorism in the end.

Third, every organization of humans who use terrorism and barbarism to wantonly kill humans and attempt to destroy civilization should be taken very serious right from the beginning. Open, free, civilized societies like the U.S. cannot live peacefully if such threats exists and proliferate.

Fourth, that terrorists have until now only rarely used ABC weapons is probably more luck than anything else. Why would (perhaps apocalyptic) fanatics hesitate to use ABC weapons after they obtained them?

Spock's Vulcan Salute

Posted: 2/28/2015

Trigger

This week actor Leonard Nimoy died, best known for his role as Mr. Spock on Star Trek. Until now I was not aware that he was an active Jew.

The Vulcan Salute

I still remember that I have taught myself Spock’s salute in my teenage days through persistent exercise.

Only now, more than three decades later, thanks to the Internet and Google search, I have come to realize there is so much more about this salute:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vulcan_salute

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Priestly_Blessing

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shin_(letter)

Was Spock praising God everytime he displayed the salute?

Spock’s Character

From Wikipedia we learn about Leonard Nimoy that:

“The second volume [autobiography of Leonard Nimoy], I Am Spock (1995), saw Nimoy communicating that he finally realized his years of portraying the Spock character had led to a much greater identification between the fictional character and himself. Nimoy had much input into how Spock would act in certain situations, and conversely, Nimoy's contemplation of how Spock acted gave him cause to think about things in a way that he never would have thought if he had not portrayed the character. As such, in this autobiography Nimoy maintains that in some meaningful sense he has merged with Spock while at the same time maintaining the distance between fact and fiction.”

I concur, I may have also identified myself much more with the character of Mr. Spock in my teenage days than I have ever realized. Spock had fascinated me in some ways!

The Many Muslim Crusades

Posted: 2/28/2015

Those who did not learn history are prone to make huge mistakes! U.S. President Obama recently stated that Christianity was not a peaceful religion because of the Crusades and Inquisition.

This man and too many other Westerners are willfully and completely oblivious or ignorant of the history of Islam.

The history starts with the founder and conqueror called prophet Muhammad!

Islams many attacks over centuries on Europe: Spain, Malta, Rome, Constantinople, Vienna ...

Islamic conquest of North Africa, Egypt, Israel, Jerusalem ...

How about the brutal Mongolian conqueror Tamerlane

And so on and so on

This is a stark reminder that government run public education in Western countries is of awfully low quality. We need more history lessons on the curriculum!

Human Addiction To Totalitarianism

Posted: 2/27/2015 Updated: 2/28/2015

Humans Still Condemned To Repeat History

Islamism is only the latest incarnation or iteration of totalitarianism.Several other forms of totalitarianism have come and gone such as communism and fascism.  For too many humans the urge to exercise extreme authority and control over other people seems all too irresistible.

Why are so many people still prone to become nihilistic and barbaric destroyers of civilization?

Why do nationalism, racism of any form, and tribalism still dominate and preoccupy so many people in the 21st century?

Why are so many people against individualism and pluralism to the point that they would kill other humans or try to destroy civilization for it!

These people are shallow, inhuman, and they do not love life! They are not God’s children!

Hannah Arendt’s Banality Of Evil

One is reminded of the works of Hannah Arendt, in particular the books “The Origins of Totalitarianism” (published 1951) and “Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil” (1963). I have to admit, I never read these two books, but I have been familiar with reviews and excerpts for a long time.

Laser Ignition For Automobiles

Posted: 2/17/2015

Trigger

Just read Lasers Could Boost Engine Efficiency by 27%. This is another great example that human ingenuity knows no bounds. This article is about a modern replacement for the spark plug and significant improvements in fuel efficiency.

Lasers In The Combustion Chamber

Not just one perhaps multiple lasers focusing at the center of the chamber or any other point: “This results in a much more complete burn, so you get more bang for your buck, literally. Also, lasers can be fired with nanosecond timing (multiple times per combustion cycle if necessary), and even targeted at different areas of the combustion chamber.”

Will The U.S. Congress Stop The FCC On Net Neutrality

Posted: 2/27/2015 Updated: 2/28/2015

The Responsibility

It is now the responsibility of each member of the U.S. Congress to explicitly remove any authority from the U.S. Federal Communications Commission over the Internet. Anyway, the FCC clearly usurped authority when it voted for the net neutrality nonsense.

The authority of the FCC is based on the Communications Act of 1934 and subsequent amendments. This is a law passed during the most socialist era in the history of the United States.

The Law

The members of the U.S. Congress need to be reminded that they already passed laws to keep the Internet free and open to market competition.

See Title 47 U.S. Code - Telecommunications - § 230 - Protection for private blocking and screening of offensive material:

“(b) Policy

It is the policy of the United States—

(1) to promote the continued development of the Internet and other interactive computer services and other interactive media;

(2) to preserve the vibrant and competitive free market that presently exists for the Internet and other interactive computer services, unfettered by Federal or State regulation;”

President Obama has been repeatedly reported in the media  to be some kind of a legal professor or scholar specialized in constitutional law. Well, lawyers are often the worst offenders of law.

Credit to Bret Swanson who pointed me in his article to the above cited U.S. Code.

The Internet

The Internet would have never developed so spectacularly and fast had government not stayed away as it did.

The Internet is not a government run utility and it should never become one!

The Internet is something built by all all the people and businesses of the world. It is truly transnational and global! To think that any national bureaucracy could impose power and control over it like the FCC now has attempted is ludicrous.

China's Great Firewall Futility

Posted: 2/25/2015

Trigger

Recently read China’s Great Firewall Gets Taller Internet Filter Makes It Harder to Circumvent Blocks to Services Like Google and Facebook.

An Exercise In Futility

If the leaders of the communist party of China thinks it can stop free speech on the Internet by raising the Great Firewall, they are gravely mistaken for underestimating the Chinese people’s yearning for more information and facts.

History does not have much mercy and patience on autocrats!

In an irony of history, Karl Marx and Engels wrote in their Communist Manifesto:

“The bourgeoisie, by the rapid improvement of all instruments of production, by the immensely facilitated means of communication, draws all, even the most barbarian, nations into civilisation. The cheap prices of commodities are the heavy artillery with which it batters down all Chinese walls, with which it forces the barbarians’ intensely obstinate hatred of foreigners to capitulate.” (emphasis added)

The Soviet empire had to lock up copy machines to prevent insurrection and dissidence.

Ex Post Versus Ex Ante Prevention Of Harm

Posted: 2/25/2015

The Prevention Of Harm To Individuals

The perfect pretense for government paternalism or the nanny state! Or to protect us from ourselves nonsense!

Predominance Of Ex Post Prevention Of Harm

In most Western democracies one can observe how over the past 100-200 years governments and legislatures have increasingly implemented laws, regulations, and bureaucracies in pursuit of more ex post prevention of harm at the expense of individual freedom and responsibility.

In the U.S. we have since the early 20th century e.g. a plethora of federal agencies who constantly interfere in a myriad of ways with our daily lives in any state:

1. U.S. Food And Drug Administration (FDA)
2. Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC)
3. U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC)
4. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA)
5. U.S. Department Of Transportation (DoT)
6. U.S. Department of Agriculture (DoA)
7. U.S. Department of Health And Human Services (HHS)
8. U.S. Department of Education (DoE)
9. Federal Trade Commission (FTC)
10. Federal Communication Commission (FCC)
11. And the list goes on and on

Banning light bulbs or mandating the amount of water that can be flushed in a toilet or the infamous Corporate Average Fuel Efficiency (CAFE) standards are just a few examples of how Big Government operates.

Why do we have so many prescription drugs?

Why do we have speed limits instead of speed recommendations?

Without the FCC we could have had smartphones 10-20 years earlier!

Limited And Small Government

Such a government should primarily focus on punishing criminals of any kind, white collar or other, with a guilty mind (mens rea) and let individuals decide for themselves how they want to live their lives.

Second, such a government should focus on research and advice of the general public or businesses to improve the human condition not rely on mandates etc.

Only as an ultima ratio (as a last resort), a governments may resort to regulation and control of a perceived severe harmful situation.

Modern Language Of Superstition

Posted: 2/25/2015

Trigger

Just read “The Earth Is Not a God The false theology of radical environmentalists”

One takeaway from this article is that modern superstition can be summarized as repeated “Predictions of starvation, depletion, and pollution” that did not pan out.

Humans Are Still Superstitious

Anyone, who believes that humans are not superstitious anymore since Francis Bacon (1561-1626) or Voltaire (1694-1778), should think again. Humans are still prone to unfounded apocalyptic thinking.

Superstition is still the enemy of human ingenuity as well as  human and nature’s adaptability!

Language Of Superstition

1. Precautionary Principle (The fear of doing something)
2. Environmental Sustainability (A self imposed straight jacket)
3. Peak Oil (Predicted many times for over a century)
4. Carrying Capacity (How many people can live on this planet at the same time)
5. Global Warming (A hoax)
6. Global Cooling (The hoax before Global Warming)
7. Vaccination (How many sophisticated parents refuse to vaccinate their children for no good reason?)
8. And the list goes on and on …

I have blogged previously about some of the above terms (e.g. 1, 2, 5)

Instrumentum Regni

That is exactly what superstition has been and still is used for centuries as an instrument of control and power! That is one major explanation why government run public education is more indoctrination than education.