Book: Discarded Science

After I finished "Would You Kill The Fat Man" (excellent BTW) I perused the offerings on my "to read" shelf and, not finding anything that turned my crank, again went book shopping.

Found the above-listed book by John Grant, a compendium of theories both wacky and arcane and occasionally hilarious, everything from hollow earth to physiognomy to inheritance of acquired characteristics. Just starting in, but so far it's already sent me off on a dozen fact-finding missions because I could not believe what he wrote was accurate.

Alas, so far he's 100% right. People are stupid.

The 1908 Tunguska event is widely agreed to have been a small comet that exploded about 8km above the ground.

However, alternative explanations have been put forward. One I hadn't heard before -- which absolutely scared the shit out of me -- is that it was a tiny black hole. This black hole, like a bullet, never exited the far side of the globe (apparently) so it must have been moving slow enough to have been captured by Earth's gravity.

Or more precisely, the center of gravity between the Earth and the Moon.

Which means that it is orbiting 1,062 miles underneath the Earth's surface, gobbling up matter with every revolution. It will continue to hollow out the Earth until the planet's surface becomes unstable and it begins to collapse.

Or will it? Is 1,062 miles down into the mantle yet?

Would the orbit be a closed racetrack, running the same path each time? The center of gravity would not shift, even with the variations in the Earth's tilt that causes the seasons, right?

Excellent rational level headed book but the author has one annoying habit: he refers to related chapters often, but they're always in the future, in later parts of the book you haven't read yet.

Authors should be legally prohibited from letting us know that they know more about the book they're writing than we do. It's fucking annoying.

Phlogiston, caloric, aether, focal sepsis, homeopathy, naturopathy, osteopathy, Bach Flower Remedies, colonic irrigation, alchemy, leeching, koro, orthowater, globulism, levity, N-Rays, antigravity, cold fusion, Atlantis, Lemuria, Mu, El Dorado, Ramtha, Antilla, creationism, Zetetic Society, Velikovsky, Annular Theory, Vulcan, Antichthon, Phaeton, Maldek, Mallona, continuous creation, world ice theory, Lawsonomy, Selfish Biocosm, panspermia, phrenology.... The list goes on and on.

The author has this to say about acupuncture:

John Grant wrote:

Science as yet keeps an open book - just open - on the practice of acupuncture, which does seem to be efficacious in some instances where the results cannot be simply explained away in terms of the placebo effect. The underlying theory used to explain the effects of acupuncture is, however, in general roundly rejected by occidental science, drawing as it does far more on metaphysics than on reality. One hypothesis advanced in hope of explaining acupuncture's attested beneficial effect is that the pricking of the body stimulates the generation of endorphins, which are the body's natural painkillers. Of course, simply because pain has been reduced doesn't mean the acupuncture has had any effect on the illness which created that pain.

My sister, who died of cancer in 2011, found that acupuncture -- and only acupuncture -- relieved the nausea of her chemotherapy treatments. Every two weeks she would go in for a drip then go straight to acupuncture. She was a PhD, a scientist by trade, and was not given to woo or placebos. She said she could not explain WHY it worked but said it had an undeniable benefit.

My other sister has a congenital spine problem, she's had to have a couple vertebra fused and is in pain much of the time. She tried acupuncture recently (she's also a PhD, who taught human anatomy) and she said the benefit was slight, and fleeting. She is not planning to continue.

Isn't it odd, that fingerprints and fingerprinting were only discovered in 1890.  Presumably they could have been discovered anytime in history, though I suppose the technology for searching fingerprint databases was required for them to be used in identification and crime-solving.

As of 2013, approximately 270 people have been cryogenically frozen.

Do you know how many of those are head-only freezings?

One of the more bizarre affectations of the narcissistic.

No idea.  The majority, presumably -- since nobody will want their old wrinkly body back when they're reanimated.

The industry is somewhat secretive, and at least one facility had a major power failure leading to a lot of spoiled meat.

The largest (and one of the oldest) companies, Alcor, froze their 136th person a couple months ago.  Head only, according to this surprisingly frank report.

Quote :

Patients
Neurocryopreservation = 86
Whole Body Cryopreservation = 47
Neuro with Whole Body = 5