Put on your thinking cap when you visit CITB - here you'll find Concepts, Ideas, Thoughts and "Outside The Box" thinking, plus we call Bullsh!t for what it is. Enjoy the ride, and if we stimulate your brain, please tell others about us!
Posted by Thom Byxbe | Under Concept, Thought
Tuesday Mar 18, 2008
I have long believed in the mind body connection. I have noticed recently more and more stories like the one below. Often these type of stories just scrape the surface in an attempt to not offend common current thinking. This story was published by the Telegraph.co.uk which bills itself as "Britain's No.1 quality newspaper website". While I have used excerpts from this story to make a larger "Thought Provoking" point, I have included a link to the entire story.
A woman claims to have undergone a complete "personality transplant" after receiving a new kidney.
Cheryl Johnson, 37, says she has changed completely since receiving the organ in May. She believes that she must have picked up her new characteristics from the donor, a 59-year-old man who died from an aneurysm.
Now, not only has her personality changed, the single mother also claims that her tastes in literature have taken a dramatic turn. Whereas she only used to read low-brow novels, Dostoevsky has become her author of choice since the transplant.
Academics in America have developed a theory called cellular memory phenomenon to explain the personality changes that are allegedly experienced by some transplant recipients.
Cellular memory is the hypothesis that such things as memories, habits, interests, and tastes may somehow be stored in all the cells of human bodies, i.e. not only in the brain.
Examples include a Massachusetts woman with vertigo who became a climber; a Milwaukee lawyer who began eating Snickers, having always hated chocolate; and a seven-year-old girl who had nightmares about being killed after being given the heart of a murdered child.
However, the only case recognised by the scientific community is that of a 15-year-old Australian girl whose blood type changed following a liver transplant.
Body memory is a belief that the body itself is capable of storing memories, as opposed to only the brain. It was cited by some to explain certain claims of having memories for events where the brain was not in a position to store memories.
IS YOUR BRAIN REALLY NECESSARY?
By Richard Milton
Alternative Science
Is your brain you really necessary? The reason for my apparently absurd question is the remarkable research conducted at the University of Sheffield by neurology professor the late Dr. John Lorber.
When Sheffield's campus doctor was treating one of the mathematics students for a minor ailment, he noticed that the student's head was a little larger than normal. The doctor referred the student to professor Lorber for further examination.
The student in question was academically bright, had a reported IQ of 126 and was expected to graduate. When he was examined by CAT-scan, however, Lorber discovered that he had virtually no brain at all.
Instead of two hemispheres filling the cranial cavity, some 4.5 centimetres deep, the student had less than 1 millimetre of cerebral tissue covering the top of his spinal column. The student was suffering from hydrocephalus, the condition in which the cerebrospinal fluid, instead of circulating around the brain and entering the bloodstream, becomes dammed up inside.
Normally, the condition is fatal in the first months of childhood. Even where an individual survives he or she is usually seriously handicapped. Somehow, though, the Sheffield student had lived a perfectly normal life and went on to gain an honours degree in mathematics. This case is by no means as rare as it seems. In 1970, a New Yorker died at the age of 35. He had left school with no academic achievements, but had worked at manual jobs such as building janitor, and was a popular figure in his neighbourhood. Tenants of the building where he worked described him as passing the days performing his routine chores, such as tending the boiler, and reading the tabloid newspapers. When an autopsy was performed to determine the cause of his premature death he, too, was found to have practically no brain at all. Do you need your brain? Professor Lorber has identified several hundred people who have very small cerebral hemispheres but who appear to be normal intelligent individuals. Some of them he describes as having 'no detectable brain', yet they have scored up to 120 on IQ tests.
Later in that post was this:
One of the few biologists to propose a radically novel approach to these questions is Dr. Rupert Sheldrake. In his book A New Science of Life Sheldrake rejected the idea that the brain is a warehouse for memories and suggested it is more like a radio receiver for tuning into the past. Memory is not a recording process in which a medium is altered to store records, but a journey that the mind makes into the past via the process of morphic resonance. Such a 'radio' receiver would require far fewer and less complex structures than a warehouse capable of storing and retrieving a lifetime of data.
CITB EDITOR'S NOTE:The name Dr. Rupert Sheldrake may sound familiar to CITB readers. It is Dr. Sheldrake that is directing the experiments detailed in our post titled Do You Have Telephone Telepathy?
As I stated at the start of this post, my intent was to make a larger "Thought Provoking" point, and here it is...
To see the potential in this story requires one to do some "Outside The Box" thinking. This is something that I feel it is our duty at CITB to encourage. This story does not require a quantum leap of logic - it just requires you to see possibilities until more scientific data can be gathered. But, of course, such a crazy idea couldn't possibly be true, could it?
CITB Quote of the day: "Success is a journey, not a destination. The doing is usually more important than the outcome." - Arthur Ashe
We all have stress sometimes. For some people, it happens before having to speak in public. For other people, it might be before a first date. What causes stress for you may not be stressful for someone else.
Sometimes stress is helpful - it can encourage you to meet a deadline or get things done. But long-term stress can increase the risk of diseases like depression, heart disease and a variety of other problems.
Yoga, Meditation, and Other Relaxation Techniques
Yoga can be an effective tool for dealing with work related stress. This video offers short exercises that can be done at your desk for stress relief and relaxation.
This is a video featuring Dr. Jon Kabal-Zinn. He describes the revolution in medicine that has occurred over the past 30 years that has integrated the mind back into the body and developed a remarkable range of practices for integrating one's experience, reducing stress, healing the body, coping more effectively with emotions such as anxiety, anger, and depression, and cultivating greater well-being and happiness.
Chronic Stress is stress that lasts a long time or occurs frequently. Chronic stress is potentially damaging. Family problems, a difficult class at school, a schedule that is too busy, or a long illness can cause chronic stress.
Symptoms of chronic stress can be:
eating disorder
upset stomach
headache
backache
insomnia
anxiety
depression
anger
In the most severe cases it can lead to panic attacks or a panic disorder.
If you have chronic stress, the best way to deal with it is to take care of the underlying problem. Counseling can help you find ways to relax and calm down. Medicines may also help. There are a variety of methods to control chronic stress, including exercise, healthy diet, stress management, relaxation techniques, adequate rest, and relaxing hobbies.
Ensuring a healthy diet containing magnesium may help control or eliminate stress, in those individuals with lower levels of magnesium or those who have a magnesium deficiency. Chronic stress can also lead to a magnesium deficiency, which can be a factor in continued chronic stress.
Having personally experienced the effects of stress. How stress effects your life varies from person to person. Here is a collection of links to help you and your loved ones with this issue.
Major Life Changes: This list is a handy tool to keep available at all times. Anytime you’re faced with major changes, you experience physical and emotional stress. This list will help you make choices about how many stressful situations you’re willing to juggle at one time. For instance, if you’re expecting a child, it might not be the best time to consider relocation, a new job, or to decide to head back for that college degree.
Major Life Change: Chaos Could Be a Good Sign: Although this article is brief and to-the-point, life coach Laura Young looks at the positive side of stress. When you deal with crises, you can develop inner strength and confidence in your abilities. Read on to learn more positives!
Stress at Work: NIOSH (National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health) provides a comprehensive yet concise list of tools and information where you can learn all angles about work-related stress and relief from that stress.
Stress Management: This is an About.com site that focuses on stress management in all areas of life. This is one of the most comprehensive sites we’ve encountered on this topic, as it provides a blog, articles, and tools to help recognize and deal with stress issues.
Stress Relief: Relaxation techniques such as deep breathing, visualization, progressive muscle relaxation, meditation, and yoga can help you activate this relaxation response to stress. This site shows you how to plan for and achieve a level of relaxation that may help you to cope with everyday stress triggers.
Stress Relief Exercises: Unlike exercises for physical strength, these tools will help you learn how to relax so you don’t hurt your body or shorten your lifespan.
Top 10 Steps to Making Life Changes: This PDF file was created by life coach Steve Davis, and he provides some sound advice on how to alleviate many stressful situations. For instance, if the bank forecloses on your apartment building, the stress won’t be half as bad on you if you have money set aside to handle a blow like this.
Work-Related Stress: Health & Safety Executive (HSE) provides a four-pronged approach to work-related stress. Learn how to tackle stress, about management’s role in this issue, about good practices, and advice for individuals.
CITB Quote of the day: "Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover" - Mark Twain
Posted by Thom Byxbe | Under Concept
Tuesday Jan 22, 2008
Life on Mars? What in the Mars is this? In February of 2005, Space.com reported "A pair of NASA scientists told a group of space officials at a private meeting here Sunday that they have found strong evidence that life may exist today on Mars, hidden away in caves and sustained by pockets of water."
As of today, the mainstream news outlets in the United States have yet to cover this breaking story. These amazing photos, which were sent back to Earth by Spirit (NASA's Mars explorer vehicle, which landed there four years ago) revealed a mystery figure on the Red Planet:
Space enthusiasts spent four years analyzing this image, which on much closer inspection shows the 'alien'.
The final image is where questions begin to settle in...
Posted by Thom Byxbe | Under Opinion, Review
Thursday Mar 20, 2008
I have been looking for a site that would send reminders to my cell phone as text messages. My search was originally a MAJOR disappointment, because none of the sites really worked. Then I found BitBomb.com.
This site WORKS! Setting up an account was about the easiest I have ever experienced. Adding a reminder was even easier than getting an account.
It is seldom that it takes so few words to describe a site. The strengths of this site are simplicity, and that it works! I can think of no better reason to give a site our HIGHEST recommendation. Try It, You'll Like It!
CITB Quote of the day: "The most incomprehensible thing about the world is that it is comprehensible." - Albert Einstein
Posted by Thom Byxbe | Under Thought
Sunday Mar 16, 2008
A dog is the only thing on earth
that loves you more than he loves himself! Josh Billings (1818 - 1885)
CITB Quote of the day: "Real men and women that truly possess the warrior spirit are not made for safe havens. With these types of extraordinary individuals the fullness of life is best experienced in the hazards of life" - Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli (May 3, 1469 – June 21, 1527)
Posted by Thom Byxbe | Under Concept, Idea
Tuesday Mar 11, 2008
In the course of writing CITB we read and research a LOT of web sites. While surfing the web today I saw a link to VistaRewired.com. I no longer am a Microsoft Windows user having made the move to Linux several months ago. But, in my humble opinion, no Microsoft operating system is more bloated and convoluted than Vista. When I visited Vista Rewired I knew I had found a site that was a gold mine of simple, easy to use, solutions to the mysteries of Windows Vista.
Vista Rewired was created by two aspiring young entrepreneurs with the intent of solving the headaches of Windows Vista users, and to educate them on the operating system. The easy to use tips and tricks will help Vista users so they can use the operating system to its full potential.
Here is a LIMITED selection of links to Vista Rewired articles that I felt many users would find helpful.
The complete index of articles on the site can be found HERE. Remember that this site is adding important information and growing daily. Be sure to bookmark it or subscribe to their RSS feed to stay updated on this VALUABLE resource to Windows Vista.
We give this site our HIGHEST recommendation. We think it such a valuable resource that we have added it to our permanent list of Important Blogs on CITB's sidebar.
CITB Quote of the day: "I have not failed. I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work!"- Thomas Edison
Posted by Thom Byxbe | Under Concept
Friday Mar 7, 2008
At CITB we always on the lookout for new and innovative ideas that serve the readers of our blog at large. We think we have found one that serves not only you the reader, but also bloggers like CITB. BlogUpp! has introduced a service that can help you discover new sources of quality content.
Previous methods for adding visibility to a blog consisted mostly of static blogrolls. That means the blogger had to know of the existence of a blog and then they established a link manually. With BlogUpp! bloggers have the ability to discover and make new connections in an interactive, automated, and simplified way.
There is no registration, no account, and other than providing the link to the blog no other data is required. From the site link BlogUpp! generates a short code for the blogger to copy and paste into site blog once.
This is the result:
BlogUpp! doesn't require the blogger to submit an ad, either. It automatically takes a snapshot of the blog, and shares it on other sites. Each blog's snapshot is accompanied by the most recent article, which BlogUpp! gets by reading the blog's RSS feed. This method ensures there are no animation and annoying ads displayed to the readers.Although every blogger is invited to use the BlogUpp! service, each submitted blog passes an approval step to ensure only those with quality content are added. They do not not accept adult, gambling, and illegal or inappropriate content websites. This makes BlogUpp! a family friendly service with quality content. BlogUpp! seeks to be a simple, efficient and honest community service.
Readers and traffic are the true currency of blogs, and BlogUpp! gives it free to every blogger with quality content.
We give this service our HIGHEST recommendation, based on the concept. We will watch to see how the service grows, and will report again as it develops and matures.
CITB Quote of the day: "By definition, if you don't stand up for anything you stand for nothing" - Paul Timmins
Posted by Thom Byxbe | Under Idea, Thought
Wednesday Feb 27, 2008
Remember the film of the Hindenburg disaster? Even if you are much too young to have been alive when it happened, you've doubtless seen the dramatic (and tragic) newsreel footage. After seeing those images in their local theaters (back in the days before television, when you got to see the news in motion pictures before you saw the feature film), an awful lot of people decided that there was no way in hell they wanted to travel by Zeppelin. And, since there were alternatives (planes, which might crash but at least didn't put one in the position of having to choose between being burned alive or jumping to one's death), the Zeppelin all but disappeared. Which, in a way, is a real shame, because it was probably a much more elegant way to travel (no, I am not old enough to remember).
Anyway, my point is that a dramatic video can bring out the worst in people's fears. Today we have companies wanting to put wind turbines along the shore of Lake Michigan, and of course there is local opposition. Well, just wait until that opposition sees this video from Denmark:
Now, I'm not saying that wind power is totally dead - I'd love to see any type of energy production developed that doesn't involve the use of petroleum or other fossil fuels. But, I have to tell you, I'd rather live next to a nuclear power plant than in the shadow of one of these wind turbines (not that living next to either would be my first choice). I can see all sorts of problems with those massive blades whirling in the wind, and the video just confirmed my suspicions that things can go very wrong. This video will probably be played at every local council meeting where the idea of putting wind turbines near residential areas is being explored.
As an aside, why isn't anyone exploring the use of wave energy in Lake Michigan? On the west side of the lake, we have gentle waves even on days when the wind is relatively calm, and when the wind kicks up a bit there is a massive amount of energy in those waves. And, anything that captures the energy in the waves probably isn't going to throw huge chunks of metal into someone's home (I suppose it could happen in a really nasty storm, but the probability is seriously low, and a large log or other chunk of driftwood could probably cause similar damage). I know, there are probably a three or four months where the lake is frozen over to the point that there are no waves, but still, for the other eight or nine months of the year - and particularly during the summer, when air conditioning usage is high - I suspect that a significant amount of power could be derived from wave energy!
This entry is part 2 of 2 in the series Perspective
EDITOR’S NOTE: This post is a part of our ongoing series titled “Perspective.” We will attempt to put concepts and issues in perspective by giving you everyday examples..
Let's put the Earth, Moon, and Sun in perspective:
The Moon is about 1.3 light-seconds away (240,000 miles) from the Earth.
Here is a scale picture of the Earth-Moon system, with the Earth (actual diameter: 8,000 miles) represented by a circle just a little bigger than 1/8 inch:
The Sun is 8.3 light-minutes away (93,000,000 miles) from the Earth.
A scale drawing of the relationship with the Sun is not as easily made here as it was for the Earth and Moon above.
If we chose the same 1/8 inch diameter circle to represent the Earth, then we would require a circle bigger than one foot in diameter to represent the Sun (actual diameter: 864,000 miles). The center of the Sun circle would have to be placed about 121 feet from the center of the Earth circle!
You can begin to be impressed by the different sizes and separations that we encounter in space.
The terms light-seconds and light-minutes are used as units of distance along with light-years. These units may be understood as distances, or in another way. When we look up, we see the Moon and Sun, not as they are now, but as they were 1.3 seconds and 8.3 minutes ago, respectively.
Hence, the concept of the space-time continuum: the further out we look into space, the farther back we see into time.
And now you have "The Scale Of Perspective..."
CITB Quote of the day: "Reliability + Consistency = TRUST" - Thom Byxbe
This post - Rebus Puzzles - is a part of our Brain Builder series. If you’ve never done a rebus puzzle before, then this quick introduction will explain all you need to know. They are essentially little pictures, often made with letters and words, which cryptically represent a word, phrase, or saying.
This page, our Guide To Rebus Puzzles, explains eight of the main ways in which a rebus puzzle might encode its solution.
re·bus Pronunciation [ree-buhs]
-noun, plural -bus·es.
1. a representation of a word or phrase by pictures, symbols, etc., that suggest that word or phrase or its syllables: Two gates and a head is a rebus for Gateshead.
2. a piece of writing containing many such representations.
We use Backpack here at CITB everyday. After trying a LOT of software solutions to manage the multitude of tasks necessary to plan, schedule, and coordinate the day to day operations of our 3 blogs we chose Backpack.
Please click below and take advantage of the FREE version of Backpack.
I have long believed in the mind body connection. I have noticed recently more and more stories like the one below. Often these type of stories just scrape the surface in an attempt to not offend common current thinking. This story was published by the Telegraph.co.uk which bills itself as "Britain's No.1 quality newspaper website". While I have used excerpts from this story to make a larger "Thought Provoking" point, I have included a link to the entire story.
You can begin to be impressed by the different sizes and separations that we encounter in space.
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