Computers, Society, and Nature

Nature has a new article on the use of spare computing time to cure malaria. The public is being asked to download software on to their computers so the software can run on their machines while they’re idle. The article explains the need for multiple processers:

The model attempts to individually simulate malaria infection in each of 50,000 to 100,000 people over a lifetime. It simulates how often each individual is bitten, becomes infected and fights off an infection, plus their age, health, changing number of parasites in the blood and level of immunity. It updates this information every 5 days over a population’s lifetime, a computing feat that takes about an hour to tot up on an average PC.

To refine the model, the researchers have to adjust each component multiple times until it best mimics real data collected from infected areas. This means they must run the simulations many thousands of times, eating up thousands of hours of computing time.

This project uses the same approach as the one used to model climate prediction and analyze data in the search for extra-terrestrial life.

Not a bad use for your computer’s idle time: to spare individuals a lifetime of illness.

Lakehead University, in in Thunder Bay, Ontario, Canada, has decided not to install wireless on campus because of health concerns.

The safety of chronic, long-term exposure to electromagnetic energy, of which radio waves are a part, is a hotly contested scientific subject. Researchers have conducted hundreds of studies assessing the health impacts of this form of energy, studying not only radio waves, but related topics, such as microwaves and the electromagnetic fields around electric wiring.
…

With the profusion of cellphone towers, wireless networks and electricity using electronic devices, exposure levels are rising rapidly across the globe.

But most studies have been unable to prove conclusively that common, everyday exposures are a health hazard. In response, regulatory bodies around the world have usually concluded that there is no reason for public concern.

The university instead will rely on and augment its existing fibre optic network. This actually handles some of the bandwidth problem experienced by universities. Increasingly students expect ubiquitous Internet connectivity — wherever you are on campus, you can connect. They don’t often connect their low bandwidth to the number of users on the network. However, this is becoming a huge strain on campus networks. Increasing capacity is expensive and university IT departments find all sorts of innovative ways to finance the growth, like downloading costs to neighboring academic departments. Wonder why tuition or user fees are going up? Here’s one reason.

Also, I appreciate the logical consistency of a university taking a stand on a health issue. Universities talk a lot about protecting the health of their student and staff population. Here they’re taking the precautionary principle under consideration and, in the absense of definitive evidence that the waves are safe, are being proactive. This step won’t make the administration a lot of friends. (Of course, it’s easy for me to say. I’m sitting here in the comfort of my own electromagnetic radiation…)

Read to the last paragraph.

How do you feel about your food security?

In a tragic, Jared Diamond-esque realization, it might strike you that the entire South American continent hung by an agricultural thread, and then fell. Specifically in the Yucatan Penninsula, with the expansive plots of crops nestled in too-thin dirt, an extended spell of no rain caused the spongey earth to cake up and kill the crops, and, subsequently, the civilization.

So much for Aztec urban planning.

However, we are not immune to similar legendary catastrophes. Much attention has been given to Food Security in recent past. The famous economist T. Homer-Dixon writes much about how resource scarcity, especially food and energy, are the seeds of inter-national conflict and war. With the emergence of high-powered GIS and analysis, a ‘Famin Early Warning System‘ was produced a short while ago to model risks. Attention at the L. D. Earth Obersvatory, Columbia University, has kept global-perspective detail on draughts that can – and will, beyond a shadow of a doubt – re-occur in the near future.

And now, an upcoming lecture:

“Room at the Table for Everyone: Challenges to Global Food Security in the 21st Century.”

Professor Don Smith – Chair, Plant Science Department, McGill University

Friday, October 21, 2005
3:30pm
Redpath Mueum Auditorium

We tend to treat population growth and environmental degradation as though it were a one-way causal street, namely population growth causes environmental degradation. However, there is no lasting empirical evidence that has affirmed this claim.

However, there is ample evidence–to be scientifically correct, not causative evidence but ample associative evidence–that environmental degradation negatively impacts population growth. One example is endocrine-disrupting compounds (EDCs) that interfere with the sexual development of animals. A study just published by the University of Ottawa reports on the impacts of exposure to high levels of one such EDC, hexachlorobenzenes (HCBs), on the sex selection of children. The study tracked over time the number of boys and girls born in a native community in Sarnia, Ontario. The Aamjiwnaang community live next to the Sarina-Lambert Chemical Valley, a complex of petrochemical, polymer, and chemical industrial plants.

The authors tracked the sex ratio from 1984 to 2003. From 1984 to 1992, the ratio of boys to girls was about 1. But something happened in the mid-1990s and the ratio of boys to girls declined. These were not minor differences in the sex ratio: from 1999 to 2003, half as many boys as girls were born to members of the Aamjiwnaang community. The authors are not sure why the rate declined when it did–they do not have longitudinal data on environmental quality. However, a 1996 soil study found high concentrations of both inorganic and organic contaminants. Among the organics, high levels of HCBs were found in the soil.

If you’re interested, the full text of the study is available here. It’s an easy, albeit alarming, read. In addition to effects on human population, the study also reviews the endocrine disruption in local wildlife in the region.

Many EDCs are essential to computer production. See related post on the impacts of brominated flame retardants.

The NYTimes reports that one Arizona town provides an “oasis in a toxic world”

Snowflake (a town named for early settlers named Erastus Snow and William Flake) became a home for those suffering from chemical sensitivities in 1988, when Bruce McCreary, the electrical engineer, arrived here from Mesa. The year before, he said, chemicals in the aircraft factory where he worked had left him almost totally disabled.

About two dozen other people with multiple chemical sensitivities (M.C.S., or “environmental illness”) have joined him, and Mr. McCreary helps them construct houses without the plastics and glues that are the mainstays of modern home building. They bought their home sites for $500 to $1,000 an acre.

The townspeople are worried because a recent real estate boom may cause people without MCS to locate in the town. The newer residents may choose to use pesticides on their lawns or build driveways with asphalt.

Apparently, many of the residents are also sensitive to electromagnetic fields (EMF) and have erected elaborate devices so that they can operate electrial devices, watch TV, and access the Internet. The Aarticle links to a multimedia show that describes the lengths to which they’ll go to minimize contact with EMF.

Here’s an interesting take on extinction: We will genetically modify ourselves sufficiently that we are no longer Homo sapiens sapiens.

Conversely, by modifying ourselves, we will make ourselves extinction-proof.

Check out the alternate forms of humans at Human evolution at the crossroads: Genetics, cybernetics complicate forecast for species

I’m opting for astran.

Philips Medical Systems Technology has plans to sell a home defibrillator. That’s right: if your spouse or child or friend’s heart has stopped beating, you could grease up the paddles and jumpstart their heart . Not surprisingly, there are concerns.

some doctors and other emergency medicine experts are skeptical of the product making that promise – HeartStart Home, which at a list price of $1,995 is the first external heart defibrillator for sale without a prescription.

External defibrillators in the hands of trained professionals can and do save thousands of lives each year. That it is why they have made their way beyond emergency rooms and ambulances to be widely installed at airports, gyms and other public places.

But some medical workers and doctors say they fear that having a device like HeartStart in the house might delay calls to 911 to seek the dispatch of an emergency medical service team.

Anyway, great conversation piece for dinner guests. Additionally, you now can justify all those hours of watching ER.

After reading this article about human cloning. I got thinking about just what we use computers for. The article is about harvesting organs from “made to order” humans. In essence, if one of your organs breaks down, it would be easier for you to find a new one, or have a new one found for you.

My question is, are we using computers as substitute brains? I realize that this may seem like a pretty bizarre question, but seriously, is it that we find our brains can’t work fast enough or think of enough ideas on their own that we must turn to computers – to check our spelling, to check our grammar, to translate things from one language to another, or to reserach ideas?

Is it that there should be just as big of an ethical concern regarding computers for use by brains as for cloning humans for new organs?

The US Department of Agriculture has launched a new food pyramid. It’s actually kind of cool. They have an introductory video and a separate site that allows you to track your own food intake over the year compared to your level of physical activity. Usually, the US government is a fairly slow innovator when it comes to technology–a late adopter–but this time it’s ahead in terms of promoting public health.

However, as a Washington Post article reports, you have to log on to stay healthy. Considering that obesity is concentrated among the poor, the people most likely to benefit from something like this may be the least likely to access it.

I just found an article in the globe and mail about the potential hazards to hospital patients in having computers in patient-care areas. Apparently, computer keyboards are great places for viruses (real life ones) to make homes. one hospital in toronto had to throw out all of their keyboards during one virus outbreak.. the viruses that hospitals are worried about are genearlly only found in hospitals but have the potential to be lethal. the study that was reported conclusively recommends increased handwashing after computer use in hospitals!! more work needs to be done to dertermine how much cleaning (i.e. germicides and such) keyboards can handle.

Here is the article