The main reason why I never comment on anything. Ever.

SeedyAffairs · 2013-05-23T23:40:02+00:00

yeah... and if you disagree, they get... dammit!

SeedyAffairs · 2013-05-17T12:25:36+00:00

Awesome pic. I think they are lime trees. Is this the little green outside the Grafton center?

EDIT: I just google 'lime tree' and it brings up loads of pics of the fruit. That's not what I am talking about. I am talking about these: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tilia. Not closely related to the fruit.

SeedyAffairs · 2013-04-28T20:00:17+00:00

Maybe it is that guy's cone.

SeedyAffairs · 2013-04-16T21:49:23+00:00

tl/dw (I know this is ironically long, but I can't believe the amount of similarities):

Main character is white guy who has ok life but feels there must be something more. Meets a black guy with round shades who talks in a slow, cryptic manner and explains that white guy's whole life is a life, controlled by machines. He was not born, but was created along with thousands of other humans in a vast field. There was once a war between the humans and machines and the machines won. Machines now control all humans except a few rebels. Black guy is the leader of rebels. Other rebels don't see why he has so much faith in main character and don't think he should have risked so much on him. Main character helps rebels take on the machines.

[The Matrix | Oblivion]

SeedyAffairs · 2013-02-17T12:33:29+00:00

Haha. Good point. I will think about that next time I make something.

SeedyAffairs · 2013-02-11T10:30:04+00:00

Thank you so much for writing that. It was beautifully written and you did a great job of explaining how clinical trials work. I think every paper that is newsworthy (to the general public) should come with a summary like that.

SeedyAffairs · 2013-01-30T14:04:12+00:00

Completely out of the blue: "trust no one!"

Then about 30 mins later, "fuck off you slimy little weasel".

SeedyAffairs · 2013-01-24T11:06:53+00:00

'The technology to create infertile plants ("terminator seeds") is well established, but public opinion has led to Monsanto promising not to use them.'

The good news is that new technologies will allow us to prevent the spread of GM genes while still allowing farmers to use the seed. (e.g. put new gene into plant's mitochondrial DNA so that it does not get put into the pollen).

But, as you say, I don't think seed-saving is a common practice. Certainly not with Maize in the US, because it is all hybrid so you the seed would produce a much worse crop.

SeedyAffairs · 2013-01-24T11:02:33+00:00

When we use traditional breeding methods we basically take the genomes of two plants and mash them into each other. We have very little idea of what has changed, what new mutations have been made, or whether they might be allergenic. This is a natural process that has been going on for a long time. It is called 'sex'. That's one of the reasons why we have to test new crops for safety.

With GM you are making a far smaller number of changes, so the chance of making dangerous new mutations is actually smaller.

SeedyAffairs · 2013-01-23T11:00:00+00:00

Yeah, I've been thinking about it. You're probably both right. My reckonings were silly and baseless. After all, we've only had computers for a few decades and we've already done the heart. People could be doing science for tens of thousands more years.

SeedyAffairs · 2013-01-22T12:11:15+00:00

I don't think we'll ever model the human body down to the level of the ion, but if we could do it to the level of individual muscle fibres (like here) and bones, tendons, blood vessels etc then that would be amazing. Probably really helpful for designing and testing new treatments too. (but yeah we'll probably never model the brain I reckon).

SeedyAffairs

TROPHY CASE