iTherapy is easily iConfused
While I appreciate the idea behind the new site iTherapy it does have a few issues with actual human interaction, for example take this exchange between me and the bot:
Human: I knows eh!
TARA at iTherapy.com: Are you Canadian? I am learning more about you all the time.: said knows.
Human: I already said I wasn’t Canadian
TARA at iTherapy.com: Perhaps I misunderstood. What were you?
Human: Well at one point I was a ball of cells called a gastrula
TARA at iTherapy.com: Well that’s okay. Do you often use a computer there?
Human: Well yes, we’re so advanced in New Zealand we’ve made uterus based compu...
Source: Animacules - April 12, 2008 Category: Medical Scientists Authors: J. O'Donnell Tags: Public Health WTF Source Type: blogs
Man, I suck at blogging
It’s either that I fail at blogging or that I’m so busy with my work to write regular updates.
I’d like to think it’s that I am busy. (Source: Animacules)
Source: Animacules - March 23, 2008 Category: Medical Scientists Authors: J. O'Donnell Tags: Uncategorized Source Type: blogs
Pope adds a lot more people on the way to hell
I heard this on the morning news and thought I just had to bring it up here as the Pope has added a whole bunch of new sins that will send you to hell. Some of these I can somewhat understand, but a couple are just a little narrow-sighted in their intention:
“You offend God not only by stealing, blaspheming or coveting your neighbour’s wife, but also by ruining the environment, carrying out morally debatable scientific experiments, or allowing genetic manipulations which alter DNA or compromise embryos,” he said.
Morally debatable experiments? Does that mean anything you disagree with? The part about ...
Source: Animacules - March 10, 2008 Category: Medical Scientists Authors: J. O'Donnell Tags: Science WTF Source Type: blogs
One step forwards and two steps back
So it seems that Bush and company have decided that they are no longer forcing much of their AIDs money to go into abstinence only campaigns. Instead they now require ‘justification’ if less than 50% of money doesn’t go into abstinence or faithfulness campaigns, which may sound reasonable but it will depend in my view on how stringent they are (and what conditions they stick on that). The ABC (Abstinence, Be faithful and use Condoms) campaign in Nigeria showed this can be a very effective approach, but preaching abstinence and faithfulness alone is utterly worthless for doing much of anything. If this is ...
Source: Animacules - March 5, 2008 Category: Medical Scientists Authors: J. O'Donnell Tags: HIV Public Health Science Source Type: blogs
Some people should not be allowed pets, like ever.
Crazy woman and her dog that goes nuts in the park. I believe the explanation she gives about the dogs behaviour is not only funny, it’s just making everything worse than it already was. (Source: Animacules)
Source: Animacules - March 3, 2008 Category: Medical Scientists Authors: J. O'Donnell Tags: Critters Humour Source Type: blogs
It’s fun to be busy.
Very busy at the moment so no updates for today. Hopefully more science this week and next week once I get things sorted. (Source: Animacules)
Source: Animacules - March 2, 2008 Category: Medical Scientists Authors: J. O'Donnell Tags: Uncategorized Source Type: blogs
Imperial Guard WIP
We all have our hobbies, mine is assembling and painting plastic models such as these Imperial Guard, which are still a WIP as I’m not decided on if I like the colour scheme or not. It’s supposed to be a kind of urban camo, but I’m not sure how well it comes off. Click for the full sized image.
The Imperial Guard have always appealed to me, partly because they are just regular people armed with a pretty average weapon who rely on sheer numbers and weight of firepower to overcome all sorts of horrible things. (Source: Animacules)
Source: Animacules - February 29, 2008 Category: Medical Scientists Authors: J. O'Donnell Tags: Personal Wargaming Source Type: blogs
All I can do is sigh
It seems that one of our hospitals once again makes a grievous mistake and everyday New Zealanders pay the price for it:
Dr Roman Hasil botched eight of 32 32 tubal ligations (sterilisation procedures), resulting in six pregnancies.
In his report Commissioner Ron Paterson censures the doctor and the DHB for “serious failings in the care of women at the hospital.”
A new report blames the health board for not making background checks which would have revealed the Czech trained doctor had spent time in jail overseas before coming to New Zealand from Australia.
Really, I don’t believe further commentary is re...
Source: Animacules - February 26, 2008 Category: Medical Scientists Authors: J. O'Donnell Tags: Public Health WTF Source Type: blogs
Random banned books
I disagree with the practice in some places of banning books, which I view as a generally stupid and anti-educational practice (there would be certain exceptions of course, borderline pornographic romance novels would be one example I could think of, but even then…). Thankfully, there are groups that seem to want to fight back against this sort of thing, which is something I highly approve of and should be clearly encouraged. Something that does peak my interest is some of the weird choices in books people have campaigned to ban are. Some of them have at least some reasonably logical basis, such as having considerabl...
Source: Animacules - February 25, 2008 Category: Medical Scientists Authors: J. O'Donnell Tags: Education History Personal WTF Source Type: blogs
Psychic sexual powers and murder
I really can’t fathom this murder case going on in Australia terribly well:
His de facto wife, Angela Wells, 29, of Blacktown, was a long-time friend of Ms Mayfield and introduced the pair.
All three bonded with each other over a shared interest in the supernatural, and Shepherd persuaded Ms Mayfield to sleep with him by promising he could exorcise her demons with his psychic sexual powers.
Seriously, what in the hell were either of these women thinking to begin with? (Source: Animacules)
Source: Animacules - February 22, 2008 Category: Medical Scientists Authors: J. O'Donnell Tags: WTF Source Type: blogs
