Inhumane Humans

Recently in Zimbabwe 81 elephants we're killed by poachers. They contaminated the water holes in a western national park with cyanide poison. Not only have elephants have been found dead, but other smaller animals that feed near the water hole have been also. The poachers were after the elephants for their ivory tusks, and as of now nine suspected poachers have been arrested. This article really stuck out to me because that is completely an inhuman and morally wrong to do to such a thing to a beautiful animal. Also all the smaller animals that fed at the water hole need to be taken into consideration also. Hunting is one thing, when you hunt an animal you should always eat it. If you aren't going to eat it, then you should never kill an animal intentionally. What is the point? Another reason I choose this article is because the other day I was driving through the woods with my boyfriend, and we saw a dead deer with the antlers ripped off. It was a horrible sight and something I have never seen before. This kind of stuff must happen more often then we really know about, the awareness of poaching should be raised. Maybe rules and regulations should be stricter to prevent something like this ever happening again. If you think about it, usually what takes place once, repeats itself again down the line. So if this was to happen a few more times could elephants become endangered or even extinct? http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/25/world/africa/zimbabwe-81-elephants-killed.html?ref=science&_r=0

H.I.V Vaccine Breakthrough

The search for a H.I.V. vaccine has been long and frustrating, but Dr. Picker a vaccine expert at Oregon Health & Science University may have made a breakthrough. In a recent experiment Dr. Picker “tested his vaccine in 16 monkeys who were then infected with simian immunodeficiency virus” (Donald G. McNeil Jr.). The virus is closely related to HIV, and in most normal cases the primates would have died a miserable death. Oddly enough the vaccine cured only nine of the monkeys, but still this was a huge breakthrough. The monkeys were slowly cleared of the virus and even three years later you couldn’t tell them apart from the monkeys that never suffered the virus. This was the first time the existing infection was completely eliminated; many scientists often do similar experiments to “test ideas for potential AIDS vaccines by creating similar one against S.I.V.” (Donald G. McNeil Jr.). Dr. Picker’s vaccine was unlike any other, his curing was similar to the curing of two famous cases known as the Berlin patient and the Mississippi baby. They both no longer have HIV lurking deep in their bodies, but still it is hard to be sure because only certain tissues from the body can be tested. Dr. Picker had an advantage by working with monkeys, because he was able to “necropsy them, grind up every organ, and take 240 samples” to make sure their bodies no longer possessed the virus. The vaccine was fused with S.I.V. genes and the cytomegalovirus, better known as the “big cell” and is a part of the herpes family. This fusion of viruses seems to work best. Dr. Picker cannot be sure that this vaccine will work on humans; he believes it will take around three more years of research and experimenting to find the right fusion of viruses. After reading this article I am completely intrigued, this is amazing to me. Dr. Picker’s vaccine could be a breakthrough for the medical field. I feel like we should expect to see a vaccine for the cure of H.IV. within the next ten years. Technology has opened up so many gateways for science, and also just society in general. It is important to find a cure for H.I.V. and the sooner the better. Many people suffer from this virus; this leaves people with a weak immune system. Once H.I.V destroys so many of your CD4 cells then your body cannot longer fight infections and diseases. This can result in another virus known as A.I.Ds. The virus has been around since the 1800’s, so hopefully soon Dr. Picker’s vaccine will be mastered, and then used on humans to cure the virus for good. http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/17/science/new-hope-for-hiv-vaccine.html?ref=science&_r=0

Seven Veruses Four

For years the number seven haunted the cognitive psychologist George A. Miller. It is just a coincidence that there is “seven deadly sins, seven days of the week, seven seas, and seven dwarfs” (Roni Jacobson). Miller felt that he was “persecuted by an integer”, so “he then went to describe several experiments where seven pieces of information- plus or minus tow appeared to be the limit of what our mind could retain in the short term” (Roni Jacobson). Since the time of Miller’s theory we now understand that the mind’s capacity has to do with several factors such as “age, attention, and the type of information presented” (Roni Jacobson). After psychologists studied further into short term memory, they have now realized by “chunking” information it helps our ability to retain and remember. The smaller the words or concepts you are learning the easier you are able to recall the information. The larger the words or concepts the more difficult it is to quickly retain what you have just learned. It is now believed we can “recall about four chunks of information at a time” (Roni Jacobson). I found this article interesting because it ties in with what I have learned in Psychology previously and also what I am learning right now in Child Psychology. I agree with the psychologists’ who believe we can recall about four chunks of information at once. Four chunks of information is a reasonable amount for the brain to remember, seven pieces of information at once is an overload. I also believe the brain retains better when learning about something of interest, therefore I am sure in certain cases the brain can recall more than four chunks in certain cases. http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/10/science/seven-isnt-the-magic-number-for-short-term-memory.html?ref=science