How would you prioritize the reintroduction of American Bison?
Ecologically and politically speaking, this is a freebie. We know American Bison work well as a cornerstone for plains ecologies in the U.S. because they already have, we have lots of plains ecologies here, and the native tribes are sitting there with a brilliant, self-contained organization poised to carry out the restoration process, mostly just hoping that we'll stay out of their way. We should stay out of their way. And buy their bison stuff once they get going. Mmm, bison.
Post your thoughts on "Cancer risk higher in rich rural families".
Well, I've always thought that kids have trouble being disconnected from the natural world, but this is a much more intense example than I was expecting. I'm also surprised, as a city dweller, that someone living in a rural environment could be even more isolated from their surroundings than someone living in an urban one. Us city kids are usually the ones complaining that we don't know what an oak looks like or something similarly ridiculous. In fact, I've always idealized rural living. With no experience of it, I could only think of it as a permanent camping trip, and being rich at the same time could only make things more fun. I guess the grass on the other side isn't always as green as it looks.
Thursday, July 28, 2011
Thursday, July 7, 2011
HIV
-How do you feel about Western approaches to HIV/AIDS?
Well, first off they are completely necassary. HIV is a modern virus, and some modern response must be made to it. It's a plague, and the proper response to a sudden, violent plague is to make sudden, violent changes in treatment. A plague created the Wen Bing; there's no reason our current one should not create at least a new viral cocktail.
At the same time, Western approaches require Eastern support. My view of AIDS is that it is a disease that struck when its victims weren't all that healthy anyway. With its narrow historical perspective, Western medicine can only hope to return our community to its earlier, also unhealthy state, and that's no good. Chinese medicine can be a powerful framework for picking up where the Western one leaves off in this case.
-Can TCM strengthen our immune systems?
The first thing I want to say about this question is that I'm not sure what it means, so I'm going to make some assumptions. From what I understand, the immune system is cells and specialized protiens that kill stuff in our bodies. In that case, I suppose that a "strong" immune system would mean having a lot of these cells and protiens, and/or that these cells and protiens would be very vigorous and active. Being as we're in a country ravaged by autoimmune as well as immunodeficiency diseases, it seems like we must keep the "strength" of our immune system within some pretty narrow parameters! As for TCM, it has been my experience that it's very difficult to make such a holistic system respond predictably to lab tests. There was even a student here who selflessly e-mailed everyone about her experience trying to do that with Shan Zha, said to lower cholesterol. She ended up with unchanged cholesterol and an ulcer. Do not ignore this warning!
Now, if we're talking about whether TCM can increase resistance to disease, that's a whole different kettle of fish, only one of which is the number of cells and protiens in the blood. To take an example most friendly to holistic treatment, any area with impaired fluid drainage will undoubtedly be more vulnerable to disease, as the branch of every system in that area will be having trouble. It's not just about T-cells; if you can't get the byproducts of an immune battle out of the area, you've got trouble that no amount of injecting phagocytes (or even antibiotics, ultimately) will fix. This is just one example of a causal relationship between systems in a hypothetical infected area of the body. There's a lot more, which is why we came up with the term wei qi to encompass them all and make them easier to talk about. That's what wei qi is, a massively generalized umbrella term one creative translation of which could be "superficial processes." That's right, I'm talking about physically superficial processes. All of them. It's a huge category! No amount of bloodwork could possibly render a diagnosis of such a massive field.
Anyway, yes, TCM can up or indeed down regulate the immune system. But that's not what folks mean when they ask us to make them stronger.
(oh, hey, Chinese Medicine considers the insides of the lungs and digestive tract to be, er, "physically superficial", which should inform the definition above)
-Save the Whales
Brilliant! Mexico has it on us and every other country everywhere when it comes to conservation in a poverty stricken area. Now, I'm usually pretty hard nosed about international politics, but in this case this advantage seems to come directly from the hearts of the Mexicans in the area. When else have you heard of really, really poor people accepting a yearly stipend with heavy independent oversight over a huge lump sum with no strings? I can only assume that the reason they accepted the deal was that the overseeing body had interests that aligned with theirs. These interests were and are the protection of the natural world. This means that subsistence fishermen in Baja California care far, far more about the environment than rich first worlders, which you could say is the problem facing global conservation in a nutshell. It's about time we started giving these people some hard cash.
Well, first off they are completely necassary. HIV is a modern virus, and some modern response must be made to it. It's a plague, and the proper response to a sudden, violent plague is to make sudden, violent changes in treatment. A plague created the Wen Bing; there's no reason our current one should not create at least a new viral cocktail.
At the same time, Western approaches require Eastern support. My view of AIDS is that it is a disease that struck when its victims weren't all that healthy anyway. With its narrow historical perspective, Western medicine can only hope to return our community to its earlier, also unhealthy state, and that's no good. Chinese medicine can be a powerful framework for picking up where the Western one leaves off in this case.
-Can TCM strengthen our immune systems?
The first thing I want to say about this question is that I'm not sure what it means, so I'm going to make some assumptions. From what I understand, the immune system is cells and specialized protiens that kill stuff in our bodies. In that case, I suppose that a "strong" immune system would mean having a lot of these cells and protiens, and/or that these cells and protiens would be very vigorous and active. Being as we're in a country ravaged by autoimmune as well as immunodeficiency diseases, it seems like we must keep the "strength" of our immune system within some pretty narrow parameters! As for TCM, it has been my experience that it's very difficult to make such a holistic system respond predictably to lab tests. There was even a student here who selflessly e-mailed everyone about her experience trying to do that with Shan Zha, said to lower cholesterol. She ended up with unchanged cholesterol and an ulcer. Do not ignore this warning!
Now, if we're talking about whether TCM can increase resistance to disease, that's a whole different kettle of fish, only one of which is the number of cells and protiens in the blood. To take an example most friendly to holistic treatment, any area with impaired fluid drainage will undoubtedly be more vulnerable to disease, as the branch of every system in that area will be having trouble. It's not just about T-cells; if you can't get the byproducts of an immune battle out of the area, you've got trouble that no amount of injecting phagocytes (or even antibiotics, ultimately) will fix. This is just one example of a causal relationship between systems in a hypothetical infected area of the body. There's a lot more, which is why we came up with the term wei qi to encompass them all and make them easier to talk about. That's what wei qi is, a massively generalized umbrella term one creative translation of which could be "superficial processes." That's right, I'm talking about physically superficial processes. All of them. It's a huge category! No amount of bloodwork could possibly render a diagnosis of such a massive field.
Anyway, yes, TCM can up or indeed down regulate the immune system. But that's not what folks mean when they ask us to make them stronger.
(oh, hey, Chinese Medicine considers the insides of the lungs and digestive tract to be, er, "physically superficial", which should inform the definition above)
-Save the Whales
Brilliant! Mexico has it on us and every other country everywhere when it comes to conservation in a poverty stricken area. Now, I'm usually pretty hard nosed about international politics, but in this case this advantage seems to come directly from the hearts of the Mexicans in the area. When else have you heard of really, really poor people accepting a yearly stipend with heavy independent oversight over a huge lump sum with no strings? I can only assume that the reason they accepted the deal was that the overseeing body had interests that aligned with theirs. These interests were and are the protection of the natural world. This means that subsistence fishermen in Baja California care far, far more about the environment than rich first worlders, which you could say is the problem facing global conservation in a nutshell. It's about time we started giving these people some hard cash.
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