Sloppy Research Regarding GM Crops

I've come to the conclusion that I'm too busy and far too easily distracted to post to Verbatio with any sort of regularity right now.  (That may change if/when SkepSIG starts up though).  I'll still post when something is on my mind, but in general, I won't beat myself up for not posting regularly.  So if I don't post for a few weeks at a time (like now), don't think that I've completely abandoned Verbatio.  Rather, it's likely that I've just been busy or haven't thought of something to post about lately.  But when something comes up, or when I feel like procrastinating instead of studying for an exam (like I'm doing now), I'll be sure to blog about it.

But I digress, onto the matter at hand: those evil genetically modified (GM) crops!  A classmate of mine linked this study, which compared the effects of 3 different GM maize/corn varieties on mice.  What caught my eye from the beginning is that the authors consistently use the term "toxic" or "toxicity" instead of simply "different."  A change in metabolite concentration in the serum or urine is a sign of hepatorenal toxicity rather than just being statistically different from the control.  Rather than state what their hypothesis was (that the GM crops would just be statistically different, or that certain concentrations would be decreased or elevated), they took any change from the control to be a sign of toxicity, rather than simply a difference.  Sloppy science.

Richard Tillman on Real Time with Bill Maher

Bill Maher interviewed Richard Tillman (brother of Pat Tillman - the NFL player who left to join the Army) on last week's Real Time.  Richard discusses The Tillman Story, a new documentary about his brother and the circumstances surrounding his death.

Now, I believe that a lot of skeptics agree that Bill Maher is... let's call it inconsistent... when it comes to his rational beliefs about science and the like.  He's an atheist, and in Religulous he repeatedly brings up some of the problems and fallacies of religion.  He takes the reasonable position of saying that you CAN'T know about the existence of god -- and most atheists acknowledge this position as well.  I don't believe in god, but I also know that I can't prove or disprove his existence; I just see little reason to hold the belief the such a being exists.

Contrast Bill's reasonable stance on the existence of god with his beliefs regarding germ theory and vaccination, and you'll understand why I have mixed feelings about the guy.  He tends to jump to conspiracy theories all to readily, but nevertheless I appreciate the fact that he shines a light on other aspects of our society that I also find troubling.

Rally to Restore Sanity

I reserved my hotel rooms for the Rally to Restore Sanity/March to Keep Fear Alive in Washington, D.C. on October 30th.  I've never been to D.C., so I'm hoping I get a chance to look around the day before the rallies.  I hope to see you there!

Note:  I'm in the middle of an exam block right now, so probably no updates until next week.

I'm not playing a game, I'm preparing myself!

In honor of Halo: Reach coming out today, I thought I'd refer you to this gem at Ars Technica.  A recent research paper published in Current Biology shows that gamers who enjoy action games take less time to make decisions while remaining just as accurate as non-gamers who take a greater amount of time.  So, rather than say I'm wasting all of my time today playing a video game, I'm going to stick with the story that I'm honing my decision-making prowess so that I can make decisions faster and on less information when I start my clinical rotations, especially for emergency medicine.  Yeah, that's plausible enough... kinda.

In the meantime, I'm going to get as much studying done as possible until UPS shows up with my copy.  I love Amazon's release-date delivery!

I Almost Forgot I'm Going to be a Doctor

A strange thing seems to happen throughout your 1st year in medical school: you forget you're actually going to be a doctor at some point.  You get so caught up in studying anatomy, biochemistry, histology, cell biology, etc. that you lose sight of WHY you're studying all of that stuff.  Instead, you spend all of your time studying (or, if you're me, you spend all of your time reading skeptical blogs and books about the financial collapse, and playing Halo or Call of Duty until 2-3 days before an exam).  You don't really experience much outside of the classroom.

However, you really need to have a lot of that basic medical science down before you can even approach anything clinically-oriented.  In my yearly meeting with a faculty member the other day, I explained how utterly useless most 1st year medical students are when they attempt to give us some amount of clinical exposure.  Sure, they can take 1st years into the hospital to interview patients and get a history, but the patients tend to know more about their disease than we do.  I've joked a few times that at this stage in my medical career, I'm a lot like my uncle when it comes to computers -- I [think I] know just enough to be dangerous.  Some schools brag about offering clinical exposure in the first year, but realistically, it's basically like show & tell back in kindergarten.  You get to see some pretty machines, neat disease processes that you still don't understand, and meet some interesting people.  But don't plan on the encounters changing your life or enhancing your understanding of the science you're trying to learn.

But a funny thing happened at the beginning of this semester.  The professors snuck up on me and reminded me that I'm actually going to be a doctor.  This year, I get to do some exciting things.  I see at least one patient every week to work on history-taking and physical exam skills.  More often than not I even have a clue as to what's going on with them and how that disease has progressed.  Each week we have a special session about a particular specialty where we learn about the specialty and have some sort of clinically-oriented experience.  For example, when we had the session for plastic surgery, I got to practice my suturing skills (on a pig's foot).  It was comforting to know that after spending a semester dissecting a cadaver last year, I actually did pretty well in stitching skin back together.  It was too little too late for the pig though.

So, since my medical school did me the kindness of reminding me that I'm in medical school to do more than just learn neuroanatomy and pathology this year, I'm going to follow suit and try to post a little more often about medically relevant topics.  I'm sure I have a few readers who are interested in the medical school perspective on more than just science topics, so I'll try to include some of that when I can.  Considering my ADHD nature, however, I'm confident I'll still bounce around quite a bit between that, skepticism, what I'm reading on my Kindle, and whatever else happens to hold my attention while I'm at the computer.  I hope you enjoy it!

A Game of Thrones

I finally finished A Game of Thrones.  Despite some of the annoyances I discussed earlier about the eBook being an OCR'd copy of the print version, it was one of the most compelling pieces of fiction I've read in a while!  If you haven't read this book yet, you need to start now.  That way you can finish before they start the HBO series in Spring 2011!  The book was recommended to me by one of my preceptors from last year, and ironically enough, it was probably the best advice he's ever given me!  Now when the HBO series starts, I can be one of those elitist pricks who constantly complains that "it was never like that in the books," or "they totally screwed up that character," and "the books were WAY better."  Though I actually have a good bit of confidence that HBO will do right by this series.  We'll find out.

A few friends have warned me that I'll be extremely pissed after the first 4 books because it's been 5 years since George R.R. Martin released the 4th book and there's no release date in sight for #5.  Unfortunately, I'm already addicted so I can't stop now.

I usually find enough nonfiction to satiate my palate between Orson Scott Card's books that come out a couple times a year, but I'm glad I tried something new.  Of course, I've already pre-ordered Pathfinder, but I'm going to try to get through as much of A Song of Ice and Fire (the name of the series) until then!  Next up is A Clash of Kings.

So, if haven't already, give A Game of Thrones a shot.  It's not exactly a quick read at ~850 pages, but it's worth it!

Review: Kindle 3G + WiFi vs. Kindle for Android vs. Hardcover Book

I've had my Kindle for a week now, and I don't know that I've read this much in a while.  It's just so much more convenient to be able to read with my Kindle rather than having to carry around a big hardcover wherever I go.  But when I shelled out $249 for this thing ($189 Kindle + $60 cover), I wondered how it would compare to having Kindle for Android on my HTC Evo, or just reading out of a good old-fashioned hardcover.  It better be a wonderful experience, considering how much I spent on the device just so I could spend more money on books in the Kindle Store!

I purchased the 3rd generation Kindle with 3G.  At first, I was tempted to get the WiFi-only version and save $50, but I figured if I'm going to have this thing for a few years, I'd rather not worry about always being in WiFi range to download/purchase new books or sync my place in a current book should I decide to read on my phone instead.  I had money from working over the summer, so the $50 extra wasn't the end of the world to me.  If you're on a tighter budget, you would probably be just fine with the WiFi-only version.  Personally, I haven't used the Kindle anywhere outside of my apartment yet, but I could envision myself reading in the park or by the canal downtown.  I'm of the mind that if you're going to be making any purchase that will last for more than a couple years, you better make sure you're happy with it so that 1 or 2 years down the line, you don't regret the fact that you cheaped out that extra $50 or whatever.

In addition to the Kindle itself, I spent $60 on the lighted black leather cover.  The leather is alright and it feels plenty sturdy to protect the Kindle.  The light is bright enough and covers the screen adequately.  Some of the reviews on Amazon complain about it being an uneven light due to its position, which is true, but I still have no problems reading the last few lines.  The convenience of having the light as part of the cover and having it powered by the Kindle is worth it, even if the light is uneven.  I'd prefer that to having to carry around a clip-on light.  As I've said previously, the case adds quite a bit of heft to the Kindle.  I've mostly gotten used to it now, though if you don't plan on needing the light, you might better off with a lightweight protective skin instead.  I've been reading in bed at night quite a bit, and I prefer to have the light with the cover rather than having to situate myself specifically to read by desklight.  So I'm plenty happy with my purchase, although $60 is pretty steep.  I think $30-40 would be more reasonable.

So, $249 later, I have a brand new Kindle.  But how does it compare to Kindle for Android or a hardcover book?