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  • Preparing for Colds & Flus, 2021 edition

    I had a sporadic cough for a long while – my brother says it was “years”. This was not an infection, just an occasional itch that could only be scratched with a cough.

    In March 2020, when the media started catastrophizing about people dropping like flies during the 2019-2020 cold and flu season, I thought people would think I was sick and putting them in danger. I ordered some charred oak barrels, purchased some apple brandy and started huffing apple brandy fumes, as Edgar Cayce often recommended for restoring lungs. Upon deciding that my cough was much improved, I asked the Prescott Valley Community Market about joining them at their markets on Sundays, and have been promoting Cayce’s advocacy of inhaling apple brandy fumes ever since.

    tl/dw: The ethanol is an antiseptic. Apple and oak flavoring compounds help stimulate the lungs to fix themselves.

    Edgar Cayce’s Gentle Approach to health

    It’s been over 18 years since I bought this domain. Around 2009 I started a little business selling a few of the items that Edgar Cayce recommended in his psychic health readings. I’ve always kept this separate from this main page (at RadialAppliance.teslabox.com), on account of ‘psychic’ and science’s general arrogance about how psychic is unpossible according to “the laws of physics”.

    But as of 2021, I think a very good case can be made that if only our dear leaders had consulted with the Edgar Cayce readings for what to do about cold and flu season, they could’ve stood up to the charlatans who said to throw out all the prevailing science about how to respond to colds and flus.

    This was just a quick video. Cayce’s core recommendation for being resilient was to consume plenty of foods with alkaline minerals (Calcium, Magnesium, Potassium, Sodium).

    21st Century Science Confirms Cayce’s recommendations for using inhaled ethanol to treat lung problems

    Science has almost caught up with the advice that Edgar Cayce gave psychically in the early 20th Century. For example, this study found that inhaled ethanol (alcohol) reliably deactivates the sort of pathogens that Humanity is making a big deal of in 2020/2021:

    Viruses such as [self-censored] and [self-censored] are lipophilic, enveloped [pathogens], and are relatively easy to inactivate by exposure to alcohols. […] By inhaling the alcohol vapor at 50~60∘C (122~140∘F) through the nose for one or two minutes, it will condense on surfaces inside the respiratory tract; mainly in the nasal cavity. The alcohol concentration will be intensified to ~36 v/v% by this process, which is enough to disinfect the corona [pathogen] on the mucous membrane. This method also provides more moisture into respiratory tract, and helps to clean the inside of the nasal cavity by stimulating blowing of the nose, and also makes the mucous escalator work actively so that the self-clearing mechanism in the trachea will remove [pathogens] faster. An alternative prompt method is also discussed. We use 40 v/v% whisky or similar alcohol, dripping on a gauze, inhale the vapor slowly at room temperature. This method works well for the front part of the nasal cavity. This is suitable for clinical workers, because they may need to use prompt preventative measures at any time.

    Possibility of Disinfection of [Super-Pathogen of 2019] in Human Respiratory Tract (arxiv.org)

    Click the link for the actual text. I was previously censored by the robot do-gooders at the tech giant; hopefully removing the keywords will keep me from getting banned this time.

    My first customer did end up in the hospital with a case of the super-pathogen. I heard he had fantastic lung function, the pathogen was just attacking his kidneys.

     

  • color vision / night vision notes

    Noticed an article about color vision this morning: The Red and Green Specialists: Why Human Colour Vision Is so Odd. This article, and re-reading some of my bookmarks, helped me better understand why red and orange lights are especially useful for humans at night, and why blue-white LEDs are fundamentally defective when used outside.

    a traffic circle with terrible white LED lights
    defective street lights

    tl/dr: Most humans have three proteins in their eyes that vary in sensitivity to the different colors of light (some have two-color vision, others have four-color vision). Our peripheral vision is highly sensitive to green/cyan/blue light. Our eyes’ most red-sensitive protein (red line, graph below) is highly sensitive to the orange light emitted by a low pressure sodium bulb. The second-most red-sensitive protein (green line) is less sensitive to orange light. The protein sensitive to blue light is not at all activated by orange light (blue line).

    graph of response of human color vision pigments to different wavelengths of light
    Normalized absorption spectra of the three human photopsins (solid curves) and of human rhodopsin (dashed curve). Orange bar placed at 590nm to denote location of LPS lamp spectrum. graphic: wikipedia / Photopsin

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  • An update for a neglected blog

    About a year and a half ago my sister-in-law said something about how I should write something new for my blog, as the last post was (then) months old.

    Lots of ideas for posts have crossed my mind, and while I’ve started a few, I never finished any of them. I have been researching and thinking, and working on my other websites and businesses, but teslabox.com has been neglected. (more…)

  • How Birth Control Torpedos Libido

    [Update 10/8/2013 – at the bottom…]

    My first post about birth control focused on cost — why the pharmaceutical industry’s contraceptive pills tend to be expensive. I’ve since realized that staying baby-free is much more important to women than the money spent on pills, no matter the cost. Given the choice between spending lots of money and likely becoming pregnant, women will spend the money, if they have it.

    Every woman has a unique response to the pharmaceutical industry’s various birth control products. Some women can tolerate the $9/month generic. Others find they do better with the patent-protected pills that cost $100/month. Still others find that all “hormonal” birth control products are completely intolerable.

    Birth control’s side effects are accepted as another cost to bear. The most ironic side effect is decreased libido. Many women find that the “hormones” they take so they can enjoy sex cause them to lose interest.

    This is reflective of the industry’s chemical birth control products’ most fundamental problem: so-called “hormonal” birth control products don’t actually contain human hormones.

    While the pills, implants and injections do a good job of suppressing ovulation and preventing pregnancy, all the side effects that women experience are caused by replacing Nature’s hormone with man-made chemical imposters. (more…)

  • Why Birth Control Pills Are So Expensive

    One aspect of the federally-mandated changes in insurance coverage of birth control products hasn’t gotten nearly the attention it deserves.

    The problem that reformers were addressing is that birth control prescriptions are expensive. It’s not just the $60 or $100/month for a pack of pills. There’s also the $60 or $100 for an appointment with a doctor, and the followup visits for prescription refills.

    If birth control was safe enough to sell over the counter for a penny or a dime a pill like generic aspirin, there would be no controversy. Religious figures could continue their teachings about birth control (and NOT be expected to pay for it), and women would make their own choices about actions they think are right for them.

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  • ‘This Bill was BORROWED from Wall Street’

    A one-dollar bill stamped with “I VOTED” recently spent a day or two in my pocket. I looked for a Where’s George inscription, but this was not present. This dollar, like all the others, wasn’t in my pocket for long before I traded it to a fellow human for something they’d produced with their labors.

    For all the talk and theory, money is nothing more than a medium that helps humans value each other’s time.

    Some months ago I wrote a letter to the editor about fixing the government’s finances, where I discussed how the money we trade with is created:

    Under the present monetary system, money is created only when someone borrows it.

    Usually, the federal government borrows a little money from the Federal Reserve, and the banking system expands this “seed money” 10 times (or more) by making loans.

    Due to the failure of the banks to lend, the government has had to step in as “the borrower of last resort.”

    Recently someone on a web forum thought Occupy Wall Street [OWS] protesters who advocate an audit of the Federal Reserve were stupid, because “The Fed is doing nothing illegal.”

    My response was that we can’t really know whether the Federal Reserve Banks are operating legally without an audit, as the Federal Reserve system is rather secret about their operations. Furthermore, the limited audit that Senator Sanders got passed found that the U.S. central bank had some questionable behavior during the 2008 financial crisis, including the creation of an entire National Debt’s worth of money that was given to connected financial institutions – 16 trillion dollars, according to the Senator’s page.

    The key point in my response were these lines:

    If you have a dollar bill in your pocket, it’s only there because someone borrowed it from a banker. The bills are printed by the Treasury and purchased by the Federal Reserve at cost [4 cents?]. If you have a quarter or a dime or a Susan B. Anthony dollar in your pocket, the Fed bought these from the Mint for face value.

    Sharing The Truth About Money

    This is how I came to be thinking about the occupation of Wall Street, currency, and modifications to currency… How could the very core of the system for concentrating wealth and economic power be effectively conveyed?

    I think a stamp would do it:

    This Bill Was BORROWED From Wall Street:

    Ideas are seldom truly original, so I searched on “occupy wallstreet currency stamp” (no quotes), and learned that people are just starting to put messages on currency. They’re calling it Occupy George. While the sentiment is right, their specific messages are entirely non-helpful.

    Instead of focusing on the central defect of the modern banking system – that private banks create the economy’s money supply by making loans, starting with the seed money created by their 12 “Federal” Reserve Banks – they’re muddying the issue with meaningless messages about division of wealth that don’t lead to an obvious solution.

    Yes, wealth is rather concentrated in the present day. But some people work for their millions, while others game the system. Increasing taxes on the people who’ve been especially successful will only perpetuate the L-Curve distribution of income because it does NOT address any of the curve’s CAUSES. Incomes are best balanced by creating a level playing field for all players in an economy, NOT by forcibly taking and giving.

    A core element in motivational speaker Zig Ziglar’s philosphy was that “you can get everything in life that you want, as long as you help enough other people get what they want.” Instead of getting jealous that someone was in the right place at the right time, and worked to make the most of an opportunity, the present protests need to focus like a laser on individuals and groups that game the system.

    Transitioning to a monetary system that uses money created by the national or state governments, as advocated by the American Monetary Institute and others, would do a lot to end the need for the present protests.

    Currency Validation

    I have a few dollars in my pocket, and a red pen. This Bill Was BORROWED From Wall Street. Ahh, much better. $5’s have much more blank space on the reverse than $1’s. 🙂 I think I will order a rubber stamp.

    Perhaps the petitioners on Wall Street could set up a station for “currency validation”. Paper money is actually made of a blend of 25% linen and 75% cotton.  Currency validation pens change color if the bill is made of wood (paper), and the Secret Service has a helpful page for spotting counterfit currency. If the currency checks out, volunteers could stamp the bill as genuine: This Bill Was BORROWED From Wall Street.

    Moving Beyond Protest

    Fortunately, there’s no need to beg Congress to fix the laws to free us from the Federal Reserve’s yoke. I’ll be covering this strategy in my next post. Put your email in the box to the right if you’d like notification when this gets posted!

  • Job Projects for those who have nothing else to do

    I spent a few minutes in a local supermarket yesterday, and noticed a man in the cafe who was making himself busy by pushing in chairs, and straightening tables and napkin holders.

    He had a bit of a “homeless” look to him. A cart full of stuff confirmed my impression.

    Everyone else in the cafe was sitting in a chair doing whatever they were doing – eating, drinking, checking email, etc.

    I thought about telling this man that his constant laps around the room were making him stand out. If he’d just sit still and read his book for a bit, he could enjoy the air conditioning, and wouldn’t draw nearly as much attention to himself.

    Today, outside the same store, I noticed this homeless man again near the bottle & can recycling center.  A few minutes later he was back ‘at work’, picking up trash and pushing in chairs.

    It occurred to me that the worst part of being unemployed, homeless and living on the street would definitely be the boredom.

    One of the problems with the market economy is that a certain percentage of the population is basically unemployable, for a variety of reasons. Mental illness, health problems top the list, and others just never learned a skill that’s marketable.

    Make-work projects are those from which little value is created. The classic example of a make-work job program is paying one person to dig a ditch, and paying a second person to fill it in.

    To me, a ‘job project’ is something that puts people to work doing things that ought to be done anyway. There are always weeds that need to be pulled, public structures that need a fresh coat of paint, graffiti vandalism painted over, etc.  I imagine a program where the crew chief would take whoever shows up and put them to work doing whatever needs to be done.

    There could be big jobs projects too. The maintenance and building of bridges and other forms of infrastructure is one possibility. The American Society of Civil Engineers grades the United State’s infrastructure at a D- (just above failing).

    On the other hand, direct government employment may be the only solution to some of our most serious long-term unemployment problems: structural unemployment.

    … People who cannot find jobs because they lack relevant skills of any kind best fit the definition of “structural unemployment.” It seems pretty clear that neither policies that change job search behavior nor policies that expand spending in general are very suited to this group.

    http://web.archive.org/web/20090423213059/http://william-king.www.drexel.edu/top/prin/txt/controv2/un12.html (emphasis added)

    Paying for it all…

    Many people’s first objection is probably about the cost: “Who’s going to pay for this?”,

    As I alluded to in my recent letter to the editor, the government’s most important job is managing the money supply.

    While there is a case to be made that the government can’t be trusted with something this important, practical experience shows that private banks have failed to facilitate an equitable distribution of money in the economy.

    If the government were to create more of the money supply, this could be spent directly into circulation. Right now, the only fraction of the money supply that it creates are coins, which are purchased by the federal reserve at face value and distributed to the banking system.

    Imagine having the money to do a task properly…

    A few months back I saw a crew of two men spraying something into the blackberry bushes that grow between the creek and the trail. I said that I’d just moved to Oregon, and asked what they were spraying for. I learned that  Blackberries are considered noxious weeds in Oregon, and that the city has to spray to keep the vines from completely overgrowing the trail.

    After two weeks there was a band of defoliated blackberry vines about 3 feet thick. 20 feet of blackberries with green leaves were behind this band.

    Instead of having the city pay to spray a large amount of herbicide on these bushes, why not have work crews completely clear blackberries out of the entire 20-mile trail? This is much more expensive than two guys with a herbicide sprayer, but the job would be done right.

    The war against blackberries can probably never be won, but at least this section of trail would be blackberry free for a while.

    Perhaps blackberry trimming isn’t the greatest example of what could be done but for lack of funds.

    Many existing jobs are actually make-work

    The number of people incarcerated for victimless crimes has exploded in recent decades. While it’s important to be able to segregate problematic members of a society, a large percentage of the prison population are more political prisoners than genuine potential hazards. The largest portion of these “political prisoners” were put there by the so-called “war on drugs”.

    Prison is extraordinarily expensive, much more so than any job project I can think of. The cost of a jail bed averages out to about $62/night. Eight hours of work at $7.25/hour (current minimum wage) is $58.

    Much more value is created by putting someone to work than locking them up.

    Rather than locking someone up for petty offenses (of which many are economically driven), society would turn a lose-lose situation into a win-win.

    Education is another example of a sort of make-work program. While education itself is very important, the government currently spends $billions more educating children than it needs to.

    Young people are currently subjected to entirely too much schooling. Accelerated learning methods allow just about anyone to make exponentially more years of progress in a single year than in the present system. See my recent post about the fellow who was trying to get a young man to care about school.

    Putting people to work

    An estimated 14-million people are currently unemployed, and millions more are working less than they’d like. The government needs to step to the plate, and provide  money to put people to work.

    Some final thoughts from someone with more certifications in Economics than I:

    … Nothing could be more foolish right now than policies that reduce government spending or increase taxes. We have nearly 14 million unemployed people in the United States, a number that undoubtedly underestimates the true magnitude of the problem since it ignores discouraged workers and the underemployed. Despite this, Messrs. Obama, Ryan, and Geithner tell us that we need to make sacrifices. Seriously? The American people already have, and what they are asking us to do will simply make it worse. …

    Why You Should Learn to Love the Deficit: Federal Budget Fallacies

  • Fixing the Government’s Finances

    I used to write a lot of letters-to-the-editor. It was mostly an exercise in futility – it’s been about 8 years since I sent the first one, and still nothing changes.

    The constant talk from the mainstream media about the “debt ceiling” is rather irritating, and this letter sorta flowed out of my fingertips. The Arizona Republic saved it most of a week to put in their Sunday paper.

    One of my signatures for message boards is “learn the rules so that you know how to break them properly”. This means that we must understand the systems that we interact with to maximize our personal freedom.

    The present debt ceiling uproar is a completely contrived crisis. Most of the members of congress are completely clueless about what they’re arguing about.

    This was my effort to help people “learn the rules” about finances:

    GOP, Dems don’t understand banking

    Can we please get past all the hot air about the government’s finances?

    Everyone is talking as if the logic applied to household and corporate finances applies to the government.

    The formula for household fiscal solvency is “spend less money than you make.”

    The government gets different rules because it’s the one that’s supposed to make the money that households spend.

    (continued inside) (more…)

  • The opposite of genius

    Haven’t posted anything in almost a year. I get a lot of inspiration for blog posts, but haven’t actually taken the time to flesh many of them out. Sorry about that. 🙂

    I was at a local cafe this morning with my laptop. A 60-something year old man sat down at a nearby table with a pair of teenagers – a 15 or 16 young man, and a 2-3 year older young woman. The young man had red hair. I couldn’t help but overhear the lecture.

    It wasn’t a stern lecture – the gentleman just wanted to share some helpful advice about doing well at school. Take notes, review notes, ask questions.

    This is a great strategy, if you care about the subject. But it’s exceedingly difficult to care too much in a standardized school environment. Even if the ‘kid’ tried to implement the advice, I’d be stunned if the effort continued past the first week of school.

    That’s how it always was for me, anyways: “this year I’ll have good habits”, but it’d never last. I spent 16.5 years getting formally educated. Most of that time was spent coasting, doing the bare minimum for most of the classes I took…

    Anyone can learn just about anything, if they care about the topic. There’s a quote about how it only takes is an hour of concentrated study a day to become an expert on just about any topic in a year.

    If I’d been the one offering a possibly troubled young man advice, I would have started by asking what he’s interested in. What’s exciting, what does he look forward to?

    At least that way the money spent on coffee wouldn’t be wasted.

  • When Disaster Strikes, Send The Enterprise

    Whenever a disaster happens here on Planet Earth, the first responders frequently come from the Military/National Guard. They have manpower, equipment, and financial resources to respond to the unexpected.

    Today humanity’s greatest challenge is dealing with Mother Earth’s curveballs… Floods, Tsunamis, and Earthquakes can all dramatically upend the lives of affected people, anywhere on the planet.

    Rather than throwing together a response to the disaster-du-jour (of the day), we should have ships on standby that are prepared and ready to lend assistance to the people who need it.

    www.SendTheEnterprise.org.

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