While Australia debates the merits of going nuclear and frustration grows over the slower-than-needed rollout of solar and wind power, China is going all in on renewables....
To add a touch of perspective, China has spent 70% more than the EU and the US combined on their renewable infrastructure.
It’s odd how politicians only seem to point out China’s current position of largest annual carbon emitter, and use that as an excuse not to lift a finger in the way of reducing domestic emissions. It goes entirely ignored that those numbers are a result of China being the world’s factory.
Despite this, they still have close to half the carbon emissions per capita compared to the runner up in annual carbon emissions - the United States of America - despite all that manufacturing.
You could leave the top line blank or vote for the candidate trying to manifest her way into office, the Gates Foundation guy that won American Samoa, it the congressman who had Ackman’s backing.
Or depending on your state about a hundred other people who somehow had even worse odds.
As to that 2028 topic…If Harris wins, it pushes all of them all the way back to 2032. Many of those hopefulf may like their odds right now, as opposed to 8 years later, unless those same people are confident Harris will lose against Trump.
Might be weird to Americans, but other countries like Canada actually limit their campaigns to 3 months total. I find it odd that you guys' politicians have a relatively major election every 2 years and essentially don't take a break from campaigning that entire time.
Seeing AOC oddly shill for Biden before he dropped out… which I’d expect from Pelosi, Schumer & Schiff, but not from her. She may actually be trying to get the VP spot.
Both candidates are experiencing decline, and if Biden were elected and incapable of doing the job it would have resulted in a Harris Presidency anyway. It's such an odd thing to object over. We've had presidents in decline before and the country kept running just fine, (FDR, Reagan.)
Biden did a fine job in office, I'm especially proud of his union support, and his policies were spot on in my opinion. To throw him under the bus like this seems really shitty.
The shortlist I’ve seen thrown around a lot so far is pretty much Whitmer, Shapiro, Cooper, and Kelly. Maybe someone like Beshear, but I’d call that slightly lower odds than the others. I think they will probably lean away from a 2 woman ticket too
DATE: July 21, 2024 at 02:00PM
SOURCE: PSYPOST.ORG
** Research quality varies widely from fantastic to small exploratory studies. Please check research methods when conclusions are very important to you. **
TITLE: Fluoride exposure during pregnancy linked to child neurobehavioral issues
Fluoride has been added to community drinking water systems in the United States since 1945 to prevent dental cavities. Currently, 73% of the U.S. population receives fluoridated water at a targeted concentration of 0.7 milligrams per liter. However, a new study suggests that prenatal fluoride exposure at these levels may increase the risk of neurobehavioral problems in children.
The research, published in JAMA Network Open, found that a 0.68 milligram per liter increase in fluoride exposure during pregnancy was associated with nearly double the chance of a child exhibiting neurobehavioral issues at age three.
Fluoride is a naturally occurring mineral found in water, soil, and various foods. In teeth, fluoride helps to rebuild (remineralize) weakened tooth enamel, making it more resistant to acid attacks from bacteria in the mouth. This process helps prevent the formation of cavities.
But fluoride might impact neurodevelopment due to its ability to cross the placental barrier and reach the developing fetus. High levels of fluoride exposure have been shown in animal studies to cause neurobiochemical changes, such as oxidative stress, disruption of neurotransmitter function, and alterations in cellular signaling pathways.
Recent studies in Mexico and Canada have indicated that even lower levels of fluoride exposure, similar to those found in the United States, might be linked to poorer neurodevelopmental outcomes. These studies have shown associations between higher prenatal fluoride exposure and lower IQ, increased symptoms of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, and poorer cognitive functioning.
However, U.S.-based research on this topic has been lacking. The researchers aimed to address this gap by examining whether prenatal fluoride exposure is associated with neurobehavioral outcomes in children in the United States.
“There is no known benefit of fluoride consumption to the developing fetus, but we do know that there is possibly a risk to their developing brain,” said the study’s lead investigator Ashley Malin, an assistant professor at the University of Florida.
The study involved 229 mother-child pairs from the Maternal and Developmental Risks from Environmental and Social Stressors (MADRES) cohort. This cohort consists predominantly of Hispanic women of low socioeconomic status living in urban Los Angeles, California. The participants were recruited during prenatal care visits between 2015 and 2020, with eligibility criteria including being 18 years or older, less than 30 weeks pregnant at the time of recruitment, and fluent in English or Spanish.
To assess fluoride exposure, the researchers collected single spot urine samples from the mothers during their third trimester of pregnancy. These samples were analyzed for urinary fluoride levels, which provide a reliable measure of total fluoride intake. The measurements were adjusted for specific gravity to account for variations in urine concentration. The mean gestational age at the time of urine collection was approximately 31.6 weeks.
When the children reached the age of 36 months, their mothers completed the Preschool Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL), a widely used parent-reported measure of child neurobehavior. The CBCL includes 99 items that assess a range of behavioral and emotional problems, such as emotionally reactive, anxious-depressed, somatic complaints, withdrawn, sleep problems, attention problems, and aggressive behavior.
The checklist also includes scales consistent with the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5) categories, including depressive problems, anxiety problems, oppositional defiant problems, autism spectrum problems, and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder problems.
The study found that the median urinary fluoride concentration among the mothers was 0.76 milligrams per liter. A key finding was that a 0.68 milligram per liter increase in maternal urinary fluoride levels during pregnancy was associated with nearly double the odds of the child scoring in the borderline clinical or clinical range for total neurobehavioral problems.
Specifically, this increase in fluoride exposure was linked to a 2.29-point increase in internalizing problems, such as emotional reactivity, anxiety, and somatic complaints, and a 2.14-point increase in total neurobehavioral problems.
In addition to the overall increase in neurobehavioral problems, higher fluoride exposure was also associated with specific behavioral issues. For instance, a 0.68 milligram per liter increase in fluoride was linked to a 13.54% increase in scores for emotionally reactive behaviors and a 19.60% increase in somatic complaints. Furthermore, there were significant associations with DSM-5-oriented scales, including an 11.29% increase in anxiety problems and an 18.53% increase in autism spectrum problems.
“Women with higher fluoride exposure levels in their bodies during pregnancy tended to rate their 3-year-old children higher on overall neurobehavioral problems and internalizing symptoms, including emotional reactivity, anxiety and somatic complaints,” said Tracy Bastain, an associate professor at the University of Southern California and senior author of the study.
The study did not find significant associations between fluoride exposure and externalizing problems, such as aggressive behavior and attention problems. Additionally, the researchers did not observe any interaction between fluoride exposure and the child’s sex, indicating that the associations were consistent across both boys and girls.
The findings from this study suggest that prenatal fluoride exposure, even at levels considered optimal for preventing dental cavities, may be associated with an increased risk of neurobehavioral problems in children. The researchers emphasized that the fluoride levels found in the study participants’ samples are typical for people living in communities with fluoridated water.
Variations in a person’s fluoride exposure can be attributed to differences in dietary habits, such as using tap water for drinking and cooking instead of filtered water, and consuming foods and beverages naturally high in fluoride. These include green and black tea, certain seafoods, and foods treated with fluoride-containing pesticides.
There are currently no formal guidelines for limiting fluoride intake during pregnancy. Given the widespread use of fluoridated water, these results highlight the need for further research to confirm these findings and to better understand the potential risks of fluoride exposure.
“I think this is important evidence, given that it’s the first U.S.-based study and findings are quite consistent with the other studies published in North America with comparable fluoride exposure levels,” Malin said. “Conducting a nationwide U.S. study on this topic would be important, but I think the findings of the current study and recent studies from Canada and Mexico suggest that there is a real concern here.”
The study, “Maternal Urinary Fluoride and Child Neurobehavior at Age 36 Months,” was authored by Ashley J. Malin, Sandrah P. Eckel, Howard Hu, E. Angeles Martinez-Mier, Ixel Hernandez-Castro, Tingyu Yang, Shohreh F. Farzan, Rima Habre, Carrie V. Breton, and Theresa M. Bastain.
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They’ll do all that no matter what. They already did that to Kamala Harris, in the last election. I’m sure they tried really hard to dig up shit on her but had to resort to making up shit.
Basically all they fabricated was the same weak-ass birther bullshit they did to Obama (odd how it’s only non-white people they use that on, isn’t it?) which is now being spread again on Facebook as we speak.
Intentionally mispronouncing her name, which they re-hashed in the RNC convention. Her name is literally consonent-vowel-consonent-vowel-consonent-vowel, not really hard to say so they just sound like morons when they do that.
I guess they don’t like how she laughs?
They lost that election. Their base likes the racist dog-whistles, but those are votes they have no matter what. Doing the same bullshit they did before loses them independents.
Remember how a lot of Republicans voted for Nikki Haley even after she dropped out of the primary? It wasn’t a love for Nikki Haley, it was a dislike for Trump that motivated Republicans to vote for Nikki Haley in the primaries. After she dropped out. So there’s even Republicans that are open to voting for a woman with a South Asian background that the MAGAs like to intentionally mispronouncing her name.
It's telling that the big thing the guy cared about in terms of each candidate's impact was the NordStream pipeline sabotage.
(Not that I think Biden was behind the pipeline exploding necessarily, just that it's an odd thing to pick out as a big impact of Biden's term in office.)
A 12-year-old girl in Tennessee has been charged with murder, accused of smothering her 8-year-old cousin as the younger girl slept. A relative said they had been arguing over an iPhone....
Why was a security camera in the bedroom? Or was it somewhere else but you could see in the bedroom? Am I the only one who finds this odd, or is this a common thing to have for 12 and/or 8 year olds?
The distro part is actually kinda easy. In my mind there’s only a few distros that should ever be considered by a new user. Fedora, or Ubuntu/Mint/Pop!_OS. The last three are effectively the same thing under the hood and all of them will do the job.
The real hard question is which desktop environment. Plasma is generally my go to suggestion. I feel it follows a tried and true paradigm for UI and UX. It’s incredibly polished, fast, and very full featured. The one that really sticks out as odd to me is gnome and is the one that I would never recommend. I wouldn’t discourage, just not recommend.
Sorry to be a bother, but I’m hitting a wall here, and my google-fu is not strong enough apparently. I’m trying to reinstall a Home Assistant VM on my server, (It’s been a while, and I have no idea how I did it originally). Running: virt-install --name haos --description “Home Assistant OS” --os-variant=generic...
It should be. I just had an identical VM running on the same machine yesterday. Oddly, it stopped being able to boot for unclear reasons, so I’m trying a fresh install.
It's sad that like 90% of #indieweb blogs are #tech -focused. Had the internet developed slightly differently, I bet every #humanities scholar would have a delightfully idiosyncratic personal site.
@KentNavalesi@academicchatter I can point you to some rather odd blogs and networks of blogs that implement WebMention and other indieweb bits. Mostly not tech-oriented.
Oddly, one of CrowdStrike’s selling point is that it provides pretty good EDR for Linux and Mac. If you want crap EDR, which pushes you towards Windows, Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is the ticket.
I didn’t actually think about what all these wild AV systems could do, but that’s incredibly broad access.
Always has been. I’ve clean Symantec A/V off way too many systems in my time, post BSOD. That crap came pre-loaded on so many systems, and then borked them. The problem is, that in order to actually protect system from malware, the A/V has to have full, kernel level access. So, when it goes sideways, it usually takes the system down. I’ve seen BSODs caused by just about every vendor’s A/V or EDR product. Shit happens. Everyone makes mistakes, but when that mistake is in A/V or EDR, it usually means a BSOD.
Maybe I’m just old, but it always strikes me as odd that you’d spend so much money on that much intrusive power that on a good day slows your machines down and on a bad day this happens.
I get that Users are stupid. But maybe you shouldn’t let users install anything. And maybe your machines shouldn’t have access to things that can give them malware. Some times, you don’t need everything connected to a network.
It’s tough. The Internet and access to networks provides some pretty good advantages to users. But, it also means users making mistakes and executing malware. And much of the malware now is targeted at user level access; so, you can’t even prevent malware by denying local admin/root. Ransomware and infostealers don’t need it. A/V ends up being a bit of a backstop to some of that. Sure, it mostly is a waste of resources and can break stuff when things go bad. But, it can also catch ransomware or alert network defenders to infostealers. And either of those can result in a really, really bad day. A ransomed network is a nightmare. And credentials being stolen and not known about can lead to all kinds of bad stuff. If A/V catches or alerts you to just one or two of those events and lets you take action early, it may pay for itself (even with this sort of FUBAR situation) several times over.
A couple things. First, you might need to freshen up on your Schoolhouse Rock, because this is not true:
Then there’s also the fact that unless you’ve got 60 votes in the Senate it doesn’t matter what anyone in the House wants it won’t even come up for a vote.
It’s been several decades since I’ve learned civics, but… no. Here’s what I recall:
Bills can originate from either the House or the Senate (except budget bills which always come from the House).
If the bill originates and passes in one House, it goes to the other for debate, etc. If the other house passes the bill as is, it goes to the President.
If the other house makes any amendments to the bill that the first house previously passed, it goes back to the first house again for more debate and vote. This happens again and again until we end up with a bill that both houses agree to (one reason for pork barrel spending).
This works this way regardless of which house the bill originates in. Both must agree (in some form) to the final, possibly amended, bill, before it heads to POTUS.
Second, I understand the purpose of the Senate. This is a federalized system (I imagine you understand this given we’re both on Lemmy), we are a nation made of smaller nations in many ways as each state can often be wildly different. Lately we’ve seen some of the pros and cons of such a system, but this is what we are right now at least.
So the idea is a bicameral house, with one that is meant to be a direct representative of the people, proportionate to the number of people in a district, and the other meant to represent each state (i.e. “mini nation”).
It’s just the way our entire system is structured, including state funding and such. This is federalization.
The House of Representative is meant to represent the will of their constituents (without the Reapportionment Act, could actually be representative), hence the nickname, “the people’s House.”
Conversely, The Senate exists to represent the will of their state.
These are often different, and occasionally even at odds. But that’s not necessarily a bad thing.
And frankly, the last decade or so has shown me that sometimes we are stupid and need saving from ourselves. If everything ran on only one House that was actually representative, it would be chaos.
How would federal funding be divvied up? Do Congressional Reps need to not only be on top of the needs and demands of their district, but they must also do the same for their state? Do you know how insane that would be? Would states even be able to continue to exist as they currently do without a Senate?
This comment is already too long so I will stop.
I get the idea people have about the Senate, but it is currently completely necessary in our government.
If I was that wrong about the voting power of a Californian, that just reinforces how disproportionate the House is (and therefore the entire federal government becomes dysfunctional).
I think a truly proportionate House to balance out the Senate could actually work pretty well (of course this is without getting into the topic of money in politics which is a whole other can of worms).
Odd. I replied to this comment, but now my reply is gone. Gonna try again and type up as much as I can remember.
Regardless, an algorithm expecting binary answers will obviously not take para- and extralinguistic cues into account. That extra 50 ms hesitation, the downwards glance and the voice cracking when answering “no” to “has he ever tried to strangle you before?” has a reasonable chance to get picked up by a human, but when reducing it to something that the algorithm can handle, it’s just a simple “no”. Humans are really good at picking up on such cues, even if they aren’t consciously aware that they’re doing it, but if said humans are preoccupied with staring into a computer screen in order to input the answers to the questionnaire, then there’s a much higher chance that they’ll miss them too. I honestly only see negatives here.
It’s helpful to have an algorithm that makes you ask the right questions […]
Arguably a piece of paper could solve that problem.
Seriously. 55 victims out of the 98 homicide cases sampled were deemed at negligible or low risk. If a non-algorithm-assisted department presented those numbered I’d expect them to be looking for new jobs real fast.
By that I mean, it must be an inherently comforting thing to think - we inherently know this and want there to be something after death, because it feels right, or more meaningful. There’s a reason basically every civilization ever has some sort of afterlife ethos....
You don’t understand statistics. It’s the opposite. The odds of life not existing in a universe this incomprehensibly large are infinitesimally small.
It would be far more notable if 4+billion years of this shit and none of the literally countless planets (in our galaxy alone.) capable of hosting life contained life.
No, science simply doesn’t (and can’t) provide any answers or odds for or against god.
God by definition isn’t subject to the laws of nature, and all science does is observe nature and come up with theories that fit the observation.
Nvidia could lose up to $12 billion in revenue if US bans new China-oriented GPU — analysts believe the H20 will get the banhammer soon (www.tomshardware.com)
'Winning the race': How China plans to meet its 2030 renewables target by the end of this month (www.abc.net.au)
While Australia debates the merits of going nuclear and frustration grows over the slower-than-needed rollout of solar and wind power, China is going all in on renewables....
Kamala Harris sees surge in big money support after Biden drops out of race (www.cnbc.com)
Kamala Harris is already seeing a wave of big money donor support since President Joe Biden dropped out of the race....
Philippines says reached deal with China to avoid disputed shoal clashes (www.aljazeera.com)
Kamala Harris Launches Presidential Bid: ‘My Intention Is to Earn and Win This Nomination’ (variety.com)
Kamala Harris has launched her campaign for the White House, after President Joe Biden stepped aside Sunday under pressure from party leaders....
Live updates: Biden drops out of 2024 presidential race | CNN Politics (www.cnn.com)
This is it. The leaks were true. He’s gone for good.
Breaking News!
[Mega thread] - Biden ends bid for presidency
Biden announced he’s ending his bid for the presidency via X (formerly twitter)....
Joe Biden ends re-election campaign (www.bbc.com)
“There was four years of Trump and nothing particularly bad happened” (lemmygrad.ml)
Except you know, that one thing...
A 12-year-old girl is accused of smothering her 8-year-old cousin over an iPhone (apnews.com)
A 12-year-old girl in Tennessee has been charged with murder, accused of smothering her 8-year-old cousin as the younger girl slept. A relative said they had been arguing over an iPhone....
LOL (lemmy.world)
virt-install vTPM issue
Sorry to be a bother, but I’m hitting a wall here, and my google-fu is not strong enough apparently. I’m trying to reinstall a Home Assistant VM on my server, (It’s been a while, and I have no idea how I did it originally). Running: virt-install --name haos --description “Home Assistant OS” --os-variant=generic...
CrowdStrike effectively bricked windows, Mac and Linux today. (possumpat.io)
CrowdStrike effectively bricked windows, Mac and Linux today....
In Major Order, Appeals Court Blocks Student Loan Forgiveness And Lower Payments For 8 Million Borrowers (www.forbes.com)
An Algorithm Told Police She Was Safe. Then Her Husband Killed Her. (www.nytimes.com)
Is everyone so depressed now partially because modern science has probably proven there is no god / afterlife?
By that I mean, it must be an inherently comforting thing to think - we inherently know this and want there to be something after death, because it feels right, or more meaningful. There’s a reason basically every civilization ever has some sort of afterlife ethos....