text:
I certainly do accept that cannabis carries some risks and is implicated in some harmful outcomes.
Cannabis - harms and dangers
First, I've already mentioned that smoking cannabis carries a risk of cancer. It hardly need be added that I would assume it imposes the other major risks associated with smoking. [UPDATE 17 Jul 2011 18:50: But see following post.] In any case, in Europe cannabis is most commonly smoked mixed with tobacco (and unfiltered, though that may be something of a red herring). So far as the present debate goes, Hitchens though has already said As for the risk of cancer, while it undoubtedly exists, it is not my principal concern..
Second, there are the effects of intoxication, some of which may be unwelcome. While stoned, for example, users tend not to be very attentive to some things, and may fail to lay them down in their memory - this is the fabled 'short-term memory loss'.
A stoned person may become rather self-absorbed and 'self-conscious' - that is, conscious of themself as the object of others' attention. This can mean not only being oversensitive to actual attention (yes, those 12 year old girls at the back of the bus might well be giggling about you, that shopkeeper might well be looking at you funny - but normally you wouldn't even notice, let alone care), but also 'paranoid' or oversuspicious of others.
In cases of extreme intoxication - for example after ingesting relatively large quantities of hashish (cannabis resin) - it is even possible to experience hallucinations.
Stoned folk often become lazy and may spend an inordinate amount of time arguing about who is going to go to the 24-hour garage to get Twixes and chocolate-flavoured long-life milk. Some people find the whole thing distinctly unpleasant, and may even in some circumstances feel sick - in which case once the effect has largely worn off in an hour or so, they can give it a miss and do something else. But all of these effects are transient, that is they do not persist once the drug is out of the user's system.
Third, problematic patterns of usage. I have no doubt that just like a hundred other activities, from overeating to computer games to routine and joyless sexual activity, cannabis can become the focus of obsessive and excessive behaviour. Being very stoned all the time is, just to be clear, not a good way of going about things. It is not going to do one's state of mind any good. Distancing oneself from reality for a prolonged period is bound to end up distorting your view of the world, your relationships and even to cause such warped perceptions and habits of mind as to count, technically, as 'psychotic symptoms' (this covers much more than persistently hearing voices, or harbouring bizarre and grandiose delusions). But such symptoms are symptoms of cannabis use or of an ongoing cannabis 'dependency', not of anything else.
Cannabis can no doubt be used as a crutch to deal with problems which would be better faced up to. (Or in some cases, perhaps for problems which are not best faced up to - in this vale of tears, we've all got to try and muddle through somehow and if you can fend off misery for a while I'm not going to frogmarch you off to the cells for it).
It's possible to waste a lot of time sitting around getting stoned, and it's not the kind of thing you want to be doing all day every day. But these are not, in the end, the fault of the evil weed. It doesn't enslave anyone, and it doesn't force anyone to take it (and as I've pointed out, dealers rarely need to do any 'pushing' - they're more likely to be worried about keeping enough back for their regulars, and heading off such new customers as seem likely to draw heat or otherwise cause trouble.) People can take cannabis or not, and most people are quite capable of enjoying a bit of a smoke in moderation without any associated behavioural problems whatsoever.
It's worth noting that problematic cannabis use - particularly very heavy cannabis use, or 'dependence' is not something that simply infects people, as the 70-year-old tropes of invasion and contagion would suggest. Rather, it has its own antecedents and risk factors. It can be explained statistically to some degree, and even be regarded as a symptom. A subfield of psychiatric and psychological research is dedicated to investigating this issue:
Hüsler et al., 'Psychosocial predictors of cannabis use adolescents at risk'
Green et al., 'Predictors of cannabis use in men with and without psychosis'
Creemers et al., 'Predicting onset of cannabis use in early adolescence: the interrelation between high-intensity pleasure and disruptive behavior. The TRAILS Study.'
Wilens, et al., 'Alcohol, drugs, and attention-deficit/ hyperactivity disorder: a model for the study of addictions in youth'
To pre-empt for a moment the next post, none of this gets us anywhere near justifying either the kind of Draconian laws that would be required to effectively banish the stuff from the realm, nor the kind of paternalistic threats required to stop people from taking it. And even if those things could work, I happen to think they are not worth the price. If people are turning to problematic patterns of drug use, that is likely to suggest a lack of hope, direction, the realistic possibility of ambition. The plight of the poor, marginalised and 'socially excluded' is not primarily about the effects of ganja use.
I should point out that being brought up in a city is said to increase the probability of a schizophrenia diagnosis by a factor of 3-4. That is substantially more than current figures - which I dispute in any case - would suggest for the cannabis link. It is nice to hear Hitchens speak of the 'weak and vulnerable', rather than telling people to pull their socks up and their fingers out. Shame the next sentiment to follow should be 'bang 'em up'. (Or is that - infantilise them before they have a chance to do it to themselves?)
Overblown claims
So much for relatively uncontroversial harms and disadvantages of cannabis use. What of 'overblown' claims? I want - Hitchens states - to know precisely which claims he views as 'overblown'. I don't think propositions about cannabis use can be overblown in themselves - only more or less accurate. For a claim to be overblown, there has to be someone doing the claiming, and along with it the overblowing.
My initial mention of the self-defeating nature of overblown warnings was tangential to the issue of criminalisation. If cannabis were legal, I would still, in a helpful spirit, warn against inflated claims. People are not stupid. when you're telling them what they want to hear, or something uncheckable about what is happening in a foreign country they don't have any stake in, you can get away with rampant lies. When you're giving them information that directly affects their lives and about which they have other sources of information, any hint of the 'noble lie' is going to scupper any chance of being taken seriously. Consider the damage done to the global warming campaign as a result of the behaviour of the climate scientists at the University of East Anglia and the subsequent fudged inquiries, just as one example.
Criminalisation, though, tends itself to produce palpably exaggerated warnings. After all, the current criminalisation of cannabis doesn't tend to be defended by reference to any moral arguments about the charred corpses of toddy-drinkers, or by alluding to something Alan Bloom once wrote (more on those topics in part three). The justification that is offered - and which would be offered for any remotely plausible future 'crackdown' - is primarily danger. Accordingly, the warnings given to provide that justification have to be suitably, well, overblown.
This is perhaps especially ironic in the case of those who advocate criminal sanctions without believing, as Hitchens does, that an acceptably civilised prohibition regime could come close to eradicating cannabis use. For some such people, criminalisation is seen as a means of providing public information messages, on an 'only language they understand' kind of basis. In the recent hoo-hah over the finer points of drug classification (which neither I nor Hitchens consider to be of more than marginal relevance to altering behaviour via deterrence), this was just about the only relevant consideration. Having downgraded cannabis from class B to C, politicians responded to pressure from those they judged as having the strongest feelings - and loudest voices - and rapidly performed an about-face.
This memorable advertisement managed to be appear rather overblown without providing much actual content:
Just to complicate things, this was introduced as part of a a campaign which followed the short-lived downgrading of cannabis - and was intended to offset a reduction of penalties rather than to justify an increase.
As this video suggests, and my first post indicated, though only in outline, the main strand of widely exaggerated - and very probably misconceived - rhetoric I'm concerned about relates to the link between cannabis and schizophrenia.
Cannabis and Schizophrenia
A number of clinicians and academics are pursuing this avenue of investigation with some optimism, notable among them being Robin Murray, whom Hitchens suggests it would be 'arrogant' to contradict. Of course it would also be arrogant to contradict those scientists like Nutt (the Drugs Kaiser fired by the last government for expressing the opinion he was employed to give) or many others who have less invested than Murray in the cannabis/schizophrenia issue. So going by Hitchens's logic, arrogance is unavoidable if one is to make any useful judgement about the matter. So I'll embrace my arrogance with regard to Dr Murray, and see if I can explain to others my reasons for doing so.
Hitchens's question concerned my acceptance that cannabis has - or might in future be found to have - any dangers for those who use it. As well as accepting that cannabis is associated with some harms and dangers, I certainly accept that all kinds of things might yet be discovered. Such general possibilities are however of little interest, since they cut both ways. One should certainly observe Cromwell's precept think it possible that ye may be mistaken - not to do so is rank dogmatism. But in the context of adversarial debate, unilaterally admitting such a possibility in general terms is apt to be taken as a concession to the other side.
So arrogance aside, of course I may be mistaken. I may be mistaken about anything. Am I especially likely to be mistaken about this matter? No. In fact given that I've taken considerable interest in the matter, done a fair bit of research, and have some general training in methodology, pretty good analytical ability and even a personal connection with the world of psychiatric research, my judgement is that I'm less likely to be mistaken about this than many other things. The key is to address the issue of how likely one is to be mistaken before finalising an opinion, and thus moderating the certainty with which you hold that opinion. If you want to be really fancy about it, you can even consider some alternatives and assess how much credence you might give those, then formulate a complex opinion, with a probability distribution and everything. There is always a generalised risk (or uncertainty) that one might be mistaken, but that is a common factor which can be ignored so far as choosing among opinions goes.
So I am happy to 'fess up to the generalised and unquantified possibility of unknown error. But I don't consider such a possibility to undermine my opinions. And - importantly - I apply the same principle to my criticism of the research into this topic - I have a good and coherent reasons to think that there are specific problems with the research. I am not just taking pot shots at a view I'm hostile to, or waving my hands in the general direction of error and claiming victory for the 'druggies'. It is one thing to point out, for example, the common hazards of using complex statistical methods to derive conclusions from data. It is another to indicate specific ways in which such hazards appear to have affected research in this area. Doing that properly is not a straightforward business, though, and as a result these comments are lengthy and go into some detail.
Murray: marijuana warner
The research programme has been under way sporadically for some decades, but has not yet produced sufficiently impressive results for any scientist, even a true believer (and advocate) like Murray, to be willing unequivocally to assert, in an academic paper, a causal link leading from cannabis to schizophrenia. Murray, like anyone who thinks he is onto something, has a tendency to bury his caveats and forget them as quickly as possible, but he still has to include them, and their relative lack of prominence ought if anything to draw more attention to them.
Murray has been busy prematurely pseudo-replicating his findings in a variety of reports, survey articles, and meta-analyses, and has been involved in rehashing and revisiting existing studies, to squeeze every drop of statistical goodness from the data. I will consider at least one of these later, but for a foretaste, consider that a widely-cited survey article in which Murray was involved states:
Consistent with the previous findings, a follow-up study of the same Swedish conscript cohort showed that 'heavy cannabis users' by the age of 18 years were 6.7 times more likely than non-users to be diagnosed with schizophrenia 27 years later (Zammit et al, 2002). This risk held when the analysis was repeated on a subsample of men who used cannabis only, as opposed to using other drugs as well.
This is flatly incorrect: the first figure was in fact 3.1 rather than 6.7 - though because of an accident of the numbers, it is, thankfully, possible to attribute this to carelessness.
Murray is though without doubt committed - to a degree that I would consider prejudicial - to establishing a causal link between cannabis use and subsequent onset of schizophrenia. His writings in the press make this quite clear: for example, he claims that Nutt and the rest of the 2002 ACMD 'boobed' by advising that cannabis has no serious mental health consequences. He then states that the evidence that cannabis contributes causally to the onset of schizophrenia "although not yet conclusive, has been mounting steadily over the past six years." Since this was written in 2009, elementary arithmetic tells us that the inconclusive statistics Murray refers to had not even begun the process of 'mounting steadily' at the time the ACMD 'boobed' so badly by ignoring them! I should point out that I don't accept Murray's statement about the mounting data, nor much of anything else he says, at least not in newspaper commentary. My purpose is to expose one of the reasons for my lack of confidence in his capacity to maintain scientific detachment - or indeed basic coherence - in discussing these matters.
Murray states:
Professor Nutt contrasts a 2.6 fold increase in risk of psychosis carried by using cannabis with a twentyfold increase in risk of lung cancer if one smokes cigarettes. Unfortunately, he is not comparing like with like. The twentyfold increased risk is not carried by just being a cigarette smoker but rather by being a long-term heavy smoker. For cannabis, the risk of psychosis goes up to about six times if one is a long-term heavy cannabis smoker.
One of the more thoughtful of the proliferating survey articles, Semple et al, suggests that the best estimate of statistical correlation between cannabis use and subsequent schizophrenia diagnosis, adjusting for some but by no means all sources of error, is an odds ratio of around 1.41.
This ought to mean, if it were a directly usable statistic, that on finding out someone has smoked cannabis you should increase your assessment of the probability that they will subsequently receives a schizophrenia diagnosis by a factor of 0.4 (for an average person - somewhat less for a higher-risk individual) while for the very heaviest cannabis users, the best guess - though admittedly still probably too high, and by no means indicating causation - is given as an odds ratio of 3 - not 6, which is the figure Murray has cherry-picked from somewhere. Even if unlike me you think this research is on the right track, this figure can't be justified.
In 2007, too, Murray was at it, in the Independent, making strange claims about skunk:
Skunk is to old-fashioned hash as is whisky to lager. You can become alcoholic by just drinking lager; but you have to drink a lot more lager than whisky.
Hash is resin, and the more refined forms of it are roughly as strong, in terms of THC content, as skunk. Typical skunk is stronger than most other herbal cannabis - but is accordingly more expensive. And the difference in strength, i.e. bulk, is negligible - like the difference between whisky and whisky with a dash of water. There is nothing stopping people from getting just as stoned on relatively weak cannabis as they do on the strongest stuff.
Murray cites a UN report which, like his own article, reads like a polemical document. So much for no interest from government - the UN and various government bodies have sponsored a great deal of the work that has been done in pursuit of cannabis-induced schizophrenia). (I happened to notice p117 has a graphic showing a 5% increase in cannabis use over 12 years, but is described in the text as showing a 10% increase in a different 5 or 6 year period (between the 'late 90s' and publication in 2006. The graphic itself is a fantastically misleading, giving the visual impression of cannabis use shooting up from near zero to some huge figure.
In the preface to that UN report, Antonio Maria Costa, Executive Director of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, feels able to say
With supply virtually unlimited and demand subject to the vagaries of government policy, traffickers have invested heavily in increasing the potency - and therefore the market attractiveness - of cannabis. The result has been devastating: today, the characteristics of cannabis are no longer that different from those of other plant-based drugs such as cocaine and heroin. (emph. mine).
It is hard to say what this is supposed to mean, but it's even harder to find any possible meaning at all one which it comes out true.
(In an even less convincing variation on Murray's non-sequitur, the report also states on p.174 that "Most of the cannabis smoked in the 1960s would be considered to be of low quality today. In addition to seeds, it comprised a great deal of the large leaf, twigs, and other material that would be currently regarded as waste." But it would also have been regarded as waste then, and thrown away, with the possible exception of large leaves.)
The UN report's distinctly partial approach to cannabis might suggest that Hitchens is not on particularly strong ground when he suggests that funding for studies seeking a causal path from cannabis to schizophrenia is unlikely to be available from governmental sources. While funding is not a central issue in the absence of specific allegations of prejudicial motivation, I would suggest that neither drug companies, from whom much funding for medical research comes, nor - contrary to Hitchens's quixotic protestations - governments seem likely to be very interested in research which would debunk the findings of this recently-hewn niche in schizophrenia literature. And as I pointed out in my first post, alcohol interests have been known to give financial assistance to anti-cannabis causes. Trying to paint cannabis as a populist issue, with powerful pro-legalisation forces ranged against the little man who favours prohibition is not a viable position so far as I can see.
Having said that, as far as it is of any relevance at all, Murray himself makes it clear that, wedded though he is to the RM-causation hypothesis, he does not subscribe to Hitchens's prohibitionist agenda:
I care little whether cannabis is classified as a class B or class C drug. Fourteen year olds starting daily cannabis use do not agonise over its exact classification; many do not even think it is a drug and few have any knowledge of its hazards. By comparison, most adults in the UK drink alcohol in moderation, but do so in the knowledge that drinking a bottle of vodka a day is likely to be injurious to health, and few are in favour of daily drinking from age 14 years.
And that, for all my disagreement with Murray on science and rhetoric, is largely my approach. If there are significant dangers, then a properly independent agency staffed by professionals should be tasked with publicising them honestly and clearly. Peter Hitchens talks of the vulnerable and weak - I think he means teenagers - but there is a limit to how far we should go in trying to protect teenagers from danger, and attempting to eradicate cannabis from the country by instituting an enormous crackdown is too far. My personal opinion - in itself largely irrelevant since no-one need share it to reject increased criminalisation, nor to endorse legalisation - is that to justify a ban, the harms would have to exceptional - near-certain lethality, say - or the substance would have to be capable of taking people over and sapping all ability to resist taking it - something that neither I nor Hitchens think is remotely the case. I don't particularly approve of youngsters smoking dope in any case and under a legalisation regime I'd envisage similar - or should the evidence merit it, heavier and better enforced - penalties on selling to minors.
In fact, I have a question for PH - what kind of penalties, what expansion of prisons and of policing, do you suppose would be required to achieve your preferred cannabis-free UK? How much more stop-and-search would there have to be, how much drug testing, how many more homes smashed up looking for the stuff? Would we bring the import trade to a halt by searching every container that comes into the country?
So, to be clear: I consider that even accepting Murray's most egregious misrepresentations, the herb should still be legal. Why then, am I about to embark on extended criticism of the cannabis-induced-schizophrenia hypothesis? Well, in part simply because I consider it an interesting issue in itself, and a case study in how science works, and have accordingly done a good deal of research into the matter. That is a bad reason.
A slightly better reason is that I consider Murray in particular to have overstepped the bounds of scientific objectivity by some degree with his public statements, and suspect him of having done so - unconsciously, no doubt - in some of his academic work too. After all, here at 'Surely Some Mistake?', the policy is to aim the Cointreau of criticism squarely at the peach of privilege.
And then there is of course the urgency with which Hitchens has repeated his request - in all four tranches of his response - for me to state my position on the harms of cannabis, which of course most saliently involves the schizophrenia issue.
But the most pressing reason, as intimated in round one of the debate, is that overblown claims of cannabis-induced-schizophrenia have gained such traction with the public, and have been illustrated with highly emotive anecdotes calculated to appeal, in particular, to parents' deepest fears. Any attempt to actually change minds in favour of legalisation requires that this issue be put firmly in perspective, and the tenuous basis of the fearmongering be established.
The rhetoric of prohibition
One of the less decorative rhetorical devices in the canon is 'correctio' - making a bold statement, then moderating it - the aim of course being to gain an (unfair) advantage in debate. The stronger statement may be unjustified, but is more persuasive than a moderate one, so assent is first gained by use of the stronger proposition, and even after this is pared back to pre-empt criticism, the assent remains. In psychology, a similar tactic is known as the foot-in-the-door technique - a person is first asked to agree to some modest proposal, and once they have done so, the demand is ramped up. This can be done in stages, so as to avoid escalating demands too abruptly.
The engineering of public support for, among others, the US/NATO invasions of Kuwait, Iraq, and Libya all showed observable elements of this technique. A foot in the door was gained by telling extreme tales of the dreadful events that were going on or were imminent and which required military intervention (tales which to many were rather obviously fabricated; consent need not be universal). As it became clear that these tales were indeed false and fabricated (in the case of Libya, this has not yet really happened - that's progress for you), they were abandoned or replaced with slightly more realistic reasons for war. Classically, the psychological foot-in-the-door is supposed to depend on a 'preference for consistency'. War rhetoric is rather different - once you get people marching to that drum beat, the momentum gained owes more to the lower reaches of the brain than to any preference for consistency.
The same is true of an opening gambit that involves the highly emotive elements of parental protectiveness and the spectre of rampant insanity. Once the image of murderous lunatics is out there, and parents are provided with appropriately lurid scare stories about their own offspring's chances of developing schizophrenia, subsequent gradual moderation of the message has little effect.
Neither I nor, as far as I know, any other prominent advocate of cannabis legalisation denies that cannabis use by schizophrenics interferes with standard treatments and can worsen their prognosis. I don't challenge the idea that ongoing very heavy cannabis use and its associated lifestyle can be a factor in bringing forward the onset of frank psychosis in those who are on the pathway to schizophrenia. And as I suggest above, ongoing heavy cannabis use is itself likely to be associated with phenomena which will show up on a checklist of 'psychotic symptoms'. What I do deny is that there is good reason to believe in what I - in honour of the Mail story linked above - will call RM-causation (for 'Reefer Madness' - a famously lurid propaganda film of the 30s, when the failure and reversal of alcohol prohibition was leaving FBN agents short of work, and (some say) timber and Nylon interests were anxious to see off the threat of new hemp processing technology, among them a newspaper tycoon who was responsible for much 'yellow journalism' demonising hemp... but I digress). Furthermore, considerable effort has been made to establish that cannabis causes schizophrenia, and at least one scientist at the centre of these efforts shows signs of excessive zeal. Failure to discover a link in those circumstances, goes beyond mere absence of evidence to constitute evidence of absence.
RM-causation is the big headline item, the one that, thanks to the likes of Murray, gives every parent nightmares (and my interest in the issue was certainly influenced by my own parenthood). This is the claim that there is a more than negligible chance that a person who would otherwise have been unaffected by the horrors of schizophrenia might develop the condition through taking cannabis. I repeat, the key claim I am referring to as RM-causation and which has lodged - quite understandably - in the mind of the public, in particular of parents, is that cannabis is capable of causing schizophrenia in those who would otherwise not have developed the condition. Of course, at the margins it will no doubt be possible to point the finger to aspects of cannabis use, especially very heavy and prolonged use, as factors in tipping borderline cases into full schizophrenia - the same is true of almost anything you care to mention. Remember, social isolation is regarded as a risk factor for schizophrenia as is, for another example, being brought up in a city - the relative risk of that factor supposedly being higher than that currently claimed with any credibility at all - that is, assuming I am completely wrong - by the Murray camp.
Given what they are being told, I don't blame parents for being worried. While we didn't refuse the combined MMR vaccine on our son's behalf, we certainly gave it some thought before opting to volunteer our own flesh and blood in the cause of herd (and his own) immunity. And elsewhere, I've defended the decision other parents took to refuse the jab as not only understandable but rational, given the widely available information. The present case is of course not one of an Andrew Wakefield, though it is worth remembering that his research was published in the Lancet. the point is that his warnings, while not backed with strong evidence, concerned a sufficiently severe outcome to be of great concern even at low probability, especially given that the risk could be very easily avoided without much wider impact.
So a head-on approach seems better. I'll explain why I have been suspicious of this strand of research (other than the selfish desire to keep open the option of revisiting youthful habits with impunity), and why I believe it is on the wrong track. I reiterate that to do this I'll need to go into some detail, since otherwise my criticisms will amount to little more than denial, or else may appear to be general nitpicking objections of the kind which could be made to any study. It is important that the root problems I detect are all of the same two kinds, and that more ad hoc objections to individual studies are geared towards showing how these general problems are manifested.
I'll also point out how the claims currently being made bear little resemblance to those touted so loudly when the issue first found its way into our esteemed press. A quiet and gradual correctio has been under way, with the result that the original headline-grabbing claims of RM-causation are just about extinct, and some much more modest positions taken up in their stead - positions which would never on their own have been considered remarkable, and which I have very good reason to expect will as the research project continues, become more modest still.
The decline effect and bias
Once this vocal but heterodox group has made more headway in influencing scientific opinion, results which produce the finding 'nothing to see here' will become more interesting and might stand a chance of being published. The fact that negative results are commonly rejected for publication, especially when a new 'discovery' is in its infancy has, in conjunction with related forms of bias, been dubbed the decline effect. The linked article observes that initially promising findings tend to fall off, and even to disappear altogether, as further studies are conducted. There are a number of reasons for this: the usual standard of 95% confidence implies that one in 20 such statistical results should be expected to be wrong without containing any errors or design flaws, or to put it another way, the probability that a given statistic falls outside the 95% confidence range is higher than that of rolling snake eyes on a pair of dice. If a one-in twenty chance of this kind appears to make a new and exciting finding, a wild goose chase ensues. (And if multiple re-analyses are run on the same data, any bias in that data will be manifested on each occasion.)
Various forms of bias can of course creep in - including the all-too-human tendency for scientists to want to believe, and to interpret results accordingly, even to re-run a statistical analysis using a different test, then discard the 'anomalous' result (this, though generally impossible to detect, is entirely unethical and invalidates any findings). Not that I'm saying that Murray himself has ever done anything like that; this is a general point. Another reason why results 'disappear' from subsequent studies is that the subsequent studies refine and improve experimental design, and eliminate flaws that had affected previous work. That seems to be one of the things that has happened in the case of the RM-causation hypothesis.
(The popular article linked has been extensively criticised by scientists. The key criticism has been that it poses as a bold debunking of science, but is in fact just a perfectly ordinary account of how science works - to the scientists themselves, it is too obvious! I would agree with these criticisms as far as they apply, indeed I'd consider them to reflect the same point I have already made - that general possibilities of error are ubiquitous and care should be taken not to exaggerate their importance. In this case, the criticisms amount to pointing out that the proposition 'for every claim, it is possible that it is mistaken' is different from and far weaker than 'it is possible that every claim is mistaken'.)
The decline effect has certainly occurred in this case - in the academic literature, multiples like 6, and even 12, times increased expectation of schizophrenia in cannabis smokers are now nowhere to be seen. Instead, figures from recent studies have fallen below 2. 2 of course here represents a doubled expectation (or 'risk'), but that is double a very small starting probability, so even if it were accounted for entirely by RM-causation, that would still be a very small risk.
Publication bias is a real and widely-acknowledged problem. There are methods for detecting it, such as funnel plots though they are of limited usefulness, especially as a means of ruling it out. On the one occasion I have seen such methods used in this context, in a Semple et al. survey article, the funnel plot does seem to show skew:
(and the Egger bias plot, another test, fails to show a line passing close to the origin), yet the funnel plot is described as follows:
Where studies with results in a certain direction are not published or identified, the spread of studies about the horizontal line will tend to be asymmetrical. The study effect sizes shown above are approximately symmetrical about the line of overall effect and the presence of publication bias is not supported
But the study effect sizes are not symmetrical about the line - 5 of 7 lie above the line. Furthermore, it is the smaller studies which are supposed to reveal publication bias if it is present - the larger studies effectively decide the position of the line. All of the four smaller studies are above the line. If the plot is to be taken seriously, the conclusion from this one ought to be that there is evidence of bias.
(The Egger plot is also explained away by a very odd argument: although the line does not pass through the origin exactly, the confidence interval for the intercept (indicated by two small circles on the vertical axis) includes the origin. This may be interpreted as a lack of statistically significant publication bias.)
The pachyderm in the parlour - no rise in schizophrenia
Perhaps the most obvious stumbling block in the way of establishing RM-causation is the rather obvious fact that if cannabis were actually causing people to become schizophrenic who wouldn't otherwise have done, we should expect, in the absence of countervailing factors, to see a proportionate increase in the rate of schizophrenia.
This has of course been pointed out by a number of eminent academics in the field, for example:
there is no evidence that the incidence of schizophrenia has risen dramatically over the past 50 years, in parallel with the huge increase in cannabis use.
- Dr. Colin Blakemore, Chair of the Department of Physiology at the University of Oxford; Dec. 27, 2002 email to ProCon.org.
Given that the incidence of schizophrenia declined substantially in Western societies in the 1970s, at the same time cannabis use was rising, it seems highly unlikely that marijuana causes schizophrenia in otherwise healthy people....
Cannabis psychosis is self-limiting, disappearing in a few days with or without medical treatment. Toxic psychosis probably occurs more commonly in individuals with preexisting psychiatric disorders...
- Lynn Zimmer, Former Professor Emeritus at the Queens College, City University, New York (CUNY), in Marijuana Myths, Marijuana Facts, 1997)
Their prediction that 14% of psychotic outcomes in young adults in the UK may be due to cannabis use is not supported by the fact that the incidence of schizophrenia has not shown any significant change in the past 30 years.
- Professor Leslie Iverson, Oxford University. BBC News
To quote from the relatively thoughtful meta-analysis of Semple et al:
The question of whether cannabis is a precipitating or a causative factor in the development of schizophrenia remains. A recent study that used mathematical modelling to explore the possible effects of cannabis use and schizophrenia (Degenhardt et al., 2003) supported the possibility that cannabis precipitated psychosis in vulnerable individuals and that cannabis use is more likely among individuals with schizophrenia, but did not support a direct causal hypothesis. The main reason for this finding was the absence of any increase in the incidence of schizophrenia, despite clear increases in the use of cannabis in the Australian population studied. Any hypothesis that suggests that cannabis causes schizophrenia must explain this discrepancy in the epidemiological data.
Again, Degenhardt et al., Comorbidity between cannabis use and psychosis: modelling some possible relationships, Conclusions:
This study has examined a hotly debated issue from a different point of view - through the use of modelling, using data-based parameter estimates to predict what changes we would expect to see in the incidence and prevalence of schizophrenia if each of four hypotheses about the relationships were true. If cannabis caused schizophrenia among persons who would not otherwise have
developed the disorder, significant increases would have occurred in the number of persons with the illness. Given that the incidence of schizophrenia is either unchanged or decreasing, such a causal relationship is unlikely.
All other hypotheses provided a better fit to the available data. However, it is difficult to judge which of these is the best fit, or whether a combination of them is most appropriate. If cannabis use acts as a precipitant of psychosis, we would have seen small increases in the number of early onset cases. If cannabis use made relapse to psychotic symptoms, we would have seen small increases in the number of chronic cases. Finally, if persons with psychosis were simply more likely to become regular cannabis users, we would expect to see no differences in the number incident or chronic cases, but a higher prevalence of regular use in this population. Future research needs to examine these possibilities in prospective studies.
This approach has suggested that cannabis use is probably not causally related to psychosis in the strong sense of causing cases that would no otherwise have occurred. Nonetheless, cannabis use may affect persons who are vulnerable to developing psychosis, or who have already developed the disorder. This suggests that such persons may be advised of this possible relationship and counselled against using cannabis.
This is a big problem for Murray and, to the extent they share his premature zeal, others pursuing this line of investigation. It has led Murray to suggest that it is too early for the supposed effects to be seen in the general population, because it mostly affects young people, and is associated with the new 'super skunk' (something of a myth in itself, though I believe that newer strains and hybrids used in producing intensively cultivated sinsemilla have little or none of the chemical cannabidiol which, it has been suggested, moderates or otherwise interacts with the action of THC. Of course no large studies into that topic can be conducted, nor most probably would any recommendations be worth making, because without regulation, no-one knows what they are smoking).
The idea that RM-causation is restricted to those taking cannabis at a relatively young age in any case seems to have been forced on Murray since the results of recent, more rigorous studies are, not for want of trying, inconsistent with much of an effect in any other group.
In fact, this research programme, though not (yet) fairly describable as degenerating, exhibits a certain degree of retrenchment, not limited to the moderation of claimed effect sizes typical of the 'decline effect. In some ways, this retrenchment resembles the psychological 'foot-in-the-door' and rhetorical 'correctio' techniques, though of course it is not intended as a technique. Murray's readiness to proselytise for an unproven proposition and his insistence on sticking to what are by now clearly inflated figures have certainly had much the same effect as a deliberate foot-in-the-door though.
These retrenchments include, as mentioned, a reduction in the claimed effect size from initial estimates of increased risk, which I believe were at one time around a factor of 10 or even more, to a factor of about 2 (i.e., if this statistic were to apply to the average person at average risk, an increased risk of 1 percentage point).
Another slippage has been in the range of the effect - while no-one ever really suggested that those not already genetically vulnerable to developing schizophrenia (it appears that about 50% of schizophrenia incidence is down to genetics) is going to be 'infected' by cannabis use, it seems that recently it has been suggested that those who are 'vulnerable' in this sense form a very small proportion of the population. Some even seem to be veering dangerously close to agreeing that RM-causation itself may not occur, and instead the only causal influence of heavy cannabis use is only to speed up the course of an already existing condition.
There seems also to have been slippage regarding the extent of use required to find any effect. While the Mail story linked above claims a single exposure increases risk by a factor of 1.4, recent studies almost exclusively limit their conclusions to the supposed effects of relatively heavy use and 'dependence'.
Perhaps the most significant and slippage, however, is in the outcomes examined. Schizophrenia is a recognised and very serious chronic condition with a fairly well-understood course. Initially, studies were primarily concerned with diagnoses of that condition. But as later studies sought to extract more information from data, they began instead to measure schizophreniform disorder, symptoms of schizophrenia, schizophrenia-like symptoms, and psychotic symptoms, none of which are the same thing as, and none of which are necessarily very closely associated with, schizophrenia.
This leads me to the first of two problems which I see as manifested in this line of research, which I don't believe have yet been adequately addressed and which in combination provide a specific alternative explanation for the observed results, without relying on unspecified residual confounding factors nor on general problems with statistical methods such as multivariate regression analysis.
The two problems
1. Transient cannabis related psychotic symptoms.
In those studies which measure psychotic, or schizophrenia-like symptoms rather than schizophrenia proper, there is a danger that transient psychosis-like symptoms of cannabis use and of ongoing heavy cannabis use will be interpreted as manifestations of some independently subsisting psychosis. Such effects of cannabis as sensory or cognitive disturbances and so-called 'paranoia' would surely show up in test for psychotic symptoms. This possibility is explicitly acknowledged in some papers, and ought in any case to be taken account of by diagnostic criteria and methods, but it doesn't appear to have been addressed properly in many cases. As more recent studies have attempted to address the issue of confounding more thoroughly, they have also tended to expand the range of outcomes measured so as to include mere 'psychotic symptoms', thus introducing this new source of error. Little more can be said at this point. I'll return to the issue later in discussion of some individual papers.
2. 'Self-medication' (common predisposition)
In my first post, I used this term somewhat inaccurately to describe a wider phenomenon: a common predisposition both to take cannabis and to develop schizophrenia. Self-medication describes only those cases in which the subject is aware of taking cannabis to deal with symptoms of their illness. This does not accurately describe the case in which a person has some mild precursor or 'prodromal' mental disturbance which which motivates them, consciously or not, to seek cannabis or mind-altering substances in general.
Neither does it describe other explanations for taking cannabis which might be correlated with a predisposition to schizophrenia: tendency to rebellious behaviour (cannabis being illegal and generally frowned upon means taking it has this character - and smoking it all the time certainly does), propensity to 'addictive' behaviour, a general desire to alter consciousness and so on.
A substantial literature exists on the prodrome and precursor; to offer some haphazardly selected examples:
Cannon et al., Early and late neurodevelopmental influences in the prodrome to schizophrenia: contributions of genes, environment, and their interactions
Yung and McGorry, 'The Prodromal Phase of First-episode Psychosis: Past and Current Conceptualizations'
White et al., 'The Schizophrenia Prodrome'
Owens et al., 'Precursors and prodromata of schizophrenia: findings from the Edinburgh High Risk Study and their literature context.'
Amminger et al., 'Relationship Between Childhood Behavioral Disturbance and Later Schizophrenia in the New York High-Risk Project'
Kwapil, 'Social anhedonia as a predictor of the development of schizophrenia-spectrum disorders'
Hans et al., 'Interpersonal behavior of children at risk for schizophrenia'
Roff et al., 'Childhood antecedents of schizophrenia: developmental sequencing and specificity of problem behavior'
Self-medication properly so-called would be a case of reverse causation - schizophrenia causally contributing to cannabis use, rather than the other way round. Reverse causation is not a special kind of causation, just one that runs in in the opposite direction from that expected or hypothesised. Consider the fictitious tabloid headline: 'BLACK INFLUX LOWERS HOUSE PRICES'. The headline suggests that the arrival of black people in an area causes the house prices to drop. Reverse causation would be said to occur if in fact the reason for the co-incidence of lower prices and more black people arriving in the area is that black people have on average a lower income than the general population, and more were attracted to the area as a consequence of greater affordability.
In other cases of a common disposition, cannabis use might not be causally mediated by schizophrenia, but there may instead be a common causal influence - perhaps some genetic factor and/or an abnormal brain chemistry - which gives rise both to cannabis use and to schizophrenia. This would then be a confounding factor. Both reverse causation and confounding factors have to be addressed when a causal influence is to be established between correlated phenomena - most of the studies try to do this to some extent, though few of them, especially the earliest ones, even attempt to do so very thoroughly (by the way, one likely confounder, city living, is apparently believed to be associated risk of schizophrenia increasing by a factor of 3-4, substantially higher than that indicated by studies of RM-causation, even taken at face value).
In any case, I think it is sensible for my purposes to treat this family of explanations, variants of which have generally been considered the obvious explanation for high cannabis use, as one hypothesis, despite the fact that it cuts across the distinction between reverse causation and confounding factors. I'll refer to it by the catchy name 'common predisposition'.
The common predisposition hypothesis has been around in one form or another for a long time, and is the obvious competitor to the RM-causation hypothesis, as all the authors of RM papers acknowledge in one way or another. A range of scientific work supports the general idea that the schizophrenia-prone are also likely to be cannabis-prone.
This paper attempts a partial explanation of substance abuse by reference to underlying aspects of schizophrenia which need not be contemporaneous with manifestation of psychotic symptoms:
Chambers et al., A Neurobiological Basis for Substance Abuse Comorbidity in Schizophrenia
Other papers of of relevance examine various behaviours which can be precursor or prodromal predictors of schizophrenia, and link those directly to cannabis use:
Korhonen et al., 'Externalizing behavior problems and cigarette smoking as predictors of cannabis use: the TRAILS Study'
Buckner et al., 'Specificity of Social Anxiety Disorder as a Risk Factor for Alcohol and Cannabis Dependence'
This type of consideration might be of special relevance in the context of a finding that only heavy use is of relevance to subsequent development of schizophrenia, since it may be the case that such heavy use, as distinct from typical recreational and social use, tends to arise from other abnormal behaviours or dispositions.
As is the way of these things, those investigating (hoping to find) RM-causation have a natural tendency to regard the common predisposition hypothesis as an obstacle. It is to be controlled for, eliminated, ruled out. That is quite reasonable. Less reasonable but equally understandable is the inadequacy of the measures taken to rule it out. If you are, like Murray, a true believer in the RM-causation hypothesis, you will approach the matter as a necessary but rather tiresome technicality, much as a sleuth who's convinced he has his man may regard the task of observing proper procedures in gathering evidence. As a result, few of the attempts to rule out the common predisposition explanation in studies not directly aimed at that end are convincing, even among those which do attempt to account for a wide variety of other confounding factors.
Two brief examples:
Henquet et al., 'Prospective cohort study of cannabis use, predisposition for psychosis, and psychotic symptoms in young people', which appears to do a relatively thorough job in addressing standard confounding factors, seems vulnerable to challenge on both counts. The outcomes tested are merely 'psychotic symptoms - a far cry from schizophrenia, on which early studies concentrated, and which remains the headline topic of the kind of discussion in which papers such as this are commonly cited (or alluded to). So far as common predisposition is concerned, while the paper attempts to evaluate predisposition for psychosis, it states: we used self reported psychotic experiences on the symptom checklist to determine predisposition for psychosis. This is not a test of predisposition for psychosis, but of levels of psychosis itself.
Fergusson et al., 'Tests of causal linkages between cannabis use and psychotic symptoms' takes some trouble to attempt to adjust both for confounding factors and for common predisposition, but its results are solely in terms of 'psychotic symptoms'. It states:
participants were questioned on current (over the past month) psychotic symptomatology using items from the Symptom Checklist 90 (SCL-90) [20]. A series of 10 items were selected as representative of psychotic symptoms.These items spanned the following
symptoms: hearing voices that other people do not hear; the idea that someone else can control your thoughts; other people being aware of your private thoughts; having thoughts that are not your own; having ideas and beliefs that others do not share; the idea that something is seriously wrong with your body; never feeling close to another person; the idea that something is wrong with your mind; feeling other people cannot be trusted; feeling that you are watched or talked about by others.
Confirmatory factor analysis of the item set has shown previously that the items formed a unidimensional scale reflecting the extent of psychotic symptomatology. (p. 356)
It is far from clear that the claim that the item set forms a unidimensional scale is robust to the presence or absence of prolonged heavy cannabis use. The last three items in particular might seem especially likely to be found in heavy habitual users of cannabis as compared to the general population. It would be interesting to know whether these were especially heavily represented among heavy cannabis users. I'm not inclined to rest a great deal of weight on the presence of items like having ideas and beliefs that others do not share in questionnaires of this kind - even though both I and Hitchens, neither of whom are remotely psychotic, might well give a positive response. Questions and questionnaires of this kind have generally been carefully calibrated and weighted so as to provide results which are overall statistically accurate.
I should add that these two relatively refined studies reported low increases in risk rate compared to the kinds of figures quoted in newspapers. In Fergusson et al., the highest estimate - for the heaviest cannabis users - was a 1.77 times greater risk of 'psychotic symptoms'. Henquet et al. found an odds ratio (a comparable measure in this instance) of 2.44 for increased risk of any 'psychotic symptoms'; this occurred among the second most frequent users at 3-4 times/week.
And finally
In the second part of my response, to follow shortly, I'll attempt to nail down and substantiate the position outlined here by examining in more detail some prominent studies in this area. The third and concluding part of my response will return to moral and policy arguments relating to legalisation.
Apologies to Peter Hitchens for the delay in responding - other obligations have taken up a good deal of my free time over the past week, and though my opinions were clear enough, as intimated in my first post, I'd not anticipated focusing on this empirical issue. Revisiting and documenting references, and attempting to impose some semblance of organisation on the whole thing, has been quite time-consuming.
Further apologies to readers for the length and relatively technical nature of the discussion. There seemed little point in addressing the issue of harm without addressing this central rhetorical issue, and there seemed in turn little point in addressing that without going into some detail, especially since RM-causation has a considerable head start so far as public discourse is concerned.
Finally, apologies to any scientists whom I may have offended - while I do think Robin Murray has gone further than he ought in his newspaper articles, the remaining limited ascriptions of bias and my criticism of specific papers, are not intended to suggest that any of those engaged in this research were acting in bad faith, nor that their conduct was in any way atypical of the normal progress of scientific inquiry.
[Edited 15 Jul 2011 11:30 - minor corrections, added missing references for prodrome and precursors]
[Edited 15 Jul 2011 16:01: moved references from one list to another]
[Edited 17 Jul 2011 17:55: belated minor corrections to spelling, syntax, sentence construction etc.]
[Edited 20 Jul 2011 10:44: 'correctio', not 'retractio']


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"I know. It's really cool!" says this month's British Vogue cover star 17-year-old Georgia Jagger of her fashion and rock royalty life. Georgia Jagger is the gourgeous youngest daughter of Mick Jagger and Jerry Hall.
Photographed by Mario Testino and interviewed by Alex Bilmes the model teenager reveals a penchant for Gossip Girl and staying in, while the rest of the issue celebrates affordable wardrobe ingenuity. To read the complete interview with Georgia and watch a video preview of the new Vogue visit Vogue UK.
On the cover Georgia Jagger wears sequinned minidress, £55, ASOS.COM. Swarovski-crystal and gold-plated tassel necklace, £78, Butler & Wilson. Personalised necklaces, £20 each, Punkypins.co.uk. Sunglasses, £5, So High Soho. All make-up by Maybelline. Fashion Editor: Lucinda Chambers.


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GAINESVILLE, Fla. - A Florida gun rights group on Friday sued the University of Florida, seeking a permanent injunction on the school's prohibition of firearms and weapons on all university property.
Florida Carry Inc. says they are going to court "to protect the rights of students, faculty, and the public from the university's illegal and unconstitutional regulations."
The group says the Florida Legislature issued state-wide licenses to carry for self-defense in 1987. In December, Florida Carry won a similar case challenging a similar ban by the University of North Florida.
"University of Florida decided not to repeal their policies and regulations. We attempted to contact them and discuss it with them," said Florida Carry's lead counsel, Eric Friday. "Their general counsel wasn't interested in having a discussion with us about what needed to be fixed."
On Monday, the University of South Florida said it will allow guns to be kept in cars on campus under a policy change prompted by the appeals court ruling. The Tampa school previously prohibited guns anywhere on its property. Guns still cannot be carried onto the campus under state law.
"Students who do follow, who are responsible with guns and just keep their guns in their vehicle, will be better equipped to handle those who aren't responsible with fire arms, who would bring firearms directly onto campus," said UNF student, Joshua Harris.
Florida State University changed its gun policy following the appeals court ruling.
Florida Carry says that UF simply added an "Intent" footnote to its gun policy, which the group claims fails to comply with the court's ruling.
"I don't think anybody's really stupid enough to use a gun on somebody over a college argument," said UNF student Zach Williams.
Florida Carry says Executive Director Sean Caranna reached out to UF President Bernie Machen in an attempt to avert the need for legal action, but the call was returned by the university's General Counsel, who "refused to take our concerns about UF's illegal policies and regulations seriously and was dismissive of our plea that they work with us to craft a legal set of regulations. Florida Carry was left with no choice but to file this case."
Late Friday, UF spokeswoman issued a statement:
"We are completely surprised by this press release based on the conversation our General Counsel had with Florida Carry on Wednesday. They didn't object to the steps we have taken to comply with the court's decision, and they never raised the issue of guns in the home, which was not the subject of the court's decision.
We need to be clear that the University of Florida is not challenging the 1st DCA decision, and we believe we are in full compliance with that law requiring universities to allow individuals 18 years or older to store their guns securely in their cars on campus.
We have not been served with the lawsuit nor have we been contacted by Florida Carry regarding it and therefore cannot comment further."
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Ignorance, denial or lack of education?
Suche in Medline nach
|14. April 2011
Growth rate and size that can reach a tumor, either malignant or benign, are common features of malignancy. In addition, the tumors can due soft tissues invasion, bone erosion, bleeding, and inflammation with or without infection, neurological signs, pain and functio laeza of the organs in which they grew. In the field of head and neck, tumors are growing and producing monstrous deformities and defects almost impossible to ignore. It's very difficult to understand how a licensed nurse, for example, can stay with a giant cancer of larynx, externalized through the neck skin, about 12 cm in diameter. This is ignorance, denial of diagnosis or lack of education? The authors aimed to present few cases of giant tumors of head and neck at the patients with different stages of education, as well as their explanations for the advanced tumor stage.


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Subscribe To Draw Something Losing Millions Of Gamers Updates
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OMGPOP's highly popular casual game, Draw Something, could be suffering from casual gamer fatigue, as a new report indicates that millions of gamers are giving up on the casual drawing game, moving on to smaller and not-necessarily-better games.
According to Side Mission WebMediaBrands is saying that based on their initial reports, OMGPOP's title is seeing a drop of nearly five million users, going from 14.3 million users down to 10.4 million daily users between April 2nd and May 2nd.
OMGPOP now belongs to one of the largest gaming publishers in the world, Zynga. They were originally bought out for a breezy $180 million dollars, mostly because of the success of Draw Something, which caused a bit of controversy thereafter. According to the BBC News, even though Zynga believes it's one of the fastest growing casual games on Facebook, the service is allegedly bleeding its members very quickly, dropping from its 3,000 drawings per second mark.
However, is the news really all that surprising? The casual gaming market is, for a lack of a better word, fickle. Most casual gamers play a game for a bit and then move on to something else, it's the reason it's called "casual gaming". However, dropping from 14.3 million to 10.4 million users over the course of a month still isn't that bad, a lot of developers just wish they could maintain a million concurrent users at a time, so it's all good in the Zynga camp.


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For students and graduates of August Martin High School, the name's significance far surpasses letters emblazoned on the front of a school building. It exemplifies legacy, tradition and achievement. It represents a man that everyone that walks through the doors can look to as an example of triumph.
In 1971, the school's named was changed from Woodrow Wilson to August Martin, honoring the country's first black commercial pilot.
The Jamaica high school currently finds itself is on the list of schools planning to be turned around, meaning the school may close and reopen under a new name.
"If we allow August Martin to be taken off this building, what it does is simply does away with history," said Ricky Davis, a commercial pilot and teacher of aviation at the school. "It does away with the struggle of our ancestors."
The predominantly black school is just three miles from John F. Kennedy International Airport and the only school that allows students the opportunity to man an aircraft. Approximately 300 students are enrolled in the aviation program. Every Thursday, Davis takes his class to fly, sometimes solo, allowing students to obtain hours towards a pilot license.
"I would never be in favor of getting rid of the name August Martin," said Councilmember James Sanders. "I would be very much in favor of keeping tradition; keeping a legacy going."
Martin, a Tuskegee Airman, was killed in 1968 while delivering goods to Biafra during the Nigerian civil war.
"That name means something, because if it wasn't for a man like that, guess what, [Chancellor Dennis Walcott] wouldn't have his job," said Cleavon Evans August Martin's Alumni Association president. "You want to take that name and destroy it? How disrespectful to this community."
A handful of students attended Monday, April 16's public hearing on the school's potential closure proudly displaying their pilot stripes earned at the school.
"[The DOE] doesn't understand that this school is rooted in the community. They don't understand that [Martin] learned to fly in Tuskegee, they don't understand that he died bringing goods to children in Biafra," said Leo Casey, the UFT vice president for high schools. "They think that a name is like a number, that you can just change it. Well, this school has history and this school cannot die."


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New era for stunning historic Rocky venue
NESTLED in West Rockhampton is a beautiful heritage listed village dating back to the very early years of Rockhampton.
For the past 12 months, local mother and daughter duo Janice and Lauren Dawson, along with their family and friends, have worked tirelessly to breathe new life into the historical property and will next weekend launch a 'new era' for St Aubins Village at 73 Canoona Rd.
The Dawsons will open St Aubins to the public for viewing on Saturday 22nd and Sunday 23rd July from 10am to 4pm.
Pre-loved items will be for sale including beautiful formal gowns suitable for school formals and wedding gowns, After 5 gowns, bridesmaid's and flower girl dresses, shoes and accessories that have only been worn once or not at all.
Lickity Fingers will provide $5 Yum Cha tasting plates in the gardens and Devonshire Tea will also be served on fine china in the courtyard with Stylish Events showcasing their business by supplying and decorating tables along with other displays.
A selection of local market stalls displaying their handmade items will also be at St Aubins on both days.
Janice said it had been a long time since St Aubins has been open to the public and was excited to show the community just what had been going on behind the grand front gates.
When the property was owned by the Bleines family from 1970-2007, it was a popular historical village featuring a nursery specialising in herbs, a teddy bear shop and children's clothing shop with items from England, France, Denmark and Sweden.
The property was sold to Bill and Noleen Gillham in 2007 and the couple worked to renovate the on site cottages and prepare the venue for events. Sadly, Noleen passed away before the property was opened to the public.
"We leased the property back in July last year and are maintaining it to try and get it back to the way it was," Janice said.
"We have tidied it up and breathed a bit of a life back into a sleeping beauty. We have a vision to hold events here in the future."


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Hearing on the federal administration of funds for New Jersey Title III and IV-C, ESEA projects: hearing before the Subcommittee on Elementary, Secondary, and Vocational Education of the Committee on Education and Labor, House of Representatives, Ninety-eighth Congress, first session, hearing held in Washington, D.C., on May 17, 1983
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Ying xiong (2002)
King of Qin: I have just come to a realization! This scroll by Broken Sword contains no secrets of his swordsmanship. What this reveals is his highest ideal. In the first state, man and sword become one and each other. Here, even a blade of grass can be used as a lethal weapon. In the next stage, the sword resides not in the hand but in the heart. Even without a weapon, the warrior can slay his enemy from a hundred paces. But the ultimate ideal is when the sword disappears altogether. The warrior embraces all around him. The desire to kill no longer exists. Only peace remains.
Nameless: Your Majesty, my task is completed now. My decision will cause the deaths of many and Your Majesty will live on. A dead man begs you to remember; a warrior's ultimate act is to lay down his sword.
[first title cards]
Title card: People give up their lives for many reasons.
Title card: For friendship, for love, for an ideal
Title card: And people kill for the same reasons...
Title card: Before China was one great country, it was divided into seven warring states.
Title card: In the Kingdom of Qin was a ruthless ruler. He had a vision - To unite the land.
Title card: to put an end, once and for all, to war.
Title card: It was an idea soaked in the blood of his enemies.
Title card: In any war there are heroes on both sides...
Flying Snow: How swift thy sword.
Nameless: Great calligraphy.
Broken Sword: Great swordsmanship.
Nameless: You didn't see my swordsmanship.
Broken Sword: Without it, I couldn't have written this calligraphy.
Nameless: Good calligraphy.
Broken Sword: Good swordsmanship.
Nameless: Broken Sword said "The people have suffered years of warfare. Only the King of Qin can stop the chaos by uniting all under Heaven."
Nameless: Halt!
Sky: What can a minor official do?
Nameless: This is my territory.
Sky: And?
Nameless: You are on the kings most wanted list; I am here to place you under arrest!
[lifts sword ready to fight]
Moon: I am going to kill you and avenge my master!
[first lines]
Nameless: [voiceover] I was orphaned at a young age and was never given a name. People simply called me Nameless. With no family name to live up to, I devoted myself to the sword. I spent ten years perfecting unique skills as a swordsman. The King of Qin has summoned me to court, for what I have accomplished has astonished the kingdom.
Old Servant: You Must Remember! Strong as the arrows Of Quing may be; though they will shatter Our Cities and destroy Our Nation, they shall Never Extinguish Zhao's Written Word. Today, I Shall Teach You the True Spirit of Our Culture!
Broken Sword: Is the sword the only answer?
Flying Snow: Since you wish to die, I will assist you.
[last lines]
Emperor's advisors: [in unison] This is the sacred law of Qin! If your majesty is to unite the land, this man has to be made an example of! Your Majesty, execute him! Your Majesty, execute him! Your Majesty, execute him! Your Majesty, execute him! Your Majesty, execute him! Your Majesty, execute him!
[last title card]
Title card: The nameless warrior was executed as an assassin but buried as a hero. The King of Qin went on to conquer all of the six Kingdoms and unite the country. As China's first Emperor he completed the Great Wall to protect his subjects. This was more than two thousand years ago. But even now when the Chinese speak of their country They call it Our land.


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I was inspired by this thought because of a lecture given by Sam Harris and the following discussion between him and Richard Dawkins.
Do you think science can say anything about what morality is.
I think it actually can and on the contrary Religion can't. It is an argument I hear very often by religious people. I think religious "morality" is very immoral because it is absolute. Morality has to be relative, has to be discussed and reasoned.
Furthermore I act morally because I want to. A religious person acts "morally" because he or she wants to be rewarded for it in the afterlife. I think this is very selfish and thus immoral.
You have to be moral because you want to be and not because you're told to be so because that in it self is immoral.
To act moral means to be ourselves, to be human and to be responsible for our actions.
Now the latter argument can be discussed or argued against since science has shown that there actually might not be a free will, thus it is questionable wether we can be held responsible for our actions.
What do you think? What can Religion say about morality?
Views: 544
I just don't see how (e.g.) AI as designed by other humans could be trusted to make such a decision for us.
A recent experiment showed that artificial evolution mimics biological evolution. So artificial entities can evolve morality, just like we did. But with enough research I believe that we can develop AI's that don't have the human failing of jealousy, prejudice, hate etc. And such AI's could make impartial decisions that are for the better of everyone.
In his Void Trilogy, author Peter F. Hamilton had this AI named ANA, well it was a technological singularity. It's personality was the sum of the personalities of all the people uploaded into it. By uploading I mean that in the books, humans could leave their bodies & live in a software world(& they could go back into a body, or meat bag as they called it). So whenever someone was uploaded into the ANA, their personality became a part of the overall ANA personality.
I don't think we can have the ANA anytime soon(but it would be cool if we could), but we can build systems that can help us a lot.
with enough research I believe that we can develop AI's that don't have the human failing of jealousy, prejudice, hate etc. And such AI's could make impartial decisions that are for the better of everyone.
But surely that's the point. Those human failings are a part of being human, and must be taken into account when humans make moral decisions. Why do we need computers or machines to do the job? Judge Judy not good enough for you?
Emotions don't usually help the cause of rationality and biases(which you didn't) are opposed to it. And us humans can't really help getting our emotions & biases in the way.
There is a small town somewhere in Texas where all the patent trolls file their trolling cases. Why? Because the jury pool is biased & is known for siding with the patent holder.
Over here in India, cheating in exams is a very common thing. Most of the times when a kid is caught, nothing happens. Nothing! And it's not even that someone is suspected of just peaking at someone else's paper, I've seen scores of kids allowed to continue with their examination after chits have been found on them. At most they are told to not give the paper any further if it was late in the exam or if it was early they are given a fresh answer sheet. I saw one guy had photocopied several pages from the book to a very small size & had sort of a cheating booklet. No action was taken against him when he was caught once other than not letting him complete his paper. And the reason so many of these cheater get away is because the invigilators don't want to screw with the kids career. The human factor comes into play.
So yeah, I think it would be better if we could have machines to aid us with our decision making by seeing things we couldn't or wouldn't see & by looking at things from various perspectives in an unbaised way.
Akshay - greetings to India.
A recent experiment showed that artificial evolution mimics biological evolution. So artificial entities can evolve morality, just like we did.
It would be interesting to see what moral values the artificial entities came up with. The results would, I'm sure, be very illuminating. We might be forced to examine our existing moral values in a new, fundamental way - and that must be a good idea. Still, ultimately - the selection and value-judgements of particular moral qualities will always have to be made by humans.
Texas ... India
Those are two interesting cases which you mention. Obviously, there is a blatant moral failure in both cases. What would be a solution? We have two possible choices of adjudicators - humans, or, like you say, machines. Humans are sometimes corruptible. Machines are never corruptible, if they are programmed and operated correctly. Also, like you point out, a machine could cope with many different scenarios, inputs, rules etc., like some kind of moral spreadsheet(!). So yes, I can see a case for using a machine to make moral decisions if there are no trustworthy human beings available; or to do a theoretical investigation. However, that still leaves the question of how to originate the moral rules in the first place. I contend that a machine is unable to do this - it is a purely human problem and not scientific or mathematical. I believe it is not too hard - just a matter of observing real life, and moral situations, and moral people, and picking out what works. Further, I contend that we can select a small, axiomatic set of morals which everyone [or at least, ALL "good", "decent" people] believes is good and always valid - an objective moral foundation.
Why do we even need an objective morality? Christians talk about it a lot. Atheists don't seem at all interested. The atheists are right - 99% of the time we don't need one. But the Christians are more right - we need it for the sake of moral solidity and philosophical soundness. Without one, we really are on shifting sands. There's no getting away from that. Without objective moral values, how do we properly prove that our actions are morally valid? I really would like an answer to that. I've never found one. I just don't believe it's enough to say, "because I think I'm right" or "because this group says so" etc. It has to be based on satisfactory foundations, just like every other area of knowledge.
There are rare situations where moral objectivity is absolutely vital in order for daily life to carry on. When I was younger, I was in that situation. Suddenly, I was unable to trust any of my own moral decisions and was forced to start again completely from scratch. I didn't trust anyone else's either - they were no more reliable than my own. The only solution was to find some abstract moral values which I could be satisfied were self-evidently true and which were easy to apply. I came up with "absolutely anything is allowed unless it harms others". Being an anarchist, this satisfied me. I didn't think of it - it was around already. Anyway - just that one rule was sufficient to allow me to get by OK until I could find a few more - which, of course, are necessary to do a proper job.
Other people for whom a set of objective moral standards is essential, could include newly-deconverted Christians. They have suddenly lost all their old moral framework, and need to find another which they can truly rely on. An individual, or group, is always fallible. The only solution is something universal - which by definition, no decent reasonable human being will disagree with. Hence, by a process of elimination, and from a purely human perspective, we cannot make an error in our particular choices of fundamental moral values if we take this approach. We can rely on them with confidence. Hooray! Just what we were looking for.
Akshay - what do you say to that?
Machines are never corruptible, if they are programmed and operated correctly.
I agree with this statement, but I'd also add that the if in it is a really, really big if. I'm fearful of people's feelings that there can be a perfect version of morality, and that if there is a perfect version of morality then some "objective machine" should be able to determine it.
Firstly, how can one ever know that a machine's programming has become and will be eternally perfect? Secondly, how can one know that a machine's owner will never have hidden, selfish motives?
Take for example a scenario where several civilizations living on different planets decide to trust one, so-called perfect artificial intelligence built by one of the planets. When could we really ever know that it's perfect, and know that we wouldn't just be forfeiting our freedom to it?
When someone keeps saying that reliance on some perfect, unquestionable version of reality will someday be possible, I just don't see yet how this perfection could ever be guaranteed, or who of us should be entrusted to vet it and grant absolute power to it. It just sounds to me like another possible, potent version of dogmatic religion.
Btw, a new TA discussion "Atheists cannot be moral" brought me back to this discussion.
What I mean is, the list of basic axiomatic values has to be as small and restricted as we can get away with, to ensure its universality. After all, as you may properly point out, humans disagree on just about everything.
Then, if we choose a value from this list, we can be confident that the value we choose will never be wrong. [sorry for 55 edits.]
Perhaps science can tell us something about why we act in a moral way.
It can, there are many books on the evolution of morality. Starting with Dawkins' Selfish Gene.
Gustaf, do you have a link to the original lecture and discussion? I am very interested in this subject.
Getting a copy of Sam Harris' book "the Moral Landscape" is your best bet. The talk is about it.
This topic has been the subject of some decent scientific study.
For a good summary, pick up Michael Shermer's "The Science of Good and Evil". Also, go to a science news aggregation site like Sciencedaily and search for "morality", like this: http://www.sciencedaily.com/search/?keyword=morality
Here's a related search that you may find turns up interesting tidbits: http://www.sciencedaily.com/search/?keyword=liberal+conservative+gene
In general, since we are social animals, behaviors consonant with cooperation and fairness may have been selected for during our long evolution.
I agree - morality is innate to human existence, and wasn't invented by religion. However. We often need moral guidance. We need to be reminded what is the right thing to do. This is why I advocate a simple axiomatic approach. It's fundamental; easy to figure out; easy to remember; easy to understand; and simple to apply. FOLLOWING THROUGH of course is the hard part.
When I make my 55 edits after making a post, do they all show up in your e-mail? I am never sure.


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The MXC-HD32X32S 32 x 32 HDMI Matrix Switcher is part of the MXCORE-HD line of modular switchers from Smart AVI. It allows you to route up to 32 HDMI sources to any of 32 HDMI outputs. Each input can be assigned to a dedicated output or a single input can be mapped to multiple outputs. The switcher supports resolutions up to 1920 x 1200 and can pass DVI and HDMI 1.3b compliant signals as well as embedded audio. The inputs are equalized to help restore weak signals resulting from an extended cable runs.
The MXC-HD32X32S supports Smart AVI's SmartControl GUI software application. Through this applications you can adjust the switcher's settings using a Windows computer. This saves you the trouble of having to code your own RS-232 control software. Alternatively, an integrated web server combined with the Net-IP-Pro feature allows multiple users to operate the switcher from anywhere in the world using a web browser. The web server also supports Telnet for integration with third-party or custom control solutions.
The unit is designed for rackmount installation. A single power supply comes integrated and a second, redundant power supply can be added if required.
|Video Bandwidth
|340 MHz, 10.2 Gbp/s
|Input Video Signal
|Video (TMDS) 0.5 to 1.0 Vpp
|Input DDC Signal
|Supported Resolutions
HDMI: 480, 720p, 1080i, 1080p
DVI: Up to 1920 x 1200 at 60 Hz
|Supported Standards
HDMI - DVI-D single-link 1.1 and HDPC 1.0 and 1.1 compliant
Sampling: 4:2:2 and 4:4:4
Word Length: RGB / YCBCR: 24, 30, or 36-bit; YCBCR: 8, 10, 12, 16, 20, or 24-bit
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|Input Card Slots
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|Output Card Slots
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IR Remote: 38 kHz RC5
Front Panel: 2 x 8 keyboard with 4 x 40 LCD
RS-232: 9600 bp/s on DB9 female connector
TC/IP: Web Server, Telnet
|Power Consumption
|Power Requirements
|100 to 230 VAC at 50 or 60 Hz
|Operating Temperature
|32 to 131°F / 0 to 55°C
|10 to 90%
|17.1 x 12 x 12" / 435 x 305 x 305 mm
|20 lb / 9.1 kg


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Photochemistry for Wellbeing of SocietyActivity by N.M. Sanjaya Hettigedara | added on May 06, 2011 | Sri Lanka
Sponsor(s): Unilever Sri Lanka, Institute of Chemistry Ceylon
A seminar on Photochemistry for the well-being of the society will be held by the Institute of Chemistry Ceylon on 17th June 2011 at the Sri Lanka Foundation Institute, Colombo
A seminar on Photochemistry for the well-being of the society will be held by the Institute of Chemistry Ceylon on 17th June 2011 at the Sri Lanka Foundation Institute, Colombo.(Registered participants only).
Presentations will be made by the eminent scientist who are experts in the relevant field.
Welcome address and Introduction to Photochemistry will be made by the President of the Institute of Chemistry Ceylon.
The main subjects discussed are:
Organic Photochemistry, A Personal History- Photochemistry of Solar Cells, Photochemical Sensors, Industrial Photochemistry, Photochemistry in Medicine, Photochemistry in Nano technology and, Environment Photochemistry.
Presentations by:
Prof. M.D.P.De Costa, President Institute of Chemistry Ceylon
Prof. J.A.Pincock, Department of Chemistry, Dalhousie University,Canada
Prof. O.A.Ileperuma,Department of Chemistry, University of Peradeniya
Mr. Asanga Ranasinghe, Managing Director, Unilevers Sri Lanka
Dr. R.Senthilnithy, Senior Lecturer, Southeaster University ,Oluvil
Prof. Pradeeep Jayaweera, Department of Chemistry, University of Sri Jayawardenepura
Dr. Ranil De Silva, Department of Anatomy, University of Jayawardenepura
Prof. Nalin de Silva, Department of Chemistry, University of Colombo,
Prof. K.R.R.Mahanama, Head, Department of Chemistry, University of Colombo
Opportunity has been provided for 100 participants to attend.
(Quoted by: A. M.Jayasekara, Programme Officer IYC 2011, National Secretariat (Sri Lanka)
Today, photochemistry has become one of the most powerful research tool in many fields of chemistry. Compounds of different atoms are formed through various photochemical reactions in the environment which may have good as well as bad effects on the animals as well as plants.
Solar energy is one of the most effective energy source in the world. Therefore harvesting solar energy by converting it to electrical energy is very important and development of new materials useful for such conversions attracted major research interest at present.
Applications of photochemistry in medicine are becoming very attractive. These applications are already in use for cancer treatments ,genes repair techniques etc. in the present world. Development of new drugs and new treatment techniques based on photochemistry are are emerging.
Application of photochemical and fluorescence sensors are very attractive in environment and biological analysis due to the low sensitivity and higher selectivity. Many researchers are developing these sensors since they replace unsafe radiochemical methods.
Use of photochemistry in nanomaterial is becoming an attractive research area at present. Developing of nano particles,which can do wonders in the future with the help of photochemical reactions,are coming very soon.
Basic knowledge in photochemistry and applications in photochemistry in different areas for the wellbeing of the society will be discussed during the seminar.
|celebrating chemistry, chemistry education, demonstrations
|industrial chemists, post graduate students, professors, educators, research scientists, secondary school students, women chemists, secondary schools students
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Specification link: 5.7 The 'image' element
The image test case checks to see if the svg image format are supported.
The rendered picture should match the reference image, except for possible variations in the labelling text (per CSS2 rules).
The test uses the 'rect' element, as well as basic fill (solid primary colors), stroke (black 1-pixel lines), font-family (Arial) and font-size properties.


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2010 Barnstable Brown Party | Kentucky Derby 136
April 30, 2010 by Jonathan Palmer
Filed under Arts & Entertainment, Centerpiece, Features, Jonathan Palmer, Music, Rich Copley, Slideshows
While the forecast is calling for possible flash floods for Saturday's Kentucky Derby, it was a flash flood of stars that turned out for Friday night's 23rd annual Barnstable Brown Party.
"This is my first Derby," said CBS newsman Bob Schieffer, the first celebrity to arrive. "I hear this party is over the top."
The idea of the party is bringing a little bit of Hollywood to Louisville's Highlands neighborhood.
Those stars were out, including actor Jerry O'Connell declaring his love for all things Kentucky, such as bourbon and the Wildcats.
And this year's gala highlighted local talent too, with Cats Coach John Calipari and members of the University of Kentucky basketball team on the guest list and the UK Opera Theatre on stage.
While he is departing for the NBA, Patrick Patterson promied he would be back for events like the Derby.
"I love Kentucky," he said. "I love the fans."
"JOHN WALL! JOHN WALL!" cheered Louisville fans surrounding the barricades along the front lawn of host Patricia Barnstable Brown's home.
And as the stars kept coming out, the cheers rained down.