Thursday, December 25, 2008

study 6.stu.001 Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire

Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire . Far fewer people suffer from mental disorders requiring treatment than was initially indicated by two national surveys, according to a reanalysis of them. However, some researchers argue that the revision understates the reach of serious mental illnesses in the U.S. population at large.http://louis3j3sheehan3esquire.wordpress.com

"Establishing the clinical significance of mental disorders in the community is crucial for estimating treatment need," say psychiatric epidemiologist William E. Narrow of the American Psychiatric Institute for Research and Education in Washington, D.C., and his colleagues. The outcome of this scientific debate is almost certain to influence political efforts aimed at expanding insurance coverage for mental illness.

Narrow and his coworkers probed the responses of 20,861 individuals surveyed from 1980 to 1985 and 8,098 volunteers interviewed between 1990 and 1992

(SN: 1/22/94, p. 55). Rates of mental disorders in these government-sponsored surveys were based solely on the presence of symptoms that met criteria for psychiatric diagnoses.http://louis3j3sheehan3esquire.wordpress.com

Narrow's team rated mental disorders as "clinically significant" if survey participants had reported that their symptoms led them to thoughts of suicide, made them seek mental-health treatment, or interfered markedly with their daily activities. Based on these criteria, the rates of any mental ailment for 18-to-54-year-olds in the year before each survey declined from 30 percent to 25 percent in one study and from 30 percent to 21 percent in the other.http://louis3j3sheehan3esquire.wordpress.com

These revisions represent a decrease of 13.3 million and 13.9 million people, with at least one mental illness, respectively, the researchers report in the February Archives of General Psychiatry. The adjusted rate for both data sets falls to 18.5 percent for all adults, they add, since mental disorders affect a smaller proportion of people older than 54.

Reasons for discrepancies in the rates of certain ailments between the two surveys remain unclear. For instance, the 1-year prevalence of major depression was 6.5 percent in the 1980s survey and 10.1 percent in the 1990s one. The reanalysis brought these rates closer together, to 5.2 percent and 6.4 percent, respectively.

The new study takes a necessary but still inadequate step toward assessing treatment needs of people with mental disorders, contend psychologist Jerome C. Wakefield of Rutgers University in New Brunswick, N.J., and psychiatrist Robert L. Spitzer of Columbia University, in a commentary accompanying the new report. Its clinical-significance ratings rest on self-reports, which likely understate the personal havoc wreaked by various symptoms, Wakefield and Spitzer note.

Moreover, they say, Narrow's group did not distinguish between clinically significant symptoms caused by biological disturbances and those that arose in response to stressful events.

The director of the 1990s survey, sociologist Ronald C. Kessler of Harvard Medical School in Boston, says the new report greatly underestimates the prevalence of serious mental disorders. Preliminary data from a new survey that he's conducting, which probes for symptom-related impairments more extensively than Narrow's group was able to, largely confirms the higher prevalence rates in his previous survey, Kessler says.

study 6.stu.001 Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire

Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire . Far fewer people suffer from mental disorders requiring treatment than was initially indicated by two national surveys, according to a reanalysis of them. However, some researchers argue that the revision understates the reach of serious mental illnesses in the U.S. population at large.http://louis3j3sheehan3esquire.wordpress.com

"Establishing the clinical significance of mental disorders in the community is crucial for estimating treatment need," say psychiatric epidemiologist William E. Narrow of the American Psychiatric Institute for Research and Education in Washington, D.C., and his colleagues. The outcome of this scientific debate is almost certain to influence political efforts aimed at expanding insurance coverage for mental illness.

Narrow and his coworkers probed the responses of 20,861 individuals surveyed from 1980 to 1985 and 8,098 volunteers interviewed between 1990 and 1992

(SN: 1/22/94, p. 55). Rates of mental disorders in these government-sponsored surveys were based solely on the presence of symptoms that met criteria for psychiatric diagnoses.http://louis3j3sheehan3esquire.wordpress.com

Narrow's team rated mental disorders as "clinically significant" if survey participants had reported that their symptoms led them to thoughts of suicide, made them seek mental-health treatment, or interfered markedly with their daily activities. Based on these criteria, the rates of any mental ailment for 18-to-54-year-olds in the year before each survey declined from 30 percent to 25 percent in one study and from 30 percent to 21 percent in the other.http://louis3j3sheehan3esquire.wordpress.com

These revisions represent a decrease of 13.3 million and 13.9 million people, with at least one mental illness, respectively, the researchers report in the February Archives of General Psychiatry. The adjusted rate for both data sets falls to 18.5 percent for all adults, they add, since mental disorders affect a smaller proportion of people older than 54.

Reasons for discrepancies in the rates of certain ailments between the two surveys remain unclear. For instance, the 1-year prevalence of major depression was 6.5 percent in the 1980s survey and 10.1 percent in the 1990s one. The reanalysis brought these rates closer together, to 5.2 percent and 6.4 percent, respectively.

The new study takes a necessary but still inadequate step toward assessing treatment needs of people with mental disorders, contend psychologist Jerome C. Wakefield of Rutgers University in New Brunswick, N.J., and psychiatrist Robert L. Spitzer of Columbia University, in a commentary accompanying the new report. Its clinical-significance ratings rest on self-reports, which likely understate the personal havoc wreaked by various symptoms, Wakefield and Spitzer note.

Moreover, they say, Narrow's group did not distinguish between clinically significant symptoms caused by biological disturbances and those that arose in response to stressful events.

The director of the 1990s survey, sociologist Ronald C. Kessler of Harvard Medical School in Boston, says the new report greatly underestimates the prevalence of serious mental disorders. Preliminary data from a new survey that he's conducting, which probes for symptom-related impairments more extensively than Narrow's group was able to, largely confirms the higher prevalence rates in his previous survey, Kessler says.

Wednesday, December 17, 2008

ants 4.ant.000100 Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire

Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire . Consciousness is overrated. With tiny brains and force of numbers, social insects have achieved most of the things we consider quintessentially human—farming, warfare, air conditioning—and have taken over the world. http://louis0j0sheehan0esquire.wordpress.com Ants alone weigh as much as the planet’s people, even before you add in bees, wasps, and termites. When it comes to pollination, composting, hunting, and gathering, these insects do most of the heavy lifting, and long after we have nuked/warmed/polluted/eaten ourselves to extinction, it is likely that they will keep the place ticking just fine. http://louis0j0sheehan0esquire.wordpress.com

Renowned sociobiologists and ant experts E. O. Wilson and Bert Hölldobler go so far as to call the most advanced insect societies—like the leaf-cutting ants, which cultivate fungus in air-conditioned nests with their own hygiene and waste disposal systems—“civilized.” http://louis0j0sheehan0esquire.wordpress.com It’s hard to disagree, although these civilizations are more Alien than Star Trek, dark and squishy worlds with buildings made from living bodies or stitched together by workers using silk-extruding grubs as sewing machines. Communication is mostly by smell, and it is staggeringly efficient: A milligram of a pheromone that ants use to mark their paths would lay a trail 60 times around the earth.

So what good is a big brain? It lets you work out what these social insects do, and why. Hölldobler and Wilson have done more than most in this regard, and their books—this is the follow-up to their Pulitzer Prize–winning The Ants, from 1990—are landmarks, yielding huge rewards to anyone willing to tackle the scientific basics. These guys make you proud of your own lumbering species.Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire

Thursday, December 4, 2008

california 222.cali.0000 Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire

Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire . The health of southern California kelp forests may depend more on the ecosystem's predator population than on the forest's access to nutrients, researchers report. The finding suggests that fishing practices have a profound impact on these ecosystems. http://www.soulcast.com/Louis3J3Sheehan

Kelp forests grow worldwide in shallow coastal areas with mild climates. The brown seaweed called kelp reaches from the ocean floor to the water's surface, usually spanning 10 to 20 meters, says Benjamin S. Halpern of the National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis in Santa Barbara, Calif. Along western U.S. coasts, these ecosystems support up to 1,000 species of fish, plants, and invertebrates, he says. http://www.soulcast.com/Louis3J3Sheehan

Ecologists have long debated whether the number of predators—such as fish that feed on smaller creatures—at the top of the ecosystem's food web or the availability of nutrients at the bottom of the web more strongly influences the condition of ecosystems.

Halpern and his colleagues studied kelp forests that surround the Channel Islands, about 25 miles off the coast of Santa Barbara. The group analyzed surveys of species' abundance from 16 sites around the Channel Islands National Park. They also examined satellite data from 1999 to 2002 on chlorophyll concentrations—an indirect indication of nutrient levels—in the ocean waters surrounding the islands.

The "top-down" control accounts for 11 to 20 percent of the ecosystem's pattern of species abundance, the team reports in the May 26 Science. The predator populations have 7 to 10 times as much influence over the ecosystem as the availability of nutrients does.

"No one has tested these two factors at the same time," says Halpern. "How healthy a kelp-forest community is depends primarily on which predators and how many of them you have in the community." Overfishing that depletes these predator populations could affect the ecosystem's stability.

"I think this is a very powerful paper in terms of suggesting the strength of top-down influences," says Robert S. Steneck of the University of Maine in Orono. "As we basically fish down global food webs in all these different ecosystems, we will in essence be restructuring communities."

James Estes of the University of California, Santa Cruz agrees that the work is important to fisheries management. "It provides further evidence for the notion that overfishing has a strong effect on the ecosystem. It's not just the [fish] stocks being taken out."

But Michael H. Graham of Moss Landing (Calif.) Marine Laboratories notes that the new study may have underestimated the bottom-up effect. He points out that the 1999–2002 satellite data cover a period without an El Niño or La Niña event, two weather phenomena that can have large impacts on nutrient prevalence in kelp forests. Furthermore, the satellite measures chlorophyll concentrations near, but not in, the kelp forests. Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire

Monday, December 1, 2008

Stephen Bassett 66.ste.0002993 Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire

November 26, 2008 at 22:34:46 Permalink

Open Letter to Barack Obama re: Truth Embargo


Diary Entry by Stephen Bassett





This open letter is part of the Million Fax on Washington, the goal of which is to direct one million letters, faxes and emails to Barack Obama calling for the immediate end to the 61-year truth embargo on formal acknowledgement of the extraterrestrial presence engaging the human race. The Million Fax on Washington is a project of Paradigm Research Group.

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President Elect Barack Obama

[Note: this open letter is part of the Million Fax on Washington, a project of Paradigm Research Group.]
November 21, 2008

Dear Mr. President Elect:

On October 17, 2008 PRG published an open letter to the candidates callingfor them to make preparations to end the six-decade truth embargo regarding an extraterrestrial presence engaging the human race. This letter reiterates that request. http://LOUIS-J-SHEEHAN.INFO

Your staff is now aware that letters, faxes and emails are arriving at your former Senate office and the Washington, DC transition headquarters. In general this correspondence will ask of you the following:

1) demand a full briefing from your military services and intelligence agencies regarding what they know and what they are doing about extraterrestrial related phenomena. If you are told you do not have the proper clearance for this information, replace that person with someone who has read the Constitution.

2) press for open and comprehensive congressional hearings to take testimony from scores of government witnesses who have already come forward with extraordinary evidence and are prepared to testify under oath.

3) formally acknowledge the extraterrestrial presence and finally end the truth embargo after 61 years.

4) make available for open development technologies which have been secretly studied and reverse engineered for decades with unlimited black budget funding. These technologies are derived from extraterrestrial vehicles and are now essential to overcome the environmental, economic and societal challenges of our time.

PRG is well aware of your intention to launch a high technology “New Deal” code named “New Apollo Project” to restore America’s economy. This massive program to subsidize green technology development, create jobs, expand the manufacturing base and reverse the trade imbalance will be likely accompanied by legislation prohibiting overseas hiring and offshore manufacturing. http://LOUIS-J-SHEEHAN.INFO

All well and good, but it will not be enough. The challenges are too great and the response to these challenges too long delayed. It is essential the paradigm breaking technologies hidden in unacknowledged special access programs and sequestered behind the extraterrestrial truth embargo be included.

If you are in need of counsel to assist you in these matters, you have but to turn to your transition co-chair, John Podesta. His efforts to end the truth embargo and release all relevant government documents date back to at least 1993 and the Rockefeller Initiative. PRG believes he is fully aware of the extraterrestrial presence and is committed to creating more open, transparent governance. In this he is in sync with the chief financial backer of his Center for American Progress think tank, George Soros.

Reach out to your party’s allies within the military services and intelligence agencies. When you take office conduct the necessary meetings with the cross agency committees managing the extraterrestrial presence issue. In the spring of 2009, before the truth embargo becomes your embargo, initiate the most profound event in human history and begin rebuilding the trust of the American people in their government and the standing of your country in the world.

Respectfully,

Stephen Bassett
Executive Director

Rockefeller Initiative: http://tinyurl.com/2o526u and www.presidentialufo.com/clinton.htm
New York Times: http://tinyurl.com/5mstsr
Coalition for Freedom of Information: www.freedomofinfo.org
Million Fax on Washington: www.faxonwashington.org
Paradigm Research Group: www.paradigmresearchgroup.org



Stephen Bassett is arguably the leading advocate in the nation for ending the 60-year government imposed truth embargo regarding an extraterrestrial presence engaging the human race and the planet earth. He is a political activist, lobbyist, commentator, columnist and conference producer. He is the founder of the Paradigm Research Group, the Executive Director of the Extraterrestrial Phenomena Political Action Committee (X-PPAC), the creator of the Paradigm Clock and the executive producer of the X-Conference. His work has been covered internationally including the Washington Post, Washington Times, New York Times, Legal Times, Roll Call, Christian Science Monitor, National Journal, Pravda and the London Sunday Express. http://LOUIS-J-SHEEHAN.INFO

Since 1996 Bassett has assisted many organizations and initiatives making the case for 1) an end to the government truth embargo, and 2) open congressional hearings to take the testimony of former military and agency employees witness to extraterrestrial-related events and evidence. He has appeared on hundreds of radio and television talk shows and in numerous documentaries delivering the message to millions of people of the likelihood and implications of "Disclosure" - the formal acknowledgement of the ET presence by the governments of the world.

Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire