Slashdot Mirror

There is no proof that Microsoft had anything to do with this, and I think they didn't. I believe what he said in the article, he was fired because of the ties @stake has with Msoft, not because they specifically called @stake and asked for him to be fired.

By way of comparison,
magazines that run cigarette ads tend to do poor coverage of the health effects of cigarettes even though those same magazines do all sorts of coverage on other health questions.

Now, do you think this happens because tobacco executives call the magazines and threaten them? Not!

Instead, it's just understood, by everyone who works at the magazine, that you don't do hard-hitting articles on tobacco as long as Altria (Philip Morris) is a major advertiser.

If you work at People magazine, for instance, you soon learn that as long as Altria and R. J. Reynolds and Brown and Williamson are buying full page full color ads, your editors won't be real interested in a lung cancer story. It's seldom necessary for your editor to tell you this. You work for People, you learn that certain stories aren't encouraged. And it's almost never necessary for RJR or B&W to say anything to People. Everyone understands the game. The tobacco industry almost never has to pull a few million dollars worth of ads to make its point. That's because everyone understands the game.

Now does that mean that Altria and RJR and B&W have nothing to do with the lack of tobacco coverage in People? Of course not! It just means that they very seldom have to show their hand. But they have everything to do with it. As does People. Both are complicit. The former uses its power, and the latter responds to it.

Both are responsible for the fact that, for instance, you'd never know from a People story that more women are killed every year from lung cancer than breast cancer.

The tobacco industry is a particularly ugly example, but there are others. Check out an eye-opening videofor other examples.

So it's a mistake to say merely because Msoft didn't make a call and ask for Geer's firing, that Msoft had nothing with it. Believe me, if Msoft was indifferent to it, @stake wouldn't have done it. And that's not how these things are done anyway. The story usually gets chilled out from indirect, unspoken, but very effective pressure. The unusual thing here is that the story ran at all.

Dead Trees are NOT just the way to be... ...at least in the medical professions.

Several medical studies have shown that physicians that use medical online databases such as UpToDate, provide better patient care. The medical literature changes so quickly that many books are outdated before they are released to the public.

In residency it was amazing how many "rare" diagnoses were made based on the ability to quickly look up a condition or situation on an online database. Plus, if you can't find it in uptodate or similar online consult references, you can always access PUBMED and review all the medical journals for the latest and greatest information on a disease process.

If you are a patient, you want your doctor going to the online databases and journals for information...

Davak

We're almost there...with bluetooth interfaces to implanted cochlear implants, and to visual cortex direct neural simulation stimulators, we can do away with the clumsy spinal taps with which Neo and friends have to put up.

Now, if we can just figure out how to teach the damn things to be suspicious of new acquaintances, we can beat the Borg via free-market alternatives to the one, monopolizing collective!

We're almost there...with bluetooth interfaces to implanted cochlear implants, and to visual cortex direct neural simulation stimulators, we can do away with the clumsy spinal taps with which Neo and friends have to put up.

Now, if we can just figure out how to teach the damn things to be suspicious of new acquaintances, we can beat the Borg via free-market alternatives to the one, monopolizing collective!

I wouldn't be surprised if it's something in their genes that turns off evolution. That there are genes that control how fast mutations can appear. Some species have these genes turned all the way up. Perhaps others have it turned all the way down. What's the mutation rate of blue-green algae?

Whoops... well, besides David Icke, also my dentist tells me to stay away from fluoride for the same reasons. And she also saved my father's life (literally... he had a bad bad bad case of dental abscess, which caused him to have liquid matter all behind his palate-bone...).

Ok, Ok, I am using my life experience which cannot count a damn in an objective discussion... I cannot convince you, but I am convinced :).

I'm against flouride in the water too, as some people are clearly allergic to it, but bringing the mentally unstable Icke into it is a very bad idea.

Ok, so let's ask the association ofParent of Fluoride-Poisoned Children which kind of research papers they foundscientific papers on the National Center of Biotechnology Information...

They might take your budget away for showing that you didn't really have a clue about biology? They aren't a magic wand. Take stem cell treatment for hearts for example - you have to have highly specific growth conditions in the laboratory culturure dishes to coax stem cells into developing as vascular cells. They're not just going to have a look round and think 'when in the heart, do as the heart cells do'.

By contrast, magnetic fields have a very measurable effect on the body. Your blood is composed of about 7-28 umol/L, or if I did the math right, about 1 mg/L. Take a magnet and rub it near a vein sometime. If the field is strong enough, you get reorientation of the red blood cells, and eventually clumping of those cells. In sufficiently concentrated doses, the health effects could be significant.

That's false. Red blood cells do not clump in the presense of magnetic fields.

There have been studies on the phosphene effect, where strong magnetic pulses cause subjects to percieve brief visual images.

Lawrence Livermore National Labs has a page on the harmful effects of very strong magnetic fields, upwards of 40,000 Gauss -- but such fields are rarely encountered. Typical MRI magnetic fields, by comparison, are typically between 5,000 and 20,000 guass. But even in very high static magnetic fields, the effects are temporary.

The big danger is for people with implanted metal, like pace makers or surgical clips.

Now, I did find a study on red blood cells in very strong magnetic fields that does suggest that they reorient, even in fields as low as 10,000 Gauss. No mention of clumping.

Your typical hand-held magnet, even a strong one, produces a field on the order of 4,000 Gauss. Not harmful.

The fields produced by any kind of transmitters mentioned in the article would be tens or hundreds of Gauss -- too weak to move a paperclip.

(The earth's magnetic field is about 0.5 Gauss, for comparison)

On the other hand, the LLNL page mentions that magnetic fields equal to the strength of the Earth's can disrupt circadian rhythm! And it has been proven that birds are sensitive to the Earth's field... so even small magnetic fields can have a measurable biological effect.

But FEAR FEAR FEAR is not warranted.

- Peter

It's not 'hard numbers', but then, a lot of people have already pointed out that hard numbers may not REALLY be what you want. (After all, since when is "Everybody's doin' it" a persuasive argument for a good scientist?)

On the other hand, I see there are still lots of applications listed at the Scientific Applications on Linux site and the NCBI Toolbox of Bioinformatics code compiles and runs just fine on my linux box, and BioPerl, BioJava, and BioPython all run just fine on Linux (there are even a couple of fledgling BioPHP projects out just getting started out there, which will obviously also work.

Disclaimer - both of the semi-active "BioPHP" type projects that I know of - Here and here - were started independently by individual amateurs...and one of them is me. Both projects are still in the early stages (Genephp has more code available at the moment) and have different development approaches, but are slowly working on trying to combine development towards a 'formal' set of "BioPHP" modules. Blatant plug - if you are interested in helping with friendly advice or actual development or testing, please join the mailing list which both projects use)

They've seen this effect on a whole range of animals. They've done this on rats and have even tried it out on monkeys.

One article from this NIH site seemed to indicate that, despite prolonging an animal's lifespan, caloric-restriction diets didn't seem to do anything about cognitive decline.

They've seen this effect on a whole range of animals. They've done this on rats and have even tried it out on monkeys.

One article from this NIH site seemed to indicate that, despite prolonging an animal's lifespan, caloric-restriction diets didn't seem to do anything about cognitive decline.

Is the guinea-pig a rodent?

No, the guinea-pig is not a rodent.

It seems that Nature is really into guinea-pigs!
This is a better writeup than the New York Times article, by the way. Although it does refer to them as rodents.

While I'm whoring, this page ought to settle some of the phylogenetic fracas here.

Is the guinea-pig a rodent?

No, the guinea-pig is not a rodent.

It seems that Nature is really into guinea-pigs!
This is a better writeup than the New York Times article, by the way. Although it does refer to them as rodents.

While I'm whoring, this page ought to settle some of the phylogenetic fracas here.

Its always great to see an underdog/specialty chip maker gain some market share, even if its in the mostly-corporate-lan-dominated arena of Thin-Clients.

At least Sun Micro's "Sun Ray" system will get some much needed competition out of this.

We use Sun Ray's here at work, and while they do thier job pretty admirably, they do have some quirky lock-up issues we haven't been able to resolve.

Your link was a bit off.

The BLAST manpage is more helpful, and contains a brief description of the algorithm. The algorithm incorporates certain assumptions about biological sequences that are not reflected in computer code. A good bit can be reduced to simple Bayesian logic.

here

Hmm... I wonder if a modification of BLAST would work. It looks for DNA (or protein) sequence homology of a given sample vs. the genome of an organism or many organisms.

It would be interesting to do something like take all the whitespace out from the source tree and tar all the files together and use it as a "genome" to BLAST snippits of (likewise "compressed") code snippits.

Normal (DNA) BLAST results return with a similarity ratio and go on to show where they are/aren't homologous. I'm not sure how it would deal with expanding the relatively small nucleotide "alphabet" to that of source code.

Hmmm..

currently, i'm employed at a major research institution as a postdoctoral researcher. One of our research projects currently is examining the factors influencing the transport of microorganisms in porous media (i.e., what happens to the bugs as they go into the groundwater).

One of the bugs we're looking at is Cryptosporidium parvum, a nasty parasite that was responsible for an outbreak in Milwaukee in 1993 that sickened something like 400,000 people and killed at least 100.

Interesting facts about crypto: It can be purchased over the phone with a credit card. With no previous clearance or paperwork or anything (at least as far as we can tell) to ensure that it is going to someone who won't misuse it. And it comes fully viable and capable of infecting individuals (as we accidently discovered a couple months back).

back of envelope calculations say that if we were to find a 1 million gallon reservoir, and dumped our sample in, (and somehow could mix it real well) there'd be near 1,000 particles per gallon. Given that it takes 1-10 to cause an infection, that's enough to infect the entire town i live in.

amazing. and all it takes is a credit card...

Office of Equal Employment Opportunity: Discrimination is defined in civil rights law as unfavorable or unfair treatment of a person or class of persons in comparison to others who are not members of the protected class because of race, sex, color, religion, national origin, age, physical/mental handicap, sexual harassment, sexual orientation or reprisal for opposition to discriminatory practices or participation in the EEO process.

Federal EEO laws prohibit an employer from discriminating against persons in all aspects of employment, including recruitment, selection, evaluation, promotion, training, compensation, discipline, retention and working conditions, because of their protected status.

I think the point is that you don't choose your race, sex, color, religion, national origin, age, physical/mental handicap, sexual orientation or to be sexually harassed. That is the spirit of EOE. If you choose to prostitute your talents for a morally corrupt company, then that is your choice and you accept the consequences.

Phillip.

1. Form a small business
2. Write Phase I proposal
3. Receive Phase I award
4. Write Phase II proposal
5. Recieve Phase II award
6. $$$

Check out the NIH SBIR page. You might be interested in the "Clinical Technology Applications" topic for the National Center for Research Resources (NCRR).

I don't see any reason why you shouldn't be able to get NIH funding and/or grants from other sources to build a low-cost or freeware EMR system with a well-written proposal and a knowledgeable Principle Investigator directing the project (you probably need someone with a PhD in Medical Informatics or an M.D./D.O. to be your PI). If you don't have a qualified PI to head the project yet, find one. You don't want to be perceived as a novice. The people you contact will likely be far more helpful the more you sound like you know what you're doing.

Since you're doing medical research, the National Institute of Health's SBIR program seems most relevant. You can also find the application forms and guidelines if you look around.

Since you're doing medical research, the National Institute of Health's SBIR program seems most relevant. You can also find the application forms and guidelines if you look around.

From NCBI.

You seem to be mixing two points together when you say "According to their study, there is an increased risk of fracture with increased calcium intake, not just milk intake."

Actually the study found that higher intakes of calcium from milk or other sources didn't by itself decrease fractures. The article I linked to before suggests exercise to reduce fractures. The other half of what was mixed into your statement (the actual increase of fractures) they claimed to be due to milk, again in-line with the article.

Basically, you drink too much water (or don't pee enough) and you wind up diluting the electrolytes in your blood. This causes disruptions in the transmissions of nerve impulses, muscle contractions, etc. Like I said, very, very rare, and hard to get simply by drinking too much water. You'd have to drink insanely massive quantities in a very short period of time.

That should work--for awhile. But consider all the other factors: those suits will have to go in and out of the shelter, as well as scientific instruments and other goodies; waste matter of various kinds; venting from the shelter (assuming emergency protocols for clearing out airborne toxins), etc. Obviously any attempt to avoid contamination would have to include some heavy-duty sterilization protocols, but [insert jurassic park reference about "nature will find a way" here]. Don't forget that bacteria survived for a few years in equipment left on the moon: Pete Conrad (Apollo 12) - "The thing that had the bacteria in it was the television camera. The Styrofoam in between the inner and outer shells. There's a report on that. I always thought the most significant thing that we ever found on the whole goddamn Moon was that little bacteria who came back and lived and nobody ever said shit about it."

So, finding life on Mars would seriously complicate setting up camp there, and probably require extensive robotic and remote exploration first.

The fact that you bring up sperm count suggests to me that it may be you who has been had. The best current evidence is that sperm counts haven't changed much at all in the last 50 years. Here are a couple relevant links:

Reuters article on male fertility study
medline reference, same study

As to the DDT issue, I don't find Prof. Wurster's letter terribly convincing since he doesn't refer to any new data to counter what seems to have been a vast flood of contrary data that came in well after the EPA ban to which he refers. Why don't we focus on eggshell thinning. Could you speak to the references (and summaries) here? Are you claiming these references don't exist, aren't relevant, are being mis-described, are nonrepresentative? Or, if all these references do exist and do show what they are purported to show, do you have some specific reason for doubting them?

I accept humans are animals and produce toxins. But you need to accept that other living things do too.

There is also a completely different plant, Bergamot Mint, which has leaves that are crushed and used for various purposes. It has a citrusy flavor that is similar, but different than oil of bergamot, which is from the rind of an orange species.

Just in case people don't realize... Harvard gets a tremendous amount of public money in the form of grants from the government. 100's of millions of dollars a year from the National Institute of Health... plus large sums from the Department of Defense, National Science Foundation, etc, etc... (for example, see the list of NIH grant amounts sorted by university here )

At a "private" school like harvard, this money is where the pay for the students education is coming from. Many (most?) professors at Harvard have their salaries paid with their grant money from public institutions.

A brief search of Medline turns this up:

Costentin J. [Recent neurobiological data on cannabis]. 2002

...We here report an evaluation of experimental data which reveal in animals a psychological dependence, common to all addictive drugs; a physical dependence, which is considered up to now as the characteristic of "hard addictive drugs"; the incentive effect that cannabis should exert on the inclination to abuse other addictive drugs, especially heroin; and finally the close relationships which seem to exist between cannabis and schizophrenia. Most of these recent data are far from reassuring as regards cannabis psychotoxicity....

Also, compare Lamarque S, Taghzouti K, Simon H. Chronic treatment with Delta(9)-tetrahydrocannabinol enhances the locomotor response to amphetamine and heroin. Implications for vulnerability to drug addiction. 2001

We examined the effects of a chronic treatment with Delta(9)-THC (0.6, 3 and 15mg/kg, ip) on the locomotor response to amphetamine (1mg/kg, ip) and heroin (1mg/kg, ip). Chronic treatment with Delta(9)-THC resulted in tolerance to the initial hypothermic and anorexic effects. ... It is hypothesised that repeated use of Cannabis derivates may facilitate progression to the consumption of other illicit drugs in vulnerable individuals.

Similarly, look at Seutin V. [Effects of nicotine and cannabinoids on the central nervous system]. 2003.

His reasearch suggests that "Both preclinical and clinical evidence suggests that nicotine is more addictive than delta 9-tetrahydrocannabinol. However, the intimate interactions that exist between cannabinoid and opioid systems within the brain suggest that cannabinoids should not be considered as harmless drugs of abuse."

The major study that everyone harps on was released recalled by the WHO, because WHO thought that the study was biased.

People like to treat this as a Civil rights issues - and it is. But it's also a public health issue.

A brief search of Medline turns this up:

Costentin J. [Recent neurobiological data on cannabis]. 2002

...We here report an evaluation of experimental data which reveal in animals a psychological dependence, common to all addictive drugs; a physical dependence, which is considered up to now as the characteristic of "hard addictive drugs"; the incentive effect that cannabis should exert on the inclination to abuse other addictive drugs, especially heroin; and finally the close relationships which seem to exist between cannabis and schizophrenia. Most of these recent data are far from reassuring as regards cannabis psychotoxicity....

Also, compare Lamarque S, Taghzouti K, Simon H. Chronic treatment with Delta(9)-tetrahydrocannabinol enhances the locomotor response to amphetamine and heroin. Implications for vulnerability to drug addiction. 2001

We examined the effects of a chronic treatment with Delta(9)-THC (0.6, 3 and 15mg/kg, ip) on the locomotor response to amphetamine (1mg/kg, ip) and heroin (1mg/kg, ip). Chronic treatment with Delta(9)-THC resulted in tolerance to the initial hypothermic and anorexic effects. ... It is hypothesised that repeated use of Cannabis derivates may facilitate progression to the consumption of other illicit drugs in vulnerable individuals.

Similarly, look at Seutin V. [Effects of nicotine and cannabinoids on the central nervous system]. 2003.

His reasearch suggests that "Both preclinical and clinical evidence suggests that nicotine is more addictive than delta 9-tetrahydrocannabinol. However, the intimate interactions that exist between cannabinoid and opioid systems within the brain suggest that cannabinoids should not be considered as harmless drugs of abuse."

The major study that everyone harps on was released recalled by the WHO, because WHO thought that the study was biased.

People like to treat this as a Civil rights issues - and it is. But it's also a public health issue.

A brief search of Medline turns this up:

Costentin J. [Recent neurobiological data on cannabis]. 2002

...We here report an evaluation of experimental data which reveal in animals a psychological dependence, common to all addictive drugs; a physical dependence, which is considered up to now as the characteristic of "hard addictive drugs"; the incentive effect that cannabis should exert on the inclination to abuse other addictive drugs, especially heroin; and finally the close relationships which seem to exist between cannabis and schizophrenia. Most of these recent data are far from reassuring as regards cannabis psychotoxicity....

Also, compare Lamarque S, Taghzouti K, Simon H. Chronic treatment with Delta(9)-tetrahydrocannabinol enhances the locomotor response to amphetamine and heroin. Implications for vulnerability to drug addiction. 2001

We examined the effects of a chronic treatment with Delta(9)-THC (0.6, 3 and 15mg/kg, ip) on the locomotor response to amphetamine (1mg/kg, ip) and heroin (1mg/kg, ip). Chronic treatment with Delta(9)-THC resulted in tolerance to the initial hypothermic and anorexic effects. ... It is hypothesised that repeated use of Cannabis derivates may facilitate progression to the consumption of other illicit drugs in vulnerable individuals.

Similarly, look at Seutin V. [Effects of nicotine and cannabinoids on the central nervous system]. 2003.

His reasearch suggests that "Both preclinical and clinical evidence suggests that nicotine is more addictive than delta 9-tetrahydrocannabinol. However, the intimate interactions that exist between cannabinoid and opioid systems within the brain suggest that cannabinoids should not be considered as harmless drugs of abuse."

The major study that everyone harps on was released recalled by the WHO, because WHO thought that the study was biased.

People like to treat this as a Civil rights issues - and it is. But it's also a public health issue.

Beri-beri is a nutritional deficiency (vitamin B1, aka thiamin); maybe you are thinking of kuru

To this question from the article: Some wondered aloud what, exactly, such a creature would be if it were transferred to a womb to develop to term.

Out of curiosity I went to the NCBI webpage to check both the rabbit and human Mitochondrial DNA. As you can see, the same genes are present in both organisms. This is not always the case, as different species have the mitochondrial genes split between the mitochondrion and the nucleus in different shares.

If you then bother to run blastn with both sequences (or even better, tblastx) you can see the similarities between coding regions are around 75% or more.

The more important a gene is in an organism, the less likely it will mutate over generations (and thus the less different it'll be between different species). Mitochondrial genes are quite important, so the rabbit mitochondria might work very well with a human nucleus.

Bottom line? If those cells can actually grow to become a fetus, chances are that fetus won't really be much different from any other human fetus. It's more likely to fail its development because of how crude our clonin technology is at this point than because of the genetic differences.

To this question from the article: Some wondered aloud what, exactly, such a creature would be if it were transferred to a womb to develop to term.

Out of curiosity I went to the NCBI webpage to check both the rabbit and human Mitochondrial DNA. As you can see, the same genes are present in both organisms. This is not always the case, as different species have the mitochondrial genes split between the mitochondrion and the nucleus in different shares.

If you then bother to run blastn with both sequences (or even better, tblastx) you can see the similarities between coding regions are around 75% or more.

The more important a gene is in an organism, the less likely it will mutate over generations (and thus the less different it'll be between different species). Mitochondrial genes are quite important, so the rabbit mitochondria might work very well with a human nucleus.

Bottom line? If those cells can actually grow to become a fetus, chances are that fetus won't really be much different from any other human fetus. It's more likely to fail its development because of how crude our clonin technology is at this point than because of the genetic differences.

These studies should not be slashdotted, they provide such a narrow perspective on some medical minutiae that, without the proper contextual info, and the references to the other (probably dozens) of studies on the exact same topic that showed either no effect or conflicting effects, leads consumers to make assumptions that they shouldn't be making, and that could seriously injure them. This one is probably safe, but have you done your research?

Dear god it hurts. How is it that someone so woefully missinformed manages to post all this bollocks and come away thinking he's done us a favour?

Dear god it hurts. How is it that someone so woefully missinformed manages to post all this bollocks and come away thinking he's done us a favour?

Listen Civil_Disobedient (261825), do yourself a favour, put down the muscle mags, stop listening to the idiots at the gym and go read some excercise science textbooks/research papers if you want to learn anything.

No. Most hermaphrodites have DNA for one person - not two distinct cell populations from two separately fertilized eggs.

Usually cases of "ambiguous gender" are the result of "testicular feminization", ... genetically they are XY males, but because of an inherited trait on the X chromosome from their mom, they develop physically as female ... partially or to the extent that only their gynecologist could tell the difference.

The two I remember from doing lab tests in a fertility clinic were very "female" looking. And no, we didn't say "guess what, you are really a man" when the chromosome testing came back because they aren't. The default state for humans is female unless testesterone is produced by the fetus AND the fetus responds to it.

Nope, Dolly was put down when her viral infection got too bad. This type of infection is not unusual to find in sheep that live indoors, as Dolly did.

True, dolly had short telomeres. But what's far more interesting is that cloned cattle don't have shortened telomeres ... I wonder how this horse's telomere will turn out.

A good selection of examples in my area (biotechnology and related disciplines) can be seen here at PubMed, one of my favourite reference sites. Some of these are very expensive standard texts, and I have actually forked out real dollars for hard copy as a result of seeing them.

I still find the printed page easier to read than the screen.

A good selection of examples in my area (biotechnology and related disciplines) can be seen here at PubMed, one of my favourite reference sites. Some of these are very expensive standard texts, and I have actually forked out real dollars for hard copy as a result of seeing them.

I still find the printed page easier to read than the screen.

Yes but that's more wishful thinking on the part of people who want to see it; the people who drink.
Southern France has a Mediterranean-style diet, which is healthier. They skew the results and make the whole country appear healthier.
I'm sure we could all spin it to our own advantage and find studies to support our own positions. MSNBC story
Link
You'll die without Vitamin A, you won't die from lack of alcohol.

(Yes, he's the guy who won an IG Nobel prize.)

Near-infrared neural imaging is already a very useful technique.

This is a new application whether or not you approve.
-j

Near-infrared neural imaging is already a very useful technique.

This is a new application whether or not you approve.
-j

Yawn, OK, whatever, if it were 67% it wouldn't hurt my point at all. But, it's not, it's more, from your own source (NIH):

Of new infections among men in the United States, CDC estimates that approximately 60 percent of men were infected through homosexual sex, 25 percent through injection drug use, and 15 percent through heterosexual sex. Of newly infected men, approximately 50 percent are black, 30 percent are white, 20 percent are Hispanic, and a small percentage are members of other racial/ethnic groups.(4)

Got that? Your reference says new AIDS/HIV infections in men are 85% from gay sex (65%) and/or IV drug use (25%).

I think you're misunderstanding the NIH stats, but it doesn't matter. Even with your interpretation, most people with AIDS (new or old cases, your choice) also have gay sex and/or use IV drugs. That's the insensitive claim for which I was taken to task. It has been demonstrated to be true now twice, with stats from two different sources that were both provded by the people arguing against me. I'm sorry that it's hard to accept that, but it's true. Please stop trying to force reality to come into line with your ideas of what you want it to be.

I can see your point for drug users, since they aren't born drug users, though I certainly disagree they should be banned from recieving organs. However, your banning of gay men from the program is ridiculous. Under your system, a man who is born gay should: A) Choose to remain celibate their entire life, so that in the event that they need an organ, they can be saved B) Live normally, and hope they never need an organ, because gay people don't deserve those organs, because they engage in high-risk behaviors.

Don't 'cha love that game? Low risk, but infinite stakes.

You forgot option C): start your own organ exchange club for people with AIDS or high-risk lifestyles and those who don't mind the idea of thier new liver possibly coming with some free bonus HIV. I'm guessing you really don't love that game -- since it's called Being Accountable For Your Own Decisions. It's not at all popular these days.

And, this line:

because gay people don't deserve those organs, because they engage in high-risk behaviors.

. . . needs to go right back in your ass where it came from. No one said being gay makes anyone less-deserving of life-saving, via transplant or otherwise. It DOES however, make an organ donated by a gay man or an IV drug-user worth somewhat less, in trade, than a organ from someone who isn't as likely to have a hard-to-detect infectious fatal disease. And this is exactly the point, since the original story was about an organ donor club that affords priority for donors (as opposed to common programs where your having agreed to be a donor or not doesn't affect the length of the line you wait if you need a transplant). This cute little straw man makes it clear that yo want me to be a homophobe who is against gays in general, but I'm not, and this is totally ruining your attempted argument.

Whether or not one is born gay (and I happen to think so) or becomes gay is irrelevant. Same for IV drug use. Gay sex and IV drug use are strongly correlated with AIDS. Causality is also pretty certain. But, I'm not trying to pick on gays and drug users here -- if people with red hair had a possible (but not completely detectable) virus in their livers that could kill me slowly and painfully if I were to accept a transplant from a red-head, I wouldn't want red-heads in my organ club either. At least not as possible liver donors. Sorry, but them's the breaks -- we're talking about survival, not how to hide pieces of the ugly reality that makes it harder to justify every possible lifestyle and make everyone feel accepted, special, and loved.

Frankly, I'm pretty sure my view is not far from what really happens in the donor club

NIH Statistics

New Infections
70% Men, 15% contracted from heterosexual conduct = 10.5% total population
30% Women, 75% contracted from heterosexual conduct = 22.5% total population

For a grand total of 33%, or fully one-third of new HIV/AIDS cases in America. Since there are anywhere between 10 and 20 times as many heterosexuals than homosexuals in America, odds are that the more and more heterosexual people are going to be getting HIV before things get any better.

If I read the statistics that you are using correctly, they are cumulative. In that case, your results are numerically correct, but misleading. According to the this page you get your numbers from, more than half of those people are dead. This is repeated in the page where I got my data. This means that new infections are going to considerably skew the dataset of living people with HIV/AIDS.

Your data falls prey to a different problem, also related to the fact that the numbers you use are cumulative: The disease was indeed, at first, being solely contracted by gay men and IV drug users. They had quite a head start, as it were. Any deviation towards a statistic on par with the population distribution of America would take a while. Again, going by new infections alleviates this problem.

I particuarily love this gem (emphasis mine, some removed from original):
I said, and I still do, that people with AIDS, AND people who admitted to gay sex and/or IV drug use would simply be excluded from this program as they are from current organ, blood, plasma, and bone-marrow donor programs.

I can see your point for drug users, since they aren't born drug users, though I certainly disagree they should be banned from recieving organs. However, your banning of gay men from the program is ridiculous. Under your system, a man who is born gay should:
A) Choose to remain celibate their entire life, so that in the event that they need an organ, they can be saved
B) Live normally, and hope they never need an organ, because gay people don't deserve those organs, because they engage in high-risk behaviors.

Don't 'cha love that game? Low risk, but infinite stakes.

Let's look at how many gay men there are in America. Estimates range from 5 to 10%. Let's go with the 10, for the purpose of arguement. There are roughly 292,000,000 people in America according to the US census, so about 29,200,000 gay people. Divide by 2, since gender is pretty well 50/50. 14,600,000 gay men. Let's also assume that everyone is as likely to die of AIDS once they get it. 42.6% of the patients are alive, so there are around 368,971 *.426 = 157,434 gay men with AIDS. That means that 157,434/14,600,000 = 1% of gay men have AIDS.

So you're proposing that all gay men be barred from recieving organs on the basis that 1 out of every 100 might have AIDS, and therefore be ineligible to donate an organ?

Hey, I hear that there are over 2 million people in prison (roughly .7% of the population)... does that mean that we should all be in prison?