sábado, 25 de abril de 2009

Pleonasmo

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qbm2w_T4laY

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: juliossbueno@...
Date: 2009/4/25
Subject: Fwd: Pleonasmo
To: Waldir Pimenta <waldir@email.com>

quinta-feira, 23 de abril de 2009

Já adormeceste assim?

Funny Sleeping Positions: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FFzkCJ8rE3c

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: spykew@...
Date: 2009/4/23
Subject: JÁ ADORMECESTE ASSIM?
Attachment: Dormir.wmv (2,660K)

quarta-feira, 22 de abril de 2009

Junkfood Science: How we’ve come to believe that overeating causes obesity

This is truly astonishing. The full article is long but if this excerpt catches your attention, do follow the link and read the complete piece. It's amazing how deep this myth has penetrated in our society and culture...

--Waldir


Excerpt:

...But the psychological changes that were brought on by dieting, even among these robust men with only moderate calorie restrictions, were the most profound and unexpected. So much so that Dr. Keys called it "semistarvation neurosis." The men became nervous, anxious, apathetic, withdrawn, impatient, self-critical with distorted body images and even feeling overweight, moody, emotional and depressed. A few even mutilated themselves, one chopping off three fingers in stress. They lost their ambition and feelings of adequacy, and their cultural and academic interests narrowed. They neglected their appearance, became loners and their social and family relationships suffered. They lost their senses of humor, love and compassion. Instead, they became obsessed with food, thinking, talking and reading about it constantly; developed weird eating rituals; began hoarding things; consumed vast amounts of coffee and tea; and chewed gum incessantly (as many as 40 packages a day). Binge eating episodes also became a problem as some of the men were unable to continue to restrict their eating in their hunger.

The act of restricting food and the constant hunger "made food the most important thing in one's life," said one of the participants. "Food became the one central and only thing really in one's life. And life is pretty dull if that's the only thing. I mean, if you went to a movie, you weren't particularly interested in the love scenes, but you noticed every time they ate and what they ate."

These experiences are familiar to those who've spent their lives dieting. In fact, many of the symptoms once thought to be primary features of anorexia nervosa are actually normal biological responses of undernutrition and restrictive eating. It was actually Dr. Keys' research that first evidenced the role of dieting in increasing risks for eating disorders.

The extreme physical and mental effects Dr. Keys observed led to his famous quote: "Starved people cannot be taught democracy. To talk about the will of the people when you aren't feeding them is perfect hogwash." This was also what led early feminist activists to see dieting and weight concerns as a way to keep women preoccupied with food, filled with guilt and self-hatred, more easily influenced by others, and too mentally and physically exhausted to succeed professionally and politically.

The aftermath

The last part of the Minnesota Starvation Study revealed perhaps the most important effects. When the men were allowed to eat ad libitum again, they had insatiable appetites, yet never felt full. Even five months later, some continued to have dysfunctional eating, although most were finally regaining some normalization of their eating. As they regained their weights, their suppressed metabolism and energy levels returned, although even three months after ending the diet none of the men had yet regained their former physical capacity, noted Dr. Keys.

While it seemed the men were "overeating," Dr. Keys discovered that their bodies actually needed inordinate amount of calories for their tissues to be rebuilt:

Our experiments have shown that in an adult man no appreciable rehabilitation can take place on a diet of 2,000 calories a day. The proper level is more like 4,000 kcal daily for some months. The character of the rehabilitation diet is important also, but unless calories are abundant, then extra proteins, vitamins and minerals are of little value.

In other words, they weren't really "overeating," it was a biological, normal effect of hunger and weight loss. The men regained their original weights plus 10%. The regained weight was disproportionally fat, and their lean body mass recovered much more slowly. With unlimited food and unrestricted eating, their weights plateaued and finally, about 9 months later, most had naturally returned to their initial weights without trying — giving scientists one of the first demonstrations that each body has a natural, genetic set point, whether it be fat or thin. Despite the fear that with unrestrained eating everyone would continue to grow larger, it isn't true.

As Dr. Garner explained:

One of the most notable implications of the Minnesota experiment is that it challenges the popular notion that body weight is easily altered if one simply exercises a bit of "willpower." It also demonstrates that the body is not simply "reprogrammed" at a lower set point once weight loss has been achieved. The volunteers' experimental diet was unsuccessful in overriding their bodies' strong propensity to defend a particular weight level. Again, it is important to emphasize that following the months of refeeding, the Minnesota volunteers did not skyrocket into obesity.


 
 
 
 

Astrónomo português na descoberta do primeiro planeta extrassolar semelhante à Terra

Astrónomo da universidade do Porto na descoberta do primeiro planeta extrassolar semelhante à Terra
21/04/2009
 
O astrónomo Nuno Cardoso Santos, do Centro de Astrofísica da Universidade do Porto (CAUP), participou na descoberta do mais pequeno planeta extrassolar conhecido, com menos de duas vezes o tamanho da Terra, anunciou hoje fonte da instituição.
 
Designado Gliese 581e, este planeta tem pouco mais que 1,9 vezes a massa da Terra e é o mais pequeno planeta extrassolar até agora descoberto e também o mais semelhante à Terra, revelou a mesma fonte. *
 
Nuno Cardoso Santos está integrado na equipe de astrofísicos que fez esta descoberta, liderada pelo astrónomo suíço Michel Mayor, do Observatório de Genebra.
 
O planeta agora descoberto gira à volta da estrela Gliese 581 (GJ 581), situada a 20,5 anos-luz, na direção da constelação da Balança.
 
Nesta estrela já era conhecido um sistema planetário com um 'Netuno' (GJ 581b) e duas 'super-Terras' (GJ 581c, GJ 581d).
 
Esta mesma equipe de investigadores também determinou com maior precisão os parâmetros orbitais destes planetas, concluindo que o planeta Gliese 581d se encontra na zona de habitabilidade da estrela, ou seja, a região em torno da estrela com as condições necessárias para que permita a existência de água líquida em um planeta do seu sistema.
 
O professor Michel Mayor considera que "o Santo Graal da atual procura de planetas extrassolares é a detecção de um planeta rochoso, semelhante à Terra e dentro da zona de habitabilidade da respectiva estrela, fator essencial para o desenvolvimento de vida". "A descoberta deste novo planeta demonstra que o sonho de encontrar novas Terras está cada vez mais próximo. Com a experiência adquirida e os excelentes resultados obtidos, estamos convictos que a nova geração de detectores, como o ESPRESSO, nos permitirá ir mais longe", disse Nuno Cardoso Santos.
 
ESPRESSO é um novo detector que está sendo desenvolvido para o observatório VLT (ESO - European Southern Observatory), projecto no qual o CAUP participa.
 
Os resultados agora apresentados resultam de mais de quatro anos de observações, usando o mais produtivo caçador de planetas extrassolares de pequena massa, o espectrógrafo HARPS, instalado no telescópio 'ESO 3.6-m', em La Silla (Chile).
 
Com a descoberta do Gliese 581e, este sistema planetário passa a contar com quatro planetas conhecidos, sendo as respectivas massas equivalentes a 1,9 (GJ 581e), 16 (GJ 581b), cinco (GJ 581c) e sete (GJ 581d) massas terrestres.
 
O planeta GJ 581e necessita apenas de 3,15 dias para completar uma órbita em torno da sua estrela.
 
Xavier Bonfils, do Observatório de Grenoble (França) disse a propósito desta descoberta que "este é o menor dos planetas extrassolares detectados e é muito provavelmente rochoso".
 
Estes planetas foram descobertos através da medição das ínfimas deslocações da estrela causadas pela força de gravidade dos planetas à medida que giram à sua volta. **
 
O primeiro planeta extrassolar foi descoberto em 1995, em redor da estrela Pegasus e foi denominado Pegasus 51b. ***
 
"A massa do Gliese 581e é 80 vezes menor do que a do planeta e Pegasus 51b. Trata-se de um progresso fabuloso em apenas 14 anos", afirma Michel Mayor.
 
Fonte: Correio do Minho, link: http://www.correiodominho.pt/noticias.php?id=5488

________________________________________________________________________________

* A Wikipédia tem uma lista completa dos planetas mais parecidos com a Terra até hoje descobertos, em factores como tamanho, distância à estrela, duração do ano e temperatura: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terrestrial_planet#Most_Earthlike_exoplanets

**
mais informações sobre este método:

The method of discovery primarily implemented is studying the Doppler wobble of stars. As a planet orbits its parent star, its gravitational pull causes the star to wobble. Using the Doppler Effect, the scientists are able to determine the velocity of the planet. When the planet moves away from Earth, its star moves toward the Earth, causing it to emit shorter wavelengths, which appear bluer. The opposite is true as well; as a planet moves closer to Earth, its star moves further away, emitting longer (redder) wavelengths of light. The AAPS uses highly advanced, sensitive spectrographs to record these very small wavelengths.

fonte: Are We On the Brink of Finding a Second Earth? NASA/Harvard Teams Say "It Could Happen Anytime Now" - http://www.dailygalaxy.com/my_weblog/2009/03/nasa-harvard-an.html

*** Ver lista completa de exoplanetas já descobertos (76 confirmados e 253 candidatos, à data de hoje) em: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_extrasolar_planets

sábado, 18 de abril de 2009

120 seconds of "Ouch!"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gqFC3Mkpfwo

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: carlimas@...
Date: Fri, Aug 1, 2008 at 10:34 PM
Subject: Fwd: FW: 120 segundos de asneiras

sábado, 11 de abril de 2009

Not for people with fear of flying...

Very rough crosswind landing:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F2PwB5QCISQ

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: carlimas@...
Date: Sat, Apr 11, 2009 at 12:54 AM
Subject: Fwd: Vejam esta aterrajem...
Attachment: Swiss Avro ldg LCY.wmv ( 973K )




sexta-feira, 10 de abril de 2009

River Dance (Irish Tap Dancing) amazing!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B718RsboGEI

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: carlimas@...
Date: Fri, Apr 10, 2009 at 9:35 PM
Subject: Fwd: FW: BALLET RUSSO ( absolutamentefantástico ...)
Attachment: Team Work.wmv (5,257K)