What's in the news?

[Blythe]

The IRS granted non-profit status to the First Church of Cannabis

Now that was a story that certainly made me grin when I read it browsing the news today.  :D

[Cycle]

The First Church of Cannabis' 12 tenets for living a good life are:

• Don’t be an a**hole. Treat everyone with love, as an equal.
  
• The day starts with your smile every morning. When you get up, wear it first.
  
• Help others when you can. Not for money, but because it’s needed.
  
• Treat your body as a temple. Do not poison it with poor quality foods and sodas.
  
• Do not take advantage of people. Do not intentionally hurt anything.
  
• Never start a fight, only finish them.
  
• Grow food, raise animals, get nature into your daily routine.
  
• Do not be a “troll” on the Internet; respect others without name-calling and being vulgarly aggressive.
  
• Spend at least 10 minutes a day just contemplating life in a quiet space.
  
• When you see a bully, stop them by any means possible. Protect those who cannot protect themselves.
  
• Laugh often, share humor. Have fun in life, be positive.
  
• Cannabis, “the Healing Plant,” is our sacrament. It brings us closer to ourselves and others. It is our fountain of health, our love, curing us from illness and depression. We embrace it with our whole heart and spirit, individually and as a group.
  

You know, I can get behind this list...  ;D

[Oniya]

High quality sodas are okay, then?  ;D

[Cycle]

Oh heck yeah.  I'm not giving up my Orangina even for the Church of Cannabis!!  ;D

[Lustful Bride]

The First Church of Cannabis' 12 tenets for living a good life are:

• Don’t be an a**hole. Treat everyone with love, as an equal.
  
• The day starts with your smile every morning. When you get up, wear it first.
  
• Help others when you can. Not for money, but because it’s needed.
  
• Treat your body as a temple. Do not poison it with poor quality foods and sodas.
  
• Do not take advantage of people. Do not intentionally hurt anything.
  
• Never start a fight, only finish them.
  
• Grow food, raise animals, get nature into your daily routine.
  
• Do not be a “troll” on the Internet; respect others without name-calling and being vulgarly aggressive.
  
• Spend at least 10 minutes a day just contemplating life in a quiet space.
  
• When you see a bully, stop them by any means possible. Protect those who cannot protect themselves.
  
• Laugh often, share humor. Have fun in life, be positive.
  
• Cannabis, “the Healing Plant,” is our sacrament. It brings us closer to ourselves and others. It is our fountain of health, our love, curing us from illness and depression. We embrace it with our whole heart and spirit, individually and as a group.
  

You know, I can get behind this list...  ;D

They need a tenant for playing fancy flute music whenever they smoke.

Spoiler: Click to Show/Hide

https://youtu.be/uV7v1S-Ob2U

[Mikem]

How can Cannabis be a "healing plant" if it contains Carcinogens. Granted many things do, but still.

[LisztesFerenc]

How can Cannabis be a "healing plant" if it contains Carcinogens. Granted many things do, but still.

  Most modern medicine has side effects far more significant than the chance of getting cancer from smoking cannabis. Is modern medicine not healing?

[Ironwolf85]

apparently heard on the NHPR that it has been recentely discovered that there is a city in Kazakhstan that at one time died of depression/faithlessness.
other people moved in and built over it...

if someone could find more I'd like to know.

Basically according to the writings they found some greek philosopher came to the small city and convinced them that their gods, and all gods, were false. It is believed the man was a Nihilist or Cynic.
Greeks didn't take these schools dead serious and citystates often threw them out if they became a problem. these guys took him 100% serious.

Over the next year the city lost somewhere around 80-90% of it's population according to the documents. Suicides, depression, animals dying because the farmers and herdsmen stopped taking care of them, and things like that. People even stopped having sex according to the monk keeping this old scroll.

>-> dat is seriously fucked up, an ancient city dies of mass depression. Even time has exaggerated the number the concept is kinda scary.

FYI: Nihilists were a group of philosophers who believed nothing mattered, and nothing will ever matter, screaming it at people in market squares would often get them thrown out. The Cynics were their less extreme decedent philosophy that said, people are naturally immoral.

[Aethereal]

Basically according to the writings they found some greek philosopher came to the small city and convinced them that their gods, and all gods, were false. It is believed the man was a Nihilist or Cynic.
Greeks didn't take these schools dead serious and citystates often threw them out if they became a problem. these guys took him 100% serious.

Over the next year the city lost somewhere around 80-90% of it's population according to the documents. Suicides, depression, animals dying because the farmers and herdsmen stopped taking care of them, and things like that. People even stopped having sex according to the monk keeping this old scroll.

It doesn't seem much different from literally half of the things I read in my philosophy course while we were going through the older materials. Keep in mind people wrote plenty of fiction and little philosophical pieces at that time, and had been doing it for many a century. Some more obvious, some less obvious... This story was most likely one of them. Cities could also be more easily wiped out by simple dearths and disease. (And the rest is mostly coincidence.)

       ...Church of Cannabis, huh? I certainly feel that people are overglorifying this plant. It doesn't do much good besides helping people relax, and dampening the effects of expression. On flipside, it also increases reaction time, may severely aggravate schizophrenia and over longer periods causes short-term memory degradation. (And you're most likely still smoking it, which isn't too good for your lungs.)
       Eh, but then again, people also voluntarily poison themselves with alcohol and smoke cigarettes. If we could replace tobacco by cannabis, I'd probably support it.

[Lustful Bride]

       ...Church of Cannabis, huh? I certainly feel that people are overglorifying this plant. It doesn't do much good besides helping people relax, and dampening the effects of expression. On flipside, it also increases reaction time, may severely aggravate schizophrenia and over longer periods causes short-term memory degradation. (And you're most likely still smoking it, which isn't too good for your lungs.)
       Eh, but then again, people also voluntarily poison themselves with alcohol and smoke cigarettes. If we could replace tobacco by cannabis, I'd probably support it.

Couldn't agree more, not to mention if it is ever fully legalized, itl only be a matter of time until the Tobacco companies find a way to own all the weed producers and in ten to fifteen years time weed will be to the people what Cigarrettes are to us now, nothing more than cancer sticks.

[Iniquitous]

...Church of Cannabis, huh? I certainly feel that people are overglorifying this plant. It doesn't do much good besides helping people relax, and dampening the effects of expression. On flipside, it also increases reaction time, may severely aggravate schizophrenia and over longer periods causes short-term memory degradation. (And you're most likely still smoking it, which isn't too good for your lungs.)
       Eh, but then again, people also voluntarily poison themselves with alcohol and smoke cigarettes. If we could replace tobacco by cannabis, I'd probably support it.

You might want to do some research before you start saying people are make much to do about nothing. It helps those with epilepsy ( http://www.epilepsycolorado.org/index.php?s=10784&item=5985 ). It helps those who suffer chronic pain ( http://www.harborsidehealthcenter.com/learn/chronic-pain-medical-cannabis.html ). It helps those with glaucoma, gastrointestinal disorders and insomnia ( http://www.livescience.com/6232-marijuana-glaucoma.html ) It is a natural pain reliever.

Oh and hey ...

More recently, scientists reported that THC and other cannabinoids such as CBD slow growth and/or cause death in certain types of cancer cells growing in laboratory dishes. Some animal studies also suggest certain cannabinoids may slow growth and reduce spread of some forms of cancer.

So, yeah. It is not over glorified. This is a plant that has been around and used for thousands of years. As someone who suffers from a chronic pain disorder, I wish I lived in a state that it was legal. I would rather put cannabis in my system than the manufactured crap that the doctor prescribes.

[Oniya]

My mother-in-law's doctor actually offered to prescribe marijuana for her chemo side-effects (she has Hep C), but my mother-in-law opted out - possibly because of the smoking aspect, and possibly because of the neighbors in her fixed-rent housing.

[Aethereal]

So, yeah. It is not over glorified. This is a plant that has been around and used for thousands of years.

So have been tobacco, alcohol, coke leaves, magic mushrooms, quite a few allegedly-abortion-inducing plants that has pretty much been proven to not work and a bunch of other things people decided to try out over ages. "It has been used for ages" is not a valid argument as far as medicine is concerned, really.

      I have done a fair bit of research, and most of the information is very conflicting - hence I only listed those things which are generally agreed upon.

[Iniquitous]

      So have been tobacco, alcohol, coke leaves, magic mushrooms, quite a few allegedly-abortion-inducing plants that has pretty much been proven to not work and a bunch of other things people decided to try out over ages. "It has been used for ages" is not a valid argument as far as medicine is concerned, really.

      I have done a fair bit of research, and most of the information is very conflicting - hence I only listed those things which are generally agreed upon.

I am not going to agree with you on this. I suffer chronic pain. I know what works to help relieve my pain. Ironically, cannabis has less side effects than the shit my doctors keep peddling to me.  And you can call the research you have done conflicting ... my personal experience is not.

[Lustful Bride]

I am not going to agree with you on this. I suffer chronic pain. I know what works to help relieve my pain. Ironically, cannabis has less side effects than the shit my doctors keep peddling to me.  And you can call the research you have done conflicting ... my personal experience is not.

Im all for Medicinal uses for cannabis, but not for recreational use. I know how it is in a way to live with pain since my mother has chronic pain as well from a back surgery that botched it all up.

So im all for anything that will get rid of a persons pain but a substance like that shouldn't be just out there for anyone to smoke like cigarretes.

[LisztesFerenc]

Im all for Medicinal uses for cannabis, but not for recreational use. I know how it is in a way to live with pain since my mother has chronic pain as well from a back surgery that botched it all up.

So im all for anything that will get rid of a persons pain but a substance like that shouldn't be just out there for anyone to smoke like cigarretes.

  But cannabis is less harmful than alcohol. Shienvien right that the exact effect of cannabis is disputed, but as far as I know, no one with any scientific credibility has ever argued that the impact of cannabis is worse than that of alcohol.

[Blythe]

Might be good to continue additional discussion about the medical uses and research on cannabis to another thread.  :-)


OT: A rare Annamite striped rabbit was found in Vietnam!

[Iniquitous]

OOOOooo it's so purty!!! I'd say I want one but I wouldnt want to take it from it's natural environment.

[Cycle]

Is it vorpal?

[Aethereal]

And you can call the research you have done conflicting ... my personal experience is not.

Personal experience is a fickle thing. What works for one person might not work for another, and the power of simply believing something works in and of itself often enough helps (which is a known factor that skews many a research - this is why we have control groups who don't know that they ain't getting the right thing).
       I am not going to dispute the side-effects of "typical" medicine, either. I know that those can be rather nasty, and some psychoactive drugs especially are as perturbing as it goes.

Shienvien right that the exact effect of cannabis is disputed, but as far as I know, no one with any scientific credibility has ever argued that the impact of cannabis is worse than that of alcohol.

It is somewhat milder than either alcohol or tobacco products (which is also why I said I'd probably support replacing tobacco products with cannabis products). Alcohol is a known killer and cause of irrational behavior - every day, at least someone accidentally drinks themselves dead and another few come down with long-term consequences and some more crash their cars [without digging up the statistics], and I doubt any of us can claim that they don't know anyone who hasn't at least thrown up from drinking too much. Tobacco is blurrier, but certainly more addictive (just compare the withdrawal symptoms).

[Iniquitous]

It's goo.. it's snot.. it's a worm??

Found this on the news and found it appropriately weird (and disgusting). Supposedly the pink thing is it's tongue... but if that is the case it apparently spits it's tongue out and leaves it behind.

[Cycle]

I think I'm going to go open up an account at Wells Fargo today.

Keep up the good work, guys.  Don't let the angry people stop you.

[Dashenka]

I think I'm going to go open up an account at Wells Fargo today.

Keep up the good work, guys.  Don't let the angry people stop you.

It's funny because:

"This is one way we as Christians can speak out – we have the power of choice," Graham, who who heads the Charlotte-based organization named after his famed father, wrote on Facebook last Friday.

he's talking about the power of choice, yet people making their own choices, are frowned upon. Religion like these guys do and free choice don't go together. So he's contradicting himself there. Not that anybody expected any less from a person as braindead as him obviously.

But yeah.... I'm moving from HSBC... if Wells Fargo have an option for us in Europe, I might even consider :)

[Warlock]

 

I think I'm going to go open up an account at Wells Fargo today.

Keep up the good work, guys.  Don't let the angry people stop you.

Actually one of those time I get tears in my eyes from a comercial.

"This is one way we as Christians can speak out – we have the power of choice," Graham, who who heads the Charlotte-based organization named after his famed father, wrote on Facebook last Friday.

he's talking about the power of choice, yet people making their own choices, are frowned upon. ReligionBut yeah.... I'm moving from HSBC... if Wells Fargo have an option for us in Europe, I might even consider :)

Have a love/hate relationship with his brand of Christianity. One the one hand their vile and putrid message is just that. On the other hand they actually help drive social change away from their position, which is good.



An old infection makes a comback in Spain after a two decade hiatus thanks to the efforts of Anti-Vaxxers.

http://apps.who.int/immunization_monitoring/globalsummary/timeseries/tsincidencediphtheria.html

[Lustful Bride]

drive social change away from their position, which is good.



An old infection makes a comback in Spain after a two decade hiatus thanks to the efforts of Anti-Vaxxers.

http://apps.who.int/immunization_monitoring/globalsummary/timeseries/tsincidencediphtheria.html

I seriously hate that Anti Vaccination has become such a large movement. I hope there is a deep pit in hell for idiots like Dr. wakefield and all those other people that have fostered this by tricking parents into not giving their children the proper medication. They're nothing but idiots and monsters.