Drugs

Hello to everyone! Today I´m going to talk about drugs and their effect in society.

According to the RAE a drug is a substance preparation with a stimulating, depressing, narcotic or hallucinogenic effect. When we talk about drugs we relate them directly to dependence, violence or addiction. However some of them have benefits for us or are used for medical treatments such as marijuana, may be used for asthma, spasms, muscle convulsions, pain and as an enhancer of cancer therapies in places like Germany, Italy, California and Holland. But it´s also true that drugs cause a lot of problems.

These lasts years the consumption of drugs has increased: alcohol and marijuana are the most consumed ones, and cocaine addiction increases every day. Nowadays young people like to try drugs because at first they cause them happiness and wellness, but the long-term effects can be terrible for their health: like the destruction of neurons; development of psychiatric illnesses such as psychosis, depression or schizophrenia; injuries to the liver; malfunction of the kidneys and nerves; development of contagious diseases such as AIDS or Hepatitis; heart problems such as heart attack; early death…

They also cause problems in our society, there are 4 million accidents each year because of drugs, 38% of homicides are committed under the effects of them, they are also cause for unemployment, family problems and divorces.

There are different ways to consume drugs: snorting, smoking, through injections, orally… Now it is very easy to get drugs, so you have to be very careful and not fall into this dangerous area.

Risks and benefits of Genetics

Nowadays, scientists are investigating and developing new ways of genetic modification. Great advances have been made through the years. Some examples are the production of insuline or animal cloning (like Dolly the sheep). Nevertheless, the science community doesn’t always have in mind that playing with life can carry some consequences. The study of these consequences is called bioethics.

In scientific language, bioethics is the study of the ethical aspects and the risks of life sciences (medicine and biology, mainly), as well as the relations of man with other living beings. Bioethics suggests that not all alterations or genetic operations carried out by human beings are correct. An example is the prenatal genetic alteration, cloning or chosen mutation.

These studies are related to all kind of science, but to resume we are going to focus just in the most important aspects of genetics that can have beneficial or harmful consequences which should be taken into account. The main points are: medicine, agriculture and food, environment and human genetics.

Regarding medicine, we can observe many benefits thanks to genetic alterations. For example, the prevention of genetic diseases, the production of medicines, different uses in forensic medicine and paternity tests or gene therapy. However, there are also some consequences, such as side effects from the consumption of genetically modified products or the creation of new diseases.

In relation to food and agriculture, genetics can increase the production amount and the nutritional value of food and at the same time increase the strength and duration of harvests, food and animals. But having in mind other points of view, that would mean a total control of the food market by multinationals in biotechnology.

Then it is the environment. On the one hand, modifications in genetic structure can produce biodegradable plastics or bacteria which feed in pollution. On the other hand, if the modified species are not controlled, there could be a displacement of natural species and genetic pollution could occur. It consists of uncontrolled transfusion of genetic alterations.

From my point of view, human genetics is the most questionable part of bioethics. I agree that this kind of development is important, and it is good to have knowledge of the full human genome, but the creation of human clones or altered people may be really dangerous. It should have some limits. Using it to avoid human genetic diseases is right, but if we start using it to create our own personalized children just to make them perfect...well, you just have to watch GATACCA.

Magic Places in the Province of Soria

One day in our last Easter holidays I decided to take a trip with my family. We decided to make a route along some interesting places from the province of Soria.

In the morning, we went to a small medieval village called Calatañazor. We walked through the streets of the village during approximately one hour and a half. We saw interesting things like the monument dedicated to Almanzor, a muslim warrior that was defeated in a battle that occurred in the village during the Reconquista; the medieval streets of the village, with the cone-shaped chimneys, very common in the zone; the architecture of the houses, and the shops selling typical souvenirs from the area.

In the highest part of the village, we visited the Major square, where is located the “Rollo” (during the Middle Ages, this was a place of punishment where the thieves were exposed for several days).

A few meters from the square, we visited the castle and we enjoyed the view of the area form the viewpoint located at the top of the main tower.

Then, we looked for a restaurant to eat.

In the afternoon, we travelled to a very popular natural place called “La Fuentona”. During the car trip, we saw the pine trees and the sabine trees, which are very common in the place. When we arrived to Muriel de la Fuente, the nearest village to La Fuentona, we left the car and we started to walk. Firstly, we wanted to visit the waterfall that carries the same water that drops in La Fuentona. During the walk, we enjoyed the sun, the green colour of the trees and the plants, and the crystalline water. Sometimes, the water was so clear that it looked green or blue. When we arrived at the waterfall, the landscape was magical. The waterfall only contains water after periods of abundant rainfall.

Then, we walked a few kilometers more until we arrived at La Fuentona. The river Abion is born in this natural lake. Under the water, there is a set of natural galleries. Some of them are under the water and others are above the water. There are some legends that say that the Laguna Negra and la Fuentona are connected through this set of natural galleries. It is not known whether these legends are true or not because the underwater galleries have only been explored 100 meters under the floor, the rest is unknown.

After enjoying in La Fuentona for a while, we returned to the car, with a little stop at a pub to have a drink. Then, we visited “La casa del Parque”, an ancient nobleman palace that is nowadays a museum about La Fuentona and the nature of the area.

After that, we returned to Soria but during the returning trip we visited “el sabinar de Calatañazor”, a natural place with hundres of sabine trees, that are very common in the region.

I enjoyed this trip a lot and I would like to repeat it a soon as possible.

Opening Minds

I think it’s quite necessary to talk about the LGBT collective. Even if  we think that it doesn’t affect us, it affects all of us. I want to talk in this blog about the problems related to these issues. It doesn’t matter how much the thinking of some people has evolved, there are many people who still do not realize that it doesn’t matter who you love if you are happy.

I guess many of those who are reading this blog have received a good education from their loved ones, and you will not think that loving someone of your same sex or wanting to change your sex is a disorder/illness. Unfortunately, many people think that it is. Not just people like us, teenagers; I am also referring to adult people sometimes influenced by religion. Yes, you might think that I am crazy, but I am not. In many countries, because of religion, if you are homosexual, you can be jailed or you can be directly sentenced to the death penalty, and this is real. It's scary to think that by loving someone you're going to have to live hard moments, because people are going to judge, humiliate, reject and hit you.

Fear, the fear of not being able to be yourself, of having to hide from your family, from everything. There will be times when you will have to leave everything to be happy. Because of the roles, because girls can’t want to dress with wide clothes, or go without makeup. Because men aren't allowed to put on makeup, they shouldn't go shopping. For all those heterosexual women and men,that have been judged because they didn’t follow the role imposed by their society. Because we live in a world where everything is labelled, a world in which you can’t be yourself, you have to be as society dictates. And no, this can’t go that way, we can’t keep on closing our  minds. We have to open our minds, open them to new things. Because it is easier to think “better the devil you know than the devil you don´t”, but that's not true.

All together we must normalize things: by educating the youngest and the oldest. Because everything we know and we will do in the future is marked since we are young, we have to fight, because you may not need it now, but you may need the help of someone in a near future. It can happen to you, to your children, or even to your friends. But, perhaps, demonstrations and claims are not going to be enough. It is necessary that everyone does their bit, organizing talks, normalizing things. Because I want a better future for me and my loved ones, that is why we have to be united and fight for our rights.

Brainstorm on GMOs

Hi readers!

Today I’m going to talk a little bit about GMOs, which stands for Genetically Modified Organisms, and I’m also going to explain my opinion on this subject. Before I start, I want to make clear that I’m going to focus on organisms meant for human feeding (mostly vegetables), mainly because covering the whole subject of GMOs would take massive explanation on topics I don’t even begin to comprehend. Having said this, let’s start.

First of all we have to know what GMOs are in the first place; according to wikipedia, "A genetically modified organism​  (​ GMO​ ) is any organism whose genetic material has been altered using genetic engineering techniques’’. And how can this be useful for us?

• They have given plants resistance to droughts, pests and diseases since 1996, and also increasing massively the average yields and its sustainability, decreasing the cost of production, and therefore, the general cost of products on this sector without decreasing its income to their producers.
• It can provide us with cheaper ways of obtaining bio chemicals, and hormones, like insulin, which can be now easily produced by genetically modified bacteria, instead of having to use full grown mammals, like pigs and cows, to extract the hormones from their livers.

There are thousands of uses more, but for the sake shortness of this post, you’ll have to research them by yourself.

Then, Why don’t we use this technology more often? The answer is ignorance. A great percentage of people think that GMOs are bad, mostly because people tend to smack gibberish about what they fear. There are rumours that say that GMOs can generate from economic crisis to cancer, but all of them are just nonsense, which may be originated from the misunderstanding of research articles to the association of nuclear power (which is the origin of cancer misconception) with any kind of genetic alteration. There are too many ‘’fiction tales’’ out there for me to explain them all, but I’ll try to give some basic ideas on this technology.

First of all, I have to say this, or I swear my head will explode: THERE IS NO NUCLEAR ACTIVITY INVOLVED. Having that out of the way, you can sit down, there’s a long path ahead:

• Opposite to popular belief, GMOs are exhaustively tested, and go through lots of laboratories and standards before it even reaches the soil (FDA,EPA,USDA,etc…), which means that you probably won’t have your ‘’tomaco’’ soon.
• Pesticides GMOs produce are much worse than ‘’old’’pesticides. Although it would be good news for farmers who unconsciously mix all the pesticides available like it was some kind of shampoo mix laboratory scientist we all played to be in the shower when we were kids, it’s not like that. Recent studies have shown how their pesticides only affect their targets, and don’t kill the bees or your children.

In conclusion, GMOs are too demonized, but if you research a little bit, you’ll discover they aren’t bad at all, and definitely not responsible of any dementors, wingardium leviosa or Illuminatis, just some ol’ regular veggies, that won’t kill people.

Hydrogen as fuel?

There is little hydrogen in the Earth. Most of it is in water mixed with oxigen, there is plenty of it there. However, there is a huge amount of hydrogen in other parts of our solar system, like the Sun or Jupiter, but there is a problem, we can´t reach it!

The only way we can reach it is by the electrolysis of water. It consists of separating hydrogen from oxygen using electricity. The problem of using electricity is that to make electricity we pollute. That’s why some scientists are trying to provoke this separation by using sunlight.

To make hydrogen efficient, we use fuel cells. There are machines developed by the NASA which combine hydrogen and oxygen to make heat, electricity and water. For instance, astronauts use fuel cells to obtain water and energy in the space. The technology is developing, but in the future fuel cells will be able to provide energy to whole cities.

Nowadays, there are already cars that use hydrogen as a fuel, it is fantastic! They don´t pollute! Cars manufacturers like Toyota, Honda and Lexus are working in the development of FCVs (fuel cell vehicles). These are hybrid vehicles which have an hydrogen fuel cell, which works with a battery to power an electric motor.

The only problem of having a FCV is that there are very few places where you can refill your car. However, if more people buy FCVs more fuel stations will have hydrogen to fuel our cars.

Contagious Yawning

Hello, what’s up guys? Today I'm going to talk you about something very curious and that probably most of you don’t know why it happens.

Yesterday, my father told me that on his way to Madrid by train he was talking with one friend when he started yawning; suddenly his friend started yawning too. Seconds later, one of the passengers from the seat in front of them, and another that was sitting next to my father, started yawning too. It was a contagious yawing!!! Does this situation ring a bell with you? Has that never happened to you? For example when you’re in a conversation with another person and he casually yawns. As you wonder whether he's bored with the discussion, you will find that you're yawning too. Also when a man;walking by, sees you yawning, and pretty soon he yawns; and it's carried on and on, passing from one person to another in a domino effect. It is pretty funny, but do you know why this happens?

Scientists are still investigating what makes us yawn, but there is a well-known fact: yawning is contagious. Scientists say that much of the yawning is due to suggestibility. You don't need to see a person yawn to involuntarily yawn yourself; hearing someone yawn or even reading about yawning can cause the same reaction.

Previous studies about yawing suggested that there is a connection between contagious yawning and empathy. However, then they discovered that contagious yawning decreases as people age and may not be associated with empathy. Now, a new study supports that it isn’t related to facts as empathy, tiredness or energy levels.

And that’s all folks! I hope that with this you have learned a little more about yawing and that you have enjoyed it.