Curious
Times No. 316
September 29, 2005
EXTREMELY EXTREME MAKEOVER
After years of ethical debates and moral negotiations, the world’s
first face transplant is in the final planning stages and will
be carried out as soon as a perfect experimental subject is found.
The field has been cut to five men and seven women who are undergoing
intense psychological examinations in their bid to become the
world’s first recipient of an entirely new face and identity.
The candidates have all suffered total facial disfigurement due
to extreme burns and are unable to have their appearance significantly
altered by other surgical methods. The twelve were also chosen
based on their ability to cope with the unknown but potentially
dramatic emotional and physical side effects of the radical procedure.
As well as months of analysis by a team of surgeons and psychiatrists,
the first patient will need to sign a waiver which acknowledges
that the surgery is so novel and its risks so unknown that doctors
are unable to give “informed consent.” The waiver goes
on to warn: “Complications could include infections that
turn your new face black and require a second transplant or reconstruction
with skin grafts. Drugs to prevent rejection will be needed lifelong,
and they raise the risk of kidney damage and cancer...After the
transplant you might feel remorse, disappointment, or grief or
guilt toward the donor. The clinic will try to shield your identity,
but the press likely will discover it.” (USA
Today)
CONDOMS FOR YOUR BRAIN
If
you’re a regular reader of this column you probably already
have your own Aluminum Foil Deflector Beanie to protect your brain
from mind control. And if you don’t know what I’m talking
about, head over to zapatopi.net/afdb
where you can learn how to make your own tin foil hat which, according
to the website, “blocks most forms of brain scanning and
mind reading, keeping the secrets in your head truly secret.”
However, if you need a head covering designed specifically to
prevent an alien abduction, you’ll need to go to www.stopabductions.com
for simple instructions for building your own “Thought Screen
Helmet,” a device which stops aliens from abducting and controlling
humans. The Thought Screen Helmet will block telepathic communication
between aliens and humans which will prevent aliens from immobilizing,
controlling, or abducting you. Only two failures since 1988, boasts
the website.
PSYCHOS RULE THE WORLD
More research has shown that the “functional psychopaths”
of the world are primed for success not only in the corporate
world but also have more success making profitable decisions in
the financial markets. Research carried out last year by Professor
Robert Hare of the University of British Columbia found that as
many as one in 100 people display psychopathic tendencies. However,
the study also found that those who did not become violent made
the best corporate leaders thanks to their ruthless and narcissistic
personalities. Further research carried out In the U.S. and Britain
has also found that “functional psychopaths” are able
to make far more money gambling in the stock markets thanks to
emotional impairments in their brains which allow them to make
high stakes risks with their money. So-called “normal”
people are unable to risk money even when the potential benefits
far outweigh their losses, which limits their ability to get ahead.
(Reuters)
SWEET DREAMS ARE MADE OF CHEESE
The British Cheese Board has claimed victory over the old superstition
that eating cheese before bedtime will give your nightmares. According
to their highly scientific and completely unbiased experiments,
72% of volunteers who ate 20 grams of cheese 30 minutes before
going to bed reported sleeping very well each night of the week-long
trial, with not a single nightmare reported during the entire
week. One of the “scientists” who led this project went
so far as to claim that cheese actually helps you sleep. “One
of the amino acids in cheese - tryptophan - has been shown to
reduce stress and induce sleep,” said Dr. Judith Bryans of
the British Dairy Council, “so cheese may actually help you
have a good night’s sleep.” The only mildly interesting
result to come out of this study was that two-thirds of volunteers
who ate cheddar before bedtime had dreams about celebrities. (sky.com)
HERE COMES THE PLAGUE AGAIN
As if we don’t have enough to worry about, incompetent oafs
at a bio-terror research lab in New Jersey have managed to lose
three mice infected with a deadly strain of plague. The mice escaped
from the University of Medicine and Dentistry in Newark, N.J.,
where they had been injected with various forms of the plague
in order to test potential treatments in case of a bio-terror
attack. According to the FBI, there is no public safety threat...
and they’ll stick with that story until people start dropping.
(ABC
News)
FROM THE BOOK OF COMPLETELY USELESS AND THOROUGHLY UNIMPRESSIVE
WORLD RECORDS
If your name is Pete and you can travel to Britain to get into
the record books you might want to check out www.thepetecollective.co.uk
where Pete Trainor is gathering 2,000 people named Pete in order
to break the record for the largest gathering of people with the
same first name. The record is currently held by 1,500 men named
Mohammed who gathered in Dubai last year.
“I READ IT ON THE INTERNET SO IT MUST BE TRUE” FACT
OF THE WEEK
Termites eat wood twice as fast when listening to heavy metal.
Copyright
2005 by Andreas Ohrt
