Of Mulder, Mushrooms, and Mad Science Writing

Why do I call this blog 'Mad Science Writer'? I can tell you that it does not have anything to do with all this exploration of the inner worlds I keep going on about.
` On January 1, 2012, when I published the first post, I didn't know much about hypnosis beyond what I learned in college, and nothing about psychedelics other than people telling me of their experiences. At the time, I did not see any reason to learn more about either of these subjects.

A previous satirical blog of mine, Introspection of a Struggling Mad Science Writer, is the actual origin of this blog's title. I really, honestly had no idea it would turn out the way it did.
` At the time, I was too afraid to be controversial, often chasing low-hanging fruit and the same sort of subjects normally criticized in the mainstream Skeptic community.
` But, as time has gone on I've decided, to hell with that, my plan is to push the Overton Window! And if everything in my life goes right, someday I'll have to wear a bulletproof vest, just like David Silverman!

I figure that his strategies of making non-religious people seem more acceptable, and destroying the religious memes that poison our culture would work for other causes as well. That's right, this man has given me ideas. Be afraid.

And if that isn't enough, I'm branching out into podcasting, so I'll be infesting people's ears next! I vow to understand the software well enough to get my first three episodes of Skeptophony online by April! And if I'm really ambitious, I'll do even more than that!

In the meantime, I'll keep writing about stuff. And even back-posting all those drafts I never finished because I've had problems sleeping. It's been rough.
` But since I've had a regular mattress and not been sinking into memory foam hell, and my third year of physical rehab is seeing me now in sight of normal physical abilities, and an utter lack of pain, I'm feeling up to getting some writing done now. So I am!

There are many topics on my mind, but for now will only mention that my mom texted me the other day that she was watching the newest episode of the X-Files (reboot) where Mulder takes psilocybin mushrooms. As though by magic, I was able to find this episode and watch it for myself the very next day.
` Having never seen this iteration of the series, I thought the bantering between Scully and Mulder was adorable, as well as with the two new characters Einstein and Miller. Some parts I thought really worked, but the whole 'mushroom trip' thing, well, that kind of ruined the episode for me.

Basically, they need some information from this exploded guy who's in a coma, so Mulder's harebrained scheme is to take psilocybin capsules in order to somehow reach his mind. As the episode revealed, the scriptwriters didn't seem to know jack about what psychedelics actually do.

Here are my reactions to what I saw on the screen -- Spoilers!

"Spiritual" experiences versus delusional thinking: Not the same thing!

While I've met quite a few people of atheistic and/or skeptic bent, who show enthusiasm toward transcendent experiences and even psychedelic drugs, most seem to show a casual interest if any at all.
` On the extreme other end of the spectrum, I've met those who seem to think themselves "above" subjecting themselves to such experiences for themselves.

Particularly the ones that promise a truly spectacular adventure.

One activist for skepticism and against quackery and religious dogma, outright told me that practicing meditation is a form of "brainwashing".
` I tried to tell him that it is actually an exercise that helps you to control your ability to focus and stop tripping out about so much stuff. It helps decrease stress levels, and thus seems to be good for your health.
` Though increased scientific study is beginning to scrape the surface of such altered states, he didn't want to hear about it.

The need to experience zen consciousness, egolessness, transcendence, or whatever you want to call it, is not in any way the same as the need to believe in a supernatural world. Unfortunately, I have noticed that it is common for those of skeptical leanings to confuse the two concepts.

Considering what I've been studying for the past few years, I'm convinced that so-called transcendental or 'spiritual' states are among the most important and life-impacting states of consciousness that one can achieve.
` As I hope to have shown in previous blog posts, a solid argument can be made that those who don't believe in supernatural or spiritual realms really do crave so-called "transcendence" when they say they don't; it's just that they don't understand what this term refers to.

What is this with the apparent conflation between the desire for transcendent consciousness and the desire to believe? In an email to a number of skeptical activists (none of them Geo), I included the following quotations and points of consideration:

I got the scanner working...

Not only is my scanner/printer out of storage, but I've found a way to use it with the laptop. And so, it is now possible for me to scan any number of the hundreds of drawrings from both recent years and farther in the past.
` Today, after about four hours of work, I have a whopping two scans to show for it. I'll get to why that is, but first, the images.

This is from when I first began to learn about psychedelics, around in late 2012 just before the world didn't end. Although it's in black and white, the colors seem apparent to me. What do they look like to you?

Glimpses of The Vegetable Mind, 2012

The intended colors are as follows:

Top left: Alternating red and chestnut-colored surfaces, with mother-of-pearl panels and various colored jewels.
Top right: Gold-spangled Champaign sky with weird little 'planetoids', reflected in a deep ocean of sparkliness.
Bottom: Snake-like, plant-like creatures which are mostly red and orange. They possess little 'tendrils' that shoot out of their bodies, then retreat out of sight. These tendrils, which are light in color, can be seen shooting by through holes in the sides of their bodies.
` Sometimes, they are found in cups around brightly colored pencils with pencil toppers, like the two depicted above (one of them meant to be pink and fuzzy). Why this might be is a mystery.

The second image for this post was originally going to be my second large psychedelic inspiration, which is a view inside of a dodecahedron of portals to various worlds. (A photo of it serves as my background image on Facebook.) Alas, for reasons I'll mention below, this one will have to wait.

Instead, here's a drawing I did around seventeen years ago. I left it sitting in my scanner while it was in storage, in order to remind myself to get around to scanning these old drawings. Well, that worked pretty well, didn't it?
` I present to you, this ancient drawing of three faceless women surrounded by friendly alien creatures:

Faceless Women on an Alien World, 1998

What is going on when you're spending the evening with a six-legged, four-eyed alien, watching some four-legged beasts in some kind of competition, with small creatures flittering through the air?
` I don't know, but this drawing was meant to take you there anyway.

The reason I call these figures 'faceless' is because I originally was going to put some kind of breathing apparatus on them. After all, if you're on some foreign planet, what are the chances that the air is even safe to breathe, especially with alien microbes in the air?
` I even went so far as to not draw faces on them, although I thought that looked strange, so I added just a suggestion of faces. I was also going to make their clothing look more like spacesuits, but alas never did bother.
` The result is... well... unique. I'll give it that. And after all this time, why bother completing it? So, I haven't.

In other news, what's going on with the scanner/printer? The scanning function doesn't work directly with my computer, although it does have an SD card reader.
` Here's the funny thing; I have a mini-SD card with a regular SD adapter, so I can plug it into the scanner. In order to get the scans into my laptop, I plug that adapter into a USB adapter.
` Ah, technology. Thank goodness it works.

As for the dodecahedron drawing, I was going to put two different views of it on this post (instead of the aliens drawing). It is very dense as far as detail goes, and I noticed (too late) that when I used 'Crop To Selection' in ShowFoto, it clipped off the other edges as well.
` I will not stand for this mutiny, especially after scanning this drawing three different times before it was centered well enough to get opposite edges in.

Next time, I will take care to use Windows for photo editing, because Microsoft Paint can be relied upon for simple tasks such as cropping.

Happily, I have tons of neat artwork, as well as photo prints that could use some digital archiving. Not to mention digital photos that I haven't gotten around to uploading on Flickr.
` And posts that I haven't gotten around to uploading on this blog. And podcasts, even videos. As the momentum builds, I should be churning out a lot more content soon enough!

Until next time....

Adventures and Aspirations. And more photos from my smartphone.

I'm at that long-awaited point in my life when my foreseeable future finally looks pretty good. For the past few months, I've been busy, among other things moving house yet again – for the lucky thirteenth time in my life!
` And, have been having technical difficulties getting more articles in my blog and podcast up and running. Also, there's been a huge amount of stuff going on, a bit of which I'll mention below.
` But all this has not been without having some fun and adventures in between! Not to mention, I've encountered Steven Pinker, Michael Shermer and Tony Ortega, all within in the past few weeks!
` And last month, I took a little trip to a place in Oregon where the giant sea puppies haul themselves onto a dock en masse and bark hypnotically.

Auuurt, auurt, auurt...

At The Amazing Meeting 2015, I told numerous people that I was about to publish the first episode of my skeptical podcast, Skeptophony. When I got back, I immediately began work on Episode 2 and try to figure out how to upload podcasts. And then I came down with a serious case of Con Crud and couldn't get myself to do anything until the end of July.
` Even taking a walk was too much for me at times. I discovered that if I just let myself take lots of naps for a few days, I seemed to feel much better than I had years. Which is especially dramatic considering the past few years.

` Able to get back to my normal, more wakeful schedule, I stopped being able to sleep so well. At the place I was living at the time, a number of factors interfered with my ability to sleep, and I was starting to realize this must be causing not just psychological problems, but serious fatigue and soreness that was really slowing me down.
` My body was unable to rest and recover well enough from the previous day, which also interfered with my physical rehab routine, so it became a slow spiral downward again.

Stay Tuned...

Writing this from my phone, I'm on my way to The Amazing Meeting, and wanted to mention that I've finally finished the first episode of my podcast, Skeptophony.
That's what I've been working on instead of finishing more blog posts. I haven't been able to upload it, so that will have to wait until I get back.
In other news, my cat Vada has died horribly, and I'm going to have to find another place to live. Never a dull moment.
I am looking forward to my trip, however, and will have to tell you all about it when I get back. Wish me luck!

Thanks to the U.S. obsession with chopping baby penises, my blog has gone viral!

I've also had a lot of amazing feedback, including emails, a few of which I'll proudly display here.
One of my initial fears in writing an article like The Foreskin: Why is it such a secret in North America? was that I wouldn't be taken seriously -- especially in the U.S. Skeptic community.

Two years later, I'm now in the habit of stirring heretical and counter-cultural thoughts among the Skeptics, and now on my blog as well. I'm far from worried that I'll be derided as "not skeptical enough".
` I received lots of praise when I finally got the chance to finish the post, not only from skeptics, but from other people the world over! No wonder this article got 211,288 views in the week preceding April 18:

Only ten days after that, the total number of pageviews was over 600,000.

Yes, the article itself is dated May 8, 2013, but that was merely the date which I saved the first draft. I'm not above retro-publishing blog articles, especially when none of the adjacent articles had been published either, and most of the intervening time has been astonishingly insane.

Now that I have my health, my own Internet connection, and even my own space to write, blogging and getting my facts straight has been easy enough to take on this enormous task.
` After all, it is heresy in America to talk about the foreskins' sexual functions, for the man and his sexual partner. Or to say that smegma is the normal fluid coating the various folds of female genitalia, and in larger amounts than in males.

Perhaps most shocking of all is that every day in the U.S., there are medical professional who diagnose a boy's normal foreskin as a birth defect called "congenital phimosis".
` A baby's foreskin is supposed to be attached to the head of the penis, which protects it from infection and debris, and it doesn't usually retract for several years.
` Some doctors consider this normal development to be an ailment which must be 'treated' by tearing the membrane that keeps the foreskin in place, and repeatedly washing beneath it.
` This causes severe pain and further problems, which are then blamed on the foreskin instead of the doctor's incompetence.

Just like most of the other mythical "problems" with foreskins, this belief stems from moral and so-called medical claims which became popular in the late 1800s. Of course, I've explained how all this came to be in my article.
` Persistent belief in such myths is a serious issue, but one that is not likely to end unless significantly more awareness is raised. And I have already done some of the work!

Here's a screen grab of my weekly stats for today, a whole month later. It seems I've had only 19,934 views this week, along with more views and comments on other posts!

Over two hundred comments on the same post!? WHAT!?!?!!

That's another thing -- comments! I've never gotten so many! (The numbers are much inflated by one very dedicated troll, however.) So far, none of the replies I've written have shown up in the comments section. I'll no doubt address them soon enough.

Also in that graphic, you can see my next article's title, Child Circumcision: Culture-based ignorance, fetish, and pseudoscience. It delves even deeper into the insanity, from inaccurate anatomy books and ignorant doctors.
` It even contains my discovery of circumcision advocates who are motivated by a particularly sick brand of pedophilia. These are the guys behind the website "CircInfo", as well as "BoyGuard".
` It is also filled with comments from people who were raised in various cultures, which demonstrate the cross-cultural comparisons I've been making.

My next three posts essentially wound up getting deleted, and one of them was about my blog going viral. So, now I'm doing it again!

Although I "thanked Blogger" for this apparent malfunction, I thought I should take the time to mention that I am thankful that Blogger is really easy to use, hosts my blogs for free, and even tells me my stats.
` I'd also like to thank everyone for their genuine feedback (i.e., not trolling). Some people even helped me to make a few improvements past the first version of this blog post.
` First of all, some commenters were in confusion over my gender, so I added a disclaimer mentioning my girly bits. I also got many emails, and here are several that shaped the various versions of this post:

Jen B

Fascinating, well-researched article...but I have a suggestion:

It's a long piece; the graphics help "break it up" a little bit, but I think it would be easier to read/digest (more people would read it in its entirety) if it were divided into sections with headers.  

Great job, though!

So, I re-read the article, found the 'natural' divisions in subject matter, and added the various bold headings. I also decided to add more information about the efficacy of condoms in preventing HIV.
` Many more emails came into my inbox, including this one:

For all the reasons you describe, we opted not to circumcise our son. We have a great pediatrician who told us never to let anyone retract his foreskin. When he was about three years old I was giving him a bath and he was playing with his penis. He pulled the foreskin back and the head of his penis popped out. He made a cute remark like "look what I can do" and I said "neat" and that was that. There was no blood, pain, or crying. He did it one more time after that but never again. ...

Part of your blog concerns me though, because it sounds like that shouldn't have happened until he was a teenager and that he could have somehow done some damage to himself. Again, he seems fine. He hasn't had any urinary tract infections nor does he complain about pain. He does touch his penis sometimes and I ask him why and he says because it feels good, which seems normal enough to me. Do you know if him popping the head of his penis out is normal or can you refer me to someone who would know? 

Thanks,

P.

I wrote back to P. and also added some more info to my blog, mainly that it's possible for a child this young to be able to fully retract his foreskin. It isn't likely, but it happens on occasion, just as it can take as long as age 18.


Then, to my surprise, I received an email from Sayer Ji of GreenMedInfo. I felt a bit strange accepting his request to allow him to reproduce my article on his website of interesting claims -- but I did.
` Even more comments and emails poured in, and later I found my article re-posted on yet another website! Ji forwarded me an email message from Frank, who wrote:

I congratulate you and Ms. Quine for her fine, informative article on the human foreskin. But one point, please, that is not so insignificant as one might be tempted to think: The article states categorically that the foreskin retracts upon erection (and, incidentally, spells out the obvious: that retraction exposes the glans). Autonomous, no-hands-needed retraction indeed sometimes does happen---BUT VERY, VERY FREQUENTLY IT DOES NOT...!!! I have not been able to find any statistics whatsoever on this phenomenon---but I know for a fact, from myself and from NUMEROUS other men's experiences, that even a moderately longer foreskin will continue to cover the glans DURING and AFTER full erection. ~~ That's important for two reasons: (1) it is a physiological FACT, and (2) its misrepresentation can make some men without autonomous retraction believe that they are somehow not normal. Heaven forfend that it should impel them to circumcision..... ~~~ Thanks for your attention.

And so, I went back to spell out this fact in my article. And, just to be rigorous, I gave it a little editing once-over, such as removing excessive instances of the phrase "to point out" near the end of the article.
` Now it's better than ever, including copies that had previously been made of it! Besides adding a link to this post at the bottom, will I make any further changes? Only time will tell!

I've also gotten a few responses from people who want me to know that the HPV vaccine is evil, and I wonder if I'll get sucked into a cycle writing about such things and any of Ji's claims as well?

In the meantime, I have a lot to take care of in my life. Another post is on the way. Thanks for reading!

Thanks, Blogger, for NOT SAVING my last three posts!

Now that my blog has gone viral, I've spent countless hours writing a lot of new material to keep my readers coming back.
` Unfortunately, my drafts weren't being saved when I clicked 'Save' on Blogger, so I have almost nothing to show for it. Except for some photos I edited for the purpose of making my blog look more colorful and exotic:

In March, my laptop was treated to a new Linux operating system, as well as an Internet connection via my new Android phone.
` My immediate thought was -- I must go back and finish some of my old drafts!

Partly due to a particularly asinine Facebook comment at the time, the first draft that sprang to mind was one I had left for almost two years, called The Foreskin: Why is it such a secret in North America?
` It's so secret that many doctors in America don't even know that the foreskin of infants doesn't retract (because it is fused in place), and so wind up damaging and even removing it because they believe this is abnormal.
` As for the population in general, the foreskin is popularly maligned as causing disease and hindering sex, when in fact quite the opposite is true.

People from most other parts of the globe are horrified and shocked when they hear about such ignorance:
` They would never assume that such a large swath of Westerners would think to impose such senseless brutality to their own unconsenting and screaming newborns, nor would it occur to them to believe such patently false myths.

Why do Americans chop infant penises, and what's up with all the misconceptions and misinformation about the foreskin? Why is it not represented, properly or even at all, in U.S. anatomy books?
` That's a history lesson that my article covers, along with the medical and biological facts. In great detail. Such great detail that many people report becoming upset upon learning these facts from my article. As they should!

On top of that was yet more interesting stuff that I couldn't fit in this article, such as a video showing the detailed anatomy and function of the foreskin. It is accurate, just like medical textbooks in Europe!
` There were also inaccurate portrayals I have found in American anatomy books, for contrast. I even found a video of a doctor claiming that the foreskins she tears off of screaming infants are not fused in place -- outrageous!
` Not to mention, I included pro-circumcision doctors who invented false identities and studies in order to promote circumcision of children, including for the purpose of preventing boys from masturbating. In this day and age! Really sick stuff.
` Also, I had further anecdotes and Facebook comments that show the cultural differences in people's opinions -- including the one commenter that prompted me to finish this article.
` So, I put that all into my last published post, Child circumcision: Cultural-based ignorance, fetish, and pseudoscience.

Blogger seemed to be working great at this point, so I went right into writing another article about hypnosis, an article about some cool photos I took (but never so much as posted to Facebook), and one about how my blog went viral.
` Each of these has mostly disappeared -- I say 'mostly', because only the first version was saved, whereas the almost-finished versions were not. Why? Partly because I was foolish enough to not check whether or not my laptop was plugged in, and it ran out of battery.
` When I plugged it in and turned it on, I could only recover the first draft on Blogger.

Why had it not continued saving my posts? And why had I not thought to save my progress on my laptop instead of on Blogger?
` I actually had been saving on my laptop before I had my own Internet access, and yet could not recover my files after my laptop would shut off unexpectedly. So, either way, I would lose my posts.
` Perhaps a memory stick would work better? The fact that this happened twice (once when I was working on two posts at once) should be a clear message to me that I'm the one ultimately responsible.

Even so, WTF, Blogger?

Really, I am disheartened by these losses, especially since I expected to greatly increase my blog production since getting a better operating system, my own Internet connection, and an excess of 700,000 hits!

As I've mentioned a while back, it's immensely easier to blog when I have Internet access and a place to sit that doesn't cause intense physical cramps, which themselves trigger serious emotional unplesantness.
` I not only have a chair in which I can sit without causing these problems, but I have two! I found the second one in the same yard as the first, and it's an adjustable office chair with a back support attachment!

In fact, I would like to announce that not only am I fairly well physically rehabilitated (particularly my back-side), but that thanks to these chairs as well as the rehab, the cramps take a lot longer to develop if I sit down in a chair that's too low for me.
` So, at least I've gotten my Internet and sitting situation well taken care of!

Of course, in the past three years there has been a lot of interference with blogging that really has had an enormous impact on my ability to keep up production.
` Besides the brain-destroying insanity, illness, and instability of crazy-making life for over two years, there was also the fact that the "Edit Posts" page didn't like to load up on Blogger a lot of the time.
` Until I started to be able to access it more consistently, this was a serious hindrance to my finishing anything I had started and saved online.

As of late, things have been busy and I've been having adventures, as well as moving my stuff in and out of storage. Not content with 50 square feet, I've been trying in vain to find a place where I can unpack and move into.
` I'll be back soon enough, typing more frantically than ever to keep this blog well-stocked with new material. Just as I have been.
` Except this time, I will make damn well sure that my laptop doesn't shut off before I can make sure it really has been saved.