Brain (science) Implant to Treat Depression

September 2nd, 2008 Admin Posted in Your source for sciene news and information |

By Robert Webb

Deep brain stimulation is a method to alter brain functioning. The idea behind this technology is that scientists implant a small electrode deep within the brain. This electrode delivers controlled jolts of electricity to the surrounding brain tissue. Depending on how it is placed, it can either increase or decrease brain activity in specific areas.

Deep brain stimulation has been used to improve people’s mood. The DBS device has been placed in several different locations to get an antidepressant effect. The area with the most evidence for an antidepressant effect is when the device is placed in an area of the brain called Broadman Area 25. This area is located nearer to the frontal part of the bain. In regular healthy patients increased activation of this area is associated with feelings of profound sadness. People with depression, on the other hand, have abnormally high activity in this area. So a DBS device can reduce activity in this area. In a preliminary study it lead to a striking improvement in patients with major depression. It can reduce the extreme sadness that is associated with the disease.

Researchers have also targeted an area of the brain called the nucleus accumbens. The nucleus accumbens is one of the main reward related regions of the brain. When a DBS device is planted in this area, it can improve anhedonia. Anhedonia is the inability to exprience pleasure, and it is a common trait found in many schizophrenic and depressed paitents. So the DBS device can increase the amount of pleasure a person experiences. A device in this area, though, has little effect on other depressive symptoms. Researchers have also found that a device in this area can potentially make a person euphoric. So they have to be carefull to adjust the device just right so as not to make the person too happy.

There are several other areas that DBS devices have been implanted in to improve mood. Another area is called the globus pallidus. The researchers were actually implanting the device their to improve a movement disorder, but they also found that the patient’s depression improved substantially. The lateral habenula is another area that may have antidepressant properties. An overactive lateral haenular leads to less serotonin, norepinephrine and dopamine in the brain. So decreasing activity there may increase those neurotransmitters and thus improve mood.

Deep brain stimulation carries several risks because a person would have to undergo brain surgery. There is even a minor risk of death involved, so this treatment may always be limitied in scope. However, in the future it may increasingly find use for treatment resistant mental disorders.

See my blog illinois brain injury lawyer and gene therapy and finally deep brain stimulation.

Is There Evidence That Carbon-14 Dating Proves a Young Earth?
By Russ Miller

As I discussed in a previous article comparing Darwinism to what is actually validated by real science, Carbon Dating relies on several assumptions which corrupt the reliability of the dates that it obtains. Although specific dates are not likely to be reliable, Carbon Dating really does support the biblical account that the earth was judged by a global flood in the recent past.

By the recent past I mean thousands of years as compared to the millions of years that are required by the Darwinian belief system, which does not allow for any flood of biblical proportions.

Although the Bible is not a book of science, it discusses nothing that conflicts with real science. This, I believe, is sufficient reason to consider that what the Bible says about a global flood should be taken into consideration by scientists sincerely seeking the truth about our world.

Look at it this way. If the Bible account of a global flood is true it would mean that just about every condition that existed in our world before this great flood would be drastically different after such a flood. And if this is true, it would very dramatically affect the test results of anything subjected to Carbon-14 dating that lived or existed before such a flood.

The Bible describes what sounds very much like a global green-house condition in which the planet was protected by a canopy which likely filtered out ultraviolet rays (the source of Carbon-14) and therefore made the collection of Carbon-14 very rare. However, Carbon-14 dating continues to be used without any regard to the possibility that a global flood occurred or that conditions that lent themselves to the collection of Carbon-14 might have resulted because of such a flood.

Scientists are caught up in a real quandary. For example, scientists generally agree that measurable amounts of Carbon-14 should decay away in less than 100,000 years. Therefore, since there would be no measurable Carbon-14 left to measure if the item had been dead for more than 100,000 years, Carbon Dating cannot assign an age to an item older than 100,000 years old, or older.

This is of particular interest because secular teachings claim that the Carboniferous layer formed about 250,000,000 years ago, which is 2,500 one-thousand-year periods of time. Therefore, Carbon-14 should never be found in this layer, unless the layer is less than 100,000 years old.

However, scientific studies on coal recovered from the Carboniferous layer reveal that all coal deposits still contain amounts of Carbon-14! In fact, never has any coal layer been found that does not contain Carbon-14.

By itself, this is strong proof that the earth’s strata layers, from which all old-earth beliefs have been derived, can only be a few thousand years old, and the only viable explanation how the earth’s strata layers all formed recently is that the world we live on endured a global flood sometime within the last few thousand years.

Russ Miller is author of The GENESIS Report Series. Register at http://www.new-earth-thought.com to receive FREE his 50 Facts vs. Darwinism e-mail series.

Is Potassium-Argon Dating Reliable?
By Russ Miller

When compared to real science, radiometric (also called radioisotope) dating methods used by Darwinian scientists fall far short of being scientific. Many wild guesses are made which corrupt the reliability of the radioisotope dating techniques.

Bear in mind that these radioisotope dating methods are not a measure of time; but rather a method of accounting for the amount of radioactive decay that has occurred within a certain type of radioactive element.

For example, consider Potassium-Argon (Ar-K) dating.

It is a scientific fact that Potassium 40 decays into Argon 40. It is also a scientific fact that a scientist trained to work with radiometric dating techniques can grind up a rock and very accurately measure the amount of potassium 40, and the amount of Argon 40, that is contained in the rock sample that he or she is working with.

These are plain and simple scientific facts that can be tested, observed, studied and repeated. It is also a plain and simple fact that this is where the science comes to an end with regard to the radiometric dating methods.

At this point in time, to derive the age of the rock based on the amount of radioactive decay which has occurred, several wild guesses, which are referred to as assumptions, must be made. It is these assumptions that completely corrupt the integrity of the radiometric dating methods.

The following examples point out major faults with Potassium-Argon dating:

Example No. One:

A scientist using the radiometric dating methods in order to ascertain the age of a rock must assume that the rate of decay from Potassium 40 to Argon 40 has always remained the same. Since no one was there to test, study or observe that the rate of decay has always been the same, this single wild guess, if incorrect, will cause the supposed age obtained by this particular dating method to be off by millions or billions of years.

Example No. Two:

A scientist using the radiometric dating methods in order to derive the age of a rock must assume that there was not any Argon 40 in the rock when the rock first formed. Since no one was there to test, study or observe that there was not any Argon 40 in the rock when the rock first formed, this single wild guess, if incorrect, will cause the supposed age obtained by this particular dating method to be off by millions or billions of years.

Example No. Three:

A scientist using the radiometric dating methods in order to get an age to assign to a rock must assume that the rock was never contaminated with either Potassium 40 or with Argon 40. In other words, everyone is supposed to believe that this rock laid there for millions or billions of years and was never contaminated by the elements being measured. We are to blindly trust that the rock never lost or gained either Potassium 40 or Argon 40. Since Argon 40 is a gas that can easily pass from one rock to the next this is an incredulous assumption, especially since it is well documented that heat, pressure, earthquakes and moisture can all cause contamination to occur.

As in the previous two examples, since no one was there to test, study or observe that the rock was never contaminated with either Potassium 40 or with Argon 40, this single wild guess, if incorrect, will cause the supposed age obtained by this particular dating method to be off by millions or billions of years.

These three wild guesses alone reveal the corruption involved in the radioisotope dating techniques. These methods are completely unreliable when used to obtain the age of any particular rock.

Russ Miller is author of The GENESIS Report Series. Register at http://www.new-earth-thought.com to receive FREE his 50 Facts vs. Darwinism e-mail series.

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