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Topics - Super Irish

Pages: 12
31
Serious / First *full body transplant* to occur in 2017
« on: April 10, 2015, 01:55:05 PM »
Popped up on Reddit recently, and this sciency article explains how they are going to transplant a 30 year--old paraplegic's head onto a brain dead body, around 2017, as someone recently volunteered for it (a not-so sciency article).

Main points below:
Quote
The idea was first proposed in 2013 by Sergio Canavero of the Turin Advanced Neuromodulation Group in Italy. He wants to use the surgery to extend the lives of people whose muscles and nerves have degenerated or whose organs are riddled with cancer. Now he claims the major hurdles, such as fusing the spinal cord and preventing the body's immune system from rejecting the head, are surmountable, and the surgery could be ready as early as 2017.

This month (February), he published a summary of the technique he believes will allow doctors to transplant a head onto a new body, involving cooling the recipient's head and the donor body to extend the time their cells can survive without oxygen. The tissue around the neck is dissected and the major blood vessels are linked using tiny tubes, before the spinal cords of each person are cut. Cleanly severing the cords is key, says Canavero.

The recipient's head is then moved onto the donor body and the two ends of the spinal cord – which resemble two densely packed bundles of spaghetti – are fused together. To achieve this, Canavero intends to flush the area with a chemical called polyethylene glycol, and follow up with several hours of injections of the same stuff. Just like hot water makes dry spaghetti stick together, polyethylene glycol encourages the fat in cell membranes to mesh. Next, the muscles and blood supply would be sutured and the recipient kept in a coma for three or four weeks to prevent movement. Implanted electrodes would provide regular electrical stimulation to the spinal cord, because research suggests this can strengthen new nerve connections.

When the recipient wakes up, Canavero predicts they would be able to move and feel their face and would speak with the same voice. He says that physiotherapy would enable the person to walk within a year.

The trickiest part will be getting the spinal cords to fuse. Polyethylene glycol has been shown to prompt the growth of spinal cord nerves in animals, and Canavero intends to use brain-dead organ donors to test the technique. However, others are sceptical that this would be enough. "There is no evidence that the connectivity of cord and brain would lead to useful sentient or motor function following head transplantation," says Richard Borgens, director of the Center for Paralysis Research at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana.

TLDR: FULL FUCKING BODY TRANSPLANT, AS IN CUTTING OFF A HEAD AND SHOVING IT ONTO ANOTHER BODY, SOONISH

So, we are heading into a Sci-Fi dystopian novel with this barely being considered possible with today's medical technology and techniques.What do you think?




32
Gaming / Anyone play ArmA III?
« on: April 08, 2015, 10:20:46 AM »
Just wanted to know if there was enough to form a squad and try out retarded tactics on Insurgency.If there's say, 4 or 5, I'll try and organise a game night.

33
The Flood / Steam Copy of Spec Ops: The Line -COMPETITION CLOSED-
« on: March 27, 2015, 07:11:13 PM »
Saw some good deals on Humble Bundle today, so I bought a few 2k games. Thing is, with each 2k game I got, it came bundled with a copy of SO:TL, so here I am with one copy for myself and one spare...

Simply post in this thread and I'll enter into a random list generator, and the first one on that list wins it.

EDIT: COMPETITORS ENTERED, WINNER BELOW

The Winner is: Gatsby! The Steam key is on your way, enjoy!

Quote
There were 16 items in your list. Here they are in random order:

Gats
Yu
ChallengerX
Decimator Omega
GethKhilafah
BritishLemon
S\ash
Jim
Berzerk Commando
LC
Flee
Kupo
Mbr
ねこ
The Lord Ruler
Rinev Jeqkogo
Timestamp: 2015-03-28 17:31:48 UTC

34
The Flood / Was perusing Lidl today when suddenly...
« on: March 21, 2015, 07:31:00 PM »


Bought it instantly. Tasty shit.

Discuss food with funny names.

35
http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/31822842
Quote
Ireland has accidently legalised ecstasy, crystal meth and ketamine.

A legal loophole means that you cannot be arrested for possession until the new legislation is passed.
It does not affect existing laws regarding the supply, possession or the sale of older, more established drugs such as heroin or cocaine, just newer ones.The Irish Minister for Health is introducing emergency legislation on Tuesday night to close the loophole.

Ireland's 1977 Misuse of Drugs Act was found unconstitutional by the Irish Court of Appeal on Tuesday morning because both houses of Irish parliament had not agreed to the new additions, meaning that the drugs currently prohibited by the Act are legal.This includes up to 100 drugs, including 'legal highs'.

What this article fails to mention (checked from other sources) is that the emergency legislature is only going to rectify the problem by Thursday, meaning they are legal to possess for the next 48 hours (though trading and trafficking appears to be illegal still, for some reason).

What's even funnier (if you read The Independent, TheJournal appears to be patchy due to Reddit overload) is that another law passed recently has accidentally fucked up marriage laws by accidentally banning heterosexual marriages...

So, to get some discussion out of this other than "LOL", discuss retarded laws and lawmakers, and also; If drugs like Class A's became legal, would you try some of them (assuming pure quality)?

36
Gaming / The state of the Gaming Industry (NOT "#GG")
« on: March 01, 2015, 06:38:12 PM »
Found this on a site rather critical of the gaming industry, and this video surrounding The Order 1886 came up. As I haven't played the game or followed much of the info spreading around it myself, I can't comment on it...
YouTube

...but goddamn this guy's laugh.  :P

But for discussion for those of you who have it, what do you think of it? Although it's a joke, could this video apply to most Triple-A game devs of today in regards to the quality of games, the mass-production of (some occasionally useless) DLC's, and other potentially underhand business tactics?

I for one agree. Apart from RPG's like Skyrim which rely on the singlelayer only, most games today have a very short campaign and rely solely on the multiplayer side of things, which in turn needs constant additions to keep the playerbase happy and playing (and paying). That means in some cases useless aesthetics like camo packs for guns (See Gears of War 3, the more recent CoD's, as well as BF3/4's Premium Camos and Battlepacks). Some go even further and delve into the campaign, sectioning chunks out behind a paywall (Mass Effect 3, I believe?), limiting campaign difficulties and weapons to Limited Edition versions or adding them as mini DLC's (Metro Last Light), or even adding microtransactions for basic campaign equipment like ammo and upgrade slots (Dead Space 3 had those initially, though I'm not sure now).

This is a dire time for video games, with Devs giving less of a shit about your enjoyment or how long the game will last and more about whether you'll buy that golden digital camo for your gun or horse armour, or if any customers would notice DLC being made before the game is finished. That said, there is hope in indie games or smaller lesser known devs who rely on the quality of the game to survive, but that brings their own problems like many of the kickstarter-based games have (where many have accrued tens of thousands of £/$'s only to drop off the radar and the dev suddenly disappear to South America).

37
The Flood / If you had only 3 hours to play
« on: February 12, 2015, 11:15:12 AM »
Flood is full of pick ones and hypotheticals atm, so I thought I'd throw my hat into the ring for this.

You have a laptop with every game currently in existence in it's library to play on, and are heading off to Mars because you just are. In your excitement, you forgot to pack your charger for the laptop and only have 3 hours to play on it before the charge runs out, and you won't be able to charge it for at least 8 months while NASA shuttle over a charger from Earth. Internet signal is pretty shitty on Mars and only reserved for scientific research, so you can't play on online game there either*.

So, you have 3 hours to start from scratch and play any game you want. What would you choose?

*
There's nothing stopping you from playing games like CoD or CounterStrike multiplayer exactly, but you'll be on your own or with bots.

TLDR - Any and every game available to play. 3 hours only, never again afterwards. No internet. Wat u pik?

38
Serious / Which side would you defend?
« on: December 26, 2014, 06:28:29 PM »
Quote
Brain-dead pregnant woman 'can die' http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-30599063
TLDR Braindead pregnant lady, 18 weeks in. Families wishes are to turn off the life support, while lawyers for the unborn child (debate about "when is a life a life" aside) argue it should be kept on if there's a chance the foetus will survive the term, then she should be kept alive.

So, what would you argue for?

Personally, I'd side with keeping her alive until the child is born, unless it's impossible  for that to happen (Even a 1% chance is worth it). But I'm happy to hear if someone can back up the alternative.

39
The Flood / What is your worst experience with people?
« on: December 13, 2014, 10:44:45 AM »
They say "Hell is other people", so I wanna hear some anecdotal evidence for it.

My own story which is ongoing is quite long, so I'mma spoiler it.
Spoiler
My housemate is a strung-out sociopath. On the second day of moving in, weeks after everybody else after moving from another residence (I assume they kicked her out of there), she holds a massive party in her room with randoms strangers until 10am the next morning, she then fucks one around 1pm, which was rather a rude awakening after being unable to sleep for the night and repeatedly telling them to STFU, and beheaded a pigeon by ripping it's head off. She showed us it's corpse saying "Isn't it cute?".

We tried to get her kicked out after that but for some fucking reason the admin won't get around to it... ::) She's constantly high (not that I think it's all bad, but all the fucking time?), constantly bitches about all of us, to all of us, complains about mess when she's made most of it, and seems to think we're all terrible people because we've down nothing to help impoverished Africans... compared to the fuck tons of nothing she's done for them. /rant

I've shared mine, so it's time to share yours! Could be about a past/current roommate, a person you met on your travels, some event you experienced with an asshole at the centre of it, anything.

Conversely, you could say your best experience with people. Either or, one or both is good.

40
Serious / Why does music evoke emotion?
« on: November 21, 2014, 12:38:59 PM »
I was watching The Grand Budapest Hotel yesterday, and this is on the intro and outro:
YouTube


What sort of feeling does it bring to you, generally melancholic, peaceful, that sort of thing?

I've been listening to it more since, and I can't figure out why. It has no lyrics (It's just yodeling), so the only suggestive part of it is the rhythm, slow, almost well thought out. But it's made me think more about music in general.

So, why does music, even instrumentals without a single word uttered, portray and evoke such emotions?

41
Serious / What's your opinion of Nuclear Energy?
« on: November 12, 2014, 04:52:17 PM »
So in the US and the UK it accounts for just around ~20% of each countries' energy supply, and in Britain there has been plans for more since the early 90's though only early construction work is beginning now. In the US I'm not as well versed in what's being going on, but they seem to have been shutting down power plants left-right-and-centre in favour of coal, and I assume oil.


So, seeing as we all generally know a thing or two about it, rely on it to an extent and love it's benefits (and hate it's negatives), I want your opinion on it, Flood.

Go on, give your opinion about that glowing green gold.

42
The Flood / Good War Films?
« on: October 22, 2014, 03:36:34 PM »
I don't care if they're fictional, factual, in another language (so long as there's a subtitled version), or black and white.

Recommend me war & conflict films, any and all of them. It would be nice to see some WWI or modern ones though, as there's bajillions of WWII/Vietnam films.

EDIT: I'll start listing them so we can get a compilation if we ever need it.

So far:

Pre-WWI:
Spoiler
Zulu

WWI:
Spoiler
Flyboys
Warhorse

WWII:
Spoiler
A Bridge Too Far
Band of Brothers
Bridge on the River Kwai
Das Boot
Downfall/Der Untergang
Enemy at the Gates
Flags of our Fathers
Fury
Inglorious Basterds
Letters from Iwo Jima (Japanese side of Flags of our Fathers)
Pearl Harbor
Saving Private Ryan
Schindler's List
The Boy in the Striped Pajamas
The Hunt for the Red October
The Pacific
Valkyrie

Vietnam:
Spoiler
Apocalypse Now
Full Metal Jacket
Platoon
Tropic Thunder

Modern Conflicts (Inc. Cold War & 80's+)
Spoiler
Behind Enemy Lines
Black Hawk Down
Heartbreak Ridge
Jarhead
Top Gun

The Future and Sci Fi Wars
Spoiler
Starship Troopers
Star Trek (2009)


43
Most recent Ad:


C'mon Adsense, you're taking the piss here, can't even see the frickin' "beach" with that woman's boob in the way.

/distaste

44
Serious / Vote before you look
« on: October 08, 2014, 07:47:20 PM »
Note: The last option should be 4, but I can't edit the poll.

Chosen one? Excellent! Now here's some depressing context:

Spoiler
191,000 estimated killed during ongoing Syrian Civil war, including civilians, though the figure is thought to be an under-estimate(though previous estimates by the UN have put it at a round 200,000)

The 3600 estimated to have been killed so far in the Ukrainian Civil war.

The near-3000 killed in the 9/11 attacks. I won't put up a source, you all seem to know this as fact.

The 3800 recorded dead by the recent Ebola spread in West Africa.

And finally, the 3 4 Westerners that were beheaded by ISIS over the last few weeks. James Foley, Scott Sotloff, Alan Henning and David Haines.*

*Of course I'm not going to ignore the unrecorded ones of those under ISIS rule in Iraq and Syria, but there aren't many figures for that (not to mention the bias western news has for deaths of it's nationals), but Iraq's death toll alone under ISIS is around 5,500 according to the UN.

Now my question. Considering you know where these figures are coming from, does that change your perspective over which amount is worse? Would the location, the possibility of you being affected by this personally, or the nature of how these numbers came to be change the impact and your "value" of the death?

45
The Flood / Give me drawing ideas you crazy bastards
« on: October 05, 2014, 08:50:59 AM »
I've noticed the most creative mind is a crazed one ...and with that being said, I need The Flood's ideas and things to draw.

Give me inspiration and an image for reference, and so long as it isn't NSFW-ish I'll draw it and then post it here. It be posted on the same day as the request, maybe not even the same week, but it'll keep me entertained and you... you get a picture of a drawing by an unskilled artist. Good trade-off.

Sounds good? Good, now gimme your brain jabberings so I can draw 'em.

46
Serious / First baby born through womb transplant
« on: October 04, 2014, 08:58:40 AM »
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-29485996

Quote
A woman in Sweden has given birth to a baby boy using a transplanted womb, in a medical first, doctors report. The 36-year-old mother, who was born without a uterus, received a donated womb from a friend in her 60s who had gone through menopause 7 years earlier.
So yeah, that's good news, and very interesting how even a womb can still be used from a donor who's gone through menopause (though I'm not very educated on that sorta thing, so it could be normal that the womb is completely unaffected by menopause).


But...on a complete spin on the news story, discuss how while that is great that it's easier to fix infertility and allow them to have children for those who want it, that ultimately there are too many people on this planet (or not, there's always at least two sides).


So yeah...talk about this medical marvel being exactly that, and the side-discussion I've added just because.

47
The Flood / Coming to you live from Cardiff.
« on: September 26, 2014, 06:12:12 AM »
YouTube



That is all.

48
The Flood / Look at your music collection.
« on: September 15, 2014, 09:43:32 AM »
Just wanted to see if being male makes you be more biased towards male artists/bands, and vice versa.


I have to say mine is completely stacked towards male artists, with maybe a few songs having features with women in them or in the background. Jesus it's pretty bad, I only found one song with a female singer in it, out of 111 albums.


EDIT: Seeing as OST's and instrumentals are being mentioned a lot, factor in the composers for them too. I don't know any female composers at all to be honest.

49

http://www.haaretz.com/news/features/.premium-1.615667


It's a very long article (and comes from an Israeli news source, so I expected some bias...), but it pretty much outlines how the UK used secret agents to try and incite war between the Arabs and Israelis, including a plan to have the surrounding Arab nations to invade and split up Palestine, which somehow would improve Arab relations with Britain.


This is just a brief summary:
Spoiler
Quote
England will give up its mandate over Palestine as soon as possible and return it to the UN, which will oversee, if necessary, an international force to reestablish order in this country. A retreat from Palestine of most of the British troops can already be envisaged. In the event of open conflict between Jews and Arabs, the English, under the pretext of not wanting to be attacked from both sides in these hostilities, where it maintains an officially neutral position, will retreat to Transjordan, from where one or two British divisions will be able to immediately intervene if necessary. British agents will now push the Arab countries to intervene to help their brethren in Palestine if they are attacked by the Jews.”
Cairo and Arabist diplomats in London and the Middle East, supported by the senior military authorities, were determined, contrary to cabinet decisions, to hold on to the Middle East – even if it led to an all-out Arab-Jewish war.

Another goal was to prevent the establishment of a Jewish state or an Arab-Palestinian state based on the UN partition. There were also emergency safety measures – both military and diplomatic – to prevent the Jewish state from expanding its territory if the Arab armies were defeated. In this event, British forces stationed in Transjordan and Egypt would intervene, while British diplomats in the UN Security Council would act to impose a cease-fire.


Whether the Arabs won or were defeated, its instigators assumed that Britain would be in a better position than it had been in the summer of 1947. Indeed, the attaché's report concluded: “The British position, which for some time has appeared precarious, will thus find itself again dominant, all the more so as Egypt’s termination of the Anglo-Egyptian treaty will enable the British forces to maintain their position on the Suez Canal.”


As the communist threat became less convincing, British agents believed that they had to come up with more effective leverage to persuade the Arab governments and public that their countries needed Britain’s assistance.Without the knowledge of their cabinet, from June 1947 until May 1948 British secret agents conducted their own covert policy. While officially seeking to convince the Arab governments of the importance of concluding defense agreements with Britain to counter the escalating Soviet threat, they secretly instigated an Arab-Jewish confrontation in Palestine to advance Britain’s strategic ends. They sought to use a war in Palestine to deflect the Arab public’s attention from the controversial treaty negotiations; as an incentive for the Arab governments to conclude defense treaties with Britain; to demonstrate to the Arab rulers their countries’ need for military collaboration; to reinforce the Arab states’ military dependence on Britain, while preventing the establishment of a Jewish state or limiting its size.
Alongside negotiations with the Arab governments on defense treaties, the British secret agents stepped up their efforts to fuel violent Arab-Jewish clashes, urging the Arab leaders to close ranks against the Zionist threat. An Arab-Jewish conflict would also validate Britain’s long-held position regarding the solution to the Palestinian problem and demonstrate that, despite its good intentions, it was caught in the middle. Moreover, it would help Britain secure its strategic assets in Palestine: Haifa, with its port and refineries, and the Negev region in the south.
The British secret agents used almost all the “dirty tricks” in their arsenal – fear, jealousy, greed, false promises, misleading information and playing on inter-Arab rivalries – to provoke the Arab rulers into a war in Palestine. Nuri al-Sa’id (until the failure of the Portsmouth Treaty); King Abdullah (between June 1947 and May 1948); and Azzam, Mardam Bey and Sulh, and other co-opted “agents of influence” – all allowed the British secret services to operate behind-the-scenes to implement their schemes. King Ibn Sa’ud aptly described the British agents as “master puppeteers.” Azzam admitted to a Jewish Agency representative that “we have no choice but to go to war, even if we will be defeated.”

50
The Flood / Plug DJ Music Fantacular
« on: September 02, 2014, 05:13:00 PM »
https://plug.dj/sep7

Get in here.

Also, in case Plug.DJ logins still fuck up in the new year, I'd better put my fix up here:
Quote
Stuck on the stupid welcome page?

When I go to it (on G. Chrome), I right clicked the little page/lock icon next to the url, went into "show cookies and site data", removed all the cookies there, and then did ctrl+F5. Hopefully that will solve the problem (although I had to create a new account because I'd lost my old one).
This will be occasionally bumped when things are too quiet over here, and saves on a bunch of threads.

51
The Flood / What makes you happy?
« on: August 25, 2014, 01:23:29 PM »
It can be anything! Could be the comfort and love from a significant other, your favourite hobby, or simpler things, like bacon and booze (or guns, for those who have them freely available).


So, what makes you happy?


Try and not make it too depressing, the last time I made this thread it ended up with sob stories, and frankly this isn't what this thread is for!

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