Philosophy
JB asks,
When a mosquito bites you, it injects a chemical to stop clotting so it can take the blood it seeks. As a result, your body sends histamines to remedy the situation and this in turn causes a swelling in the blood vessels. This stretches the skin ever so slightly and that disruption from normal triggers the signal from the gentle touch nerves which the brain interprets as an itch. The itch is just a by-product of your body trying to heal itself from the small injury inflicted by the mosquito.
PeterLC asks,
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Philosophy
Moquito Bites and World Records
JB asks,
Why does our brain trigger us to itch a mosquito bite? It doesn't seem to accomplish anything useful...Nothing useful at all. We have two sets of nerves in our bodies, one for sensing big impacts on the body and one for sensing gentle interactions with the surroundings. This is why rubbing an injury decreases the pain experienced -- the nerves for the big stuff are sending their signal to the brain causing the pain, but the light rubbing fires up the other nerves telling your brain that there is something gentler going on. This forces your brain to split its attention and thereby give less focus to the pain signal. In the same way, scratching an itch can not only dislodge the irritant causing the itch, but triggers the big contact nerves and keep the brain from focusing on the sensation of the light touch nerves that causes the itch sensation.
When a mosquito bites you, it injects a chemical to stop clotting so it can take the blood it seeks. As a result, your body sends histamines to remedy the situation and this in turn causes a swelling in the blood vessels. This stretches the skin ever so slightly and that disruption from normal triggers the signal from the gentle touch nerves which the brain interprets as an itch. The itch is just a by-product of your body trying to heal itself from the small injury inflicted by the mosquito.
PeterLC asks,
Each year the world's fastest man seems to break his own record (by 100ths of a second). Since no one could conceivably run a 2 second 100 m dash. What is the maximum speed possible for the human body to run? There must be a physical limit that can be reached.Like yesterday, we cannot put a number on it, but yes, there will be a limit. Improvement in training techniques and athlete size may always make a record breaking run possible, but like Zeno's racetrack, there's a convergence to a lower limit. You see this in baseball where pitchers throw no harder now than at any time in history. Nolan Ryan threw 100 miles per hour and while you'll get someone who can crack 103 or 104 from time to time, you don't see major jumps. The human body works the way it does and this does put constraints on how fast we can run or throw.
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I had lunch yesterday with my editors from Johns Hopkins University Press and one of them who ordered a cup of coffee was making light of her supposed caffeine addiction. It leads to the question whether such an addiction would be a problem. ...
- Born To Be Mild: Dick Clark, Jamie Moyer, And Ayn Rand
Reflecting on two news-worthy events this week -- the passing of Dick Clark and the win by Jamie Moyer, the oldest pitcher to ever record a victory -- only further deepens my belief that human greatness of the sort we see championed by the minions of...
- Historians, Archaeologists, And Scientists
Are historians scientists? They frame hypotheses about the causes and effects of real events and use empirical evidence to support their accounts. But they don't do not look for regularities to make into laws; to the contrary, they account...
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On the heels of the Iowa caucus, let's ask about the requirements to be President of the United States. It is written into the second article of the Constitution that to be eligible for the position, one must be thirty five years old. ...
- Itchy And Scratchy--pain And Pleasure
A human phenomenon that irritates and provides pleasure. Itches...from allergies, noxious plants, pesky insects, disease, infections, wound healing...and it does feel good to scratch. Scratching does come with a risk--more infection. Why would pleasure...