Three Choices
Depending on your skin type, here are some great masks to try. For oily skin use some plain Milk of Magnesia, rub it on and let dry, then rinse with lukewarm water. It absorbs oil wonderfully!
For Normal/combination skin mix one egg and 1/2 cup cooked instant oatmeal and a teaspoon olive oil until smooth. Spread on your face and leave 15 min then rinse.
For dry skin, mix one egg yolk, one teaspoon honey and a teaspoon olive oil and some vitamin E oil if you have it. Smooth on and leave on for 15 min. , rinse in lukewarm water and pat dry. If your skin is a bit dry you can put a dab or two of either olive oil, or any other light oil, or plain crisco if you want something heavier, on your moist skin after washing or a mask and your face is set without the $$ some people spend for the same look.
Jamie L.
Homemade Facial Scrub Instead of Soap
This is for the lady who wanted a homemade facial mask. First, clean your face with water only. Never use soap. You can open your pores with hot compresses (washcloth) For a facial scrub, moisten oatmeal to a "goo", use it to scrub your face (not around your eyes). Wash off with cool water.You may also make a paste of the oatmeal and allow it to dry..remove with cool water.You may also beat an egg white, put it on your face and let it dry, rinse with cool water. Sliced fresh cucumber placed on your closed eyes will reduce bagginess and dark circles.To make your hair shine, rub in some regular mayonnaise,shampoo out after 15 minutes.
Sonja in Goose Creek
Honey for Best Facial
The best facial mask that i have found is honey. Use warm cloth to open pores, smear on honey, leave on 15 to 30 minutes, rinse off with warm water, and then use cold water to close pores. Use for 3 days in a row and then once a week. Sometimes I mix a little gound oatmeal with the honey, which makes a great mask.
M.
Facial Feels Good
One my daughter and I had fun with and found to have a cleansing and softening effect was to mix regular clean kitty litter, the clay kind, with water and strain out the grit. It really felt good.
Carol
Exfoliating Mask
For an easy exfoliating mask, mix three tablespoons olive oil or any good oil and one tablespoon kosher salt mix and gently rub into dry skin. Do not use around eye area. This works great on elbows and feet, but it can also be used on cheeks and forehead
Donna R.
Egg Whites
I use egg whites. Just beat one egg white until it is frothy. Spread it all over your face. Wait until it dries. Rinse it off. My face feels very clean and "tight" after this application. And then I use the yolk for cooking.( I have yet to have found a use for the shell)
DS
Egg Yolk
The best homemade facial mask that I have used is a raw egg yolk. just apply the raw yolk to your face and neck for 30 minutes and rinse with cool water. Egg yolks are high in vitamin A. The mask is very effective in healing blemishes.
Leona
Match Mask to Your Skin Type
For trouble-prone skin, mix oatmeal with water to form a paste.
For normal to oily skin, use an egg white.
For dry skin, use an egg yolk.
In all cases, spread mixture on face and allow to dry. Rinse thoroughly with cool water.
For oily skin, witch hazel makes an inexpensive toner.
For dry skin, you may want to add moisturizer while skin is still damp.
Susan
Oatmeal
The cheapest and best facial mask I have ever come up with is oatmeal processed to a powder in the blender and either skim milk or if you are trying to fade spots lemon juice. Really works well for me and I have dry skin.
Jan
More Facial Maks Choices
The kind of the mask you want to use depends on your skin type.
For dry skin, try:
* an egg yolk mixed with olive oil and warmed honey
* sour cream
* plain olive oil
* avocado
For oily skin:
* dissolve a teaspoon of baking yeast in a small amount of warm milk, wait until foamy, then apply (best done in the bath tub);
* puree flesh of a tomato and mix with some potato flour to make a paste;
* cucumber (it will whiten your skin);
* beaten egg whites with a few drops of lemon juice (great for getting rid of blackheads);
* carrots (but don't use this one more than about every other week because it can overdry your skin). This one will make you look tanned.
General refreshing masks:
* grapes (just cut a berry in half and rub lightly)
* strawberries (test behind your ear first, because many people are alergic to strawberies used this way even thougth they can eat them just fine)
* honey and ricotta cheese
Many fruits and vegetables can also be used to good effect. Anything acidic (lemon, strawberries, etc) will tend to whiten and refresh your skin, but you need to be careful if your skin is dry.
In general, don't apply masks more often than about twice a week, and try to vary the ingredients.
It is a good idea to test the mask first. Apply a small amount behind your ear, wait 20 minutes, then wash off. Then wait 24 hours. If the skin behind your ear is normal, then go ahead and use the mask.
Marzena
Egg Yolk and Honey
I reader recently asked if anyone had a recipe for homemade facial masks. I often use an egg yolk and honey mask. Just mix one egg yolk with a little honey and spread it on your face and neck. When it dries, rinse it off. Your skin will feel so fresh and soft!
Sarah W.
Pampering our skin is something we should learn to do for our health and well being. Many of the commercially made soaps, lotions, and bath products are actually harsh on our skin, despite what they claim. However, there are some simple things you can do to nurture your skin without buying expensive spa products.
Do not over wash your face or body. A gentle rinse in the morning is often all you need for your face and neck area. Avoid scrubbing with the abrasive cleaners that are available or harsh soaps. I have found that a good quality handmade soap works well. When washing use warm water and finally, pat your face dry gently with a soft towel. The key to pampering your skin is to be as gentle as possible.
In "Age Erasers for Women" (Rodale Press, 1994) the editors of Prevention Magazine recommend this quick home facial. Grind 2 cups of dry red beans in a food processor or grinder. Mix 1/2 cup of the powder with a little water to form a paste. Spread on your face, avoiding your eye area, and leave on for about 5 minutes. Rinse with warm water. Save the remainder of the powder in a covered container. After this cleaning mask, you can follow with a hydration mask as follows:
Mix together:
* 1 tsp. honey
* 1 egg yolk
* 1/2 tsp. olive oil
* 1/2 tsp. half-and-half or heavy cream
Apply to your face, including your eye area, and leave on for 15-20 minutes and rinse with warm water.
I have found that the best moisturizers are fragrance and color free. The simpler, the better. It's important that you do not towel dry your face or body completely before adding a moisturizer. They do not ADD moisture, but instead they help retain the moisture from your bath or shower. If you do want to add fragrance, try adding a few drops of essential oil such as calendula, which has skin soothing properties.
Making your own facial masks and scrubs is really easy, really fun, and really inexpensive. Many of the ingredients that make up a scrub or facial you probably already have in your kitchen or bathroom, but you may find yourself visiting bulk stores and natural food stores to find new ingredients to experiment with.
Masks:
Before you decide whether you want to make a scrub or a mask, you need to know the difference between the two. A scrub generally contains scrubby bits to exfoliate away dead skin, but a mask may as well. A mask is left on for about ten minutes and may or may not "harden." A mask contains an ingredient that needs to stay on your skin for several minutes for full benefit. Some of these are yogurt (plain, full fat, unsweetened), honey (astringent), green tea powder, (macha tea contains anti-oxidants that are great for your skin), aspirin (combats acne) banana (moisturizing) and avocado (moisturizing).
Why aspirin? Aspirin (even the generic types) contains a type of salicylic acid, which is great for keeping acne away. Use one aspirin per mask. If you're preparing a large batch of your mask, try to figure about one aspirin per mask. If you use more, it will sting and dry out your skin. Aspirin masks should only be used once a week, and people with very dry skin may want to avoid aspirin masks. You don't need to crush the pills; simply place a drop of water on the pill and it will turn to powder within a few minutes.
An aspirin mask can be as simple as aspirin mixed with honey and/or yogurt and spread on the face for ten minutes. When you wash mask off, you can use the little aspirin bits to scrub your skin. Here's my favorite aspirin mask recipe:
One aspirin
One large tablespoon of plain, full-fat yogurt
One teaspoon green tea powder
One small teaspoon of honey
Whisk the above ingredients together. You can make a large batch, as it will keep in the fridge for several weeks.
If my skin is feeling dry and oily, I use this recipe:
One aspirin
One tablespoon olive oil or almond oil (or any oil, really)
One tablespoon ripe, mashed banana
One teaspoon green tea powder
Scrubs:
When making a scrub, avoid using honey alone as a base, as you will find it very hard to spread. Scrubs really just need to, well, scrub.
Choose a base: I typically use olive oil. You can use honey mixed with an oil of your choice; you can also use yogurt or mashed banana, although I prefer those in a mask.
Choose a grit: A trip to your local bulk food store should give you plenty of ideas! You can use coarse, organic sugar or coarse sea or kosher salt. You can also use cornmeal or oats passed through a blender. You can use dry, ground tealeaves or dried flowers (food grade).
When you're done with your mask or scrub, you can use a mild cleanser to wash it away. Follow up with a moisturizer. I just use plain shea butter.
Less than a month after switching from commercial soaps, scrubs, masks and moisturizers, my face has gone from being acne and dry skin prone (around my nose and forehead) to being smooth and small-pored.
Sunday, December 13, 2009
Tuesday, November 24, 2009
Friday, October 02, 2009
Twilight of Pax Americana
Interesting article on the fall of the American Empire.
ARTICLE HERE
...........................
The international order that emerged after World War II has rightly been termed the Pax Americana; it's a Washington-led arrangement that has maintained political stability and promoted an open global economic system. Today, however, the Pax Americana is withering, thanks to what the National Intelligence Council in a recent report described as a "global shift in relative wealth and economic power without precedent in modern history" -- a shift that has accelerated enormously as a result of the economic crisis of 2007-2009.
At the heart of this geopolitical sea change is China's robust economic growth. Not because Beijing will necessarily threaten American interests but because a newly powerful China by necessity means a relative decline in American power, the very foundation of the postwar international order. These developments remind us that changes in the global balance of power can be sudden and discontinuous rather than gradual and evolutionary.
The Great Recession isn't the cause of Washington's ebbing relative power. But it has quickened trends that already had been eating away at the edifice of U.S. economic supremacy. Looking ahead, the health of the U.S. economy is threatened by a gathering fiscal storm: exploding federal deficits that could ignite runaway inflation and undermine the dollar. To avoid these perils, the U.S. will face wrenching choices.
The Obama administration and the Federal Reserve have adopted policies that have dramatically increased boththe supply of dollars circulating in the U.S. economy and the federal budget deficit, which both the Brookings Institution and the Congressional Budget Office estimate will exceed $1 trillion every year for at least the next decade. In the short run, these policies were no doubt necessary; nevertheless, in the long term, they will almost certainly boomerang. Add that to the persistent U.S. current account deficit, the enormous unfunded liabilities for entitlement programs and the cost of two ongoing wars, and you can see that America's long-term fiscal stability is in jeopardy. As the CBO says: "Even if the recovery occurs as projected and stimulus bill is allowed to expire, the country will face the highest debt/GDP ratio in 50 years and an increasingly unsustainable and urgent fiscal problem." This spells trouble ahead for the dollar.
The financial privileges conferred on the U.S. by the dollar's unchallenged reserve currency status -- its role as the primary form of payment for international trade and financial transactions -- have underpinned the preeminent geopolitical role of the United States in international politics since the end of World War II. But already the shadow of the coming fiscal crisis has prompted its main creditors, China and Japan, to worry that in coming years the dollar will depreciate in value. China has been increasingly vocal in calling for the dollar's replacement by a new reserve currency. And Yukio Hatoyama, Japan's new prime minister, favors Asian economic integration and a single Asian currency as substitutes for eroding U.S. financial and economic power.
Going forward, to defend the dollar, Washington will need to control inflation through some combination of budget cuts, tax increases and interest rate hikes. Given that the last two options would choke off renewed growth, the least unpalatable choice is to reduce federal spending. This will mean radically scaling back defense expenditures, because discretionary nondefense spending accounts for only about 20% of annual federal outlays. This in turn will mean a radical diminution of America's overseas military commitments, transforming both geopolitics and the international economy.
Since 1945, the Pax Americana has made international economic interdependence and globalization possible. Whereas all states benefit absolutely in an open international economy, some states benefit more than others. In the normal course of world politics, the relative distribution of power, not the pursuit of absolute economic gains, is a country's principal concern, and this discourages economic interdependence. In their efforts to ensure a distribution of power in their favor and at the expense of their actual or potential rivals, states pursue autarkic policies -- those designed to maximize national self-sufficiency -- practicing capitalism only within their borders or among countries in a trading bloc.
Thus a truly global economy is extraordinarily difficult to achieve. Historically, the only way to secure international integration and interdependence has been for a dominant power to guarantee the security of other states so that they need not pursue autarkic policies or form trading blocs to improve their relative positions. This suspension of international politics through hegemony has been the fundamental aim of U.S. foreign policy since the 1940s. The U.S. has assumed the responsibility for maintaining geopolitical stability in Europe, East Asia and the Persian Gulf, and for keeping open the lines of communication through which world trade moves. Since the Cold War's end, the U.S. has sought to preserve its hegemony by possessing a margin of military superiority so vast that it can keep any would-be great power pliant and protected.
Financially, the U.S. has been responsible for managing the global economy by acting as the market and lender of last resort. But as President Obama acknowledged at the London G-20 meeting in April, the U.S. is no longer able to play this role, and the world increasingly is looking to China (and India and other emerging market states) to be the locomotives of global recovery.
Going forward, the fiscal crisis will mean that Washington cannot discharge its military functions as a hegemon either, because it can no longer maintain the power edge that has allowed it to keep the ambitions of the emerging great powers in check. The entire fabric of world order that the United States established after 1945 -- the Pax Americana -- rested on the foundation of U.S. military and economic preponderance. Remove the foundation and the structure crumbles. The decline of American power means the end of U.S. dominance in world politics and the beginning of the transition to a new constellation of world powers.
The result will be profound changes in world politics. Emerging powers will seek to establish spheres of influence, control lines of communication, engage in arms races and compete for control over key natural resources. As America's decline results in the retraction of the U.S. military role in key regions, rivalries among emerging powers are bound to heat up. Already, China and India are competing for influence in Central and Southeast Asia, the Middle East and the Indian Ocean. Even today, when the United States is still acting as East Asia's regional pacifier, the smoldering security competition between China and Japan is pushing Japan cautiously to engage in the very kind of "re-nationalization" of its security policy that the U.S. regional presence is supposed to prevent. While still wedded to its alliance with the U.S., in recent years Tokyo has become increasingly anxious that, as a Rand Corp. study put it, eventually it "might face a threat against which the United States would not prove a reliable ally." Consequently, Japan is moving toward dropping Article 9 of its American-imposed Constitution (which imposes severe constraints on Japan's military), building up its forces and quietly pondering the possibility of becoming a nuclear power.
Although the weakening of the Pax Americana will not cause international trade and capital flows to come to a grinding halt, in coming years we can expect states to adopt openly competitive economic policies as they are forced to jockey for power and advantage in an increasingly competitive security and economic environment. The world economy will thereby more closely resemble that of the 1930s than the free-trade system of the post-1945 Pax Americana. The coming end of the Pax Americana heralds a crisis for capitalism.
The coming era of de-globalization will be defined by rising nationalism and mercantilism, geopolitical instability and great power competition. In other words, having enjoyed a long holiday from history under the Pax Americana, international politics will be headed back to the future.
ARTICLE HERE
...........................
The international order that emerged after World War II has rightly been termed the Pax Americana; it's a Washington-led arrangement that has maintained political stability and promoted an open global economic system. Today, however, the Pax Americana is withering, thanks to what the National Intelligence Council in a recent report described as a "global shift in relative wealth and economic power without precedent in modern history" -- a shift that has accelerated enormously as a result of the economic crisis of 2007-2009.
At the heart of this geopolitical sea change is China's robust economic growth. Not because Beijing will necessarily threaten American interests but because a newly powerful China by necessity means a relative decline in American power, the very foundation of the postwar international order. These developments remind us that changes in the global balance of power can be sudden and discontinuous rather than gradual and evolutionary.
The Great Recession isn't the cause of Washington's ebbing relative power. But it has quickened trends that already had been eating away at the edifice of U.S. economic supremacy. Looking ahead, the health of the U.S. economy is threatened by a gathering fiscal storm: exploding federal deficits that could ignite runaway inflation and undermine the dollar. To avoid these perils, the U.S. will face wrenching choices.
The Obama administration and the Federal Reserve have adopted policies that have dramatically increased boththe supply of dollars circulating in the U.S. economy and the federal budget deficit, which both the Brookings Institution and the Congressional Budget Office estimate will exceed $1 trillion every year for at least the next decade. In the short run, these policies were no doubt necessary; nevertheless, in the long term, they will almost certainly boomerang. Add that to the persistent U.S. current account deficit, the enormous unfunded liabilities for entitlement programs and the cost of two ongoing wars, and you can see that America's long-term fiscal stability is in jeopardy. As the CBO says: "Even if the recovery occurs as projected and stimulus bill is allowed to expire, the country will face the highest debt/GDP ratio in 50 years and an increasingly unsustainable and urgent fiscal problem." This spells trouble ahead for the dollar.
The financial privileges conferred on the U.S. by the dollar's unchallenged reserve currency status -- its role as the primary form of payment for international trade and financial transactions -- have underpinned the preeminent geopolitical role of the United States in international politics since the end of World War II. But already the shadow of the coming fiscal crisis has prompted its main creditors, China and Japan, to worry that in coming years the dollar will depreciate in value. China has been increasingly vocal in calling for the dollar's replacement by a new reserve currency. And Yukio Hatoyama, Japan's new prime minister, favors Asian economic integration and a single Asian currency as substitutes for eroding U.S. financial and economic power.
Going forward, to defend the dollar, Washington will need to control inflation through some combination of budget cuts, tax increases and interest rate hikes. Given that the last two options would choke off renewed growth, the least unpalatable choice is to reduce federal spending. This will mean radically scaling back defense expenditures, because discretionary nondefense spending accounts for only about 20% of annual federal outlays. This in turn will mean a radical diminution of America's overseas military commitments, transforming both geopolitics and the international economy.
Since 1945, the Pax Americana has made international economic interdependence and globalization possible. Whereas all states benefit absolutely in an open international economy, some states benefit more than others. In the normal course of world politics, the relative distribution of power, not the pursuit of absolute economic gains, is a country's principal concern, and this discourages economic interdependence. In their efforts to ensure a distribution of power in their favor and at the expense of their actual or potential rivals, states pursue autarkic policies -- those designed to maximize national self-sufficiency -- practicing capitalism only within their borders or among countries in a trading bloc.
Thus a truly global economy is extraordinarily difficult to achieve. Historically, the only way to secure international integration and interdependence has been for a dominant power to guarantee the security of other states so that they need not pursue autarkic policies or form trading blocs to improve their relative positions. This suspension of international politics through hegemony has been the fundamental aim of U.S. foreign policy since the 1940s. The U.S. has assumed the responsibility for maintaining geopolitical stability in Europe, East Asia and the Persian Gulf, and for keeping open the lines of communication through which world trade moves. Since the Cold War's end, the U.S. has sought to preserve its hegemony by possessing a margin of military superiority so vast that it can keep any would-be great power pliant and protected.
Financially, the U.S. has been responsible for managing the global economy by acting as the market and lender of last resort. But as President Obama acknowledged at the London G-20 meeting in April, the U.S. is no longer able to play this role, and the world increasingly is looking to China (and India and other emerging market states) to be the locomotives of global recovery.
Going forward, the fiscal crisis will mean that Washington cannot discharge its military functions as a hegemon either, because it can no longer maintain the power edge that has allowed it to keep the ambitions of the emerging great powers in check. The entire fabric of world order that the United States established after 1945 -- the Pax Americana -- rested on the foundation of U.S. military and economic preponderance. Remove the foundation and the structure crumbles. The decline of American power means the end of U.S. dominance in world politics and the beginning of the transition to a new constellation of world powers.
The result will be profound changes in world politics. Emerging powers will seek to establish spheres of influence, control lines of communication, engage in arms races and compete for control over key natural resources. As America's decline results in the retraction of the U.S. military role in key regions, rivalries among emerging powers are bound to heat up. Already, China and India are competing for influence in Central and Southeast Asia, the Middle East and the Indian Ocean. Even today, when the United States is still acting as East Asia's regional pacifier, the smoldering security competition between China and Japan is pushing Japan cautiously to engage in the very kind of "re-nationalization" of its security policy that the U.S. regional presence is supposed to prevent. While still wedded to its alliance with the U.S., in recent years Tokyo has become increasingly anxious that, as a Rand Corp. study put it, eventually it "might face a threat against which the United States would not prove a reliable ally." Consequently, Japan is moving toward dropping Article 9 of its American-imposed Constitution (which imposes severe constraints on Japan's military), building up its forces and quietly pondering the possibility of becoming a nuclear power.
Although the weakening of the Pax Americana will not cause international trade and capital flows to come to a grinding halt, in coming years we can expect states to adopt openly competitive economic policies as they are forced to jockey for power and advantage in an increasingly competitive security and economic environment. The world economy will thereby more closely resemble that of the 1930s than the free-trade system of the post-1945 Pax Americana. The coming end of the Pax Americana heralds a crisis for capitalism.
The coming era of de-globalization will be defined by rising nationalism and mercantilism, geopolitical instability and great power competition. In other words, having enjoyed a long holiday from history under the Pax Americana, international politics will be headed back to the future.
Tuesday, September 08, 2009
Thursday, August 20, 2009
Friday, June 19, 2009
134 billion dollars of funny money
HERE
The amount is $ 134.5 billion. Many may not have an idea as to what this number adds up to. In Indian currency terms today, of course, it is Rs 6,44,000 crore. But this equals the cash value of the GDP of the bottom 49 countries of the world. The annual income of the entire people of these 49 countries adds up to $134.5 billion. What is the significance of this $134.5 billion? This was the value of US treasury securities which two persons had attempted to smuggle into Switzerland from Italy. It happened on June 3. The persons who attempted this daring act were two Japanese in their 50s. An Italian newspaper reported it on June 10; other media began following it up and kept reporting. But surprisingly none of the mainline newspapers anywhere in the world, except the online Bloomberg, even reported it.
The substance of the report was this. On June 3, the Italian finance police detained two Japanese nationals who tried to enter Switzerland with US Treasury bonds of the value of $134.5 billion. They were caught at Como, which is 50 km from Milano in Italy. They were caught in Chiasso’s train station after an inspection. The two men had hidden US treasury bonds in a suitcase with a false bottom. There were 249 bonds of the face value of $500 millions each amounting to $124.5 billion and another 10 bonds titled ‘Kennedy’ bonds of the face value of $1 billion each, that is $10 billion in all, making it a total of $134.5 billion. The Japanese consul in Milan in Italy confirmed that the detention had taken place; it was trying to confirm with the Italian authorities whether they were Japanese nationals and their identities. The media reported that the Italian police had asked the US Securities Exchange Commission to confirm whether the securities were genuine or not. Financial experts in Italy had already expressed the view that such high denomination securities could not have been issued by the US Treasury in 1934 which was the date appearing according to reports on the 249 bonds valued at $124.5 billion. Also no ‘Kennedy’ bonds ever existed, according to them. A few days later, on June 18, a spokesman of the US Treasury told the media that the bonds seized were fake ones; the US had never issued individual bonds of high value at all. So the US has officially declared the bonds which were being smuggled into Switzerland are fake. But this raises more questions than it answers. Yet none of the mainline media would touch this mysterious subject despite its high and exciting news value.
If the bonds seized by Italian police were fake, it would suggest, as William Pesek, columnist at Bloomberg says, that at the minimum the US risks control over its monetary supplies on a massive scale. There have been reports for long that the US dollars in the denomination of 100s were being counterfeited all over the world. But this is the first time that counterfeiting of US Treasury securities has been found. This report comes at a time when the US economy is going through its worst phase since the Great Depression. As a commentator said, in Asia the fear of counterfeit treasury security makes the genuine ones suspect in the minds of the investors. How will new investors put in their money in US treasury securities if there is no guarantee that the bonds which circulate in the name of the US government are genuine? The commentator further points out that while circulating perfectly counterfeited enemy currency was resorted to by rival governments during the World War II, the Bank of Italy went a step further and issued its very same security twice over with duplicate numbers to conceal the extent of public debt. Could the US government have done something similar? Raising this shocking question and answering it Karl Denninger in his blog titled Market Ticker wonders ‘if the US treasury has been surreptitiously issuing bonds to, say, Japan as means of financing deficits that someone didn’t want reported for the last 10, 20 years’. That the Bloomberg columnist cites Denninger’s comments shows the extent of desperation in the financial world for an explanation for what has happened at Como.
If one looks at the pattern of holding of the US Treasury Securities, even though the US Treasury asserts that it has stopped issuing bearer securities, it has issued its securities to tax haven entities. Tax haven means that the identity of the ultimate owner is opaque. Out of the total of some 3,262 billion worth treasury securities held by foreign governments and banks as of April 2009, the amount of securities held by what the US treasury says as ‘Caribbean banking sector’ is mentioned as 205 billion and that includes Bahamas, Bermuda, Cayman Islands, Netherlands Antilles, Panama and from June 2006 British Virgin Islands. In none of these tax shelters the name of the real investor is ascertainable. Even the British investments into US Treasury takes place through the Isle of Man, the British tax haven. The US government has admitted that it has allowed address-less money, that is black money, into the Treasury bonds. The world of finance has nicknamed this as ‘funny money’. Is the $134.5 billion funny money then?
It is all mysterious. Denninger says, “Let’s hope we get those answer and this isn’t one of those funny things that just disappears into the night”. The Bloomberg columnist says “the US Treasury must go to the bottom of this tale and get the markets informed”. But will that happen? Will the truth come out and will the market ever get informed? Otherwise like many mysteries, this $134.5 billion will remain an unresolved mystery. But this is far too serious a matter to remain mysterious particularly given the depth of the financial crisis the US and thanks to the US the world is in.
QED: If the $134.5 billion bonds were genuine Italy will get 40 per cent of it — that is some $54 billion — as fine from the smugglers. That would solve all its financial problems; its external and public debt will be off its balance sheet.
The amount is $ 134.5 billion. Many may not have an idea as to what this number adds up to. In Indian currency terms today, of course, it is Rs 6,44,000 crore. But this equals the cash value of the GDP of the bottom 49 countries of the world. The annual income of the entire people of these 49 countries adds up to $134.5 billion. What is the significance of this $134.5 billion? This was the value of US treasury securities which two persons had attempted to smuggle into Switzerland from Italy. It happened on June 3. The persons who attempted this daring act were two Japanese in their 50s. An Italian newspaper reported it on June 10; other media began following it up and kept reporting. But surprisingly none of the mainline newspapers anywhere in the world, except the online Bloomberg, even reported it.
The substance of the report was this. On June 3, the Italian finance police detained two Japanese nationals who tried to enter Switzerland with US Treasury bonds of the value of $134.5 billion. They were caught at Como, which is 50 km from Milano in Italy. They were caught in Chiasso’s train station after an inspection. The two men had hidden US treasury bonds in a suitcase with a false bottom. There were 249 bonds of the face value of $500 millions each amounting to $124.5 billion and another 10 bonds titled ‘Kennedy’ bonds of the face value of $1 billion each, that is $10 billion in all, making it a total of $134.5 billion. The Japanese consul in Milan in Italy confirmed that the detention had taken place; it was trying to confirm with the Italian authorities whether they were Japanese nationals and their identities. The media reported that the Italian police had asked the US Securities Exchange Commission to confirm whether the securities were genuine or not. Financial experts in Italy had already expressed the view that such high denomination securities could not have been issued by the US Treasury in 1934 which was the date appearing according to reports on the 249 bonds valued at $124.5 billion. Also no ‘Kennedy’ bonds ever existed, according to them. A few days later, on June 18, a spokesman of the US Treasury told the media that the bonds seized were fake ones; the US had never issued individual bonds of high value at all. So the US has officially declared the bonds which were being smuggled into Switzerland are fake. But this raises more questions than it answers. Yet none of the mainline media would touch this mysterious subject despite its high and exciting news value.
If the bonds seized by Italian police were fake, it would suggest, as William Pesek, columnist at Bloomberg says, that at the minimum the US risks control over its monetary supplies on a massive scale. There have been reports for long that the US dollars in the denomination of 100s were being counterfeited all over the world. But this is the first time that counterfeiting of US Treasury securities has been found. This report comes at a time when the US economy is going through its worst phase since the Great Depression. As a commentator said, in Asia the fear of counterfeit treasury security makes the genuine ones suspect in the minds of the investors. How will new investors put in their money in US treasury securities if there is no guarantee that the bonds which circulate in the name of the US government are genuine? The commentator further points out that while circulating perfectly counterfeited enemy currency was resorted to by rival governments during the World War II, the Bank of Italy went a step further and issued its very same security twice over with duplicate numbers to conceal the extent of public debt. Could the US government have done something similar? Raising this shocking question and answering it Karl Denninger in his blog titled Market Ticker wonders ‘if the US treasury has been surreptitiously issuing bonds to, say, Japan as means of financing deficits that someone didn’t want reported for the last 10, 20 years’. That the Bloomberg columnist cites Denninger’s comments shows the extent of desperation in the financial world for an explanation for what has happened at Como.
If one looks at the pattern of holding of the US Treasury Securities, even though the US Treasury asserts that it has stopped issuing bearer securities, it has issued its securities to tax haven entities. Tax haven means that the identity of the ultimate owner is opaque. Out of the total of some 3,262 billion worth treasury securities held by foreign governments and banks as of April 2009, the amount of securities held by what the US treasury says as ‘Caribbean banking sector’ is mentioned as 205 billion and that includes Bahamas, Bermuda, Cayman Islands, Netherlands Antilles, Panama and from June 2006 British Virgin Islands. In none of these tax shelters the name of the real investor is ascertainable. Even the British investments into US Treasury takes place through the Isle of Man, the British tax haven. The US government has admitted that it has allowed address-less money, that is black money, into the Treasury bonds. The world of finance has nicknamed this as ‘funny money’. Is the $134.5 billion funny money then?
It is all mysterious. Denninger says, “Let’s hope we get those answer and this isn’t one of those funny things that just disappears into the night”. The Bloomberg columnist says “the US Treasury must go to the bottom of this tale and get the markets informed”. But will that happen? Will the truth come out and will the market ever get informed? Otherwise like many mysteries, this $134.5 billion will remain an unresolved mystery. But this is far too serious a matter to remain mysterious particularly given the depth of the financial crisis the US and thanks to the US the world is in.
QED: If the $134.5 billion bonds were genuine Italy will get 40 per cent of it — that is some $54 billion — as fine from the smugglers. That would solve all its financial problems; its external and public debt will be off its balance sheet.
Saturday, June 13, 2009
even more guillotine
There are accounts of victims of the French Revolution being asked to blink their eyes when they were beheaded. They are supposed to have done this for up to 30 seconds after but it is not sure whether this is mortal spasms or not.
1880. Dr. Dassy de Lignières is given the head of a murderer three hours after decapitation. He pumps blood from a living dog into the head, and for two seconds the lips and eyelids fluttered. Concludes the doctor:"I affirm that during two seconds the brain thought."
1956. Dr. Piedelièvre and Dr. Fournier conclude, "Death is not instantaneous... every element survives decapitation... (it is) a savage vivisection followed by a premature burial."
Cecil Adams, The Straight Dope columnist, was initially skeptical of claims that humans retained consciousness after decapitation, but a reader spun to him the following story of a car crash, in which his friend was decapitated:
My friend's head came to rest face up, and (from my angle) upside down. As I watched, his mouth opened and closed no less than two times. The facial expressions he displayed were first of shock or confusion, followed by terror or grief. I cannot exaggerate and say that he was looking all around, but he did display ocular movement in that his eyes moved from me to his body and back to me. He had direct eye contact with me when his eyes took on a hazy, absent expression... and he was dead.
Adams declared that he had re-opened his mind on the subject. (http://www.newtimesbpb.com/issues/1998-06-11/columns.html)
During the French Revolution, when everyone was a little excited about using the guillotine, one aristocratic scientist, an Antoine Lavoisier (thanks mirv!), decided to see if there really was life after death. Sentenced to die by beheading, he vowed to perform a final experiment: he would blink for as long as he remained conscious. As his head rolled away, observers recorded that he blinked five times.
actually a chicken, the body, lived and functioned for 18 months after beheading, the owners had to poke food into the hole to the stomach and it lived, in fact it grew from 2.5 ot 8 pounds in that time... it only died because the breathing tube got a blockage and the chicken suffocated... it wasn't nerve impulses at all...
do a search about 'Miracle Mike the Chicken'...
yes heads remain conscious after decapitation... it was common in the guillotine-happy days of the French Revolution to have heads in the baskets trying to talk, looking up at the executioner and looking around... this is widely recorded history... it resulted in a practice of the executioner picking up the head out of the basket by the hair and holding it's face out to the crowd so the head(person)could see the crowd laughing and mocking it before expiring... this is history... it was so widely known doctors started doing experiments, some of which were the 'blinking' tests already mentioned...
1880. Dr. Dassy de Lignières is given the head of a murderer three hours after decapitation. He pumps blood from a living dog into the head, and for two seconds the lips and eyelids fluttered. Concludes the doctor:"I affirm that during two seconds the brain thought."
1956. Dr. Piedelièvre and Dr. Fournier conclude, "Death is not instantaneous... every element survives decapitation... (it is) a savage vivisection followed by a premature burial."
Cecil Adams, The Straight Dope columnist, was initially skeptical of claims that humans retained consciousness after decapitation, but a reader spun to him the following story of a car crash, in which his friend was decapitated:
My friend's head came to rest face up, and (from my angle) upside down. As I watched, his mouth opened and closed no less than two times. The facial expressions he displayed were first of shock or confusion, followed by terror or grief. I cannot exaggerate and say that he was looking all around, but he did display ocular movement in that his eyes moved from me to his body and back to me. He had direct eye contact with me when his eyes took on a hazy, absent expression... and he was dead.
Adams declared that he had re-opened his mind on the subject. (http://www.newtimesbpb.com/issues/1998-06-11/columns.html)
During the French Revolution, when everyone was a little excited about using the guillotine, one aristocratic scientist, an Antoine Lavoisier (thanks mirv!), decided to see if there really was life after death. Sentenced to die by beheading, he vowed to perform a final experiment: he would blink for as long as he remained conscious. As his head rolled away, observers recorded that he blinked five times.
actually a chicken, the body, lived and functioned for 18 months after beheading, the owners had to poke food into the hole to the stomach and it lived, in fact it grew from 2.5 ot 8 pounds in that time... it only died because the breathing tube got a blockage and the chicken suffocated... it wasn't nerve impulses at all...
do a search about 'Miracle Mike the Chicken'...
yes heads remain conscious after decapitation... it was common in the guillotine-happy days of the French Revolution to have heads in the baskets trying to talk, looking up at the executioner and looking around... this is widely recorded history... it resulted in a practice of the executioner picking up the head out of the basket by the hair and holding it's face out to the crowd so the head(person)could see the crowd laughing and mocking it before expiring... this is history... it was so widely known doctors started doing experiments, some of which were the 'blinking' tests already mentioned...
more guillotine
LINK HERE
Monsieur le Docteur Joseph-Ignace Guillotin did not invent that instrument which bears his name. Such devices had been in use in Europe for two centuries. But the times being what they were, some such mechanized expedient was called for. Or perhaps the contraption's excellence cried out for use -- a better mousetrap and all that.
There would be much to recommend such a device. Avoid a reprise of the Mary, Queen of Scots debacle, whose neck took three great whacks and still she didn't lose her head -- the discomfited headsman had to saw through the last bits of integument with his hip knife before the job was quite done. How embarrassing for him. During the interim between the first and the second chops, the poor former queen loosed such a wrenching and protracted groan that the crowd, usually intoxicated in such festive circumstances with blood lust, gaped in horrified silence. So, then -- live and learn, eh?
But what about these heads? Does consciousness survive for some brief moments within the disembodied -- or would it be disbodied -- head? Anecdotal evidence abounds. The heads of two National Assembly rivals were placed into a sack -- when later removed, one had bitten into the cheek of the other so deeply it could not be pried off. The executioner of Charlotte Corday -- who murdered Jean-Paul Marat -- held up her severed head and slapped its cheek; witnesses claimed the face blushed and looked indignant. A soldier who witnessed the decapitation of a friend in a 1989 auto accident relates how the head opened and closed its mouth several times, taking on an expression of shock or confusion, then of terror or grief; its eyes moved from the soldier, to its separated body, then back to the soldier -- direct eye contact, then hazy, then absent and dead.
Which brings to mind the report of Dr. Beaurieux, who, staid man of science that he was, resolved one early summer morning in 1905 to settle once and for all the question of whether a severed head retains for any appreciable time some measure of consciousness, and if so, for how long.
Observe, then, condemned murderer Henri Languille, who mounts with notable sangfroid the scaffold to kneel beneath the blade.
Next, consider his severed head, which fortuitously lands stump-down on the neck, thus perfectly oriented for observation. The doctor notes the eyelids working in irregular contractions for five seconds or so, then they are still and half-closed, the face relaxed. The doctor calls out sharply, "Languille!" The eyelids lift slowly and smoothly, as an awakening, and the eyes focus very definitely upon the doctor's -- clearly, undeniably living. A pause of several seconds, and then the eyes close again. One might almost hear a sigh. Again the doctor cries out, "Languille!" -- and again, smoothly, slowly, the eyelids lift and the eyes fix on the doctor's, with perhaps even more intelligence than the first time. Then a drooping of lids, a fading, a third calling of the name, Languille! but there is no response, and the eyes are glazed, empty, gone. Thirty seconds have passed.
The issue is murky, though. No fewer than three physicians attended the 1879 beheading of one Theotime Prunier, amenable to their end if not his own. The triumverate of medicos immediately snatched up the head and shouted in the face, stuck it with pins, placed ammonia under the nose and candle flames in the eyeballs. No response but a look of astonishment on Prunier's visage, which need have no special significance -- slack jaw and gawking eyes would be expected.
All of it need mean nothing. Two severed heads in a bag need not have been snarling and snapping at each other; one might have been placed sometime after the other, but immediately after its own severing -- and the bite a mere spasmodic reflex. A severed head's cheek might well blush, because blushing is certainly dependent upon capillary blood, but not necessarily upon vascular bloodflow: slaps cause redness. Expressions of shock or of horror are instinctive and universal to the human condition -- perhaps they have no more meaning than the galvanic twitching of frog legs. Eyes widen at a loud sound -- as it happens in this case, the loud calling of a name. Yes. It may all be true, and at the same time meaningless.
The very idea is absurd, that a severed head should be alive. It takes eight seconds to choke a man into unconsciousness -- as I, the third most dangerous middle-aged man west of the Mississippi, ought to know. A severed head can have no blood pressure whatsoever, so one might think that unconsciousness, if not death, must be instantaneous.
But upon deeper reflection, the oxygen that is present, remains present -- it doesn't just remove itself along with the body. Capillaries do not drain themselves in a great Niagara of gore. So we might expect something like eight seconds of consciousness. Further, what effect does having one's entire body mass instantly reduced to some 10 pounds have on the metabolic rate of oxygen usage? Perhaps when the brain doesn't have to think about running the body, it uses less oxygen. And it may be that the concept of consciousness and unconsciousness -- lucidity and dreaming -- takes on an almost incomprehensible meaning, upon the shocking loss of one's bodily appendage. We know the spirit lingers -- heart stoppage isn't death, anymore.
Ah well. It's all speculation. That is, the speculation is speculation. The observations are what they are: phenomena translated into neural impulses within the brain, to manifest eventually as expressions of opinion.
So? Do I have a point? No. I could drag the islamists into it, what with their holy sacrament of beheading infidels and insufficiently subservient women. I could make some bitter correlation between aborted fetuses and still-conscious but not-legally-human-anymore severed heads. I could make it a metaphor for loss and mourning. I could try to blame God for it all. But sometime I just like to chat, share a little of the odd things that have collected in my brain. You know -- the way buddies just talk to each other, sometimes. Let's call this one of those times. Okay? Pal? Because we have voices. We can communicate with each other, in complex ways, with more than just blinking. So that we can know for sure that we're alive.
........
In actuality, the human head does remain conscious fifteen to twenty seconds after decapitation. This was proven when a scientist condemned to the guillotine in the 1700s told his assistant to watch and that he would blink as many times as he could. The assistant counted fifteen to twenty blinks after the head was severed, the blinks coming at intervals of about one second. So the head does remain briefly alive.
........
Let's see. Over the years we've covered crucifixion, kidney theft, and now a second helping of decapitation. What next, you ask — how to perform your own spinal tap? But bear with me. New facts have come to light.
A lot of people disputed my claim that victims of the guillotine blacked out immediately. Many had seen a TV show on the Discovery Channel called "The Guillotine" in which a medical expert tells the story above, with the added detail that the scientist was the pioneering French chemist Antoine Lavoisier, who was beheaded during the Reign of Terror in 1794.
Not likely. There's no mention of the blinking incident in the standard biographies of Lavoisier. When I contacted the expert quoted on the TV show, neurosurgeon Robert Fink, he said he'd heard the story from a colleague. The colleague said he'd read it in a book, but couldn't remember which. He admitted the story may be apocryphal.
But let's return to the original question, appalling though it may be: Is a severed head aware of its fate? People have been debating the point since the invention of the guillotine, and not just out of morbid curiosity. Some felt the guillotine, far from being quick and painless, was an instrument of the most profound and horrible torture: to be aware of having been beheaded. Numerous anecdotes and bizarre experiments have been adduced as evidence on either side. After Charlotte Corday was guillotined for murdering Jean-Paul Marat, the executioner slapped her cheek while holding her severed head aloft. Witnesses claimed the cheeks reddened (without blood?) and the face looked indignant. According to another tale, when the heads of two rivals in the National Assembly were placed in a sack following execution, one bit the other so badly the two couldn't be separated.
It doesn't get any better. In one early series of experiments, an anatomist claimed that decapitated heads reacted to stimuli, with one victim turning his eyes toward a speaker 15 minutes after having been beheaded. (Today we know brain death would have occurred long before.) In 1836 the murderer Lacenaire agreed to wink after execution. He didn't. Attempts to elicit a reaction from the head of the murderer Prunier in 1879 were also fruitless. The following year a doctor pumped blood from a living dog into the head of the murderer and rapist Menesclou three hours after execution. The lips trembled, the eyelids twitched, and the head seemed about to speak, although no words emerged. In 1905 another doctor claimed that when he called the name of the murderer Languille just after decapitation, the head opened its eyes and focused on him.
Is it possible? The aforementioned Dr. Fink believed the brain might remain conscious as long as 15 seconds; that's how long cardiac arrest victims last before blacking out. (Dr. Fink's colleague put the window of awareness at 5 seconds.) He also pointed out that people have remained alert after having had their spinal cords severed. Still, this didn't seem like the sort of question that could ever be resolved.
Then I received a note from a U.S. Army veteran who had been stationed in Korea. In June 1989 the taxi he and a friend were riding in collided with a truck. My correspondent was pinned in the wreckage. The friend was decapitated. Here's what happened:
My friend's head came to rest face up, and (from my angle) upside-down. As I watched, his mouth opened and closed no less than two times. The facial expressions he displayed were first of shock or confusion, followed by terror or grief. I cannot exaggerate and say that he was looking all around, but he did display ocular movement in that his eyes moved from me, to his body, and back to me. He had direct eye contact with me when his eyes took on a hazy, absent expression … and he was dead.
I've spoken with the author and am satisfied the event occurred as described. One can of course never be certain that anyone in this predicament is aware of his surroundings and realizes (briefly) what has happened to him. But I concede the possibility that he might.
........
The Medical Answer:
The current medical consensus is that life does survive, for a period of roughly thirteen seconds, varying slightly depending on the victim's build, health and the immediate circumstances of the decapitation. The simple act of removing a head from a body is not what kills the brain, rather, it is the lack of oxygen and other important chemicals provided in the bloodstream. To quote Dr. Ron Wright "The 13 seconds is the amount of high energy phosphates that the cytochromes in the brain have to keep going without new oxygen and glucose" (Cited from urbanlegends.com, no longer extant). The precise post-execution lifespan will depend on how much oxygen, and other chemicals, were in the brain at the point of decapitation; however, eyes could certainly move and blink.
Do You Remain Aware?:
This solely technical survival forms only part of the answer; the second question is 'how long does the victim remain aware?' While the brain remains chemically alive, consciousness can cease immediately, caused by the loss of blood pressure or if the victim is knocked unconscious by the force of the decapitating blow. If that weren't to happen immediately, an individual could in theory remain self-aware for part of the thirteen-second period. There is no consistency in this answer, as the precise length of both actual, and practical, survival will vary depending on the victim. Of course, this applies to many forms of swift decapitation, and not just to the victims of the guillotine.
Monsieur le Docteur Joseph-Ignace Guillotin did not invent that instrument which bears his name. Such devices had been in use in Europe for two centuries. But the times being what they were, some such mechanized expedient was called for. Or perhaps the contraption's excellence cried out for use -- a better mousetrap and all that.
There would be much to recommend such a device. Avoid a reprise of the Mary, Queen of Scots debacle, whose neck took three great whacks and still she didn't lose her head -- the discomfited headsman had to saw through the last bits of integument with his hip knife before the job was quite done. How embarrassing for him. During the interim between the first and the second chops, the poor former queen loosed such a wrenching and protracted groan that the crowd, usually intoxicated in such festive circumstances with blood lust, gaped in horrified silence. So, then -- live and learn, eh?
But what about these heads? Does consciousness survive for some brief moments within the disembodied -- or would it be disbodied -- head? Anecdotal evidence abounds. The heads of two National Assembly rivals were placed into a sack -- when later removed, one had bitten into the cheek of the other so deeply it could not be pried off. The executioner of Charlotte Corday -- who murdered Jean-Paul Marat -- held up her severed head and slapped its cheek; witnesses claimed the face blushed and looked indignant. A soldier who witnessed the decapitation of a friend in a 1989 auto accident relates how the head opened and closed its mouth several times, taking on an expression of shock or confusion, then of terror or grief; its eyes moved from the soldier, to its separated body, then back to the soldier -- direct eye contact, then hazy, then absent and dead.
Which brings to mind the report of Dr. Beaurieux, who, staid man of science that he was, resolved one early summer morning in 1905 to settle once and for all the question of whether a severed head retains for any appreciable time some measure of consciousness, and if so, for how long.
Observe, then, condemned murderer Henri Languille, who mounts with notable sangfroid the scaffold to kneel beneath the blade.
Next, consider his severed head, which fortuitously lands stump-down on the neck, thus perfectly oriented for observation. The doctor notes the eyelids working in irregular contractions for five seconds or so, then they are still and half-closed, the face relaxed. The doctor calls out sharply, "Languille!" The eyelids lift slowly and smoothly, as an awakening, and the eyes focus very definitely upon the doctor's -- clearly, undeniably living. A pause of several seconds, and then the eyes close again. One might almost hear a sigh. Again the doctor cries out, "Languille!" -- and again, smoothly, slowly, the eyelids lift and the eyes fix on the doctor's, with perhaps even more intelligence than the first time. Then a drooping of lids, a fading, a third calling of the name, Languille! but there is no response, and the eyes are glazed, empty, gone. Thirty seconds have passed.
The issue is murky, though. No fewer than three physicians attended the 1879 beheading of one Theotime Prunier, amenable to their end if not his own. The triumverate of medicos immediately snatched up the head and shouted in the face, stuck it with pins, placed ammonia under the nose and candle flames in the eyeballs. No response but a look of astonishment on Prunier's visage, which need have no special significance -- slack jaw and gawking eyes would be expected.
All of it need mean nothing. Two severed heads in a bag need not have been snarling and snapping at each other; one might have been placed sometime after the other, but immediately after its own severing -- and the bite a mere spasmodic reflex. A severed head's cheek might well blush, because blushing is certainly dependent upon capillary blood, but not necessarily upon vascular bloodflow: slaps cause redness. Expressions of shock or of horror are instinctive and universal to the human condition -- perhaps they have no more meaning than the galvanic twitching of frog legs. Eyes widen at a loud sound -- as it happens in this case, the loud calling of a name. Yes. It may all be true, and at the same time meaningless.
The very idea is absurd, that a severed head should be alive. It takes eight seconds to choke a man into unconsciousness -- as I, the third most dangerous middle-aged man west of the Mississippi, ought to know. A severed head can have no blood pressure whatsoever, so one might think that unconsciousness, if not death, must be instantaneous.
But upon deeper reflection, the oxygen that is present, remains present -- it doesn't just remove itself along with the body. Capillaries do not drain themselves in a great Niagara of gore. So we might expect something like eight seconds of consciousness. Further, what effect does having one's entire body mass instantly reduced to some 10 pounds have on the metabolic rate of oxygen usage? Perhaps when the brain doesn't have to think about running the body, it uses less oxygen. And it may be that the concept of consciousness and unconsciousness -- lucidity and dreaming -- takes on an almost incomprehensible meaning, upon the shocking loss of one's bodily appendage. We know the spirit lingers -- heart stoppage isn't death, anymore.
Ah well. It's all speculation. That is, the speculation is speculation. The observations are what they are: phenomena translated into neural impulses within the brain, to manifest eventually as expressions of opinion.
So? Do I have a point? No. I could drag the islamists into it, what with their holy sacrament of beheading infidels and insufficiently subservient women. I could make some bitter correlation between aborted fetuses and still-conscious but not-legally-human-anymore severed heads. I could make it a metaphor for loss and mourning. I could try to blame God for it all. But sometime I just like to chat, share a little of the odd things that have collected in my brain. You know -- the way buddies just talk to each other, sometimes. Let's call this one of those times. Okay? Pal? Because we have voices. We can communicate with each other, in complex ways, with more than just blinking. So that we can know for sure that we're alive.
........
In actuality, the human head does remain conscious fifteen to twenty seconds after decapitation. This was proven when a scientist condemned to the guillotine in the 1700s told his assistant to watch and that he would blink as many times as he could. The assistant counted fifteen to twenty blinks after the head was severed, the blinks coming at intervals of about one second. So the head does remain briefly alive.
........
Let's see. Over the years we've covered crucifixion, kidney theft, and now a second helping of decapitation. What next, you ask — how to perform your own spinal tap? But bear with me. New facts have come to light.
A lot of people disputed my claim that victims of the guillotine blacked out immediately. Many had seen a TV show on the Discovery Channel called "The Guillotine" in which a medical expert tells the story above, with the added detail that the scientist was the pioneering French chemist Antoine Lavoisier, who was beheaded during the Reign of Terror in 1794.
Not likely. There's no mention of the blinking incident in the standard biographies of Lavoisier. When I contacted the expert quoted on the TV show, neurosurgeon Robert Fink, he said he'd heard the story from a colleague. The colleague said he'd read it in a book, but couldn't remember which. He admitted the story may be apocryphal.
But let's return to the original question, appalling though it may be: Is a severed head aware of its fate? People have been debating the point since the invention of the guillotine, and not just out of morbid curiosity. Some felt the guillotine, far from being quick and painless, was an instrument of the most profound and horrible torture: to be aware of having been beheaded. Numerous anecdotes and bizarre experiments have been adduced as evidence on either side. After Charlotte Corday was guillotined for murdering Jean-Paul Marat, the executioner slapped her cheek while holding her severed head aloft. Witnesses claimed the cheeks reddened (without blood?) and the face looked indignant. According to another tale, when the heads of two rivals in the National Assembly were placed in a sack following execution, one bit the other so badly the two couldn't be separated.
It doesn't get any better. In one early series of experiments, an anatomist claimed that decapitated heads reacted to stimuli, with one victim turning his eyes toward a speaker 15 minutes after having been beheaded. (Today we know brain death would have occurred long before.) In 1836 the murderer Lacenaire agreed to wink after execution. He didn't. Attempts to elicit a reaction from the head of the murderer Prunier in 1879 were also fruitless. The following year a doctor pumped blood from a living dog into the head of the murderer and rapist Menesclou three hours after execution. The lips trembled, the eyelids twitched, and the head seemed about to speak, although no words emerged. In 1905 another doctor claimed that when he called the name of the murderer Languille just after decapitation, the head opened its eyes and focused on him.
Is it possible? The aforementioned Dr. Fink believed the brain might remain conscious as long as 15 seconds; that's how long cardiac arrest victims last before blacking out. (Dr. Fink's colleague put the window of awareness at 5 seconds.) He also pointed out that people have remained alert after having had their spinal cords severed. Still, this didn't seem like the sort of question that could ever be resolved.
Then I received a note from a U.S. Army veteran who had been stationed in Korea. In June 1989 the taxi he and a friend were riding in collided with a truck. My correspondent was pinned in the wreckage. The friend was decapitated. Here's what happened:
My friend's head came to rest face up, and (from my angle) upside-down. As I watched, his mouth opened and closed no less than two times. The facial expressions he displayed were first of shock or confusion, followed by terror or grief. I cannot exaggerate and say that he was looking all around, but he did display ocular movement in that his eyes moved from me, to his body, and back to me. He had direct eye contact with me when his eyes took on a hazy, absent expression … and he was dead.
I've spoken with the author and am satisfied the event occurred as described. One can of course never be certain that anyone in this predicament is aware of his surroundings and realizes (briefly) what has happened to him. But I concede the possibility that he might.
........
The Medical Answer:
The current medical consensus is that life does survive, for a period of roughly thirteen seconds, varying slightly depending on the victim's build, health and the immediate circumstances of the decapitation. The simple act of removing a head from a body is not what kills the brain, rather, it is the lack of oxygen and other important chemicals provided in the bloodstream. To quote Dr. Ron Wright "The 13 seconds is the amount of high energy phosphates that the cytochromes in the brain have to keep going without new oxygen and glucose" (Cited from urbanlegends.com, no longer extant). The precise post-execution lifespan will depend on how much oxygen, and other chemicals, were in the brain at the point of decapitation; however, eyes could certainly move and blink.
Do You Remain Aware?:
This solely technical survival forms only part of the answer; the second question is 'how long does the victim remain aware?' While the brain remains chemically alive, consciousness can cease immediately, caused by the loss of blood pressure or if the victim is knocked unconscious by the force of the decapitating blow. If that weren't to happen immediately, an individual could in theory remain self-aware for part of the thirteen-second period. There is no consistency in this answer, as the precise length of both actual, and practical, survival will vary depending on the victim. Of course, this applies to many forms of swift decapitation, and not just to the victims of the guillotine.
guillotine
The guillotine is a curious method of execution and although it is generally held to be humane, there is some question about how quickly one dies after being decapitated.
Two doctors in the 1960s wrote that death is not instantaneous. Every vital element survives decapitation...it is a savage vivisection followed by premature burial." Drs. Piedlievre and Fournier go on to discuss how the brain is capable of breaking down complex sugars in the neurons into oxygen for as long as six minutes after decapitation.
Eyewitness accounts also call into question the swiftness of the onset of death after beheading. "Did it, those who saw the grimacing heads in the basket wondered, kill instantaneously?" writes Colin Wilson. "In the 1790's this question was much debated, as when Charlotte Corday's head was held up and slapped by the assistant executioner, men swore that it not only blushed but 'showed most unequivocal signs of indignation.'"
In an even more graphic account written in 1905, a French doctor experimented with the head of an executed criminal:
"The head fell on the severed surface of the neck ... I was not obliged even to touch it in order to set it upright. Chance served me well for the observation, which I wished to make.
"Here, then, is what I was able to note immediately after the decapitation: the eyelids and lips of the guillotined man worked in irregularly rhythmic contractions for about five or six seconds. This phenomenon has been remarked by all those finding themselves in the same conditions as myself for observing what happens after the severing of the neck...
"I waited for several seconds. The spasmodic movements ceased. The face relaxed, the lids half closed on the eyeballs, leaving only the white of the conjunctiva visible. ... It was then that I called in a strong, sharp voice: "Languille!" I saw the eyelids slowly lift up, without any spasmodic contractions -- I insist advisedly on this peculiarity -- but with an even movement, quite distinct and normal, such as happens in everyday life, with people awakened or torn from their thoughts.
"Next Languille's eyes very definitely fixed themselves on mine and the pupils focused themselves. I was not, then, dealing with the sort of vague dull look without any expression, that can be observed any day in dying people to whom one speaks: I was dealing with undeniably living eyes which were looking at me.
"After several seconds, the eyelids closed again, slowly and evenly, and the head took on the same appearance as it had had before I called out.
"It was at that point that I called out again and, once more, without any spasm, slowly, the eyelids lifted and undeniably living eyes fixed themselves on mine with perhaps even more penetration than the first time. There was a further closing of the eyelids, but now less complete. I attempted the effect of a third call; there was one further movement -- and the eyes took on the glazed look which they have in the dead.
"I have just recounted to you with rigorous exactness what I was able to observe. The whole thing had lasted twenty-five to thirty seconds."
Saturday, May 09, 2009
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