Conservapedia - User contributions [en]

Leprosy

2008-01-23T00:19:50Z

CWE: corrected typos

'''Leprosy''' is a chronic infectious [[disease]] caused by an infection with the [[bacteria]] ''Mycobacterium leprae''. It is also known as Hansen's disease, named after its discoverer Gerhard Hansen. Leprosy mainly affects the [[skin]], the peripheral nerves, mucosa of the upper respiratory tract and the [[eye]]s. It can affect all ages and both sexes. Incubation can last anywhere between three months and 40 years, with the average incubation period lasting three to five years. Leprosy is transmitted from one untreated person to another via the respiratory tract or skin. Leprosy is curable and if detected early and treated with a prescribed duration of drug therapy, leprosy will not cause any permanent disability.

Leprosy is one of the world's oldest diseases, tracing back to the ancient civilizations of [[China]], [[Egypt]] and [[India]]. Leprosy was also rampant during the 13th century in [[Europe]]. Historically, it is one of the most stigmatized diseases with a reputation of being highly contagious, disfiguring and incurable. In the past leprosy sufferers were banished to ''[[leper colony|leper colonies]]''. Unfortunately, this practice still exists is some countries today, even though leprosy is now curable and is not considered highly contagious.

Worldwide there are 290,000 leprosy cases being treated as of January 2005, 75 percent arising in nine countries in Africa, Asia, and Latin America, according to the World Health Organization.<ref>"Doctor says he treated woman with leprosy," The Macon Telegraph (Georgia), June 7, 2007.</ref> Illegal immigration, which does not screen for disease, is significant to the [[United States]] from some of those nations.

"According to Dr. Barbara Stryjdwska, Clinician at the National Hansen’s Disease Programs in Louisiana, there are only approximately 150 new leprosy cases each year in the United States, and most of these are in immigrants coming from countries where Hansen’s Disease is endemic. In 2002, 96 cases were reported to the [[Center for Disease Control and Prevention]]. The incidence may be greater however, because many patients do not want to be reported because of their immigrant status. Additionally, if patients do not seek or purchase treatment, they are hard to be tracked. ... Because leprosy is such a small problem in the United States, and since 90% of cases are imported (immigrants from countries where leprosy is endemic), there is little reason for a leprosy vaccine to actually be utilized in the United States ...."<ref>http://www.stanford.edu/class/humbio103/ParaSites2006/Leprosy_vaccine/vaccineinus.htm</ref>
== See also ==

*[[American Medical Association]]
*[[Doctor]]

== References ==

<references/>

[[Category:Diseases]]

Cindy Sheehan

2007-04-21T11:00:19Z

CWE: /* Support */ typo

'''Cindy Sheehan''' is an anti-war protester, known for her inflammatory remarks regarding President Bush. She has received heavy media coverage. Many have declared and celebrated her as the face of the anti-war, anti-American movement. Her son was tragically lost in the [[Iraq War]]. Some of her most controversial acts include calling President Bush "the biggest terrorist in the world today," and at the same time personally praising the authoritarian president of [[Venezuela]], [[Hugo Chavez]] for "supporting life and peace"<ref>http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10704025</ref>.

== Criticism ==
It was reported that a few weeks after her son's death, Sheehan agreed to make commercials for John Kerry and was put on his campaign payroll.<ref>http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,221519,00.html</ref>

Many other parents of soldiers killed in action have rigorously protested her actions, specifically her use of the names of other soldiers who have been killed in her anti-war protests.<ref>http://www.kxan.com/Global/story.asp?S=3723057&nav=0s3ddLEI</ref>

She has also made extremely [[Anti-Semitism|antisemitic]] remarks<ref>http://www.newsmax.com/archives/ic/2005/8/14/101150.shtml</ref><ref>http://www.nysun.com/article/18436</ref>, even blaming Israel for her son's death.<ref>http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2005/08/22/the_cindy_sheehan_you_dont_know/</ref>

She has stated:“[My son] was killed for lies and for a [[PNAC]] [[Neo-Con]] agenda to benefit [[Israel]]. We were told that we were attacked on 9/11 because the terrorists hate our freedoms and democracy … not for the real reason, because the Arab Muslims who attacked us hate our middle-eastern foreign policy.”<ref>http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=N2FjYjA3NDU2NThiZjI4YzFkYTdkZmViY2M5M2U4MTE=</ref>

Sheehan has also received support from known [[Nazi]] [[David Duke]].<ref>http://www.davidduke.com/index.php?p=350</ref>

==Support==
Sheehan has received much support from [[Democrats]], and anti-war groups. {{fact}}

==References==
<references/>

[[category:liberal activists]]

Cindy Sheehan

2007-04-21T10:58:10Z

CWE: /* Criticism */ typos

'''Cindy Sheehan''' is an anti-war protester, known for her inflammatory remarks regarding President Bush. She has received heavy media coverage. Many have declared and celebrated her as the face of the anti-war, anti-American movement. Her son was tragically lost in the [[Iraq War]]. Some of her most controversial acts include calling President Bush "the biggest terrorist in the world today," and at the same time personally praising the authoritarian president of [[Venezuela]], [[Hugo Chavez]] for "supporting life and peace"<ref>http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10704025</ref>.

== Criticism ==
It was reported that a few weeks after her son's death, Sheehan agreed to make commercials for John Kerry and was put on his campaign payroll.<ref>http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,221519,00.html</ref>

Many other parents of soldiers killed in action have rigorously protested her actions, specifically her use of the names of other soldiers who have been killed in her anti-war protests.<ref>http://www.kxan.com/Global/story.asp?S=3723057&nav=0s3ddLEI</ref>

She has also made extremely [[Anti-Semitism|antisemitic]] remarks<ref>http://www.newsmax.com/archives/ic/2005/8/14/101150.shtml</ref><ref>http://www.nysun.com/article/18436</ref>, even blaming Israel for her son's death.<ref>http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2005/08/22/the_cindy_sheehan_you_dont_know/</ref>

She has stated:“[My son] was killed for lies and for a [[PNAC]] [[Neo-Con]] agenda to benefit [[Israel]]. We were told that we were attacked on 9/11 because the terrorists hate our freedoms and democracy … not for the real reason, because the Arab Muslims who attacked us hate our middle-eastern foreign policy.”<ref>http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=N2FjYjA3NDU2NThiZjI4YzFkYTdkZmViY2M5M2U4MTE=</ref>

Sheehan has also received support from known [[Nazi]] [[David Duke]].<ref>http://www.davidduke.com/index.php?p=350</ref>

==Support==
Sheehan has recieved much support from [[Democrats]], and anti-war groups. {{fact}}

==References==
<references/>

[[category:liberal activists]]

Albert Einstein

2007-04-21T10:26:12Z

CWE: /* References */ typo

[[Image:600px-Albert Einstein Head.jpg|right|thumb|220px]]
'''Albert Einstein''' (1879-1955) was a theoretical physicist who contributed to the theory of a [[Special Relativity]] and the theory of [[General Relativity]]. He also contributed to the study of Photoelectric Effect, Brownian Motion and Bose-Einstein Statistics. He was critical of quantum mechanics and has proposed the EPR-Paradox in attempt to point out spooky aspects of the theory. The last fifteen years of his life were spent in spent unsuccessfully searching for a [[Unified Field Theory]]. Born in Germany in a Jewish familiy, he won the [[Nobel Prize]] for his work on the Photoelectric Effect in 1921.<ref>http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/1921/</ref> He immigrated to the United States in the late 1930s where, upon the urging of a colleague in physics, recommended that President Franklin D. Roosevelt develop an [[atomic bomb]] project.<ref>[http://www.dannen.com/ae-fdr.html]</ref>He later regretted this and became a passionate pacifist. In 1952, he was offered the Presidency of Israel, but he turned it down.

Einstein's best-known scientific work is his 1905 papers on [[Special Relativity]]. The theory of relativity had already been published by [[Hendrik Lorentz]] and [[Henri Poincaré]]. Einstein's contribution was to give a description of the Lorentz-Poincare theory without reference to the luminiferous aether, and to clarify some of the physical consequences of the theory.

Einstein then wrote a series of papers applying relativity to gravity using the mathematics of Riemannian Geometry, resulting in [[General Relativity]]. Much of the actual mathematics of general relativity was worked out by Marcel Grossman, David Hilbert, and others. Einstein's main contribution was to give an alternate derivation of the field equations, and to apply them to explain an anomaly in the advance of the perihelion in Mercury's orbit.
Arthur Eddington popularized General Relativity by publishing an explanation of it and by attempting to prove the theory experimentally in a dramatic test. Eddington embarked on a highly publicized trip into the Atlantic Ocean off Africa in order to observe the bending of [[star]]light passing nearby the [[Sun]] during the total [[solar eclipse]] of May 29, 1919. Eddington returned with a declaration that he had proven Einstein's theory of [[General Relativity]], making Einstein extremely famous, when in fact he had selectively used data to attain this result. No Nobel Prize was given for relativity.

In April 2007, NASA reported early results from their satellite Gravity Probe B, confirming 'to a precision of better than 1 per cent' Einstein's assertion that large objects such as the Earth distort the fabric of space and time.<ref> http://observer.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,,2057529,00.html</ref> The Gravity Probe B project, a joint mission between Nasa and Stanford University, used the most precise gyroscopes ever manufactured to detect minute distortions in the fabric of the universe.

Einstein compared the effects of large objects on space and time to the way that a large ball placed on a sheet of rubber stretches the material and causes it to sag, and drew the analogy with the way stars and planets warp space-time. A smaller ball rolling along the sagging fabric will be drawn towards the larger ball, in the same way that the Earth is drawn towards the sun, but will not fall into it as long as it continues to move at sufficient speed. This was a change in thinking from the Newtonian cosmos, in which gravity was viewed purely as an attractive force between bodies.

Robert Massey of the Royal Astronomical Society said: 'From the most esoteric aspects of time dilation through to the beautiful and simple equation, E=mc², the vast bulk of Einstein's ideas about the universe are standing up to the test of time,'

==Cosmological Constant==
Einstein revised his work on [[General Relativity]] to include a 'fudge-factor' which he termed the [[Cosmological Constant]]. He was trying to account for the apparent steady-state nature of the universe.

[[Edwin Hubble]], in whose name [[NASA]]'s famous [[Hubble Space Telescope]] is named, later convinced him otherwise. At one point he had Einstein actually making direct observations alongside him, and Hubble's findings showed conclusively that the [[universe]] was indeed expanding, as predicted by certain solutions of GR's field equations in the absence of a cosmological constant. Einstein recanted his original [[philosophy]], and accepted as true the notion of a changing universe having a definite [[begin]]ning.

He later said of his Cosmological Constant, "It was the biggest blunder of my life."

An interesting end-note on this term: Principle investigators from [[Princeton University]] first published findings in 1998 apparently revealing an accelerating expansion for the universe<ref>http://map.gsfc.nasa.gov/m_mm.html</ref>. Because this initially seemed like it might be a sort of 'anti-gravity' effect (similar in concept to Einstein's original notion), it briefly became quite popular for scientists to dub the phenomenon the 'Cosmological Constant' as well. For more information, see: [[Dark Energy]].

==Controversy Surrounding His Death==

Dr. Thomas Stoltz Harvey, then a pathologist, performed the autopsy on Einstein several hours after his death. Upon completion, Dr. Harvey removed the brain and possibly his eyes <ref>NPR, [http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4602913]</ref>. There is controversy about whether or not Harve had consent from the Einstein family to remove the brain and keep it.

The brain was photographed and sliced into 240 pieces in order to be preserved and further studied. Harvey hoped some uniqueness would be discovered that distinguished Einstein's brain as "genius".

Although he sent pieces away for further study, the bulk of the brain remains with Harvey in "two large glass cookie jars full of what look(s) to be very chunky chicken soup in golden broth" <ref>4</ref>

==Religion==
There is some controversy surrounding the religion of Albert Einstein. Some of his statements, such as "God does not play dice" and "God is subtle but he is not malicious"<ref>5</ref> have convinced many that he believes in a personal God. However, many atheists point out that Einstein also said:

"It was, of course, a lie what you read about my religious convictions, a lie which is being systematically repeated. I do not believe in a personal God and I have never denied this but have expressed it clearly. If something is in me which can be called religious then it is the unbounded admiration for the structure of the world so far as our science can reveal it."<ref>6</ref>

He also denied being an atheist.<ref>http://www.time.com/time/printout/0,8816,1607298,00.html</ref>

==References==

<references/>

*"The Nobel Prize in Physics 1921"[http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/1921/]
*"On The Electrodynamics Of Moving Bodies"[http://www.fourmilab.ch/etexts/einstein/specrel/specrel.pdf]
*"Does The Inertia Of A Body Depend Upon Its Energy-Content?"[http://www.fourmilab.ch/etexts/einstein/E_mc2/e_mc2.pdf
*Michael Paterniti, <i>Driving Mr. Albert: A Trip Across America With Einstein's Brain</i>
*"Collected Quotes from Albert Einstein" [http://rescomp.stanford.edu/~cheshire/EinsteinQuotes.html]
*"Confusion regarding Einstein's Religion"[http://onegoodmove.org/1gm/1gmarchive/2004/04/confusion.html]

[[Category:Physicists|Einstein, Albert]]

Edwin Hubble

2007-04-21T10:21:23Z

CWE: typo

[[Image:Edwin-hubble.jpg|right|thumb]]
'''Edwin Hubble''' (November 29, 1889 – September 28, 1953) was an [[American]] astronomer.
Among his contributions to the field of astronomy was the discovery that the vast majority of galaxies have [[redshift|red-shifted]] light, indicating that they are receding from the point of reference (Earth). These observations provided support for [[Albert Einstein|Einstein's]] [[General Theory of Relativity]], and support scientific models of a "[[Big Bang]]" origin of the universe. The [[Hubble Space Telescope]] is named after him.
==Reference==

<references/>

{{DEFAULTSORT:Hubble, Edwin}}
[[Category:Astronomers]]

St. Olaf College

2007-04-21T10:19:14Z

CWE: typos

[[image:Seal.gif|thumb|right|Official Seal of St. Olaf]]
'''St. Olaf College''' is a private liberal arts college in [[Northfield]], [[Minnesota]]. It claims affiliation with the [[Lutheran]] Church. St. Olaf boasts excellent programs in [[mathematics]] and [[music]]. Its [[choir]] is world famous. It is currently the 55th best liberal arts college in the country according to US News and World Report<ref>http://www.usnews.com/usnews/edu/college/rankings/brief/t1libartco_brief.php</ref>.

== References ==
<references/>

== External Links ==
[http://www.stolaf.edu/about/ St Olaf Website]

[[category:colleges]]

World War II

2007-04-04T01:18:12Z

CWE: typo, inserted space after United States in first sentence

'''World War II''' was a global conflict fought between the [[Allies|Allied]] powers including the [[United States]], the [[Soviet Union]], [[Britain]], [[France]], Australia, Canada and many other nations and the [[Axis (WWII)|Axis]] powers (mainly [[Nazism|Nazi]] [[Germany]], [[Fascism|Fascist]] [[Italy]], and Imperial [[Japan]]). The war is usually considered to have started on September 1, 1939 with the invasion of [[Poland]] by Nazi Germany. During the war, eight major world powers fought, along with several lesser states joining with one side or the other. On the side which lost were the Axis Powers Germany, [[Japan]], and [[Italy]]. Against them were the Allied Powers [[United States]], [[Great Britain]] and the Commonwealth, [[Russia]], [[France]], and [[China]] (which was friendly to the West at the time.) Russia entered the war after Germany launched an attack codenamed [[Operation_Barbarossa|Barbarossa]], while Britain declared war in reaction to Germany's aggression against [[Poland]].

==Causes==
The causes of World War II are complicated. The immediate causes of World War II are generally held to be the Japanese attacks on China, the United States, the British and Dutch colonies and the German invasion of Poland. World War II began after these acts of aggression were met with an official declaration of war, armed resistance or both. One major cause of German aggression may be the fervent [[Nationalism]] that became the norm in Germany post-[[World War I]]. Germans were eager to reaffirm their position as a major player on the world stage.{{fact}}

== German Tactics ==
The major tactical innovation of the war was the use of combined arms warfare, typified by the German doctrine of [[blitzkrieg]]. In this style of warfare armor, infantry, artillery and air power all coordinate to achieve overwhelming superiority at point on the enemy lines. Armor and fast-moving infantry units then exploit the gap and penetrate deep behind enemy lines. The objective is to cause a widespread collapse of the enemy's ability to fight. It was particularly effective during the early stages of the war, before the Allies developed effective countermeasures.

==The end of World War II in Asia==
On August 6, 1945, a B-29 Superfortress, the Enola Gay, dropped a nuclear bomb on Hiroshima. Then, on August 9, a B-29 dropped the second atomic bomb. On August 20 the Japanese government told the United States they were ready to accept the terms which the Allies proposed. The next day, the Allies replied, saying the authority of the emperor would be "subject to the Supreme Commander of the Allied Powers." On August 14 the Japanese government agreed to this.

Then, September 2, 1945, the Japanese government, along with all it's military forces, formally surrendered to the United States. This happened in a ceremony aboard an American battleship, the ''Missouri'', on [[Tokyo Bay]], where the [[Japanese Instrument of Surrender]] was signed. This was the ending of World War II, after six years almost to the day.

==References==

<references/>
[[Category:History]]
[[Category:Wars]]
[[Category:Military]]