California... Sweeping Greenhouse Gas Rules

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California regulators Thursday approved the first system in the nation to give polluting companies such as utilities and refineries financial incentives to emit fewer greenhouse gases.

The Air Resources Board voted 9-1 to pass the key piece of California's 2006 climate law — called AB32 — with the hope that other states will follow the lead of the world's eighth largest economy. State officials also are discussing plans to link the new system with similar ones under way or being planned in Canada, Europe and Asia.

California is launching into a "historic adventure," said Mary Nichols, chairwoman of the state's air quality board.

"We're inventing this," she said. "There is still going to be quite a bit of action needed before it becomes operational."

California is trying to "fill the vacuum created by the failure of Congress to pass any kind of climate or energy legislation for many years now," Nichols said.

A standing-room only board chambers featured testimony from more than 170 witnesses Thursday. Outside the chambers, a few climate change skeptics held signs reading "Global Warming: Science by Homer Simpson."

Some businesses that would fall under the new rules say the system could dampen California's already flagging economy, complicate lawmakers' efforts to close a $28.1 billion revenue shortfall and lead to an increase in the price of electricity.

The rate increases, however, would still need approval from the state.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger told the board he is sensitive to the recession, but argued that many of the new jobs being created under the system are in the clean technology industry.

"The real jobs we're creating right now are green jobs. Since 2006 or so green jobs have been created 10 times faster than in any other sector, so it's also an economic plus," he said.

But he said reducing greenhouse gas pollution is not just about climate change, but about human health and national security.

"I despise the fact that we send $1 billion a year to foreign places for our oil and to places that hate us. We send this money to people that hate us and that are organizing terrorists and trying to blow up our country," he said.

Supporters say the system will help spur economic recovery and innovation, pushing business to invest in clean technologies.

They say the billions of dollars the state collects in the system could help fund clean air programs and help offset any increases in utility rates. Details of the uses of these new funds are still uncertain.

California has already enacted the strictest climate-related regulations in the country involving renewable energy mandates for utilities, tighter fuel-efficiency standards for automobiles and low-carbon fuel standards.

The state's landmark climate law had a Jan. 1, 2011, deadline for devising and enacting the so-called cap-and-trade system.

Here's how it would broadly work:

A company that produces pollution, such as a utility or a refinery, buys a permit from the state that allows it to send a specified amount of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases into the air each year. Those permits could then be bought and sold by the polluters in a marketplace.

If a company in Fresno is 15 percent under its pollution allowance, it can sell the unused portion to a company in Long Beach that has exceeded its quota. The Fresno company gets to keep the money. Polluters can even make a profit, if the marketplace sets a price above the initial cost of the permit.

The lone dissenting board member, Dr. John Telles, said he had concerns that the new market created by the regulation was too vulnerable to cheating.

"We're potentially vulnerable here to be manipulated," he said. "And I don't see enough safeguards in the design of the market."

The board's staff said it would be working on market issues in the coming year before the launch of the program, but recognized that they were creating something that had not been tried before.

Adding another wrinkle, a company that exceeds its allowance can also buy what are called "offsets." These can be bought by companies with forestry or other projects that reduce greenhouse gases.

Those companies can sell those to polluters in the marketplace, also at a profit.

Under the new California rules, regulators would enforce limits on heat-trapping gas emissions beginning in 2012, eventually including 85 percent of the state's worst polluters.

The amount of allowed emissions would be reduced over time, and the regulations would expand in 2015 to include refineries and fuel distributors, such as oil companies.

The cap would reach its lowest level in 2020, when California wants its greenhouse gas emissions reduced to 1990 levels.

Ninety percent of the allowances would be free in the first years of the program to give industry time to upgrade to cleaner equipment or account for increased future costs as the cap tightens.

Over time, as the cap gets lower and fewer allowances are available, costs would rise.

"The idea is to incentivize clean technology over fossil fuels by putting a price on carbon," said Jon Costantino, a senior adviser at a Sacramento law firm who formerly served as the climate change planning manager at the Air Resources Board.

Business groups raised concerns that the board had not yet given hard details about what each facility's allowances would be.

"It's crucial for companies to know what their compliance requirements are going to be far in advance," said Dorothy Rothrock of the California Manufacturers and Technology Association.

"There are definitely going to be some costs incurred right up front for these companies," she said.

State officials say they had to act, because of years of delays in Washington.

"The goal of (the law's) authors in 2006 was to lead by example, and being a leader you have to bring others along with you," Nichols said.

A bill to place a limit on the amount of greenhouse gases nationwide narrowly passed the U.S. House in the summer of 2009, after arm-twisting by President Obama and other Democratic leaders.

But the measure died in the Democrat-controlled Senate because all Republicans and some Democrats from coal- and industry-heavy states balked about how it would raise electricity bills.

Obama, who made the climate bill the centerpiece of his Democratic agenda, pulled support for it after the midterm elections put Republicans in control of the House. The president said he would be looking at other ways to address climate change.

While the Environmental Protection Agency has proposed the first-ever rules to reduce greenhouse gases from large industrial polluters, the GOP, with some support from Democrats, vows in 2011 to block it from moving ahead with the regulations.

California's system, however, could end up being linked to ones being developed in other countries. State officials are talking with the European Union as well as provinces in China and Canada to link systems.

In the U.S., New Mexico narrowly approved its own cap-and-trade program last month and OK'd the state's participation in a regional market. There is another market proposed in the Midwest and in New England.

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The global demand for eco-friendly products has Chilean vineyards examining their carbon footprint.

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Bids that risk insurance invites

You can say that there is a history of good growth. Crunched together, the two insurers would have leading positions in key Asian markets. Value new Prudential business in the region has increased by almost 30 per cent a year over the last decade, six times the rate of growth in other places.

Prudential is buying American international assurance, A.I.G., unit after two years of hard times for his rival in Asia attributable in part to the associations with the A.I.A. turbulent father. United States Government, majority shareholder of A.I.G., is interested in a quick exit. Simply remove A.I.G. A.I.A. could restore the trust of customers - and growth. 1.7 Times had embedded value, a secure common valuation metric A.I.A. seems relatively cheap.

However, some perspective is useful. Purchase A.I.A. imply heroic contortions. The financing agreement will need to raise $ 20 million equivalent to the market value of preannouncement Prudential, through the use of a rights issue. Also give shares and other instruments for which will be released with an 11 per cent stake in Prudential A.I.G..

Duplicate database sales agents could prove problematic too. Prudential and A.I.A. have been rivals in Asia and routinely spent lavishly to personal Cook. Many agents A.I.A. expected shares in an initial offering of shares now moot. Rivals will be be licking their chops at the prospect of nabbing A.I.A. agents and customers.

Shareholders seem to buy the growth story by now. But still it is not clear that the agreement will offer returns to justify the thrill of Prudential. Based on operating earnings for 2009, A.I.A. would have created a mere 5 percent return, even the cost deducted $ 340 million Prudential says that he thinks you can squeeze out three years. It is much lower than the cost of capital A.I.A.. Double synergies and earnings increase of 50 per cent and the return is still below 8 percent. Prudential might be safe but skepticism seems prudent.

Trusted advisor?

Wall Street gets most of guff for potential conflicts of interest. But the bankers should not feel too lonely when advisers legal white-shoed as Cravath Swaine & Moore work together with them in agreements.

Cravath is arguing in a Delaware Court that its work for a company, Airgas, there should be no prevents work it on the other hand, Air Products, a hostile $ 5.1 million bid for - you adivinado: his former client, Airgas.

Airgas argues that Cravath work provides access to privileged information, which now offers Air products an unfair advantage. If Airgas gets its way in the courts, lawyers Cravath banned represent the products of Air and could be responsible for damages.

In strict legal terms Airgas faces a high barrier. Addition, the case is heard by a judge dismissed charges of similar conflict last year against Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, the firm now to the other side of the argument as an advisor to Airgas.

Cravath says that you wasn't that cozy with Airgas. But even if you lose the Airgas by publicly called into question the ethics of Chief Advisor his rival, Airgas could buy yes some time in the acquisition attempt. Cravath has placed in the uncomfortable position of arguing it had only "routine" advised Airgas, not what one would expect for 2 million dollars in legal fees.

While the Cravath may not have violated the law, you will need to reassure other clients for their loyalty. Not enough simply to keep in mind that Airgas hired Goldman Sachs, an adviser had long with Air products. All in all, the executives expect this kind of behavior from their bankers.

When times are difficult, even as Cravath law firms might be more willing to sully his white shoes. Jilting casual for a commercial sense more generous sugar daddy dating partner. But with these conflicts outside in the open clients, companies wishing to reach agreements with their law firms in advance about how much loyalty to wait.

For more independent financial commentary and analysis, visit www.breakingviews.com.

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British company buy Asian A.I.G. Unit

The sale of American international warranty, which is based in Hong Kong and is commonly known as A.I.A., would lead to the return of more large, however, towards the more than 180 million dollars, what United States Government has invested in A.I.G. as part of a large number of ransoms. The Bank of the Federal Reserve in New York, which has preferred shares in A.I.A., would receive the first of $ 16 million in proceeds from a sale.

With a shot of A.I.A., Prudential to become the undisputed leader in Asia. Prudential said that the combined group would be the starter of life in Hong Kong, Singapore Malaysia Indonesia, Viet Nam, Thailand and Philippines and leading foreign life insurance business in China, the India.

A company of 162 years - is not related to Prudential Financial in United States: Prudential UK already draws a large portion of their revenues from Asia, with more than 11 million policyholders in 13 markets.

"We are combining the two strongest in Asia international life insurers," Tidjane Thiam, Prudential Ejecutivo Chief, said on a conference call on Monday announced the agreement.

A.I.A. acquisition accelerates a strategy outlined by Mr. Thiam to sharply increase revenue the company in Asia. The region is considered one of the fastest growing insurance life thanks to a savings culture and increase the influx in many countries markets.

"Transformational is an overused word", said Mr. Thiam, "but this treatment is transformational". Noted that, in 2008, 44 percent of the new benefits of Prudential originated in Asia; If A.I.A. and Prudential merged in 2009, the figure would have been 60 percent. This geography, said, promises "sustainable growth" in the coming years.

Prudential said that the new company would assume the Prudential name, headquarters and incorporated into United Kingdom and traded on the London Stock Exchange with the New York Stock Exchange-listed depositary receipts American.

That said, A.I.A. brand is not set to disappear. "We like good brands and we tend to not kill them unnecessarily," says Mr. Thiam. A.I.A. is a strong brand.

Once the transaction is complete, the company said, "timely" intends to seek a dual primary listing on the stock exchange of Hong Kong.

Prudential said that "this transaction offers the opportunity to bring together two leading companies, combined to capture the opportunity of future growth in Asia, positioning group".

Under the terms of the agreement, Prudential would pay about 25 million dollars in cash and a combination of values, preferred shares and convertible preferred shares $ 10.5 million. The company said that he would get the cash for the transaction on a question of rights of 20 million dollars and 5 million dollars in debt.

The issue of rights must be approved by shareholders and business faces other regulatory approvals. Prudential said provides that the rights in question shall take place in May and was going to close the transaction in the third quarter.

Several analysts degraded Prudential action on Monday.

"Will greatly be dilutive," analyst ING Kevin Ryan told Reuters, speaking the issue of rights. "No one knows exactly what contains A.I.A. how cost-effective is or how it overlaps with the existing companies in the Insurance".

Prudential first approached A.I.G. last year, but was rejected since his bid was too low, according to people who was briefed on the matter.

A.I.A., founded in 1919 and one of the most ancient divisions of A.I.G., is considered one of the main business of A.I.G. The Division has about 20 million policyholders throughout Asia, served by 23,000 employees and agents of 300,000. It has customers in Australia, Brunei, China, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Macau, Malaysia, New Zealand, Philippines, Singapore, Korea South, Taiwan, Thailand Viet Nam.

In accordance with Prudential, A.I.A. took a $ 1,438 million operating profit after-tax during the financial year ending November 30, 2009, based on unaudited figures.

Chris V. Nicholson reported from Paris and Andrew Ross Sorkin from New York. Bettina Wassener contributed reporting from Hong Kong and Michael j. of the Merced in New York.

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A.I.G. puts $ $17.8 million in selling shares of the unit

American international assurance, known as A.I.A., said Friday that its price of its shares in Serbia $ Hong Kong, or $2.53 - at the top of a range of previously - announced by the list of the initial public offering largest ever view in Hong Kong and the insurance as a whole.

Bankers said that he had seen the offer of the strength of demand for both institutional and retail investors, are trying to capitalize on rapid economic growth in Asia, and the market position of A.I.A. in a sector expected to a significant growth in the coming years.

Increasing wealth among populations generally fast-growing Asia is expected to face the growing demand for insurance and savings products in what is today still a market generally penetrated, say analysts.

This has also contributed to make the region battlefield for companies, insurance local and foreign banks seeking to expand its reach.

A.I.A. is headquartered in Hong Kong and with roots dating back to a company founded in 1919 in Shanghai, an established leader in business insurance, with a well recognized brand, employees of 23.500, 320,000

agents and policies from 23 billion across 15 countries.

As A.I.G. teetered on the brink of disaster, sending shockwaves around the financial world, A.I.A. Asia focus provided insurance giant island of relative stability.

"We are very pleased of the bid price is set at the end of the spectrum, reflecting the future of a very strong in the A.IA. confidence vote" "and our ability to capture and realize the potential of exceptional growth in the Asia Pacific region," Mark Tucker, Executive Director of the A.I.A. said in a statement Friday.

Jumbo A.I.A. flotation could grow by another 15 per cent if wide demand allows more actions that will be published in a cash call option.

This would make the announcement ever, third largest of the of two Chinese banks – also testimony to the fact that Asia has become increasingly important as a location and font share offerings.

At the beginning of this year, the agricultural Bank of China, raised 22.1 million in a listing in Hong Kong and Shanghai, becoming the largest in history. In 2006, ICBC, another giant China lender I.P.O. raised 21.9 million $ 16 million dollars in Hong Kong.

A.I.A. adds another heavyweight financial for the exchange of Hong Kong, say analysts. Shares start trading on 29 October.

"All this enhances the reputation of Hong Kong as a leading centre of fundraising," said Francis Lun, general manager of Fulbright in Hong Kong, which adds that next year could see some significant announcements from Russia and other foreign companies choose the city as a place to show their stock values.

For A.I.G., meanwhile, spin-off will draw a line under contours and prolonged for raising efforts A.I.A, which was released in the block, together with a string of other assets, after United States insurance giant money was rescued from the brink of collapse two years by a series of injections of cash mass with a total of $ 180 million.

A first effort to float Asia business was put on hold once the British insurer Prudential offered $ 35.5 million for A.I.A. at the beginning of this year. That bid later collapsed in the middle of the shareholder, opposition causing A.I.G. to return to his original plan of a listing in Hong Kong.

A.I.G. held 33 percent of A.I.A. If you exercise the option box, A.I.A., said on Friday. Even so, spin-off marks an important step in Asia for A.I.G.

The U.S. giant also recently announced that it would sell its two Japanese life insurance units: A.I.G. Star life insurance and Edison A.I.G. - United States by $ 4.8 million financial Prudential life insurance.

Also attempted to sell the Nan Shan Taiwan, life insurance business while those plans have been implemented Taiwan Government opposition.

Mr. Tucker, who was once the head of rival Prudential and took over as Director Executive A.I.A., in July, has undertaken to do business "the preeminent life insurance provider." The announcement, said in a statement Friday, mark "a critical moment for A.I.A."

"I think that once they become independent, will be able to grow the business," said Mr. Lun of Fulbright Securities. "Have been in a holding pattern since 2008: this is a new beginning for them," he said, referring to the uncertainties surrounding the main problems of the A.I.A. in two years.

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The families of fallen soldiers are denied Cash profits insurers

Inside was a letter on his son $400,000 policy. And another thing, which seemed a checkbook. The letter told Ms. Lohman that the total amount of your winnings would be a desirable interest account, which allows you time to decide how to use the benefit. Small letter in a disclaimer that Ms. Lohman said that she not noticeable, Prudential revealed that what he called his account of the Alliance is not guaranteed by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, according to a report in the Bloomberg Markets magazine.

The Mrs Lohman, 52, had left the money during six months after the death of his son in August 2008.

As time went on, said, she tried to use one of the controls to purchase a bed, and the seller turned him down. Happened once again this year, he said, when I went to buy a camera.

Ms. Lohman, a public health nurse said that she always had believed his son life insurance money was secured by the F.D.I.C. Bank This money - as a millones-beneficio death $ 28 million managed by insurers accounts: really wasn't sitting on a bench.

I was celebrated in Prudential, general company account earn investment income. Prudential survivors paid as interest of 1 per cent of Ms. Lohman in 2008 on their accounts of the Alliance, while earned a 4.8% return on their corporate funds according to regulatory filings.

Ms. Lohman wrote checks were really I.O.U. issued by Prudential or drafts. Although it had the name of JPMorgan Chase them, their money was not in the Bank; held by Prudential. Before that a check may be erased, Prudential should send money to JPMorgan, said a spokesman for the Bank, John Murray.

The practice of issuing checkbooks to survivors, instead of paying the sums fixed, extends beyond the military. In the last decade, these asset accounts maintained calls have become in the insurance industry standard operating procedures.

Prudential nor the United States's largest life insurer MetLife secretes benefits of death in a separate fund.

Prudential, the insurer of second life, suspension of payments in their own overall, according to a regulatory filing.

MetLife, dealing with insurance for federal employees remarked, survivors in a standard letter said: "to help you through what may be a very difficult, emotional and confusing time, we created a settlement, the option accounts total control money market option." "Is guaranteed by MetLife".

Letter from the company ignores that the money is in business investment and MetLife F.D.I.C. insurance account.

Checkbook system deceives the families of the deceased, says Jeffrey Stempel, a Professor of law of insurance in the William S. Boyd School of law of the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.

"Has institutionalized bad faith," he said. "In my opinion, this is a scheme to defraud by inducing beneficiary of the policy to allow the company insurance life to preserve assets that no right to." "Becoming the death claims a profit center."

Prudential Alliance account is useful to the families of soldiers, said a spokesman for the company, Bob DeFillippo. For some families, the account is the difference between earn interest on a lot of money and let it sit idle,"said. Prudential follows the law said, regularly discloses the nature and terms of account to account holders.

A spokesperson for MetLife, Joseph Madden, said its enterprise customers were pleased with the account of Total Control. "The T.C.A. offers beneficiaries security, tranquility and time to make an informed decision - while gaining interest in the meantime," he said.

Insurers are holding at least 28 million dollars due to survivors, in accordance with three companies that handle asset accounts retained approximately 130 of life insurance companies. There was no public showing record how enterprises held in such accounts.

Since 1999, the Department of Veterans Affairs has allowed Prudential send to the surviving accounts linked to your account Alliance cash. Prudential policies promise a payment vouchers or 36 monthly payments. Approximately 90 percent of survivors opt to receive the total amount in advance. When do them not gain control; get a cash account.

Stephen Wurtz, Assistant director for insurance in the Department of Veterans Affairs, and who has overseen the insurance program for 25 years, does not fully understand the nature of the programme of Prudential.

"Prudential runs the program on a basis of costo-reembolso only", the Department said initially, referring to 4.2 million dollars in fees paid Prudential in 2009. "Are really good." Do patriotically. "Don't make any money from the account of NATO".

Mr Wurtz said had thought that money from the account of the Alliance entered into a bank. Once learned payments were in the general fund of Prudential, said Mr Wurtz, Prudential asked how much money from the insurance company made from these accounts, and how many dollars held in maintaining assets.

Prudential refused to respond, saying that the information was proprietary, said.

Prudential, which has been the insurance contract with the Department since 1965, launched checkbook earnings in 1999 as an additional benefit to survivors, said Mr Wurtz.

"Maybe not ask enough questions," he said.

In response to this report, the Department of Veterans Affairs said it was investigating.

"The possibility of life insurance companies are leveraging unduly sacrifice of the members of these services is totally unacceptable," said Michael Walcoff, acting under Secretary for management benefits of Veterans of the Agency, in an email. "The V.A. is carrying out a thorough investigation on their procedures and life insurance companies in this program."

The Chairman of the camera, Ike Skelton of Missouri, armed services Committee said survivors provide more information about how to handle the death benefits. Said that insurers should be considered to be "be sure to not misrepresent the options offered to the surviving members of the family".

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TUNEUP FINANCIAL; Time for an audit of security, as the needs and changing options

A few things in our financial life could be so tedious even as important as the review of policies that ensure we possess. Hours may seem completely discussed wasted spent on pages written in arcane language. Therefore do not.

But avoiding the question does not make it disappear. Without entering through their policies each year, do you know if all of its assets are really covered?

"People do not keep your insurance policy with their lifestyles,", said Charles Williamson, President of customer private in Chartis, a subsidiary of the international group of United States insurance group.

Beyond the annual checkup, recommended people to seek new offerings for all of its policies for nonlife every three or four years. "This business changes and opportunities to get more coverage, service and perhaps save some money, are," said.

Here is a glimpse of what you have to do as part of any review of financial health:

AUTO n ° night passes television without a barrage of ads car insurance all promising to save money. But, while insurance companies try to woo to him, their releases not always compare apples and apples.

"You can say I saved $100 in my car insurance, but what desist in Exchange?", said Brad Cooper, senior Vice President of marketing for InsWeb, an online brokerage. "Any insurance agent can save you money, but you can raise your deductible. Can you afford this deductible of $1,000? "

This is read the small print where is crucial. Otherwise might find you in an accident car without means to pay for repairs.

The other area that needs revision is coverage of young drivers. If you are on your policy, will be certainly spike rates. But discounts available when their children are disappearing at University and are not driving year-round, so you should check your policy, said Lisa Lobo, Vice President of personal lines in the Hartford Financial Services Group. Similarly, persons who drive less because you are working from home may be eligible for discounts.

Uninsured motorist coverage is another thing to check your policy. Is quite expensive - a couple of hundreds of dollars a year for every million dollars in coverage - but because it is designed for your protection against someone without damaging your car or injures insurance you. James a. Fiske, Chubb, national marketing director noted that in California one of every four uninsured drivers, and New York, that number is one in seven.

HOME to the fall in house prices in the past two years, many consumers seem to think that they can save money, decreasing the value insured your home. If you pay $500,000 for the home and could now sell for only $350,000, why not reduce the coverage? That might seem logical, but the cost of reconstruction of the House may not have fallen as sharply.

"Sticks and bricks and labour and construction have not decreased," said Mr. Fiske. "Has been pretty flat in recent years."

Of course, a total loss in a House is a rare. For this reason, generally more important to maintain the current updates on your policy. Put an addition on the House is an obvious time to call your insurer - physically added to the size of your home. But if you have upgraded your kitchen with granite countertops and high-end devices, has changed the value, too, and your insurance company will want to know.

Mrs Wolf said that "If the company is aware the update, which will not be in politics,".

Even if nothing has changed, the most recent owners policies contain innovations. Last year, dozens of Bernard l. Madoff victims received payments under a relatively new "fraud safeguard provision" in Chartis policies. "Some claims were up to $100,000, which is not much with a loss of $ 15 million, but is something," said Mr Williamson.

Policies of the owners of PERSONAL property and cover some of the contents of the House, there are limits. The average homeowner probably thinks $50,000 for content is fine, but add in screen televisions flat, some audio, video equipment and camera and this limit is hit very quickly. Now imagine unique jewelry, expensive watches, a collection of wine or antiques - all those mean that it is the time to register for a valuable personal property policy.

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Oh, Christmas tree: stay hydrated and Don't Catch Fire!

Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

A fire department Cadet oversees a burning Christmas tree during a holiday safety demonstration on December 9 in Menlo Park, California.

' Tis the season for announcements of public security of Christmas trees.

Last week, New York City Fire Department held a demonstration showing how easily a Christmas tree or a Menorah may cause a fire.

He told the New York Daily News that he decided to opt for an artificial tree of demonstration City Fire Commissioner. "Don't feel comfortable with a real tree in my house," he said.

Are Christmas trees: true or false: really much of a threat?

 

On the surface, the numbers seem not too threatening. Every year, Christmas trees play a role in some 250 fire and 14 deaths and caused more than 13.8 million dollars in damage to property, for management of fires in United States, an agency within the Department of national security.

But John Drengenberg, director of safety of consumers in the Underwriters Laboratories in United States says security Christmas tree is not a joke. "Only one death is too", says Drengenberg.

The national fire protection Association agrees that Christmas tree fires are not too common, but "when they occur, it probable that exceptionally serious". According to estimates by the partnership, one of each 18 Christmas tree fires in the House in a death, while only the results of one 134 regular fire House in a death in average results.

Expand ABC, United Feature Syndicate Inc. through the AP

Be careful, Charlie Brown: the tree may not be enough fresh.

ABC, United Feature Syndicate Inc. through AP Beware, Charlie Brown: the tree may not be enough fresh.

The National Association of Christmas, which represents producers of Christmas trees tree isn't too want to demonize the tree. Counters that newspapers and magazines are 13 times more likely to result in a fire at home of a person.

Despite warnings are serious, waiving or releasing in the Christmas tree, fortunately is not necessary. Drengenberg, who said he plans to put artificial trees and real home this year, has some tips for people who want a real tree, but who don't want to see it conflagrate:

Start with a fresh tree. A Charlie Brown Christmas-tipo tree simply cannot. To see if a tree becomes meeting, execute the hand through its branches. Quitting a lot of needles in her hand is not fresh enough.hydrate your tree. Perform a fresh cut at the bottom of the trunk and put the tree in water and water daily. A dry tree goes up in flames more easily that one watered. For proof, withdraw the harrowing below.Keep Underwriters Laboratories video your heat source which can dry it tree. And be sure to not block escape routes.Pitch tree when they reach old age. Even if you water them, trees usually last a maximum of four weeks. SafetyAtHome.com

An Australian tree is less likely to go up in flames.

Source: YouTube

Plastic trees can be dangerous too, Drengenberg says, in part because they burn very hot and very fast. This means that it may have less time to exit. However, in comparison with real trees, which takes more time for them power.

If you fancy plastic, Drengenberg recommended buy flame-retardant or fireproof artificial trees. But points out that there is no associated with these tags - Protocol is something that gives as a result of a manufacturer.

But for those wishing more assurance than the single party flames in the House comes from the chimney or mistletoe, Underwriters Laboratories says that it will have a rigorous test of artificial trees by the year 2012 Christmas.

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Lunar eclipse is a highlight of winter Sky

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The shadow of the Earth will pass over the moon late Monday, Dec. 20, into Tuesday morning. Meteorologist and sky watcher Joe Rao discusses the lunar eclipse, and other astronomical events to look out for this winter, including an early dawn visit by Venus on Christmas Day.

Copyright © 2010 National Public Radio®. For personal, noncommercial use only. See Terms of Use. For other uses, prior permission required.

IRA FLATOW, host:

This is SCIENCE FRIDAY, from NPR. I'm Ira Flatow.

Mark your calendar for next Monday night. You have a date with a lunar eclipse. The exact time of the eclipse depends on where you live, but if you are able to stay up late and brave the cold, most people in North America should get a great view of the Earth's shadow passing in front of our moon.

The lunar eclipse is just one of the highlights of the winter sky. Joining me now to talk more about what we might find if you look up is my guest, Joe Rao. He's associate and guest lecturer at the American Museum of Natural History's Hayden Planetarium. He's also a meteorologist at Cablevision News 12 Network, and the publisher of Skyway, Inc., newsletter. Actually, you get this one mailed to you.

Welcome back, Joe.

Mr. JOE RAO (Meteorologist, News 12 Network; Associate, Hayden Planetarium; Publisher, Skyway, Inc.): How are you doing, Ira?

FLATOW: Hi, there. So big deal next Monday night?

Mr. RAO: Yeah, I think so, because this is the first time in about three years - actually, 34 months - that we've had a chance here in North America to see a total lunar eclipse. And although there'll be one next December, it'll be visible only across the Western part of the United States. Folks in the central and Eastern states will miss out because the moon will set before the eclipse begins.

So this is going to be, really, the best lunar show for us until April of 2014. So I would take full advantage if the skies happen to be clear over your area next Monday night.

FLATOW: And so it's the whole continental U.S.? How about Hawaii and Alaska, too?

Mr. RAO: It's the whole continental U.S., the whole part of North America and much of South America. Hawaii will be in a perfect view to see it, as well. It will also be visible, to a degree, in Western and Central Europe, and also in portions of Eastern Asia, where, for example, the moon will be rising when the eclipse in progress for Japan, and also for portions of New Zealand and eastern Australia.

In total, those who will be able to see the moon go through the total phase of the eclipse number 1.5 billion. And the total number of people that'll be able to see any part of the eclipse will be about three billion, or roughly one-half of the Earth's population.

FLATOW: Let's go through the ABCs of the eclipse. First, what time should we expect to see it?

Mr. RAO: Okay, well in Eastern Standard Time, you would be looking for the first little bite of the shadow of the Earth falling upon the upper-left portion of the moon's disk at around 1:33 a.m. Now, that translates to 10:33 p.m. on the evening of the 20th of December, Monday night. Of course, in the eastern United States and for those areas where the eclipse occurs after midnight, it's the calendar date of December 21st, which is also the date of the winter solstice.

The moon will continue to progress into the shadow, and then at approximately 2:41, it will be completely in the shadow, 2:41 Eastern Time, 11:41 p.m. Pacific Time. And for 72 minutes, while the moon is completely immersed in the shadow of the Earth, one would think that since the shadow is going to cut off all sunlight from the moon, that it would black out completely. It will not.

Instead, around the time of total eclipse, it's going to appear to light up like a coppery orange or reddish ball, and the reason for that is that the sunlight is going to be strained through the Earth's atmosphere, and our atmosphere is going to act like a lens and bend that ruddy hue - the same ruddy color that you see in sunrise and sunset -onto the surface of the moon while it's immersed in the shadow.

And that will be the only light source that will be hitting the moon, during totality, will be that faint, coppery glow. And that's why the moon will appear to light up with a reddish color. And that will be for about 72 minutes during totality, and then totality will come to an end. That'll come at approximately three - well, let's see, Eastern Standard Time, 3:53, or Pacific Standard Time 12:53 a.m. The moon will slowly exit the shadow, and then the last little bite will disappear on the moon's lower right edge - if you have enough gumption to stay up - 5:01 a.m. Eastern Time, 2:01 a.m. Pacific Time.

FLATOW: And also, the great news about a lunar eclipse is you don't have to be afraid to look at it with the naked eye, right?

Mr. RAO: Absolutely. People sometimes get this confused with solar eclipses, and, of course, if you're watching a partial eclipse of the sun, when the moon is covering the sun, you dont want to look directly at the sun, lest you wreck your eyes.

But a lunar eclipse is perfectly safe to look at. In fact, I use the analogy, Ira, of a lunar eclipse, the equivalent of when, you know, folks go to a movie.

When you go to a movie theater, you go into a big, dark room. You have a number of seats. You're going to be sitting with a number of other people. You're all facing a giant movie screen, and you're waiting to be entertained by a film that'll appear on that screen for a few hours.

Same thing with a lunar eclipse. Consider all of us on the dark side of the Earth to be inside the movie theater, you and your neighbors all around at that part of the Earth's hemisphere, and you're all looking up - not at a movie screen, but you're looking up at the moon. And you're waiting for something to be projected upon the moon's face, and that will of course be the moon's shadow - the Earth's shadow, I should say, as it slowly creeps across the disk of the moon and will provide you with some entertainment for a few hours next Monday night.

FLATOW: You know, we don't get to talk very much about occurrences of a lunar eclipse. Are they very rare?

Mr. RAO: No, not really. Actually, lunar eclipses are more common, though actually a little less frequent than total solar eclipses. To see a total eclipse of the sun, for example, you have to be in a specific spot at a specific moment when a narrow track of the moon's shadow passes you by.

That's why for any one singular spot on the Earth to see a total eclipse of the sun, you may have to wait as long as 300 or 400 years. But a lunar eclipse, because it's visible, whenever it does occur, to half of the Earth, is more commonly observed.

In fact, on average, I'd say roughly, per decade, if you are, you know, aware of things and keep track of your astronomical almanac or calendar, you could see maybe four or five total lunar eclipses per decade. So they, again, are a bit more common to the man on the street, as opposed to a total solar eclipse.

FLATOW: And so a lunar eclipse has to happen when there's a full moon.

Mr. RAO: That's correct.

FLATOW: So the alignment is the Earth is at exactly on the opposite of the sun than the moon is.

Mr. RAO: The Earth is in between the sun and the moon and throwing its shadow - getting between the two and throwing its shadow upon the moon and blacking it out, or at least diminishing it during an eclipse.

And during totality, depending upon the state of the Earth's atmosphere - and I mentioned the coppery color. Depending upon how clear the atmosphere is, if there aren't any clouds, if there are not any, you know, large amounts of particulate matter in the atmosphere, then the moon, during the total phase, could light up like a fiery orange color.

But then if there are more particulates - for example, there were a couple of volcanoes that erupted during the past year, one in Iceland, most recently one in Indonesia. If there are some aerosol clouds up there to block out that red light from reaching the moon, then instead of an orange or red color, the moon could appear murky brown or dusty red-gray. It all depends upon the effects of cloud and haze elsewhere around our globe.

So this is good for, you know, those like myself or - you know, meteorology. It gives us a clue as to the state of the atmosphere, the clarity of the atmosphere, to see just how bright or how dark the moon will get during the total phase next Monday night.

FLATOW: All right, now, we've got all that time out there bundling up and staying warm, and we've got the winter sky. What else should we look for?

Mr. RAO: Well, directly below the moon, during totality on Monday night, early Tuesday morning, will be the most beautiful of all constellations, the constellation of Orion the Hunter, four bright stars making up the body or torso of the hunter, and three stars in the middle forming the belt.

Although at this time of the year, Ira, at planetarium shows, I like to point Orion out as the giant Christmas package in the sky, the four stars outlining the package and the three stars in the middle outlining the bow.

You could also see, nearby to Orion, Taurus the Bull, a V-shaped face to the upper right of Orion. And the brightest star in the nighttime sky is Sirius, the Dog Star, below and to Orion's left.

Also dominating our evening sky, people going outside during the first half of the night might be noticing a bright, silvery-white star with not much twinkling to it, and that's the planet Jupiter, the biggest planet in our solar system. Take a look at that if you have a telescope.

FLATOW: Wow. It's a good telescope night.

Mr. RAO: It is. It's going to be a great telescope night. And, in fact, anyone in the New York metropolitan area who's hearing me right now, the sound of our voice, at the Hayden Planetarium this coming Monday evening between 6:30 and 8:00 o'clock, we're going to have a solstice/eclipse party.

We're going to celebrate the winter solstice and talk about the lunar eclipse. We're first going to have people come in, look at the simulation of the winter sky and also the eclipse using our Zeiss 9 planetarium projector in our space theater. And then after we do that, we're all going to adjourn to the Rose Center Terrace, where we'll have telescopes set up by the Amateur Astronomer's Association, and you'll be able to look at the moon and look at Jupiter and other objects.

We won't be out there for the eclipse. It'll be a little late for that, but...

FLATOW: I imagine planetariums and museums around the country are doing the same thing.

Mr. RAO: I'm sure they are. It's a great night for having a moon party.

FLATOW: And if we miss this one, and, you know, when's the next best time? What about the Perseid showers? That's gone. That's not happening in 2011?

Mr. RAO: Well - yeah, it's happening in 2011. The unfortunate part about next year for those who like to watch the August shooting-star display is it coincides with a full moon. And that...

FLATOW: Oh, yeah. That's what I imagine. That...

Mr. RAO: That full moon will just wipe everything out, or most of the meteors out.

FLATOW: So your best shot at a sky event is going to be this one -within the next, let's say, 12 months.

Mr. RAO: Absolutely. This'll be the highlight of the year, unless you happen to be listening to us on a feed over in Europe. They will have a chance to see a partial eclipse of the sun at sunrise on January the 4th. This will come two weeks after our lunar eclipse.

And - but, I mean, looking ahead to next year, it's kind of like -unless we have an unexpected sky event, like a comet coming our way - I mean, there's always a lot of wonderful things to see in the sky. But, you know, headline events such as this one I don't really see in the foreseeable next 12 months.

As I mentioned, there's a lunar eclipse next December on the 10th, and that'll be visible in the Western part of the country before sunrise. But for all of North America to enjoy what we're going to enjoy Monday night, Tuesday morning, you'll have to wait until April of 2014.

FLATOW: And the key here is if you're going to go out, really dress for the occasion, because you're going to hate yourself out there if it's too cold and you're not ready.

Mr. RAO: Well, I've often told people - a good friend of mine uses this, too, my friend Sam Storch(ph). He taught astronomy in the New York City School System for over 40 years, and he used to tell kids to watch events like this.

And, of course, when they gave him that blank stare, he said: Well, all I can tell you guys is if you don't decide to get up and watch it, if you decide to stay in bed, it's going to happen without you. So take full advantage of it, because time and tide and eclipses wait for no man - or woman, either.

FLATOW: Or woman. Joe, I want to thank you for taking time to be with us this hour.

Mr. RAO: I thank you, Ira. I want to wish you and all of our SCIENCE FRIDAY listeners a very Merry Christmas, a happy New Year, and hope to talk to you again sometime in the new year.

FLATOW: We will. Joe Rao is associate and guest lecturer at the American Museum of Natural History's Hayden Planetarium. He is a meteorologist at Cablevision News 12 New York. And that's in the network, here. And he's also - I understand he writes at Space.com. Also, you can get his stuff over there.

So we're going to take a break and come back and switch gears and then talk about the unusual story of a woman who knows no fear, literally. It's quite interesting.

Stay with us. We'll be right back. Our number: 1-800-989-8255. You can tweet us @scifri, that's S-C-I-F-R-I. We'll be right back after this break.

(Soundbite of music)

FLATOW: I'm Ira Flatow. This is SCIENCE FRIDAY, from NPR.

Copyright © 2010 National Public Radio®. All rights reserved. No quotes from the materials contained herein may be used in any media without attribution to National Public Radio. This transcript is provided for personal, noncommercial use only, pursuant to our Terms of Use. Any other use requires NPR's prior permission. Visit our permissions page for further information.

NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by a contractor for NPR, and accuracy and availability may vary. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Please be aware that the authoritative record of NPR's programming is the audio.

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Cultural change with Google Book tool tracks words

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Researchers have built a database of more than 500 billion words, culled from a collection of 5 million books. Parsing the words provides a unique insight into cultural changes, they say.

Perhaps the biggest collection of words ever assembled has just gone online: 500 billion of them, from 5 million books published over the past four centuries.

The words make up a searchable database that researchers at Harvard say is a new and powerful tool to study cultural change.

The words are a product of Google's book-scanning project. The company has converted approximately 15 million books so far into electronic documents. That's about 15 percent of all books ever published. It includes books published in English, Spanish, French, German, Chinese, Russian and Hebrew.

The study used 5,195,769 digitized books, or about 4 percent of all books ever published. That resulted in more than 500 billion words. By language:

English: 361 billionFrench: 45 billionSpanish: 45 billionRussian: 35 billionChinese: 13 billionHebrew: 2 billion

At a reasonable rate of 200 words per minute, reading just the entries from the year 2000 would take 80 years, without interruptions for food or sleep.

On Fame:

"Occupational choices affect the rise to fame. ... Actors tend to become famous earliest, at around 30. The writers became famous about a decade after the actors, but rose for longer and to a much higher peak. ... Politicians did not become famous until their 50s, when, upon being elected President of the United States, they rapidly rose to become the most famous of the groups. ... Science is a poor route to fame. Physicists and biologists eventually reached a similar level of fame as actors, but it took them far longer. Alas, even at their peak, mathematicians tend not to be appreciated by the public."

On Censorship:

"Suppression — of a person, or an idea — leaves quantifiable fingerprints. For instance, Nazi censorship of the Jewish artist Marc Chagall is evident by comparing the frequency of 'Marc Chagall' in English and in German books. In both languages, there is a rapid ascent starting in the late 1910s (when Chagall was in his early 30s). In English, the ascent continues. But in German, the artist’s popularity decreases, reaching a nadir from 1936-1944, when his full name appears only once. (In contrast, from 1946-1954, 'Marc Chagall' appears nearly 100 times in the German corpus.) Such examples are found in many countries, including Russia (e.g. Trotsky), China (Tiananmen Square) and the U.S. (the Hollywood Ten, blacklisted in 1947)."

Many of these books are covered by copyright, and publishers aren't letting people read them online. But the new database gets around that problem: It's just a collection of words and phrases, stripped of all context except the date in which they appeared.

Yet Erez Lieberman Aiden, a mathematician and bioengineer at Harvard and co-creator of this new database, says it opens the door to a whole new style of literary scholarship.

"Instead of saying, 'What insight can I glean if I have one short text in front of me?' — it's, 'What insight can I glean if I have 500 billion words in front of me; if I have such a large collection of texts that you could never read it in a thousand lifetimes?' "

A 'Fantastically Addictive' Tool

You can, for instance, type in a word or a short phrase, and the database produces a graph — a curve that traces how often an author used those words every year since 1800.

"And you realize that it's fantastically addictive," says Jean-Baptiste Michel, a mathematician and biologist at Harvard who created the new database together with Aiden. "You can just spend hours and hours typing in the names of people you know, places you like, or just random stuff. And so you end up discovering quite a lot of things that way."

The researchers discovered, for instance, that the trajectory of fame — the curve that shows how often a very famous person is mentioned in books — has changed over the centuries. Today, fame is more fleeting.

"You become famous earlier in life; so fame knocks on your door earlier than before. And then you rise to fame even faster than before. The flip side of this is that you become forgotten also somewhat faster than before," says Michel.

Specific years — 1973, for instance — also seem to fade from the literary record more quickly nowadays. And God got a lot of print in the early 19th century, but not today.

Windows Into Evolving Cultures

Aiden and Michel argue that these graphs are windows into evolving cultures. All those words represent a chunk of our cultural DNA; not a genome, they say, but a "culturome." They've named the website where anybody can search their database culturomics.org. It's just been unveiled in the journal Science.

Aiden is, however, quick to point out that the collection is limited.

"Books are just one form of cultural exchange," he says. "It's a biased form of cultural exchange. Only certain types of people write books, and only certain types of people manage to get their books published."

But at least books have survived, and it's possible to catalog the words in them, unlike casual conversations or lovers' quarrels.

Some scholars may be horrified by this approach to literature, but Stanford historian Caroline Winterer is not. She says such new tools give historians more comprehensive information about the words that people used in the past to describe their world.

"Before, you had to sit there and, well, you actually had to read the whole text, God forbid! And you'd find two or three examples, and nobody could really check up on it. For better or for worse, it does give you a more accurate sense of some things in the humanities."

But some things require knowledge of a word's context. Take the decline of the word "God," Winterer says. Over the past century or two, some writers started describing the wonders of the natural world as divine. Their books don't always use the word God, "But they are talking about nature, or the environment, or Yosemite, or Yellowstone; these are all codes for God."

Using analysis of more than 500 billion words scanned as part of the Google Books project, researchers tracked themes and phrases through time. Below is a sampling of their findings from the study.

Michel et. al. Researchers selected groups of events that occurred at known dates, then analyzed the relevant words and data around those dates. The top chart focuses on a list of 124 treaties; the second chart was made from a list of 43 heads of state (U.S. presidents and U.K. monarchs), centered around the year when they were elected or became king or queen; and the third from a list of 28 country name changes, centered around the year of name change.

Researchers selected groups of events that occurred at known dates, then analyzed the relevant words and data around those dates. The chart to the left focuses on a list of 124 treaties. Click the chart to see a similar graph of a list of 43 heads of state (U.S. presidents and U.K. monarchs), centered around the year when they were elected or became king or queen; and a list of 28 country name changes, centered around the year of name change.

Irregular verbs are used as a model of grammatical evolution. For each verb, researchers plotted the usage frequency of its irregular form in red ("throve/thriven"), and the usage frequency of its regular past-tense form in blue ("thrived"). Virtually all irregular verbs are found from time to time used in a regular form, but those used more often tend to be used in a regular way more rarely.

Irregular verbs are used as a model of grammatical evolution. For each verb, researchers plotted the usage frequency of its irregular form in red ("throve/thriven"), and the usage frequency of its regular past-tense form in blue ("thrived"). Virtually all irregular verbs are found from time to time used in a regular form, but those used more often tend to be used in a regular way more rarely. Click the chart to see more comparisons.

Events of importance provoke a peak of discussion shortly after they happened, but interest in them quickly decreases.

Events of importance provoke a peak of discussion shortly after they happened, but interest in them quickly decreases.

People leave more behind them than their name: "Mary Shelley" (blue) created the monstrously famous "Frankenstein" (green).

People leave more behind them than their name: "Mary Shelley" (blue) created the monstrously famous "Frankenstein" (green).

(A) The usage frequency of various diseases: "fever" (blue), "cancer" (green), "asthma" (red), "tuberculosis" (cyan), "diabetes" (purple), "obesity" (yellow) and "heart attack" (black). (B) Cultural prevalence of AIDS and HIV. Researchers highlight the year 1983, when the viral agent was discovered. (C) Usage of the term "cholera" peaks during the cholera epidemics that affected Europe and the United States (blue shading). (D) Usage of the term "infantile paralysis" (blue) exhibits one peak during the 1916 polio epidemic (blue shading), and a second around the time of a series of polio epidemics that took place during the early 1950s. But the second peak is anomalously broad. Discussion of polio during that time may have been fueled by the election of "Franklin Delano Roosevelt" (green), who had been paralyzed by polio in 1936 (green shading), as well as by the development of the "polio vaccine" (red) in 1952. The vaccine ultimately eradicated "infantile paralysis" in the United States.

The usage frequency of various diseases: "fever" (blue), "cancer" (green), "asthma" (red), "tuberculosis" (cyan), "diabetes" (purple), "obesity" (yellow) and "heart attack" (black). Click the chart to see more about HIV/AIDS, cholera and polio.

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Diction Science: the origin of the word 'Comet'

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Although comets were sighted at least as early as 1000 B.C., Greek natural philosophers named them sometime around 500 B.C., using the Greek word kometes for "a head with long hair." Science historian Howard Markel discusses the word's origins and the study of comets through the centuries.

Copyright © 2010 National Public Radio®. For personal, noncommercial use only. See Terms of Use. For other uses, prior permission required.

Unidentified Man: The alphabet has only 26 letters. With these 26 magic symbols, however, millions of words are written every day.

IRA FLATOW, host:

And that music means it's time for Science Diction. This is our monthly feature where it - we come up with the origin of a word. And Howard Markel, professor of the history of medicine at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, he's also a director of the Center for the History of Medicine there - welcome.

Professor HOWARD MARKEL (University of Michigan): Hi, Ira. How are you?

FLATOW: Hi, there. What word do we have this month?

Prof. MARKEL: Well, look up in the sky, you might see one, Ira. It's comet.

FLATOW: All right. I look up in the sky here, I see clouds. But I'll take...

(Soundbite of laughter)

Prof. MARKEL: Here too with the Great Lakes...

FLATOW: Yeah. Comet, yeah. Where does that come from?

Prof. MARKEL: Well, they were cited long before they were named, probably as early as 1000 B.C. But around 500 B.C., some Greek natural philosophers named the word. They derived it from the Greek word for a head with long hair. It's kometes.

FLATOW: Hmm.

Prof. MARKEL: And that perfectly describes a wandering, bright, starry head followed by that long trail of misty hair-like light that we've all seen if we have been lucky enough to witness a comet.

FLATOW: Mm-hmm.

Prof. MARKEL: About a century later, Aristotle demoted comets. He said they are not stars at all but merely dry and warm exhalations from the Earth's lower atmosphere. And he was a very powerful scientist, so that held ground for almost until the 18th century. But for most of that time, many believed comets to be messages from the gods, harbingers or oracles of disaster and bad news.

FLATOW: Wow. So if you saw a comet, something bad was going to happen.

Prof. MARKEL: Yeah. For example, Plutarch recorded a comet that lit up the skies of Rome right around the time of Julius Caesar's assassination in 44 B.C. And about 1,700 years later, William Shakespeare repeated this warning sign in his play about Julius Caesar as well. Just before the birth of Christ, a comet was seen flying over Judea. And soothsayers told the king of Israel, Herod, that this presaged the birth of a boy who would someday outshine the monarch. And so, in response Herod ordered mass infanticide of all the boy - male children in Israel. That came to be known as the slaughter of the innocents.

And a lot of soldiers took it for granted too - Attila the Hun, Genghis Khan, and most famously, in 1066, King Harold II, he was king of England, saw a comet just before he was to fight the Battle of Hastings. And he lost, of course, to William the Conqueror and his band of Normans.

FLATOW: Yeah. That was recorded in a tapestry.

Prof. MARKEL: Yes.

FLATOW: Well, we're talking with Howard Markel on the origin of the word comet on SCIENCE FRIDAY from NPR. And so when did they finally sort out the real science on this?

Prof. MARKEL: Well, the science really came to pass when Edmund Halley -of course the most famous comet that we all know is Halley's Comet. He lived from 1656 to 1742. He was a prot?g? of Sir Isaac Newton. And Halley set out to disprove Aristotle by demonstrating that comets indeed traveled like planets in closed orbits around the sun. And he used various mathematical formulae, some concocted by Newton and some concocted by himself. And he showed that many - but certainly not all of the comet sightings across human history - represented a single astral phenomenon. And based on his calculations, he determined the periodicity of about 76 years.

And the last one that he saw - that he didn't see, but it was in 1682 -he predicted it would come back in 1758. And right on time, it appeared. And that ended the oracle sort of findings that other people had thought about.

FLATOW: So he didn't name his own comet.

Prof. MARKEL: No, no. He wrote a paper - in fact, he died before it actually came back. But, you know, they call the Halley's - I imagine that there's good news and bad news. Mr. Halley is dead, but we're naming a comet after you. So that's where Halley's Comet comes from.

(Soundbite of laughter)

FLATOW: Yeah. I hate it when that happens.

(Soundbite of laughter)

Prof. MARKEL: Yeah. Don't we all.

FLATOW: Yeah. In researching this stuff, did you come up with any favorite bit of comet history?

Prof. MARKEL: Oh, I did. And it concerns the life of Mark Twain, who's back on the best-seller list even though he's been dead for about 100 years. The night he was born, on November 30, 1835, there was a brilliant view of Halley's Comet flying right over his hometown of Florida, Missouri. And Twain remained fascinated by Halley's Comet for the rest of his life. And in 1909 he boldly bragged to his legions of readers: I came in with Halley's Comet in 1835; it's coming again next year in 1910, and I expect to go out with it. It would be a great disappointment in my life if I don't. The Almighty has said there are two unaccountable freaks: They came in together and they must go out together.

Well, like clockwork, Halley's Comet made its closest and most visible approach to the sun on April 20, 1910. And one day later, on April 21st, the creator of Huckleberry Finn died of a massive heart attack.

FLATOW: No kidding.

Prof. MARKEL: No kidding. Sometimes science can't explain everything, Ira.

(Soundbite of laughter)

Prof. MARKEL: That's weird.

FLATOW: So he predicted it himself. He'd come in with the comet and leave with the comet.

Prof. MARKEL: And he did, right on time.

FLATOW: Wow. You know, I'm trying to see what goes on in your brain, Howard. I mean, why of all the words did you settle on the word comet for this month?

Prof. MARKEL: Well, I was - tell you, I have a cup of - like many people, I'm a caffeine addict and I have a cup of coffee at a local shop called Comet Coffee in Ann Arbor. And I thought to myself, I don't know anything about comets, and you and your listening audience gave me a chance to find something out about it. And it's the great thing about looking things up. You never know what you're going to find, and it's almost always great.

FLATOW: Well, I have to send you out to do eclipse, because we have, you know, that lunar eclipse next month.

Prof. MARKEL: Yeah.

FLATOW: We'll have to send you on an assignment to look up the word eclipse.

Prof. MARKEL: Eclipse would be great, but you can't look at them, as I recall.

(Soundbite of laughter)

FLATOW: This one you can. A lunar eclipse...

Prof. MARKEL: Lunar you can. Right.

FLATOW: ...you can look at, or we'll have to send you back to have another couple of cups of coffee, if that's where...

Prof. MARKEL: Well, I'm always more creative on a couple of cups of coffee, so...

(Soundbite of laughter)

FLATOW: All right. We want to you wish you a happy holiday.

Prof. MARKEL: And happy holiday to you and yours, Ira.

FLATOW: And we'll expect you back here next month, all right?

Prof. MARKEL: Okay. Great.

FLATOW: It's a date. And good luck to you. Howard Markel is professor of the history of medicine at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. He's also director of the Center for the History of Medicine there.

And that's about all the time we have for today. Greg Smith composed our theme music and with help today from NPR Librarian Kee Malesky. If you missed any part of our program, go over to our website. It's sciencefriday.com. Download our podcast. You can go to our audio and video podcast. We have our Video Pick of the Week up there. It's about taxidermia. I think you're going to enjoy it.

You can also take us along, not only on your iPhone, but as of this week we have our Android app. Yup, you can go to the market and download our Android app and you can take along in your pocket our SCIENCE FRIDAY audio and our videos right there along with us. And we'll be back next week. It'll be Christmas Eve, but we'll be here. We'll hope to see you then.

I'm Ira Flatow, in New York.

Copyright © 2010 National Public Radio®. All rights reserved. No quotes from the materials contained herein may be used in any media without attribution to National Public Radio. This transcript is provided for personal, noncommercial use only, pursuant to our Terms of Use. Any other use requires NPR's prior permission. Visit our permissions page for further information.

NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by a contractor for NPR, and accuracy and availability may vary. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Please be aware that the authoritative record of NPR's programming is the audio.

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Living without fear

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Doctors at University of Iowa have been studying a female patient they call "SM" for more than 20 years. SM has a damaged amygdala, a part of the brain. As a result, she doesn't experience fear. Daniel Tranel explains what doctors have learned from SM and how that information might be useful.

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IRA FLATOW, host:

You're listening to SCIENCE FRIDAY. I'm Ira Flatow.

Up next, an unusual story of a woman who knows no fear, literally.

For decades now, doctors in Iowa have been studying a patient they call SM. SM first came to them as an adolescent. She was diagnosed with a rare condition that caused lesions on a certain area of her brain, the amygdala. And because of the damage to her amygdala, SM does not experience fear.

Doctors have shown her snakes and spiders. They've taken her to haunted houses. They've sat through with her what most of us would consider to be scary movies, and none of that seems to frighten her.

Joining me now to talk more about this unusual patient and what her brain condition might tell us about fear in other people is my guest, Daniel Tranel. He is professor of neurology and psychology at the University of Iowa in Iowa City.

Welcome to SCIENCE FRIDAY.

Professor DANIEL TRANEL (Neurology and Psychology, University of Iowa): Thank you, Ira. I'm glad to be here.

FLATOW: She must certainly be the most unusual patient you've had, I imagine.

Prof. TRANEL: Well, she ranks up there with some of our most interesting cases and some of the patients from whom we've learned a tremendous amount in terms of understanding how the brain works.

FLATOW: How did she come to your attention?

Prof. TRANEL: Well, she was actually referred to the Neurology Department here at the University of Iowa, to a colleague of mine - in fact, a co-author on this paper, Antonio Damasio - for neurological symptoms.

We - at that time - that was back in the era when CT scans were the primary mechanism to look at brain structure. And we gave her such a scan, and lo and behold, this revealed these very intriguing lesions in the amygdala that you mentioned in the lead-in.

FLATOW: Mm-hmm. And how are you sure that that's where and why that she has no fear?

Prof. TRANEL: Well, that's a good question. We've studying her for, well, for more than 20 years at this point and have done numerous experiments, leading to the basic conclusion that she doesn't experience fear.

The recent study in Current Biology that we just published perhaps is the most definitive in that regard, though, because these field experiments that you summarized, Ira, in terms of exposing her to snakes and spiders and going through haunted houses really provide the best evidence that I've seen to date, you know, of no fear in situations that should be triggering fear.

FLATOW: Mm-hmm. Let's talk about fear for a bit. Is there a difference between fear and worry? Does she worry about things?

Prof. TRANEL: There's a very fundamental difference between fear and worry, and she does worry. Worry is more in the domain of anxiety and has a lot to do with something we humans do a lot of, which is the future, spending time in the future.

Fear, by contrast, is more of an immediate emotion that's kind of in the moment.

FLATOW: And does she realize what fear is? In other words, can you describe it to her? It's hard - is it a concept she can relate to?

Prof. TRANEL: It is. And, in fact, I was listening to your opening, and she's actually not a person who knows no fear. She experiences no fear, but she, in fact, does know fear sort of in an intellectual way.

She has a concept of what fear is and what it, you know, the situations that ought to provoke it and what normal people would do when in such situations.

FLATOW: So if she is confronted by something that might be fearful to us - let's say a snake. She's in a pet shop. She's not afraid to go over and touch it because she has no fear of it?

Prof. TRANEL: Correct. That's - yeah, that stimulus doesn't induce a state of fear, and thus, she doesn't have the feeling of fear.

FLATOW: And if you tell her that she should be afraid of it, she would not know why she should be afraid of it?

Prof. TRANEL: Well, she would at the level of, you know, yes, lots of people are afraid of snakes, and snakes could bite you. I mean, she would articulate that intellectually. So it's really the feeling that's missing.

FLATOW: Has this lack of fear caused any problems for her?

Prof. TRANEL: Very much so. She has been repeatedly in situations that fear would have kept her out of, I mean, in a nutshell. She goes into unsafe situations, where a normal person would not even approach the situation. And, of course, she does this repeatedly and doesn't avoid those situations and puts herself in harm's way, as a consequence.

FLATOW: Mm-hmm. And what do you learn from her in terms of people like us, who have fear?

Prof. TRANEL: Great question. We learn that the amygdala is a critical brain structure for taking stimuli, sensory information coming from the world outside and relaying that information to critical brain stem nuclei, hypothalamus that are responsible for enacting a bodily pattern of fear-related signals.

Those are, in turn, interpreted, you know, consciously as a feeling of fear, and now we know that the amygdala is a critical part of that pathway. So when you take that out of the loop, you don't get the fear in the body, and you don't get the feeling of fear.

And if I can just go one more step, that has some immediate and very important treatment implications. You know, for example, we can target the amygdala with medications, with therapy that could, you know, down-regulate that structure in people where it was overactive - for example, people with psychiatric conditions, with post-traumatic stress disorder, with phobias.

FLATOW: Interesting - and try to counteract it, then.

Prof. TRANEL: Yes. If we could down-regulate the amygdala in, you know, for example, people with PTSD, that could be a very effective treatment for, you know, getting rid of their fear, which is, in that case, abnormal.

FLATOW: If she hears a loud noise, or somebody yells boo or something, does it startle her?

Prof. TRANEL: Well, she tends to have a basic startle response, but not to fear stimuli. She has a more robust startle response to surprise, you know, more positive types of startled.

FLATOW: So what's it like to do this kind of work with her? Do you find her, you know, as something that you can't relate to because you're fearful of many things she's not?

Prof. TRANEL: Well, that's a great question, Ira. It's always remarkable to - you know, and I've worked with human patients, neurological patients, for close to three decades with my colleagues Antonio Damasio and Justin Feinstein and Ralph Adolphs, who participated in this study, and it's always remarkable to, you know, have a patient come along and just be missing some really basic behavior that's such a basic part of our repertoire as humans.

FLATOW: Right.

Prof. TRANEL: And, you know, to relate that to a particular brain structure is, of course, very intriguing. And that's been the bedrock of our research program here at Iowa.

FLATOW: Right. You know, when we think of fear, we also think of pain. You know now to touch something hot, right? You're fearful of that. Does she understand those things, that something might be painful?

Prof. TRANEL: She has a normal concept and reaction to pain at a basic level, but not in the sense of pain that would be associated with or conditioned to another stimulus. In fact, with Antoine Bechara, we did an experiment several years ago where we did exactly that.

We tried to condition her to a - it was basically a blue patch of color that we presented, and we accompanied that with a sort of a loud, painful auditory stimulus. And she showed no conditioning in that situation, so kind of not learning that certain things can be painful.

FLATOW: Let's go to Leslie in Indiana. Hi, Leslie. Welcome to SCIENCE FRIDAY.

LESLIE (Caller): Hi, thanks. I was wondering how it affects her in, like, social situations. I think of fear as being - sometimes being afraid of the possible consequences. Does she not fear possible consequences? Like, is she willing to say inappropriate things to her boss or something like that, approach someone with a gun and not be worried about what could happen?

Prof. TRANEL: Yeah, great question. Yes. She is impaired in that kind of a situation. The amygdala is probably more specialized for basic fear, behavior, you know, things like kind of in the spiders and snakes category.

But, you know, as you work your way up the system, you - it's exactly what the question suggests. Do you fear the, you know, adverse consequences for a particular behavioral choice and make a decision now to avoid a path that's going to run you into those consequences?

FLATOW: Right.

Prof. TRANEL: And she does have that kind of a deficit.

FLATOW: Right. And you can see the problems, the social problems or the physical problems, you know, on a street in the wrong neighborhood where, you know, you might walk into an armed robbery or something and not even know that something's going on there.

Prof. TRANEL: Yeah.

FLATOW: Where to be afraid of. How about height? Is she afraid of heights? Does she have a concept of that?

Prof. TRANEL: She's not afraid of heights. She claims to enjoy rollercoasters, and maybe that could be her next field experiment, is to take her on some rollercoasters.

FLATOW: Huh. Is there any way to monitor her brain function in real time if you would, let's say, put her on a rollercoaster and see what kind of reaction she might have? Or is that something that you don't need to do?

Prof. TRANEL: Well, it will be ideal for scientists to be able to do that. In fact, you know, the best case scenario you can look at, you know, blood flowing in the brain and neurons firing and the whole nine yards. That's, of course, really not feasible for, you know, the rollercoaster. But we could, you know, we can monitor physiological responses and, of course, behavioral output...

FLATOW: Yeah.

Prof. TRANEL: ...which brings me - you know, one of the great advantages to working with a human patient is that they can tell you what's happening. This idea that fear and the amygdala are connected has been around for a long time, and there's a lot of animal work that brought us into this hypothesis. But to confirm this with a person is, you know, you have the access to the person's consciousness.

FLATOW: And this is something that's been going on for a long time with her.

Prof. TRANEL: Yes.

FLATOW: So she's been poked and prodded and looked at ever since she was an adolescent. And is - so does she find this as a normal part of her life now?

Prof. TRANEL: I would say she does. In fact, I was telling Justin the other day, if a couple of months goes by and we haven't called her, she starts to call us.

FLATOW: Hmm.

Prof. TRANEL: And wonders if a graduate student has some new experiments to try.

(Soundbite of laughter)

FLATOW: 1-800-989-8255 is our number. We're talking about, well, fear in - and do you know of any other people who have this similar kind of condition or is she unique?

Prof. TRANEL: There are other people with this condition. It's very hard to make a guess, but maybe hundreds, the world over. It's a very rare genetic disorder. And, in fact, in only about half the cases that have the disorder, do you get this brain manifestation. So the cases are very rare. There are others in the world.

FLATOW: Well, let me just have - just put an idea in here just so we can talk a little bit more.

I'm Ira Flatow. This is SCIENCE FRIDAY from NPR.

Talking with Daniel Tranel. And this is what makes me think that could there be people - you know, you look at people who say, oh, that person is fearless. Could they be having a smaller functioning, you know, in the amygdala than most people have...

Prof. TRANEL: Absolutely.

FLATOW: ...and still be in the normal range, you know?

Prof. TRANEL: Absolutely. Absolutely. Most biological phenomena are distributed, you know, kind of in a bell curve. And you have people at the high end and at the low end and, you know, most of the people in the middle somewhere.

FLATOW: Right.

Prof. TRANEL: So, you know, lack of fear can be a good thing in some situations. You know, it can be constructive in some niches, not too many.

FLATOW: Hmm. Let's see if I can get a quick call in here. Paul in Louisville. Hi, Paul.

PAUL (Caller): Yeah, hi. Thanks for taking my call. I have a question about just, like, adventurism and fun. I mean, I've done some skydiving and bungee jumping, those kind of things. And you mentioned rollercoasters, earlier. I mean, part of the fun of that is the fear of it. I mean, that you - that the adrenaline rush and getting over this, like, terror of what it is you're about to do. Does she have that sense?

Prof. TRANEL: Well, no. She doesn't have that sense. And that's kind of a - you know, you're absolutely right. We deliberately put ourselves in situations that have a certain degree of fear because they're also thrilling and arousing, and there's a positive reinforcement from that. And she lacks a lot of that.

FLATOW: Hmm. A tweet from Tim Beauchamp says is there an opposite of fear? And if so, does she experience that?

Prof. TRANEL: Is there an opposite of fear?

FLATOW: Mm-hmm.

Prof. TRANEL: Well, she is the opposite of fear, in the sense, not having it.

FLATOW: Right.

Prof. TRANEL: And there are too much of it, and you have PTSD, you have a severe phobia that incapacitates you, et cetera.

FLATOW: Let's see if I can get another quick call from Brian in Columbus. Hi, Brian.

BRIAN (Caller): Hi. Thanks for picking up, Ira. Happy holidays.

FLATOW: You, too.

BRIAN: Hey, I'm fearful - no pun intended - that if a group of people with bad intentions were to learn the details of these findings, Dr. Tranel, could they perhaps, say terrorists, utilize this amygdala malfunction for their benefit?

Prof. TRANEL: Well, I suppose that's possible. Not to, you know, not to provide any recipes in a public forum, but, you know, let's say you were running an army and, you know, gave everybody in the army bilateral amygdala lesions, you know, maybe you'd have soldiers who would do anything. And I guess you could imagine that that could be a good thing somehow. But that's a - sounds like a disaster in the final analysis.

FLATOW: So where do you - where would you go from here? What would you like to know now and how would you proceed?

Prof. TRANEL: Well - so one interesting question, Ira, is, you know - so we have this connection with the amygdala in the middle of the circuit for stimuli coming from the outside. What about stimuli coming from the inside? What about the pain associated with a heart attack? What about the sensation of choking? What pathway would such signals use? So - and so a really interesting question to ask is whether that pathway might be different and not need the amygdala. There's a little evidence for that already, and that's an interesting question that we would like to pursue.

FLATOW: You're not going to choke or cause a heart attack or anything like that, just so we get that clear for our listeners who might be mishearing that.

Prof. TRANEL: I don't think we'll - we won't choke or give a heart attack to a subject who's arguably been a goldmine for...

(Soundbite of laughter)

Prof. TRANEL: ...the investigators in our group for a long time. But there are ways to induce those sensations experimentally, so you can kind of get that process - sort of an as-if process - started.

FLATOW: All right. This is fascinating. Thank you very much for taking the time to be with us.

Prof. TRANEL: I - thank you for having me on the show, Ira. It's always a pleasure and great to talk with everyone.

FLATOW: Thank you. Have a happy holiday.

Prof. TRANEL: Happy holiday to you, too.

FLATOW: Daniel Tranel is professor of neurology and psychology, University of Iowa in Iowa City. We're going to take a break and come back and talk more about putting a storm door under your tree. Yeah. Think about that. We'll be right back.

I'm Ira Flatow. This is SCIENCE FRIDAY from NPR.

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