Interesting discussion at today's meeting. We first reviewed the report in the new Scientist that confirms our feeling that there is a law of Karma.
ANTISOCIAL behaviour doesn't just harm society - it may also harm the perpetrators' health. That's the message of a 30-year study examining the hidden costs of petty crime to society.
The researchers, who monitored 500 children for 30 years. "It's the first study to demonstrate the link between children who engage in antisocial behaviour and deficits in physical health when they grow up," says study leader Candice Odgers of the Institute of Psychiatry at King's College London. As well as accounting for more than their share of crime in later life, "they also incur hitherto unrecognised medical costs", she says.
Although these individuals accounted for just 10 per cent of the sample, they were responsible for 18 per cent of traffic injuries, 29 per cent of the days spent in psychiatric hospitals, 72 per cent of the months spent in jail and 42 per cent of the total months where study members were homeless or taken in by others.
Persistent offenders also had three times the healthy blood level of C-reactive protein, a marker that indicates raised risk of heart attacks or stroke. It is surprising to see this marked risk for heart disease in such young men, Odgers says. "As we follow them to their 50s and 60s, the health burden will likely get even worse."
We then went on to learn about the emptiness of matter.
"Can anyone imagine this entire planet squeezed down to the size of a pearl? But that's what matter is without empty space between particles.
All this shows that matter is 99.99999 percent void - just an illusion of whirling electrical charges. If a c.c. of matter from a pulsar weighs 10 million tons, how much actual matter is in a 200-pound person like me? If the empty space were squeezed out, there wouldn't be enough to see with a microscope. We think we have substance, but we're composed of NOTHING."
After this it was easier to understand David Bohm, whose work inspired many people all over the world, his contributions to science and philosophy are profound. Bohm says that the universe is like a hologram.
