Godless Rachel

Skin, it is an important covering for your body. The whole job of our somatic cells is to protect our skin from damage to DNA by UV rays. Contained in our genetic structure are genes with a determinate amount of melanin. It determines the amount of pigmentation expressed in our phenotype. This has caused the separation of many nations. The question here is why? Looking into our ancestral ties, going back to the chimp-like ancestor, we were likely all very dark pigmented. The ones who carry the largest mutation of inactive genes are those of us with light skin, and blue eyes. For every eye color, and skin color, and hair color that is less than black to dark brown is an inheritance of genes that do not function. This is likely the reason that people who marry a blue eyed person have more brown eyed offspring. Because the DNA will use the functioning genes and pass over the non functional one. When it comes to blue eyes, the lighter they are the more genes that are non functional fo

I am the kind of atheist who does not believe in a soul. I don't believe that there could be anything to consider a god. I don't buy the bible even as a history book. I dispute that any of it is divine, or holds any moral lessons. I am a thinking rationalizing atheist. I get my truth from facts, and nothing less. But how do you deal when everything is a spiritual battle ground? My mother is one of those Christians who believe that nothing bad will happen to you as long as you think positive. She is convinced that everywhere around her are spirits listening to her thoughts. Some places would label that as schizophrenia. Here we call it religion. These beliefs are so ingrained into her that she does not dare to listen to a word otherwise. She is not alone though, and that is what scares me. It is hard to talk sense and rational thoughts to people who refuse to listen. It does not matter what side of the coin you are on. We can all be a little stuck in our ways, and mostly t

In 1944 Shlomo Venezia became a prisoner of Auschwitz. One of the most notorious death camps in Germany. During this time he was in a special area of the camp called Sonderkommando. The Sonderkommando was responsible for the gas chambers. Their job was to help usher people into the chamber, after they had gotten undressed, and then drag their bodies out. They were kept away from the other prisoners, and were only allowed to interact with other Sonderkommando. This was to keep other camp prisoners from knowing the mass genocide that took place in the gas chambers. After the people were gassed, and drug out from the chamber, their bodies were burned in ovens that operated twenty four hours a day. Sonderkommando worked twelve hour shifts removing bodies, and cleaning the gas chamber for the next group. For them it became nothing but a job, a way to survive. The endless death and horrors became common place. During his eight months in the Sonderkommando Shlomo saw hundreds of thousand

What is it about Vagina? You would think that everyone loves vagina since we all came out of one. Only those that came by Cesarean can escape this fact. But you got there by someone having a vagina. They are important things, so it is only right I am proud of mine. My vagina is one of the things that makes me different from men. It is an important fact in who I am. It being part of me has made me me. I like the fact I have one, and so I ask for it to be respected. And I will tell you what respect means to me. Respect is when I can talk about having a vagina without the fear of men calling me a whore for saying it. Respect is when I don't have to make sure no one notices that I have one. Respect is when I get to choose freely what happens to it, and not feel guilty for my choices. Because no woman should have to feel bad about her vagina, or what she does with her vagina. I enjoy being a woman. It feels good attracting the opposite sex, and it is not my fault if you are in

The power of Neurons and what makes me, ME! Inside of our skull there is a whole world. Interactions so fast moving, we don't even know they have happened before we react. Professor Gerbig once told me that a neuron can fire off 25 times in one second. Yet it does so faster than I can think about what it is doing. In fact as I think what to write my neurons have already fired out commands for my fingers to move and my eyes. The brain is a well organized machine. So mysterious and complex, that studying it often leaves us more perplexed than when we started. Neurons are a mass of Dendrites, and Axons. They all group together and fire off in the same direction. It is by having these specialized cells we are able to think, and be aware of the world around us. They are hungry and hard working cells. Just a few minutes without air leaves them dying. They are faster than any computer and work from birth to death. In fact scientists are starting to find that when neurons do not fire

Time for some fun with Dinosaurs. So let me explain why they could have never fit on the ark. And also why they did not die off in the "flood" and how we know. Take for instance my first pic. This guy weighed around 110 tons. (Aprox 220,000 pounds) It could have carried the ark on its back for most of the flood. Even if you had an ark as big as a country a pair of these would cause the ship to sink because 220,000 pounds getting up and laying down or throwing a fit out of hunger is going to crush wood like splinters. But lets say you could get these guys on. Well they would               make good company for. T- Rex. His massive jaws were made for crushing. His teeth were serrated for shredding, and his neck muscles would have made tearing your flesh pretty simple. Don't catch this guy when he is hungry. He may not run the fastest, but his foot steps make catching humans seem like a game of fetch with your dog. He would have weighed in at about 14,000 pounds. Making

If you look at the sunset, you think how perfect and amazing this world is. The simple elegant beauty of it astounds you. Then you look down and a mosquito is biting your leg. Well there went that perfect moment in time, but hey that is life. Many people believe in god. A god, or several. They believe that this world is just too perfect for all of this to be a random event. An accident, or fact of some selection process. Well then lets have a look and see how perfect our world is. It starts back in the Cambrian period. 50,000 species of Trilobites. Each of them from one extreme to another. Some with eyes in the front, others with a line of eyes. But the guy that got my attention was the one who has 5,000 eyes. Now they were not eyes like ours. They were small crystals that let him see a blurry image of light. So he was aware of predators. So imagine what would have been the drive to make 5,000 of them. If you need that many eyes, there must be serious competition. Also there must h