Are industrial chemicals causing cancer, autism and developmental disabilities in our children? Are we in fact poisoning them?

Bill Moyers, reporting on NOW (weekly on PBS every Friday), said "In my lifetime, more than 75,000 synthetic chemicals and metals have been put to use in America. Chemicals, that in many cases, make our lives easier and better. They kill insects and weeds, clean our clothes and carpets, unclog our drains, create produce and lawns, pretty as a picture.

But most of these chemicals have never been tested for their toxic effects on children. And scientists are concerned that recent increases in childhood illnesses like asthma and cancer, as well as, learning disabilities, may be related to the environment - to what kids eat, drink and breathe.

All of us have a stake in their scientific exploration of kids and chemicals.

Some highlights from the program:

To me as a medical detective, the first clue is the increase in the incidence of childhood cancer. That signals that something is going wrong. - Dr. Philip Landrigan

Children have home and garden pesticides in their urine and they're peeing out wood preservatives. Women have termite poisons and toilet deodorizers and flame-retardants in their breast milk. - Dr. Sandra Steingraber

The Centers for Disease Control are attempting to find the cause of "cancer clusters" like one in Fallon, Nevada, where an unusually high incidence of Acute Lymphocytic Leukemia has occured among the community's children. In 20 years this county of 24,000 people had recorded only one case of childhood leukemia. Now, in five years, they've had 15.

The CDC's Dr. Richard Jackson: "Environmental epidemiology, doing epidemic investigations of things in the environment, has been held back by the lack of good measures about what's in people. It's much more difficult than infectious disease epidemiology. Environmental exposures are often much lower, much more long term, it's a different kind of investigation."

One of Nevada's top health officials, Dr. Mary Guinan, comments "We will look for environmental toxins in the body. Not have you been exposed to them? But how much of these toxins have been absorbed into the human body. In fact, into these human bodies. And nobody's ever done that in a cancer cluster before."

Landrigan: I see the cluster of cases of childhood leukemia in Fallon as part of the broad increase in the incidence of various forms of childhood cancer in the United States, leukemia among them - an increase that has been going on for the past 25 or 30 years. Fifty or 60 years ago in this country the major diseases in children were the infectious diseases. Today the major causes of illness in kids are chronic diseases. Asthma is the leading cause of admission of children to hospital; it's the leading cause of school absenteeism. Cancer, after injuries, is the leading killer of children in the United States. Developmental disabilities are common. They affect anywhere from five to ten percent of all children. Things like attention deficit disorder, dyslexia, autism.

We know that chemicals in the environment are responsible for some of these effects. We know, for example, that some cases of development disability in children are caused by exposures to lead, to pesticides, to mercury, to PCBs. We suspect that children who are exposed to pesticides are at greater risk of childhood cancer than other children. But mostly we don't know.

Prior to 1996, all environmental regulation in this country was based on the notion that the entire population consisted of healthy young adults. No provision was made to take into account the fact that children are different. Children are very different from adults. First of all they're more heavily exposed pound for pound. They eat more food, they drink more water, they breathe more air. Then of course kids play on the ground. They live low, they put their hands in their mouths and so they transfer more of any toxic chemicals into their body than we do.

This isn't just food for thought. It's a call to action for parents everywhere in this country. It's a reason to avoid the use of pesticides and chemical cleaning products in the home. It's also a reason to urge policy-makers to regulate the chemical industry much more closely, to encourage the development of cleaner fuels, and to elect government officials who have our children, rather than pork-barrel projects or industry bias, first in mind.

We would like to welcome Timothy Ridge to TRIP! Tim is joining the TRIP team as an occasional guest-blogger. I know Tim through our local Humanist organization, where he will soon be webmaster. I look forward to seeing what he has to say here, and maybe we can look forward to co-projects with him at his static Humanist site.

I am always open to submission of content, if it is one-time or on a more regular basis. I do get unsolicited suggestions for stories, and I run them if they are close to the themes TRIP addresses. I am not very open to participating in the eternal back-and-forth debates between reason and religion, as I find them rather tedious, I have already made up my mind, and no one is ever convinced of the other side's arguments. However, what I do find of value is stories about aspects of reason or religion from the ungodded perspective. My vision for TRIP is not to win debates with the god-ridden, but to firmly establish that a life lived without gods is a valid, defensible, productive choice and must be respected in any open society.

While wandering through Lawrence Kestenbaum's Political Graveyard I found what is most likely an ancestor of mine: George Holcombe, US Congressman from New Jersey!

HOLCOMBE, George, a Representative from New Jersey; born in West Amwell (now Lambertsville), Hunterdon County, N.J., in March 1786; completed preparatory studies and was graduated from Princeton College in 1805; attended the medical department of the University of Pennsylvania at Philadelphia; later studied medicine in Trenton, N.J., and was granted a license by the Medical Society of New Jersey; practiced medicine in Allentown, N.J., 1808-1815; held several local offices; member of the State general assembly in 1815 and 1816; elected to the Seventeenth and to the three succeeding Congresses and served from March 4, 1821, until his death in Allentown, N.J., January 14, 1828; interment in the Congressional Cemetery, Washington, D.C.

My wife's grandfather, William Ayres, was a US Congressman from Ohio:

AYRES, William Hanes, a Representative from Ohio; born in Eagle Rock, Botetourt County, Va., February 5, 1916; moved with his parents to West Virginia and later to Lorain County, Ohio; attended the Weller Township High School; was graduated from Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio, in 1936; salesman for heating equipment in Akron, Ohio, 1936-1944; during the Second World War served as a private in the United States Army until discharged December 17, 1945; president of the Ayres Heating and Insulation Co., Akron, Ohio, since 1946; elected as a Republican to the Eighty-second and to the nine succeeding Congresses (January 3, 1951-January 3, 1971); unsuccessful candidate for reelection in 1970 to the Ninety-second Congress; died on December 27, 2000, in Columbia, Md.

I fear for my offspring. My son can be anything he wants, even a Christian, as long as he isn't a conservative!

OK, if you really feel the need to buy me a present for Christmas, how about a God Detector?

Using the Yo-God God Detector, we don't need to rely on odd turnips or other natural events as a way for God to communicate with us. It gives Him a straightforward way to let us know he exists -- He simply has to move the dial. Once hundreds or thousands of us ask in unison with the Yo-God God Detector, maybe God will respond.

Y'know, I've actually seen one of these in action. It must have been broken.

Jan Haugland of Secular Blasphemy investigates the need for Christians to have faith:

When Christianity was new, this new religion met with opposition and skepticism. Claiming that an executed criminal had been resurrected and was indeed Divine, was obviously beyond what many would accept. While we should not exeggarate the skepitcal climate of the day, it is not a stretch to assume that many people asked the Christians for some evidence supporting this extraordinary claim. Christians had no such things. So, as part of their preaching, they argued that being skeptical, being a doubter, was inheritently sinfull, and that faith -- indeed, blind faith -- was the noblest of virtues.

So, what happened was that a religion made gullability the highest of virtues. And this continues to this day. Only, this obvious fact is hidden behind the word "faith."

Gary Sloan encourages Bush to use the ultimate weapon in the arsenal of a devout Christian: prayer.

Christian doctrine recognizes the universal efficacy of prayer and the infinite power of divine love. The most egregious reprobate is redeemable. Verily, even Saddam Hussein. President Bush should immediately begin to plump for multilateral prayer rallies, not preemptive (and peremptory) strikes. Prayer is safe, feasible, viable, tested, and cost-effective. True, the Pentagon may be piqued and defense contractors may indeed grow antsy. Yes, the National Rifle Association may squawk. Certainly, secularists will ridicule him. Against all opposition, Mr. Bush must be resolute. The benefits of relentless prayer are incalculable. Touched by grace, Saddam will surely give us his oil at a bargain-basement price. Who knows? He may even become the Billy Graham of Baghdad.

I've tried to explain blogs to people as an alternative press, or maybe an alternative clipping service. When asked for examples, I now proudly trot out Trent Lott. I always get blank looks. Seems that people can't take the idea seriouosly that the internet has any effect on real life. Well, now I have proof tha tthe press itself thinks as I do. Time has a story of the Lott Debacle where they mention blogs explicitly:

If Lott didn't see the storm coming, it was in part because it was so slow in building. The papers did not make note of his comments until days after he had made them. But the stillness was broken by the hum of Internet "bloggers" who were posting their outrage and compiling rap sheets of Lott's earlier comments.

Time for the Harper's-like number of the day feature: more than 8,000; the number of pages removed by the US from the 11,800 page Iraqi weapons declaration, before passing the document on to the non-permanent members of the UN security council.

The United States edited out more than 8000 crucial pages of Iraq's 11,800-page dossier on weapons, before passing on a sanitised version to the 10 non-permanent members of the United Nations security council.

The full extent of Washington's complete control over who sees what in the crucial Iraqi dossier calls into question the allegations made by US Secretary of State Colin Powell that 'omissions' in the document constituted a 'material breach' of the latest UN resolution on Iraq.

Last week, Secretary General of the UN Kofi Annan accepted that it was 'unfortunate' that his organisation had allowed the US to take the only complete dossier and edit it. He admitted 'the approach and style were wrong' and Norway, a member of the security council, says it is being treated like a 'second-class country'.

Anyone interested in what we got in exchange for Trent Lott? Nathan Newman has a good accounting of Frist's voting record. I think it can be summed up as Bush's lap dog. And then, there is the killing cats thing:

Frist is an animal lover who said his decision to become a doctor was clinched when he helped heal a friend's dog. But Frist now found himself forced to kill animals during medical research. And his new dilemma was finding enough animals to kill. Soon, he began lying to obtain more animals. He went to the animal shelters around Boston and promised he would care for the cats as pets. Then he killed them during experiments. "It was a heinous and dishonest thing to do," Frist wrote. "I was going a little crazy."

Jody at Naked Writing has found a great quote from Robert Ingersoll that I hadn't heard before. Very appropriate for Human Light:

If abuses are destroyed, man must destroy them. If slaves are freed, man must free them. If new truths are discovered, man must discover them. If the naked are clothed; if the hungry are fed; if justice is done; if labor is rewarded; if superstition is driven from the mind; if the defenseless are protected and if the right finally triumphs, all must be the work of man. The grand victories of the future must be won by man, and by man alone.

I celebrated Human Light yesterday with my family and all my Humanist friends (the offical date is today, the 23rd). It was a four hour party/show complete with readings, speeches, music, dancing, food and a cool science demonstration for the kids. The creators of Human Light are from our Humanist group, so we were guaranteed to have the celebration. But, five other Humanist organizations also celebrated Human Light for the first time this year: Long Island Secular Humanists, Center for Inquiry - West, Secular Humanists of the East Bay, Freethinkers of Volusia/Flagler FL, and Northeastern Wisconsin Humanists! As a brand new holiday, it lacks the established traditions, history, musical canon, etc. that might appeal to the die-hard holiday seasonist. However, these will accumulate with the years, especially as more people participate across the world.

While I personally am grateful and relieved to be free from the Christian/consumerist mad-house that is the holiday season in the US, I do recognise the importance of having a Winter Humanist holiday. For political reasons, if nothing else. Nothing stops a "Merry Christmas!" dead in its tracks like a similarly chirpy "Happy Human Light!" From the Human Light website:

In Western societies, late December is the "holiday season." People wish each other a happy holiday assuming that everybody is celebrating one of the major religious holidays or is at least sharing the spirit of good cheer created by these holidays.

HumanLight allows Humanists to celebrate also.

Humanists are not comfortable with holidays based on supernatural concepts, but nonetheless wish to express their good wishes to others in a spirit of hope, love, and understanding.

HumanLight also gives us the opportunity to let people know that we are here. Our experience has repeatedly revealed that people often feel alone and isolated when they first realize that they cannot accept supernatural explanations or religious guidelines for living. They may not know about the many great thinkers in history who have come to the same conclusions. They may not be aware that there are organizations of like-minded people with whom they can share feelings and experiences, and from whom they can learn.

Steven Pinker is on WNYC's Leonard Lopate Show today at noon, hocking his new book The Blank Slate. You can listen on the web. I am currently three-quarters of the way through the book, and am greatly impressed.