Midnight Garden

[gilster]

The Compost Heap/Chamber of Horrors

[Rose]

Nicotiana Tabacum falsely accused.

or

What Nicotiana Rustica has in common with a Passionflower, or how to mess up "science".

Harmala alkaloid
"The MAOI (Monoamine oxidase inhibitor) alkaloids found in seeds of Peganum harmala (also known as Harmal or Syrian Rue)- harmine, harmaline, and tetrahydroharmine- are collectively known as harmala alkaloids. The harmala alkaloids are of great interest for their complicated relation to phyto-indole entheogens used in Amazonian shamanism"
The harmala alkaloid harmine - once known as Telepathine and Banisterine.

"Harmala alkaloids are also found in many other plants, such as tobacco and passion flower."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harmala_alkaloid

"Passionflower was widely used by the Aztecs as a sedative and analgesic. Its constituents include harmine. Harmine was originally known as telepathine because of its peculiar ability to induce a contemplative state and mild euphoria. It was later used by the Germans in World War II as "truth serum."
http://holisticonline.com/Remedies/Slee ... _herbs.htm

"The significance of these neurotransmitters to the alleged hallucinatory effects of tobacco is still inconclusive, although N. rustica contains the alkaloid harmaline, absent in N. tabacum."
http://www.homeopathy-academy.org/index ... &Itemid=73

Passionfruit
Phytochemicals: Passaflorine, Harmine, Harman, Harmol, Harmalin
http://www.phytochemicals.info/plants/passion-fruit.php

Nicotiana rustica, known in South America as Mapacho, is a plant in the Solanaceae family. It is a very potent variety of tobacco. The high concentration of nicotine in its leaves makes it useful for creating organic pesticides.

Rustica is also used for entheogenic purposes by South American shamans. Growing in the rainforest it contains up to twenty times more nicotine than common North American varieties such as N. tabacum
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicotiana_rustica

[Rose]

What are nightshades and in which foods are they found?

"Nightshades are a diverse group of foods, herbs, shrubs, and trees that have fascinated scientists, doctors, and nutritionists for centuries. "Nightshade" is actually the common name used to describe over 2,800 species of plants, many with very different properties and constituents. All of the plants, however, belong to a scientific order called Polemoniales, and to a scientific family called Solanaceae. To give you an idea of the diversity associated with this group of plants, consider the fact that tobacco, morning glory, potato, and tomato are all classified as nightshades"
http://www.whfoods.com/genpage.php?tname=george&dbid=62

Nightshade foods and human health

TOMATOES
- "Tomatoes were first brought to Europe from Mexico by Cortez and were first cultivated for food in Naples. The English regarded them as poisonous until the 1700s. They were introduced in America as an ornamental garden plant in 1808, but were not eaten as they were believed to cause stomach cancer and appendicitis. The botanical name for tomatoes ‘Lycopersicon’ means ‘wolf peach’ and refers to the association between werewolves, witchcraft and nightshades. Then, in 1820, Colonel Robert Johnson defied the advice of his physicians (“You will foam and froth at the mouth and double over”) and ate tomatoes on the steps of Salem Courthouse, New Jersey, in front of a crowd of 2000 witnesses, the local sheriff waiting to arrest him for suicide."
http://www.craigsams.com/pages/tobac.html

tomatoes are evil

"NOTE: the Tomato does NOT appear on this list raw, sliced or otherwise. the health giving benefits of the accursed fruit are only revealed when all resemblance to the evil fruit has been eliminated"
http://www.tomatoesareevil.com/tomatohealth.htm

[Rose]

Tomatine and fried green tomatoes
"Yes, you are ingesting poison, but not enough to do you any real harm.

Animals have been eating plants for a billion years, and the plants have
been fighting back. As a result of this arms race, your body can cope
with a lot. You've also got an instinctive aversion to bitter tastes
which is how you detect alkaloids in food."
http://www.bio.net/bionet/mm/plantbio/2 ... 26084.html

[Rose]

Threatened by a herb

"Researchers are trying to discredit St John's wort. They are funded by a pharmaceutical company"

"Several other things about the trial are not surprising. The researchers received "unrestricted funding" from the drug company Pfizer, who also manufacture the prescription anti-depressant Zoloft, along with a "me-too" herbal product containing St John's wort."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2001/ ... ocialcare1

Health supplements: R.I.P.

"Drug companies have a proven track record in trying to legislate the natural health business out of existence. In 1996, for example, the Ecologist magazine revealed that, when the Codex Alimentarius (the World Trade Organisation body that sets international standards for drugs, food, supplements, etc) met, the German delegation put forward a proposal, sponsored by three German pharmaceutical firms, that no herb, vitamin or mineral should be sold for preventive or therapeutic reasons, and that supplements should be reclassified as drugs. The proposal was agreed, but protests halted its implementation.

That same lobby now seems to be powering EU legislation. According to the UK department of health, the impetus for the Traditional and Herbal Medicinal Products Directive came from the European commission's pharmaceutical committee."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2002/ ... eandhealth

The Great Australian Supplements Round-up
"Media disinformation is issued directly from pharmaceutical company public relations departments on a daily basis through journalists and industry-sponsored doctors embedded in the media and other key positions. This has been occurring for over 40 years and is well documented in the chemical industry archives, documents released through litigation"
http://campaignfortruth.com/Eclub/21060 ... rticle.htm

We Become Silent
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid ... 5502728465

[Rose]

Perique Tobacco Liqueur
"The unique terroir of the Mississippi River gives Perique the intense spices and aromas that contribute to the delicate balance of this fine liqueur. Perique (liqueur) is entirely artisanal in its construction, and captures the nuances of this ancient tobacco"
http://www.slashfood.com/2007/01/09/per ... o-liqueur/

[Rose]

Leaf-burning ban could be up next

"SPRINGFIELD - Fresh off urging lawmakers to ban most indoor smoking in Illinois, the American Lung Association might turn its efforts toward pushing for a statewide ban on burning leaves next year."
http://www.thesouthern.com/articles/200 ... 738216.txt

Woodsmoke Health Effects, A Review

"The sentiment that woodsmoke, being a natural substance, must be benign to humans is still
sometimes heard. It is now well established, however, that wood-burning stoves and fireplaces
as well as wildland and agricultural fires emit significant quantities of known health-damaging
pollutants, including several carcinogenic compounds."
http://ehs.sph.berkeley.edu/krsmith/pub ... smoke2.pdf

[Rose]

Julie Mellum: But the fire is not delightful

"We're snuffing secondhand tobacco smoke, but we continue to romanticize recreational wood burning -- a hazard all its own."
http://www.startribune.com/opinion/comm ... 32066.html

Proposed wood burning ban draws fire

"it is even worse to allow these chronic and abusive wood-burners to needlessly pump our lungs full of ... fumes and particulates which bring great risks to our immediate and long term health."
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.c ... QUGD16.DTL

[Rose]

Does the air in planes make you sick?

"Emma Mahony asks whether the use of recycled air onboard is causing more passengers to fall ill than the authorities are admitting to"

"It was only when Stephen Fry suggested on the Christmas edition of QI that, since the smoking ban was introduced on aircraft, passengers were subjected to less fresh and more recycled air than before, that I began to wonder whether more joined up thinking was needed over cabin air quality."
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/travel ... 152210.ece

PILOTS SPEAK OUT AGAINST TOXIC CABIN FUMES
"Much aircraft air is supplied direct from the engines, contaminated with synthetic jet engine oils. While the oil is clearly good for the engines, it now appears it is not so good for the people who are forced to breathe it when it leaks into the air supply."
http://www.corporatewatch.org.uk/?lid=3073

[Rose]

The Great Outdoors

"The scenes which Sherard found could have come from a Heironymous Bosch painting. In the heart of the alkali industry in Widnes and St Helens, he saw that spring was not just silent, but never came at all: ‘The foul gases which belched forth night and day from the many factories rot the clothes, the teeth, and, in the end, the bodies of the workers, have killed every tree and every blade of grass for miles around.’
http://www.mesotheliomacenter.org/mesot ... -outdoors/

Revealed: our contaminated countryside

"It reveals the top 10 sites for nitrogen oxides (NOx), sulphur oxides (SOx), particulates and carbon dioxide (CO2). Nitrogen oxides and sulphur dioxide are both linked with respiratory problems. Particulates are tiny fragments of soot or metal which get lodged in the lungs and have been linked to cancer and respiratory problems."
http://news.scotsman.com/latestnews/Rev ... 3691582.jp

[Rose]

Anti-depressants make babies smaller

"Babies born to women on antidepressants are smaller and more likely to suffer tremor and irritability, but the symptoms are not long-lasting, Australian research shows."
http://www.smh.com.au/news/National/Ant ... 32985.html

[Rose]

Naturally Occurring Mutagens and Carcinogens Found in Foods and Beverages
http://www.heartland.org/Article.cfm?artId=10645

[Rose]

Medicinal Smoke
"Throughout recorded history, humans have used the smoke of medicinal plants to cure illness. A sculpture from Persepolis shows Darius the Great (522–486 b.c.), the king of Persia, with two censers in front of him for burning Peganum harmala and/or sandalwood Santalum album, which was believed to protect the king from evil and disease. More than 300 plant species in 5 continents are used in smoke form for different diseases. As a method of drug administration, smoking is important as it is a simple, inexpensive, but very effective method of extracting particles containing active agents. More importantly, generating smoke reduces the particle size to a microscopic scale thereby increasing the absorption of its active chemical principles"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smoke

Medicinal Smoke Reduces Airborne Bacteria
"This study represents a comprehensive analysis and scientific validation of our ancient knowledge about the effect of ethnopharmacological aspects of natural products' smoke for therapy and health care on airborne bacterial composition and dynamics, using the Biolog microplate panels and Microlog database. We have observed that 1h treatment of medicinal smoke emanated by burning wood and a mixture of odoriferous and medicinal herbs (havan sámagri=material used in oblation to fire all over India), on aerial bacterial population caused over 94% reduction of bacterial counts by 60 min and the ability of the smoke to purify or disinfect the air and to make the environment cleaner was maintained up to 24h in the closed room."
http://www.agri-history.org/pdf/Medicinal%20smoke.pdf

Medicinal smokes

"Most of the 265 plant species of mono-ingredient remedies studied belong to Asteraceae (10.6%), followed by Solanaceae (10.2%)"

"The advantages of smoke-based remedies are rapid delivery to the brain, more efficient absorption by the body and lower costs of production. This review highlights the fact that not enough is known about medicinal smoke and that a lot of natural products have potential for use as medicine in the smoke form. Furthermore, this review argues in favor of medicinal smoke extended use in modern medicine as a form of drug delivery and as a promising source of new active natural ingredients."
http://tinyurl.com/6ybwso

[idlex]

From Rose's link, Medicinal Smoke Reduces Airborne Bacteria

We have observed that 1 h treatment of medicinal smoke eminateation by burning wood and a mixture of odoriferous and medicinal herbs (havan sámagri = material used in oblation to fire all over India) on aerial bacterial population caused over 94% reduction of bacterial counts by 60 min... Absence of pathogenic bacteria Corynebacterium urealyticum, Curtobacterium flaccumfaciens, Enterobacter aerogenes (Klebsiella mobilis), Kocuria rosea, Pseudomonas syringae pv. persicae, Staphylococcus lentus, and Xanthomonas campestris pv. tardicrescens in the open room even after 30 days is indicative of the bactericidal potential of the medicinal smoke treatment.

Tobacco smoke would also seem to be a fumigant, and nicotine was once used for greenhouse fumigation.

MRSA is a variant form of Staphylococcus aureus, one of whose transmission routes is airborne. If smoke fumigation removes 94% of Staphylococcus lentus, why not 94% of Staph. aureus as well?

Could it be that the rise of MRSA in hospitals is, in part, a consequence of banning smoking in hospitals, and that clearing the air of tobacco smoke also cleared the air of an effective bactericidal fumigant?
idlex | 07.27.08 - 6:27 am | #

[Rose]

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