sandy_mcd wrote: I am not discarding the effectiveness of HBO, for which KBCid has provided legitimate scientific references. I am discarding Baugh's unsupported structural-modification detoxifying theory.
Thought Baugh's theory is currently unsuported by sufficient empirical testing it is after all simply a theory of what at least one person considers a valid line of inquiry. Hasn't all of scientific inquiry begun with a theory and followed by testing for evidence to back it?. Sandy consider being alive when Newton first theorised about gravity;
In the year 1666 he retired again from Cambridge ... to his mother in Lincolnshire & while he was musing in a garden it came into his thought that the power of gravity (which brought an apple from a tree to the ground) was not limited to a certain distance from earth, but that this power must extend much further than was usually thought. Why not as high as the Moon thought he to himself & that if so, that must influence her motion & perhaps retain her in her orbit, whereupon he fell a-calculating what would be the effect of that superposition... ( Keesing, R.G., The History of Newton's apple tree, Contemporary Physics, 39, 377-91, 1998)
This was the beginning of his theory and he later expanded the theory by asserting that gravity was a universal force. What he proposed had little to no empirical backing and in fact he had reservations about his own theory;
While Newton was able to formulate his law of gravity in his monumental work, he was deeply uncomfortable with the notion of "action at a distance" which his equations implied. In 1692, in his third letter to Bentley, he wrote: "That one body may act upon another at a
distance through a vacuum without the mediation of anything else, by and through which their action and force may be conveyed from one another, is to me so great an absurdity that, I believe, no man who has in philosophic matters a competent faculty of thinking could ever fall into it."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newton%27s ... 27s_theory
Would you have also discarded Newtons theories because of its initial non-support?
Baugh in his theory appears to be trying to make a connection between biblical understanding and scientific even though he has very little in the way of empirical testing. The part that makes me want to give his theory a chance at validation is that he appears to be making a serious attempt at understanding why things are the way they are now as compared to what might be interpreted from biblical texts for how the environment was to begin with.
My own understanding from the bible infers that all the creatures formed in the beginning did not hurt or kill which if Baugh's theory is any indication he agrees with and this may be the entire reason for him theorising less toxicity.
One of the things that I have studied a bit is that the 3 dimensional shapes of proteins affects their function. This may be an aspect that Baugh also understands and may be why he infers a toxicity change based on the pictures produced from his experiments which show structural changes. This to me would be well within logical inference to assert a possible change of toxicity since the current evidence from biology has empirically proven protein shape affects function and if current shapes produce toxic results then what might one infer from a protein shape change? less toxic would be one valid hypothesis wouldn't you agree?
sandy_mcd wrote:Despite searching, i could find no information on the art of interpreting venom photographs anywhere. The first link provided by KBCid in the prior post says nothing about venom becoming less toxic via HBO; the effect instead is .
At this level, oxygen shows pharmacological action such as prevention of reperfusion injury, reduction of edema and reversal of
sublethal tissue damage.
sandy_mcd wrote:An explanation of the SEM venom pictures and some discussion of the structure-toxicity relationship is necessary in order to evaluate the claims made. I haven't found anything remotely related - the closest is
http://ncse.com/webfm_send/1429 which is rather negative.
The thing here Sandy is that venom is mostly protein so really interpretation of protein images is what is happening and a fair amount of science now works by way of analysis of these 3D images of protein structures. This type of imaging can be used to empirically back or eliminate Baugh's theory.
This would be the study not performed by Baugh that tends to back his assertion;
Brown Recluse Spider Envenomation: A Prospective Trial of Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy
...Our preliminary observations using homogenized skin + venom pretreated with HBO might suggest that the HBO mechanism in this injury could be some inactivation of a venom component...
...We also cannot exclude the possibility that the mechanical action of the bubbles or the environment of the chamber also might have had an inactivating effect on the venom...
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1 ... 3738.x/pdf
You have to ask yourself here why these scientists felt it was important to tell the world: "We also cannot exclude the possibility that... ...the environment of the chamber also might have had an inactivating effect on the venom"
They observed something they could not realistically explain any other way. Which is why they are saying "Our preliminary observations... ...with HBO might suggest that the HBO mechanism in this injury could be some inactivation of a venom component".
This alone gives cause to research what Baugh asserts since in effect its not just Baugh saying there are observable differences. Would you not agree with my logic here?
