h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Another one from the Unedited Guide, and again written by krayzee girl (researcher 185759)

http://www.bbc.co.uk/h2g2/guide/A644834



watch out for her next entry being put up here


Bossel

Interesting article. I have a few comments and suggestions:

Although I'm sure they'll be caugth by the SubEd, you might want to make his/her job easier by correcting a few things: (1) careful with the use of "it's" as opposed to "its" in that first paragraph. I counted two "it's" (contraction of "it is" or "it was") that should be "its" (possessive of "it"). (2) "Huntington's chlorea" should be spelled "Huntington's chorea" or just "Huntington's disease" (which might be easier to remember for the layman). (3) The last sentence in the article has a period at the end of the quoted saying where it should have a comma. Sorry for all the nitpicks, but I just finished proofing another document and have grammar-on-the-brain.

Although very informative already, perhaps a bit more help for the engineers and other non-medically or human anatomy-learned folks might be in order. For example, I was vaguely aware that "metabolite" was some substance that's metabolised (there's that good ol' logic) and that "cortex" and "midbrain" were parts of the human brain (yes, it was the "midbrain" one that gave that one away ), but "basal ganglia" and "substantia nigra" and especially the "hippocampus" had me wondering strange things - of course, by association I guessed they were parts of the brain (or so I think, heheh), but it might be better to be informed of these rather than have to guess. And what exactly does it mean to have high dopamine concentrations in one's brain? I remember something about that in the distant past in my Microbiology course, but ... well, I guess I think it could help to spend a BIT more time fleshing out the effects and characteristic of GHB on the brain for us non-brainiacs (get it? Bit of a pun there, you see ... brainiac means sma... oh, you got it. Righto then).

You also might consider splitting it up a little more with the "HEADER" GuideML tag instead of the bold questions. Just a suggestion.

I'm interested in these sorts of things as I have a cousin who happens to have the rare genetic disorder Huntington's disease (or chorea). He's only four months older than I am and unusualy in that symptoms for him showed up around age 17 but weren't fully diagnosed as Huntington's until he was in his mid-20s (when the genetic test became available and it was known for certain). I'm not sure if he takes GHB or not - it seems there is no rhyme or reason to how lucid he'll be on any given day (or any given hour for that matter). Not a fun disease to have (if there are any at all) - lots more can be read about it at a webside that has the acronym HDSA which stands for "Hunting's Disease Society of America." There are equivalent organizations in the UK as well as many other countries, I'm sure. I know there is at least one in Australia, for example. Sorry, I'm digressing.

Good article, on the whole! Thanks for writing it.

- JD (not a scientist)

Excellent article. Very informative, and extremely thorough. It is a little on the technical side, in terms of style -- which would be great for a journal or something. Maybe some street names and a little more laypeople's explanation would polish this up? Otherwise I am really impressed.

Don't ask me what I (normally) do for work, and I won't ask you either.

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