In the first half, professor and author McKay Jenkins shared his discoveries about toxic chemicals, after he had a personal health scare. He had a large benign tumor removed, and doctors wondered if he'd been exposed to a chemical or toxin. Jenkins found out that he'd spent his life marinating in toxic stuff –everyday products that surround us from wall-to-wall carpeting to drinking water to dryer sheets. A lot of the chemicals we're exposed to in consumer products have not been around that long, "and the science that would tell us whether or not these things are dangerous has been around a very short time too," he pointed out.
There are a lot of toxins entering our homes that we aren't even aware of such as gas stoves venting carbon monoxide, furnaces burning gas or oil, and car fumes seeping in from an indoor garage, he reported. He also cited seemingly innocuous products such as scented candles and plug-in air fresheners as a source of unwanted chemicals. Formaldehyde in building materials and weed-killing lawn chemicals are also areas of concern, he added. Jenkins suggested that people pay attention to the items they buy and their ingredients, and noted that companies such as Seventh Generation offer an environmentally safe household product line.
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Dr. Bernard Beitman is the first psychiatrist since Carl Jung to attempt to systematize the study of coincidences and has developed a scale to measure coincidence sensitivity. In the latter half, he discussed the different types of coincidences, the meanings behind them, and who is more likely to have them. "A coincidence is the intersection of two independent life events that brings the person who observes that intersection some surprise and wonder. The surprise and wonder is usually generated by the low probability of those two events," he explained.
According to his research, the most common type of coincidence is 'thought-environment-connection,' such as thinking of an idea and then seeing it on the Internet, TV or other media. The person experiencing a meaningful coincidence often has more to do with creating it than is generally recognized, and individuals who tend to be more spiritual or intuitive more easily connect thoughts in their minds with events around them, he explained. Beitman also related coincidences to what he calls the "psychosphere" a dynamic flux of energy information surrounding us, and "simulpathity" a kind of inner GPS capacity we use to find our our way to people, things, and ideas without knowing exactly how we got there. For more, check out Dr. Beitman's Weird Coincidence Survey.
News segment guests: Charles R. Smith, Steve Kates