[QUOTE=ewmayer;523539]Re. having one's bell rung, I first heard the medical term [url=en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coup_contrecoup_injury]contrecoup laceration[/url] (though note it's more commonly in form of a contusion) on an old 1960s [i]Perry Mason[/i] episode. And with NFL preseason having started, there's lots of this sort of thing occurring out on the gridiron. It's the hard-helmet conundrum: when one is packing a fragile object for shipping, the standard recipe is G-force-damping padding surrounding the object, and the whole thing enclosed in a stiff box (shell) for crush resistance. With an American-football-style helmet, one has at most room for around half-inch of padding - otherwise the helmet gets awkwardly big - and the hard shell can't be like a cardboard box, which can locally crumple to absorb impacts. The helmet shell needs to be highly impact-resistant, ergo no "crumple zones", which means it [a] transmits more impact force to the contents than is desirable, and [b] can and is used as a weapon, exacerbating the dangers of [a]. I sometimes wonder if a modern version of the old padded leather helmets wouldn't be better.[/QUOTE]Or just choose to play a different sport.

[QUOTE=retina;523541]Or just choose to play a different sport.[/QUOTE]Indeed. Take up boxing, where one of the ways to win is to give your opponent brain damage.

AKA "winning by a knock-out".

[QUOTE=xilman;523542]Indeed. Take up boxing, where one of the ways to win is to give your opponent brain damage.

AKA "winning by a knock-out".[/QUOTE]For some boxers it would merely be adding to the existing damage.

I'd much rather watch the grass grow. At least that way I'd be outside in the fresh air.

[QUOTE]I note that, in regard to [B][U]the victim's loss of memory of events immediately prior to the attack,[/U][/B] a concussion alone is sufficient. I know this from personal experience. When I was 8 years old I was accidentally injured in a swimming pool during a summer vacation with some friends. I was told afterwards that the side of my head hit the side of the pool -- not terribly hard, but in just the right way that I had my bell rung.[/QUOTE]
This is called "transient retrograde amnesia." It is a common effect of head injuries. It can also be induced in a medical setting with a substantial IV dose of Valium, or its relatives. This can be useful for unpleasant procedures which don't quite warrant full anæsthesia.

[QUOTE=retina;523543]For some boxers it would merely be adding to the existing damage.[/QUOTE]
Indeed. There is a colloquial term for the symptoms of "chronic traumatic encephalopathy" associated with boxing: [i]punch-drunk[/i] (sometimes [i]punchy[/i]). These terms are also applied more broadly to indicate being tired, dazed, or confused.
[QUOTE=kladner;523548]This is called "transient retrograde amnesia." It is a common effect of head injuries.[/QUOTE]
In my case, it seems the retrograde amnesia is permanent. My recollections in the immediate aftermath are also a bit fuzzy. For example, the doctor may have told me that his colleague was injured when he rode a [i]bicycle[/i] off the porch, rather than a tricycle. A bicycle would make more sense, given the circumstances. I may have conflated the incident with a film clip used years later in [i]Rowan and Martin's Laugh-in[/i], which showed a grown man riding a tricycle until he and the tricycle keeled over.

How much do you know about proper numbers, subjunctive scaling, and declarative fractions?

If you are a wealth boy from Canada then you probably know all abut those three things.

[url]https://arstechnica.com/science/2019/04/which-students-talk-the-most-bs-researchers-say-canadians/[/url]

[QUOTE=Dr Sardonicus;523513]
To this day, I have no memory of at least a half hour preceding my accident, or of how I was injured. I have vague memories of briefly coming to in the locker room, and seeing that someone was trying to put my shoes on my feet. I came to for good in the lobby area up a flight of stairs. I saw one of our friends' kids kind of looking at me. It was the weirdest thing. I recognized him as someone I knew, but absolutely could not remember his name. Then, it was off to see the doctor.[/QUOTE]
So the total memory gap was under an hour or so?
I remember beginning a maneuver on my bicycle to avoid my girlfriend's back bike wheel one evening during a ride on city streets, then the next thing I remember I'm in a strange room and someone I don't recognize is asking me what day it is, and I tell her that judging by the calendar I can see over her shoulder it's the day after the bike ride, and by the light through the window it looks like midday. All the emergency response, local residents, ambulance, two fire trucks, 3 police cars, trip to the ER, uncooperativeness, talks with staff, talk with the girlfriend, going through my repeated set of questions (what happened, where's my car, bike, son) for ~17 hours after are just stories someone told me. So mostly anterograde amnesia. It's as if someone cut the power to the circuits connecting short term memory to the longer term storage, at moment of impact, and took most of a 24 hour day restoring the connection. The repetition rate on my question list was initially 5 minutes, then slowly lengthened until memories could be kept again.

After that it's looking at damage to the bike, my clothing, and my own body to try to figure out what happened as a result of that maneuver on the bike. Triangle tears in both palms indicate a double hand plant on the asphalt after the bike cuts hard left after the handlebars skip (sudden 30 degree rotation relative to the fork). Abrasions on bike helmet and belt and fist-sized hole in the tshirt behind a shoulder, and stitches on forehead, all on the right. For years after, I was very prone to the feeling of the world spinning clockwise around my line of sight, and the ears and eyes debating which way is up and whether it's changing at ~40 rpm. Not fun. It could come on suddenly and seemed to relate to head/neck motions. Including while driving. Or walking on an outcropping at the Grand Canyon a couple months after literally hitting the pavement. I needed the visual indication of people around me for an indication which way was vertical! A boy of about 10 noticed my caution and asked if I was afraid of heights. After I briefly explained, he ran to catch up with his family, tripped on the uneven rock surface, and slid to about 6 feet from the edge. The spins still very occasionally recur, 20 years later.
Someone I worked with took a spill on a bike on a trail in California, hit his head on a rock, and got a plate installed in his skull as a result, but did not describe any other lasting effects.

Some people will believe anything
 

[url]https://arstechnica.com/science/2019/08/the-fda-warns-not-to-drink-bleach-in-case-you-needed-that-reminder/[/url] [quote]Unscrupulous sellers have sold “miracle” bleach elixirs for decades, claiming that they can cure everything from cancer to HIV/AIDS, hepatitis, flu, hair loss, and more. Some have promoted it to parents as a way to cure autism in children ...[/quote]Gullibility rating 9000 (out of 10) :loco:

Missed this by two days, underground train boxing announcement:

[url]https://youtu.be/-PoBttUdvE8[/url]

wow that's fast. I'll take two if the benchmarks back it up
 

[URL]https://www.officedepot.com/a/products/4449180/Lenovo-Legion-T730-28ICO-90JF00AWUS-Gaming/[/URL]
claims a processor base speed of 3 600 000 000 GHz (= 3.6 Exa Hz)
It would be just the thing for knocking out some gigadigit Mersenne primality tests.

[QUOTE=kriesel;524452][URL]https://www.officedepot.com/a/products/4449180/Lenovo-Legion-T730-28ICO-90JF00AWUS-Gaming/[/URL]
claims a processor base speed of 3 600 000 000 GHz (= 3.6 Exa Hz)
It would be just the thing for knocking out some gigadigit Mersenne primality tests.[/QUOTE]

Only if you can also get the Exahertz memory needed to keep the CPU fed. Does Office Depot carry that as well? If not, you might have to try Newegg. ;)