Addiction to Smoking

Amongst the various social, economic and environmental issues, health issues are arising at a very faster rate. Though pollution is degrading the environmental standards, in door pollution is at the same time increasing and harming the health of not only the smoker but also all the family members.

Smoking is therefore considered to be an indoor source of pollution, which is affecting the health of both the smoker as well as the people in his/her surroundings. These include infants, pregnant women and people of all age.

Consequently, not only the internal system of a human body is injured but also the end is early death. It is also important to understand that the after effects of smoking would be more dangerous for women, especially pregnant womern. One needs to realize the dangers of smoking and should make it a priority to quit smoking, especially when carrying a child.

Since smoking is an addiction of nicotine, it is really hard to quit smoking. However, the best strategy to quit smoking is first to realize the dangerous affects of smoking and then to decide and plan to quit smoking. Once a smoker reaches this stage it becomes easy for him/her to quite smoking by following certain steps or by consulting a physician and following his suggestions.

Why Quitting Smoking is so Hard

When we talk about smoking one simple question comes in our mind that why do people smoke? According to a general survey taken from some smokers I came to the conclusion that the addiction to smoking is due to many reasons but the basis behind all could be the immature psychology where the youth is concerned. By copying their adults, they think they give a mature and elder look and are more impressive and attractive towards the opposite sex.

However later on this leads to a habit and then addiction. On the other hand men smoke either due to social and domestic pressure or some due to the economic burden they undergo. This time they psychologically feel relaxed and believe that this is helping in coping the challenges and generating new ideas that ultimately leads to some solution.

In fact this misconception results into making them weak physically though mentally relaxed. However, this is the psychological and social reason that instigates an individual towards smoking, while drugs like nicotine traps the smoker and makes him addict. Therefore, addictive drug in a cigarette or cigar is nicotine, which is a highly addictive stimulant. According to various researches, human body very easy gets addicted to nicotine, as it is even more addictive drug then heroin and cocaine.

Both men and women are addicted to smoking where evaluating the percentage of who Nicotine is a drug, which is extremely addictive and stimulant present in cigarettes and cigars.

Though being addict to any certain habit or behavior is very common as it is also related to human psychology and nature. However, smoking stands amongst the most common psychological as well as behavioral addiction, which immensely affects human health.

For instance, the inhaled smoke of cigarettes contains almost 4,000 chemicals, which are related to diseases like cancer. Moreover, these chemicals includes substances that are not only injurious to human health but also stimulate human body towards addiction.

Therefore, the chemicals included in the making of cigarette are nicotine, tars and carbon monoxide. However, slightly more men than women are current smokers, although among teens 15 to 19 years old, female smokers out number their male counterparts. The highest level of tobacco use is reported among young adults 20 to 24 years old.

According to the “Canadian Cancer Society”, nicotine that is present in tobacco creates dependency in the body. This at the one hand often makes new smokers ill and on the other hand produces relaxing, stimulating, or other pleasurable or rewarding effects.

Thus tobacco-containing nicotine is a powerful mood-altering drug, which upon inhaling immediately gets into the bloodstream and hits the brain with in 6 seconds. This psychological as well as physical dependence on Cigarette is the actual culprit behind the addiction.

No matter what the motivating force is behind smoking but no one can deny the fact that Cigarette smoking can result to addiction similarly people get addicted to alcohol, tranquilizers and other drugs, where nicotine is an extremely stimulating drug leading to a smoking addiction.

Addiction & Gambling

The desire to earn more and more money is there ever since the existence of mankind. Where the means to make money have always been different. However, making quick money is a skillful task as gambling is one of them. It has been a source of making money at a faster speed over centuries.

Even in USA gambling earns around 40 million dollars a year that is more then any other movie or music industry. Even if these two industries combine they cannot meet the level of money making that gambling achieves.

So with the advancement of technology and the Internet revolution, industries and companies has started developing their business online. Like wise, gambling has earned a lot of space in this fast moving technological world and is strengthening roots in this business.

Gambling itself is an interesting and quick way to make money either via Internet or from land base casino. However the thing that matters is the techniques and strategies to win more and more with minimum loss. It also depends upon the variety of games and the quality to earn via these games. Though online casinos is the fastest means to make money with out any physical effort but land-based casinos have their own importance as they have a wider verity of games to offer for earning money.

What Makes Gambling an Addiction

Gambling is at the same time a game and a fast and sharp means to earn money. Most interestingly gambling has earned tremendous fame in America, as it is one of the fastest growing industries in the country. There are a variety of games that various land base casinos and Internet based casinos offer to play and earn at the same time. Though gambling is considered to be a very interesting means of entertainment with out any harm but when it becomes and addiction immense repercussions occur to various aspects of the gamblers life.

However, a very important question that comes to our mind when we talk about gambling and addiction is the causes that makes gambling an addiction. The fist and basic cause is the human nature and greed towards earning more and more money with out any hard work, just by using mental power.

On the other hand the very nature of this brainy game it self-causes addiction. Once a person gets involve in this risky game, and learns each an every aspects as well as the technical tools to win the game, automatically makes a person more attracted and deeply involve in the game, which eventually leads to addiction.

Therefore, addiction to gambling is not a one-day result. It is an evolutionary process, which undergoes three phases. These include the winning phase, the losing phase and the phase of desperation. However, in the first phase the gambler experiences beautiful fantasies in the shape of practicality, where he wins a series of games and earns tremendous money thus the life style changes, which makes the gambler extremely positive in his approach and behavior.

Thus the gambler decides to adopt this as the only means to earn money and this results in a constant increase in the amounts of their bets.

However, in the second phase where addiction is being realized, as the gamblers becomes proud about winning the games so frequently earning tremendous profits and fame in the gambling world. At the same time when the gambler starts losing games, he becomes dishonest to himself and his family.

Being arrogant and proud of his winning skills he decides to borrow money form various legal as well as illegal sources and means. At the same time he also starts lying to his family members about the sources of money. On the other hand his they experience psychological and emotional changes in their nature about which they are at the moment unaware.

Therefore, they start getting edgy and irritating in their behavior and become restless, which affects their family life as well. In order to win back their losses and pay the heavy debts they not only are frustrated but also gets more deeply involve in gambling.

In the last phase they themselves realizes their abnormal involvement in gambling as they are experiencing extreme anxiety and ultimately increases the time spent in gambling, which makes them aloof from their family and friends. Consequently they either engage themselves into illegal means to earn money for their gambling or some after being hopeless and depression develops suicidal thoughts.

Intense and Negative Consequences of Addiction

However, other intense and negative repercussions of addiction to gambling are attempted to murder for money, divorcing their spouses, being alcoholic and trapped into drug abuse or any other emotional trauma.

Therefore, the very nature of the whole process of gambling, combing with the human nature and desire to earn more and more money by winning the game and winning the losses made in the game eventually leads to addiction, which results into serious social, economical, physical as well as environmental problems and sometimes violence leading to criminal actions.

Astronomers discover planet made of diamond

LONDON: Astronomers have spotted an exotic planet that seems to be made of diamond racing around a tiny star in our galactic backyard.

The new planet is far denser than any other known so far and consists largely of carbon. Because it is so dense, scientists calculate the carbon must be crystalline, so a large part of this strange world will effectively be diamond.

The evolutionary history and amazing density of the planet all suggest it is comprised of carbon -- i.e. a massive diamond orbiting a neutron star every two hours in an orbit so tight it would fit inside our own Sun," said Matthew Bailes of Swinburne University of Technology in Melbourne.

Lying 4,000 light years away, or around an eighth of the way toward the center of the Milky Way from the Earth, the planet is probably the remnant of a once-massive star that has lost its outer layers to the so-called pulsar star it orbits.

Pulsars are tiny, dead neutron stars that are only around 20 kilometers (12.4 miles) in diameter and spin hundreds of times a second, emitting beams of radiation.

In the case of pulsar J1719-1438, the beams regularly sweep the Earth and have been monitored by telescopes in Australia, Britain and Hawaii, allowing astronomers to detect modulations due to the gravitational pull of its unseen companion planet.

The measurements suggest the planet, which orbits its star every two hours and 10 minutes, has slightly more mass than Jupiter but is 20 times as dense, Bailes and colleagues reported in the journal Science on Thursday.

In addition to carbon, the new planet is also likely to contain oxygen, which may be more prevalent at the surface and is probably increasingly rare toward the carbon-rich center.

Its high density suggests the lighter elements of hydrogen and helium, which are the main constituents of gas giants like Jupiter, are not present.

Just what this weird diamond world is actually like close up, however, is a mystery.

"In terms of what it would look like, I don't know I could even speculate," said Ben Stappers of the University of Manchester. "I don't imagine that a picture of a very shiny object is what we're looking at here." (Reuters)