j[I attended a Seminar put together by the Litigation Department at my firm. Its an annual event that they put together for clients in the Insurance areas. I thought that all new Associates were required to attend, it turns out I wasn't because I'm in the Business Department and I don't ever see the inside of a courtroom. Well I'm glad I went. I took a little notebook with me and took some notes and made some observations. Anything in brackets and bold are additional comments I've made in transcribing my notes to this format. Obviously I've improved on the grammar (not very well) and expanded on the thoughts a bit.] Litigation Seminar. The first speaker is giving a presentation on medical terminology in handling cases dealing with back injuries. Very interesting. He's discussing and explaining medical terminology and clinical definitions of body parts, muscles, tendons, orientations in X-rays, etc. I'm a bio-engineer and I've done some bio-physics and bio-mechanics, but its been a while. I've been too far removed from it. Well, rather, I've haven't thought about it or had much to do with it. The discussion is very engaging. He's showing us imaging techniques and examples of pictures of brains, muscles, tendons, cross-sections of people. How similar we all are! It's making me slightly queasy but I think its good to get this perspective every now and then. You see the fragility of yourself and the commonality of all people.
Outward appearances give only a limited expression of the whole that we are, but most of what we are is very similar to everyone else around us. Visually, its just your face that's different. Barring any visual cues, it's only our brains that sets us apart.
[I'm not sure where I was going with this.] I guess with this blog you only have what I say to judge me if you've never seen me before.
Wow! I can't believe I'm actually writing this. I've never had a journal before and I'm surprised how much I feel the need to my thoughts down.
The C1 vertebra is called the Atlas because it carries the skull.
Listening to this anatomy lesson is making me more aware of myself and how my body is put together.
I'm sitting next to a colleague. I wonder if she's wondering what I have so much to write about.
[Especially considering I have nothing to do with medical litigation.]The speaker is talking about evolution (which I believe to be true). I wonder how many of the people in the audience (most of them are clients of ours) accept the theory of evolution. Amusing.
The speaker just said "If you believe in the theory of evolution, we had tails." Hah. He just spoke about evolution not a minute ago as fact and then throws in this statement to cover his ass. (no pun intended)
[I think the speaker is a lawyer too.]A spine has 4 curves, 2 inwards and 2 outwards. The curves act like springs that dissipate and absorb shocks.
Kyphosis - humpbacks
Scoliosis - lateral S-shaped curvature of the spine
Lordosis - backward bending of the spine
I wonder how much your state of mind figures into your overall health. Your brain and central nervous center control so much...
This lecture is still slightly disturbing. It shouldn't be. It's a view I don't normally have.
[Or don't normally take the time to have...]The end of the spinal cord where it branches off is called the Cauda Equina - the horsetail because the branching resembles one.
The speaker just showed us a video clip of a dog who's sensory signals and motor signals were confused. The dog was growling at its own leg and biting it viciously. It couldn't figure out that it was it's own leg. Quite a few people in the audience laughed or smirked. I couldn't figure out what was so funny. The lecturer said that the dog has a nervous problem. People still snickered. Chances are they wouldn't have it it were a video clip of a person. I suppose that was the point. The clip got the point across without making the audience too uncomfortable. I still don't see what was so funny.
Your head is 6.2% of your total body weight. In a 160lb person that's almost 10lbs. That's like a bowling ball held in place with muscles, ligaments and tendons. In a car accident you head can act like a cannon ball moving through the air.
He just showed us another video clip. A man comes out of a bowling alley located at the top of a hill. As he goes back to his car his ball falls out of his bag and starts to roll down the middle of the street and down the hill before he can stop it. He yells down to the people at the bottom of the hill to watch out. One man at the bottom of the hill sees the ball rolling down the steps out into the middle of the street to intercept it. The ball hits a bump in the road and launches into the air. At this point I'm picturing smashed heads and blood and gore all over the place - not a good situation. You would think that at this point a sane person would get out of the way. But the man who was in the path of the ball instead jumps up head-butt it!!! A BOWLING BALL!!! The man was trying to head-butt a bowling ball!!!! The frame freezes with the man in mid-air and the caption "NEED GLASSES?" comes on. *sigh* That's one effective commercial.
[Assuming you could see it with your poor eyesight.]Comparing our understanding of the human body with what, for example Bahauddin knew (I'm using him because he's the last person I've read who's talked about health and he was around in around 1200 AD), there was a wonder at the human body and how it works. Bahauddin mentions somewhere something along the lines of how trying to figure out exactly how things work isn't a good idea. I'm not entirely sure what he was getting at. It seems to me that with our knowledge of the human body there is even more to wonder at. All this presentation covers is gross anatomy. We aren't getting into cellular, biochemical, or genetic functions (which I'm more familiar with). Going even further, there's the molecular and atomic levels and into the sub-atomic and even further into subcomponents at the current limits that physics can observe. Going from each level down, the distinction between people disappear. From the gross anatomy to the cellular, the differences between species blur. From the cellular to the molecular, the distinctions between taxonomic kingdoms disappear. From the molecular to the atomic, the distinctions between life and non-life blur. From then on, all distinctions disappear (as far as we can tell at the moment). We are only separated by space and possibly the energy between matter. Everything is indistinguishable at this level. Everything is interconnected.
[The space between matter at that sub-atomic level is relatively large. What keeps matter distinct is generally the forces that interact between the atoms. The only reason that my fingers don't fall through the keyboard I'm typing on is because the atoms of my fingers are repelled by the atoms of the keyboard, but I'm exerting sufficient pressure to push the keys down to connect the capacitors under each key to activate and signal the processor to enter what I type. But the essential truth is the same. The fact is science has progressed to the point that we can truly say that we are all connected and all the same.] How are our thoughts created? Is it a physical change, a change in matter at a molecular level? Is it a change in energy? How far does out natural electromagnetic field extend? I remember reading about this somewhere... I'll have to look it up. But the point is our interaction with the universe extends a lot further than we are aware of. I'm talking about what we emit not about what we absorb (which is probably greater).
[I'm sorry I didn't get to completely explore this line of thought. It's a brief expositon on my ideas of LUE and my theory of the GIOAT. Maybe I'll add to it later.]64% of asymptomatic adults with no back pain have herniated discs so actually herniated discs are not abnormal and evidence of herniated discs is not indicative of injury due to an accident. 78% of herniated discs heal by themselves with conservative care. 80% of people have back pain.
I thought attendance at this thing was required of all new Associates, but I guess it isn't. Oh well. I'm glad I showed up if only to catch the first lecture. Now we've broken up into different rooms for a panel discussion. I can choose between Un-Insured Motorists (UIMs) or Worker's Compensation (WC). I'll take WC because I took a class on it in NY law in law school so the contrast of PA law may be interesting.
My Snapple bottle cap tells me that Mongolians invented lemonade around 1299 A.D.
Well apparently I'm in the UIM panel discussion not the WC one. Oh well.
I didn't expect to get into a discussion of GIOAT. Neat. I'm happy even if the UIM discussion turns out to be crap.
Under a February decision, the PA Supreme Court held that insurance companies are no longer required to include a mandatory arbitration clause in UIM claims.
[This is amusing because in the '60s the insurance companies tried to get mandatory arbitration clauses into UIM claims. Back then juries were awarding higher returns to plaintiffs in UIM cases. However in recent years the awards from the arbitration panels have been getting larger and larger. The cynical reason is because the attorneys who make up the arbitration panels also represent plaintiffs in other cases and tend to want to increase the award amounts so when their cases come before arbitration they are more likely to get away with higher awards. The insurance companies have been trying to get the requirement reversed for years.] I guess I could have figured out that this seminar isn't required for me. I mean, I don't litigate. I'm primarily an Intellectual Property lawyer and the only litigation support I don is in Environmental Law where my civil/environmental engineering experience comes in handy. Oh well. Apparently there are some litigation associates who aren't here and a couple of partners mentioned that they will have a little chat with them later. Apparently I'll get Kudos for showing up from the Litigation Department, but we'll see if the Business Department gives me flak for not getting more billable time in. It probably won't be a problem. We'll see.
There's a bookmark in the folder with the firm letterhead on the front and the attorney's contact info on the back. It's new and I'm in it! Yay! :-)
Wow. I have a lot written down already. I'm sure I can expand on everything I've written when I transcribe it later. I'll distinguish my additions somehow.
[Done that.]My knee hurts.
[I really should get it taken care of...]Wow, I am a legal geek. This is actually interesting even though I don't really know what they are talking about. However, I suspect this would be much less interesting if I didn't have this notebook.
The speaker
[who's a partner in the firm] has a very nasal voice. I think I may have noticed it before but it never registered. Well it's very obvious now probably because I'm paying attention to him.
[that is, when I'm not writing]OK, maybe I'm not that much of a legal geek. This is starting to lose my interest. They switched speakers
[to another partner] and this one is using slides with a lot of text on them. It's distracting. Why should I listen to her if what she's saying is on the slides anyway. The flip side is why should I look at the slides if shes going to say what I need to know anyway.
[What are the slides for?] WAY too much text. It's probably easier to create wordy slides because then you don't have to think about what to
not put on them and the slide's relation to the idea you're trying to get across. I think if you are going to use slides it takes a lot of work to distill the meaning and impression your are trying to convey and actually get the content of the slide to convey it without either the slide or the speaker overpower each other or the audience. I'm going to have to prepare a presentation on keeping inventor notebooks, What am I trying to distill in that? She's just talking about cases and every now and then she shows a picture. She only really needs to have the slides having the pictures. The text content of the slides are overpowering and unnecessary and detract from her presentation.
A presentation doesn't have to be funny to be good. It does have to be interesting and sometime the interesting parts could be digressions that vary the pace of the presentation. Huh. I'll have to think about it...
The speakers have switched off again. The speaker who started off the discussion is back. His voice projects better. He's still using her slides though, but it doesn't appear that he's reading from them. His comments completed what are on the slides, but the content is still extraneous.
[That's it. THe notebook did help pass the time. I'm getting tired though. I'll add to it later.]
