Marguerite wrote:
 
>With anything both HUMAN and ANIMAL related, if there is a health issue,
>it is fine to do some back up research in the internet including asking
>people on these groups.  But for goodness sakes, I hope everyone is
>smart enough to go to a Dr. or a Vet to have the problem checked out.
>NEVER go by what someone says they are on the internet, no matter how
>many "Good Credentials" they have.  People deceive people all the time
>on the internet, even ones who sound nice and sweet.  So please heed the
>warning.........using the internet as a learning tool but not the cure
>for everything.
 
YES!  Said so correctly and so well that the best i can do is to quote
it and agree.  There is no substitute for having a ferret knowledgeable
vet.  (Addendum: individuals and cases vary, so hands on is best for that
reason, too.  What is learned on the internet is best discussed with the
vets but not taken as a final answer since it simply may not fit, or may
be wrong, or may be still too hypothetical to risk it for a certain
individual.)
 
John wrote:
>Reminder: "Einstein failed an examination that would have allowed him
>to pursue a course of study leading to a diploma.."......so much for
>credentials!
 
Not so.  There is a lot of very wrong mythology about Einstein.  (See
how useful it is to be married to a high energy physicist with some
physicist-"family" connections to the man?)
 
Einstein talked in normal speech late (4) but did differential equations
at the age of 11 partly due to his family having a boarder who was
studying for an advanced degree in mathematics who introduced Einstein
to math and to pacificism.  (BTW, there are geniuses on record who have
developed their own alternate languages early and understood but
typically ignored the normal speech but we do not know if he did that.)
 
He did choose to leave a university but that wasn't from a failure; it
was because he was dissatisfied.
 
He obtained a PhD in the normal fashion.
 
Nor did he work on the atomic bomb, though he did confirm for Roosevelt
(in a letter actually written by a different physicist to which Einstein
added one line, and on which he was a number of signers) that the atomic
bomb was possible and the enemies might pursue it.  In fact, as early as
the 1930s there was some reasonably accurate sci fi by actual physicists
describing such bombs with reasonable accuracy.
 
He did not work at Princeton University, but at the Institute of Advanced
Physics in Princeton where his office was a typical small one (maybe 100
sq. ft Steve estimates) that is still in use by other experts.  There
had been talk of turning it into a sort of museum but he hated fame so
they didn't do it.  Ditto his house there.
 
He had a gift for major leaps -- like Feynman did.
 
Dawkins recently railed on-line in Salon about a way that some groups
misrepresent Einstein in relation to faith.
 
There seems to be as much false mythology about Einstein as the
California F&G has about ferrets!  LOL!
 
Einstein definitely had credentials.  On the other hand, I do wonder
about the credentials of some butt-covering souls in the CA F&G... :-)
[Posted in FML issue 4867]