Friday, December 29, 2006

Speedlinking 12/29/06

This the M42 galaxy:

BODY
~ The effect of the holiday season on body weight and composition in college students.
~ Study: Many Kids Too Fat by Preschool -- Wow, that's scary. This is more scary: 1 in 3 low-income preschoolers obese.
~ Horticulture therapy: the power of plants and flowers to heal.
~ Reveal those abs with crunches, cardio and diet -- And weight training, damn it, don't forget the weights.
~ Belly Fat Matters More than BMI When Determining Your Heart Disease Risks -- If you are shaped like an apple (lots of intra-abdominal fat), your risk is much higher than if you are shaped like a pear.
~ Spices and herbs may help you avoid disease -- It's about time medicine gets with the natural cures.


PSYCHE
~ Reading Shakespeare Has Dramatic Effect On Human Brain -- The Bard rocks my brain as well as my soul. Very cool.
~ High-Quality Marriages Help To Calm Nerves.
~ Virtual Experiences Can Cause Embellished, False Memories.
~ Humour Helps You Live Longer -- That extra "u" in there is funny.
~ Glass Half Empty Overfilled -- It seems adults struggle with grasping volume the same as children do -- and it makes them eat more.
~ Sea Slug Offers Clues to Human Brain Disorders -- "Beneath a slimy façade, the sea slug is somewhat of a brainiac. At any given time within a single brain cell, more than 10,000 genes are hard at work."
~ Preventing Teen Suicide a Tough Challenge -- "Suicide is the third leading cause of death among teens, but doctors are far from figuring out how to spot and treat teens who might try to take their own lives."
~ Good News About the Blues: Scientists Discover Gene Therapy for Depression -- "Scientists have discovered a new gene that makes mice happy, a finding that suggests another avenue of drugs for improving depression in humans."
~ Aaron at Anxious Living has been reading about Generalized Anxiety.


CULTURE
~ From Time: The Bests of 2006, in 25 different categories.
~ John Edwards, 2.008 -- Has Edwards matured since 2004?
~ Australians Support Mandatory Fitness Testing To Combat Childhood Obesity -- I put this in culture because it seems to me an effort to impose cultural values (thinness) on kids. Reminds me of the presidential physical fitness tests from my childhood -- made a lot of kids hate exercise and feel bad about themselves.
~ A review of a new review on William James: The buzzing blooming life of William James.
~ A cult of wrongness -- Glenn Greenwald on Mark Steyn on Iraq and stuff.
~ Most Americans Want Public Policies to Prevent Obesity -- I sometimes favor these, but not as an across the board approach. We need to create some kind of personal responsibility, which means that smokers and the obese pay more for insurance -- a lot more.


HABITATS
~ The fuel tax America needs?
~ Oil Industry Blamed for Polluting India's Assam -- "Oil companies in India's northeastern state of Assam are responsible for polluting rivers and destroying rainforests and have been told to clean up their act or face closure, authorities said on Thursday."
~ Norway Wants U.S. Politicians to See Warming Arctic -- "Norway will invite U.S. politicians to visit a group of fast-thawing Arctic islands in 2007, hoping to win converts for tougher action against global warming, its foreign minister says."
~ Scientific American: In Focus: Most Important Science Stories of 2006.
~ Ice shelf collapse sends chill. Canada's North changing. Global warming suspected cause of huge breakup on Ellesmere Island.
~ Jefferson researchers uncover new way nature turns genes on and off -- From Kurzweil's blog.
~ From P2P Foundation: Attention Economy Recap and commentary from John Hagel.


INTEGRAL
~ From Mystery of Existence: Big Mind process and the belly center.
~ From Gary at Integral Seattle: Heroes and Monsters.


1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Your information about what doesn't get into the MSM helped confirms the Big Brother experiences I have. For instance when I linked onto your site tonight, I was shut down. This happens every time that I go onto a "controversial" site. During the recent political season I was getting shut down a lot. I expect the men in black to come anytime.