Monday, February 05, 2007

Speedlinking 2/5/07

Quote of the day:

"It is well to remember that the entire universe, with one trifling exception, is composed of others."
~ John Andrew Holmes

Image of the day:

BODY
~ Power nap to power your run -- I'm a huge fan of naps, but then I get up at 3:30 every morning.
~ Study Shows Active Children Focus Better In School -- Works for adults, too.
~ Lavender And Tea Tree Oils May Cause Breast Growth In Boys -- Environmental estrogens are evil. We are exposed to far too many of these toxic chemicals. This is why kids shouldn't eat soy, too.
~ Creatine Supplement May Help People With Muscular Dystrophies -- Creatine should be considered an essential nutrient. It also improves memory, heart health, and is anti-viral, among many other benefits.
~ Detecting Performance-Enhancing Drugs -- Some top-notch coaches claim that ALL world-class athletes are using some form of banned substance.
~ Chromium Picolinate Shows Greater Clinical Benefits In Diabetes Management Than Other Forms Of Chromium Supplements -- Old news, and still they keep doing more studies.
~ Weight-Loss Supplement Shows Good And Bad Traits -- The study looked at CLA, a popular supplement that many claim can help with fat loss. The results pose cause for concern, but certainly are not definitive.
~ Less Television And More Gathering Around The Dinner Table Prevents Childhood Obesity.


PSYCHE
~ Mood-Food Connection: We Eat More And Less-Healthy Comfort Foods When We Feel Down, Study Finds -- "People feeling sad tend to eat more of less-healthy comfort foods than when they feel happy, finds a new study co-authored by a Cornell food marketing expert. However, when nutritional information is available, those same sad people curb their hedonistic consumption. But happier people don't."
~ Research Investigates Whether Vitamin Folate Helps To Treat Depression -- "Folate, a vitamin found in foods such as green vegetables, helps to produce chemicals that regulate brain functions, including mood, sleep and appetite."
~ Feeling blah? Beat back the winter blues -- "For sufferers, January and February tend to be the months when this form of depression, clinically known as Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD), hits hardest. But thanks to years of research and numerous studies, there are several methods considered effective in treating SAD."
~ Does Marriage Take Work? -- This is from a new blog I am watching called The Art of Intimacy.
~ Why Health Benefits of Good Relationships Rival Exercise and Nutrition -- "It is now a truism that our relationships have important effects on our psychological well-being. Some even suggest maintaining and fuelling good relationships might be as vital for our health as good nutrition and regular exercise (Ryff et al., 2001)."
~ Prescribing ecstasy -- "Slate has an article on the use of MDMA ('Ecstasy') in the treatment of people with post-traumatic stress disorder or PTSD." We now know that alpha lipoic acid can be used to combat the death of serotonin cells associated with ecstasy, so this is good news.
~ New Harvard Findings Suggest Multiple Dimensions Shape Our Perception Of 'Mind' -- "Through an online survey of more than 2,000 people, psychologists at Harvard University have found that we perceive the minds of others along two distinct dimensions: agency, an individual's ability for self-control, morality and planning; and experience, the capacity to feel sensations such as hunger, fear and pain."
~ Study Explains Why Psychedelic Drugs Produce Different Neurological Effects -- Sounds cool, but it just explains the neurological pathways, not why we can have transpersonal experiences.
~ The Most Important Quality to Have in Tough Times -- On gratitude.


CULTURE
~ Little Progress Seen for Poorest After Hurricane -- "The recovery from Hurricane Katrina has stagnated for the poorest families displaced by the storm, a new study shows."
~ S.D. Billionaire Donates $400 Million -- "When officials at Sioux Valley Hospitals & Health Systems told him of their dream to transform the facility into a major research institution for children's health, he donated $400 million, and they promised to rename the institution after him - Sanford Health."
~ Required STD shots worry some parents -- "Some conservatives and parents’ rights groups worry that requiring girls to get vaccinated against the sexually transmitted virus that causes cervical cancer would condone premarital sex and interfere with the way they raise their children." Yeah . . . that's just dumb.
~ Candidate Edwards: raise taxes for healthcare -- "Democratic US presidential candidate John Edwards on Sunday said that he would raise taxes, chiefly on the wealthy, to pay for expanded healthcare coverage under a plan costing $90 billion to $120 billion a year."
~ Support Our Troops (Except for the Gay Ones) -- "A new Harris Poll shows that just over half of Americans, 55%, think gays and lesbians should be allowed to serve openly in the military. Which means that nearly half think they shouldn't."
~ Coaching Players For Life -- Sometimes, George Will makes sense.
~ Why the yin disconnects from the yang -- "Any future vision that features a rising Asia is labeled "Blade Runner-ish," as in, fooking scary!" From the always challenging to read Thomas P. M. Barnett.
~ Scorsese Takes Top DGA Honors -- Damn well deserved. Next up, the long-overdue Oscar.
~ From The Zero Boss: Gays Killing Themselves? Blame It on The Liberals!
~ Buddhism and God Reposted -- From James at Buddhist Blog.


HABITATS
~ Oil giant primes the biofuel pump with $500 million -- "BP will team with UC Berkeley, the University of Illinois and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory on a 10-year research project."
~ The Greenest Building in the world is in Chicago.
~ Envisioning One Planet Schools -- "The best way to get new ideas to take hold is to teach them to young people. School-age kids are impressionable and imaginitive, and pick up new perspectives readily. So it makes sense that a concept like "One Planet Living" -- which many of us find difficult to imagine -- would be natural to a kid."
~ Homo Futurus: How Radically Should We Remake Ourselves - Or Our Children? -- "Transhumanists -- those who advocate the use of science to alter the human future -- may be playing an instrumental role in reshaping our lives."
~ The looming oxygen shortage -- Trees? We don't need no stinkin trees.
~ Google Earth to blur key India sites -- Paranoia will destroy ya. Well, okay, they may have a point.
~ Apple: iTunes Users Should Wait on Vista -- "Apple Inc. is urging some iPod and iTunes users to hold off on upgrading computers to Windows Vista, warning that the iTunes music software may not work well with the new operating system from rival Microsoft Corp." Anyone know if there are compatibility issues, for real?
~ 46 Nations Back Body to Protect Planet -- "Forty-five nations answered France's call for a new environmental body to slow inevitable global warming and protect the planet, perhaps with policing powers to punish violators."


INTEGRAL
~ Ken's Foreword to Big Mind/Big Heart by Genpo Roshi -- At least KW pays lip service to the fact the Genpo Roshi "borrowed" his technique from Voice Dialogue by Hal Stone. The problem is that Big Mind is a watered down and less effective approach.
~ Ken Wilber is a Transhumanist Borg -- From ~C4Chaos, of course.
~ The Shadow Knows -- ISC update.
~ Also from ~C: Neurotheology + Neuromysticism = 21st Century Shamanism.
~ Integral pathology? -- A good post from Joe at Until.
~ From CJ Smith: tiers upon tiers.
~ The many faces of integral politics from Ed Berge at Open Integral.
~ Weekend reading — on "metaphysical imagination" -- An excellent post from Matthew at The Daily Goose.
~ Mystery of Existence has put up several excellent posts of late around the topic of alchemy.
~ "Transcend and Exclude?" Deconstructing unhealthy eros -- From Durwin at Zaadz.


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