Speedlinking 8/15/07

Quote of the day:

"If we don't change direction soon, we'll end up where we're going."
~ Professor Irwin Corey

Image of the day (Tristan Campbell):


BODY
~ Applied Bodybuilding Research -- "Learn more from these studies about water and how it may effect your heart, effects of Strength training on free testosterone, weight management, and Panax Ginseng - Can it get you lean?"
~ A Simple Method for Improving Hamstrings -- "They're one of the most difficult muscle groups to develop, but the cure to your underdeveloped hamstrings might lie in the answer to this question: 'Which way do you point your toes during a leg curl?'"
~ 10 Anabolic Diet Recipes by Lynne A -- "Lynne A posted several Anabolic Diet recipes last week in reply to 10 More Quick & Easy Anabolic Diet Recipes. I decided to put all her recipes into one post. Here they are." You might want to avoid these if you have high cholesterol.
~ Red meat diet linked to colon cancer return -- "Colon cancer survivors with diets heavy in red meat and fatty foods are more than three times as likely to suffer a recurrence of their disease or die from it than those who avoid such foods, a study found." Yeah, that's like lung cancer survivors dying from smoking after beating the cancer.
~ Scientists Discover Gene That Suppresses Tumours In A Number Of Cancers -- "A new Canadian study has discovered a gene that stops cancer tumours in a range of cancers, including breast, lung and liver. The researchers hope the discovery will help to improve treatments for many cancer patients.The study is published in the early online issue of Nature Medicine."
~ How To Treat and Prevent Low Carb Diet Headaches -- "Strict no carb phases of low carb diets have developed a reputation for giving dieters severe headaches. Dietitians have identified a number of different factors that could cause these headaches. They vary from person to person." Note: caffeine actually prevents diabetes, so if you're doing a low-carb diet, that morning coffee can help free stored fat for energy.
~ 'DNA Vaccine' For Multiple Sclerosis, UK -- "Scientists have reported that a newly developed DNA vaccine appears safe and may produce beneficial changes in the brains and immune systems of individuals with multiple sclerosis (MS)."


PSYCHE/SELF
~ Signs of a Codependent Relationship -- "Family secrets. Guilt. Shame. Repressed anger. Low self-esteem. Compromising your own values to avoid another person's rejection or anger. Those are just a few red flags of codependence."
~ AIDS virus is a ‘double hit’ on the brain -- "The AIDS virus damages the brain in two ways, by not only killing brain cells but by preventing the birth of new cells, U.S. researchers reported on Wednesday."
~ Scientists find reason for contagious yawning -- "Showing empathy can make for a lot of yawning. A study of autistic children has bolstered evidence that people who identify better with others are more prone to contagious yawning, Japanese researchers say."
~ The Blues: Bringing Down the House -- "Depression can jump from one family member to another."
~ The Relaxation Response -- "Everyone reading this is old enough to be a ‘black belt’ in their body’s use . . . so why aren’t we? Why aren’t we smarter about how our bodies and minds work? We go about our day thinking that we’re relaxed but if we really paid attention we’d realize we’re not."
~ Effectiveness of Mutual Support Groups -- "In stressful times we can all do with a little help from our friends. Sometimes, though, our friends cannot provide - or we do not want to ask for - the kind of support required. Mutual support groups based around shared topics such as cancer or addictions have grown rapidly to meet this need."
~ Blossoming brains -- "Exactly how mental maturity develops—and the anatomy responsible for its emergence—is being revealed."


CULTURE/POLITICS
~ College Mascots -- "A gallery of the nation's most eccentric college mascots."
~ Seven Years in India -- "Images from "Pan India", photographer Prashant Panjiar's long-term project to document the country's changing visual landscape."
~ Fed 'Injections': Who Benefits? -- "The world's central banks have promised to keep "injecting" tens of billions of dollars into investment markets to allay fears of a price crash related to defaults on subprime mortgages and securities backed by such loans. Senior Writer Kim Clark asked Alan Blinder, former vice chairman of the Federal Reserve and now a professor of economics at Princeton, how much this fiscal medicine would cost taxpayers or help investors."
~ The critical buzz on The World Without Us -- "The World Without Us, by Alan Weisman (Thomas Dunne). What would happen to the world—both natural and man-made—if human beings suddenly disappeared en masse? Veteran journalist Alan Weisman combines scientifically informed conjecture and original reporting to answer that question."
~ WorkPlace: Prices for Key Foods are Rising Sharply; Half of Eligible Poor Don't Get Food Stamps -- "Already stung by a two-year rise in gasoline prices, American consumers now face sharply higher prices for foods they can't do without. At the same time, half of the nation's eligible poor aren't getting the food stamps to which they're entitled."
~ WorkPlace: Raising the Minimum Wage: Don't Stop Now! -- "It's awfully tough to live on $5.85 an hour."
~ In Retrospect: Robert Lowell's "Day by Day" -- "The following essay by Adam Kirsch on Robert Lowell's 1977 NBCC winner, Day by Day, kicks off IN RETROSPECT, a new series on Critical Mass in which critics and writers revisit NBCC finalists from previous years. It is published here with grateful acknowledgment to the New York Sun. Stay tuned for more posts on "Day by Day" later this week."


HABITATS/TECHNOLOGY
~ A Guide to Creating a Minimalist Home -- "Is this kind of minimalist home devoid of character and fun and life? Some might think so, but I get a strange satisfaction, a fulfillment, at looking around and seeing a home free of clutter. It’s calming, and liberating, and just nice."
~ Environment: The Toxic Chemistry of Everyday Products -- "Investigative journalist Mark Schapiro discusses why companies that manufacture hazard-free products for the European Union often produce toxin-filled versions of the same items for America and developing countries."
~ Plain soap as effective as antibacterial but without the risk -- "Antibacterial soaps show no health benefits over plain soaps and, in fact, may render some common antibiotics less effective, says a University of Michigan public health professor."
~ New Online Tool Unmasks Wikipedia Edits -- "What edits on Wikipedia have been made by people in congressional offices, the CIA and the Church of Scientology? A new online tool called WikiScanner reveals answers to such questions." Related: Wikipedia is only as anonymous as your IP -- Fox News caught editing Al Franken entry.
~ Comet May Have Exploded Over North America 13,000 Years Ago -- "New scientific findings suggest that a large comet may have exploded over North America 12,900 years ago, explaining riddles that scientists have wrestled with for decades, including an abrupt cooling of much of the planet and the extinction of large mammals."
~ Rainforest coalition proposes rewards for 'avoided deforestation' -- "A 15-country coalition of rainforest nations has complained that the UN climate change mechanism encourages countries to replant forests they have cut down, but fails to reward 'good' countries that have not deforested in the first place."
~ Ocean 'supergyre' link to climate regulator -- "Australian scientists have identified the missing deep ocean pathway - or ‘supergyre` - linking the three Southern Hemisphere ocean basins in research that will help them explain more accurately how the ocean governs global climate."


INTEGRAL/BUDDHIST
~ Yes or Nhat? -- "Will the real Thich Nhat Hanh please stand up? Or peel a tangerine?" Another teacher looking bad -- damn, I like this guy, too.
~ The dreaded level line fallacy (LLF) and feet -- "The LLF is one explanation for why smart people come to believe really ignorant things by essentially infantalizing or demeaning an entire area of human nature (such as religious development) by insisting that some partial view is the whole enchilada. Hokai tackles LLF in relationship to "new atheist" Sam Harris in a post called "The Unbelievable".
~ Extinguishing Anger's Fire -- "If you get Angry often, you develop a habit of Anger. Negative emotions and habits, are like thieves of happiness; they should be caught and stopped as quickly as possible."
~ No culture has had a monopoly on these forerunners -- "A remarkable result of the meeting of the “timeless” East with the progressive West is the idea of Yoga as a process related to evolution. The origins of this idea can be traced back at least to Swami Vivekananda. But it was left to Sri Aurobindo to arrive at a synthesis of the principles and methods of Yoga that is profoundly evolutionary in its spirit."
~ A simple way to talk about the absolute and relative -- "The absolute is what is, when not filtered through stories. The relative is using the filter of thoughts to help this human self navigate and function in the world."
~ Emotions and awakening -- "What happens to emotions after awakening? Do they go away? Is there ecstatic bliss all the time?"
~ Synchronicity: an Integral View -- This is an interesting thread over in I-I pod at Zaadz.

Tags: synchronicity, integral theory, emotions and awakening, absolute and relative, Sri Aurobindo, anger, level line fallacy, Thich Nhat Hanh, oceans, rainforests, comet, WikiScanner, soap, toxic objects, minimalist home, Robert Lowell, Day by Day, poverty, minimum wage, The World Without Us, Alan Weisman, investment markets, India, college mascots, growing brains, mutual support groups, depression, contagious yawning, AIDS virus and the brain, codependent relationships, multiple sclerosis, low carb diets, gene that stops cancer, colon cancer, anabolic diet recipes, hamstrings, bodybuilding research, speedlinking