"If everything seems under control, you're not going fast enough."
~ Mario Andretti
Image of the day (Ed Cooley):
BODY
~ From Brain to Biceps -- "If you've been reading Testosterone for any length of time, you've figured out that each article is just another piece of the weightlifting puzzle. This one's about a big piece of the puzzle, one that's often neglected: the brain."
~ Pumping Yourself Up: Music And Your Workout -- "You know how you can get pumped up when you hear your favorite song on the radio? The adrenaline and motivation that you feel can actually help improve your workout. So much so that USA Track & Field, the U.S. governing body for running, barred the use of headphones and portable audio players like iPods at its official races in 2007."
~ Metabolism Affected By Probiotics New Study Finds -- "Probiotics, such as yoghurt drinks containing live bacteria, have a tangible effect on the metabolism, according to the results of a new study published 15 January in the journal Molecular Systems Biology.The research is the first to look in detail at how probiotics change the biochemistry of bugs known as gut microbes, which live in the gut and which play an important part in a person's metabolic makeup."
~ Prostate Cancer Progression May Be Promoted By Hormonal Dietary Supplements -- "Hormonal components in over-the-counter dietary supplements may promote the progression of prostate cancer and decrease the effectiveness of anti-cancer drugs, researchers at UT Southwestern Medical Center have discovered."
~ The Top 8 Foods to Make You Feel Younger in ‘08 -- "Everyone wants to feel younger. We all wish we had more energy, looked better, and had more time to get our health on the right track. So, I reviewed tons of research and came up with the following list of foods that will help you feel younger this year."
~ Study suggests heart risk from calcium supplements -- "Older women who take calcium supplements to maintain bone strength may have an increased risk of heart attack, researchers in New Zealand said on Tuesday."
~ A Review of Sugar Shock by Connie Bennett -- "SUGAR SHOCK! How Sweets and Simple Carbs Can Derail Your Life, written by journalist Connie Bennett with Stephen Sinatra MD, is not just another low-carb diet book. In the book, Ms. Bennett explains the addictive nature of sugar and discusses the profound effects this can have on your health."
~ Body Weight Influenced By Thousands Of Genes -- "Researchers have for the first time attempted to count the number of genes that contribute to obesity and body weight. The findings suggest that over 6,000 genes -- about 25 percent of the genome -- contribute to help determine an individual's body weight. This high degree of complexity suggests that a quick fix to the obesity problem is unlikely."
PSYCHE/SELF
~ The Nature Of Bisexuality In Women -- "Bisexuality in women appears to be a distinctive sexual orientation and not an experimental or transitional stage that some women adopt "on their way" to lesbianism, according to new research published by the American Psychological Association. The study of 79 non-heterosexual women over 10 years found that bisexual women maintained a stable pattern of attraction to both sexes."
~ Depression Stems From Both Nature And Nurture -- "Depression is one of the most common forms of psychopathology. According to diathesis-stress theories of depression, genetic liability interacts with negative life experiences to cause depression. Traditionally, most studies testing these theories have focused on only one component of the diathesis-stress model: either genetics or environment, but not their interaction."
~ Lithium's Neural Mechanisms Uncovered -- "Despite its near-ubiquity in the treatment of severe bipolar disorder since FDA approval in 1970, experts could not, until now, explain the precise ways in which lithium so often serves to moderate the peaks and valleys that color the daily lives of bipolar patients."
~ Recover Your Abandoned New Year’s Resolutions -- "Statistically most people who start new year’s resolutions drop them by the third week. Regardless of whether it’s because they take on too much or go into them with good intentions but little knowledge of how to achieve them, people need not abandon their resolutions so easily at the first obstacle. Below are suggestions on how to turn things around and restart those resolutions."
~ Our Obstacles -- "And yet, obstacles, by their very nature, precisely because they must be overcome if we are to surmount them, offer an innate opportunity. If we allow ourselves to view obstacles from another standpoint, we might just come to the conclusion that obstacles are our friends."
~ The neuroscience of theory of mind -- "The study of social cognition ("people thinking about people") and social neuroscience has exploded in the last few years. Much of energy -- but by no means all of it -- has focused on Theory of Mind."
~ 20 Qualities for a Successful Life -- "All too often we equate a successful life with material possessions. Yet, there are millions of people out there who lead successful, fulfilled lives who may be of modest means. They may not be rich in the financial sense, but they are rich in life and values."
~ Light Therapy Pros and Cons -- "The Mayo Clinic has an excellent article on the use of light therapy for treatment of Seasonal Affective Disorder, depression, obsessive compulsive disorder and some sleep disorders. The article includes the benefits and side-effects of using light boxes as well as instructions on using a light box."
~ Sense of personal control influences Latinas' decisions about sexual debut -- "A sense of personal control over sexual behaviors strongly influences Latina women`s decisions of when to first engage in sex, report researchers from the University of Chicago Medical Center in the November issue of the Journal of Adolescent Health."
CULTURE/POLITICS
~ What Religion's Blind Stranglehold on America Is Doing to Our Democracy -- " We've got to find a way to take the conservative symbolic message of faith talk out of American politics."
~ In Praise of Melancholy -- "Ours are ominous times. We are on the verge of eroding away our ozone layer. Within decades we could face major oceanic flooding. We are close to annihilating hundreds of exquisite animal species. Soon our forests will be as bland as pavement. Moreover, we now find ourselves on the verge of a new cold war. But there is another threat, perhaps as dangerous: We are eradicating a major cultural force, the muse behind much art and poetry and music. We are annihilating melancholia."
~ Why incest makes us so squeamish -- "This recent story went wide: British fraternal twins who were adopted separately at birth later married without realizing they were brother and sister. Why does this make us so instantly and overtly squeamish?"
~ Former Big Leaguer Says Fear Driving MLB Drug Issues -- "For former major league center fielder Doug Glanville, who wrote an editorial piece for today's New York Times, the reason for all this drug use is clear: fear. As Glanville eloquently explains, baseball can be a cruel business where a player may make the All-Star game one year and find himself out of work the next due to eroding skills. Age and injury can greatly diminish a player's abilities, and when the going gets tough, players can either fight to keep their job the healthy way or the now-illegal way."
~ The Identity Trap -- "Both Clinton and Obama have eagerly donned the mantle of identity politics. A Clinton victory wouldn’t just be a victory for one woman, it would be a victory for little girls everywhere. An Obama victory would be about completing the dream, keeping the dream alive, and so on."
~ Repress U -- " Free-speech zones. Taser guns. Hidden cameras. Data mining. A new security curriculum. Private security contractors. Welcome to the homeland security campus. From Harvard to UCLA, the ivory tower is fast becoming the latest watchtower in Fortress America."
~ The closing of the Christian mind -- " In the late fourth century political expediency led a ruthless Roman emperor to shut down debate within the Christian church. Charles Freeman explains."
~ Coming Out - Former 'Ex-Gay' Minister Speaks Out -- "Harrison says the relatively recent alignment of Exodus International, one of the largest ex-gay groups with some 120 ministries in North America alone, with anti-gay Christian "dominionists" — people who want to impose Christian rules on the secular institutions of society — has led to ex-gay ministers pursuing a hard-line message with young people that can only end in mental anguish and failure."
~ The Huckabee/Obama Challenge -- "Both candidates highlight generational divides in their respective parties and bring into question theories of political engagement that have guided the evangelical and civil-rights movements for decades."
HABITATS/TECHNOLOGY
~ Are Whales Smarter Than We Are? -- "Cetacean brains, such as those of dolphins (left) and humpback whales (right), have even more cortical convolutions and surface area than human."
~ Surveillance Society: New High-Tech Cameras Are Watching You -- "In the era of computer-controlled surveillance, your every move could be captured by cameras, whether you're shopping in the grocery store or driving on the freeway. Proponents say it will keep us safe, but at what cost?"
~ It Happened to Him. It's Happening to You -- "Now we face the possibility of mass extinction event No. 6. No big killer asteroid is in sight. Volcanic eruptions and earthquakes are not of the scale to cause mass extinction. Yet recent studies show that troubling earlier projections about rampant extinction aren't exaggerated."
~ Environment: Is the Greening of Business for Real? -- "Can a friendship between the business and enviro world really be legit?"
~ First Image Returned of Mercury's Previously Unseen Hemisphere -- "NASA's MESSENGER probe returns the first images ever seen of the surface of Mercury from just 124 miles away."
~ Wired Video: Hands-On With the MacBook Air -- "In this one-minute video, Wired's Jose Fermoso checks out Apple's new, ultra-light, ultra-slim MacBook Air."
~ Ambient Intelligence: Snowboarding To The New Frontier -- "The My Space/Facebook phenomenon has shown how we love to share personal information. But will we take the next step and share our feelings and emotions across the ether? Whether it is sensors on our skin, in our clothing or embedded in the environment, research into ambient intelligence is advancing in leaps and bounds. We could soon be using technology in a whole new, human-centric way."
~ One-Ton Rat Roamed Ancient Swamplands -- "The newly-found species lived four million years ago and was likely vegetarian."
INTEGRAL/BUDDHIST BLOGS
~ The Evolution of Consciousness as a Planetary Imperative: An Integration of Integral Views -- "In this large manuscript Gidley aims to broaden and deepen the evolution of consciousness discourse by integrating the integral theoretic narratives of Rudolf Steiner, Jean Gebser, and Ken Wilber, who each point to the emergence of new ways of thinking that could address the complex, critical challenges of our planetary moment."
~ Studying Happiness -- "Over ten years ago, I went on a two week meditation retreat on the subject of metta – the basic positive emotion talked about in Buddhism. For the first few days, I sat there in silent meditation hating every moment of it, gritting my teeth, trying to crank out this positive emotion, getting frustrated with myself for my failure, cursing the whole business."
~ OBE's and the Brain -- "Very interesting post over at the Memeing Naturalism blog called Displacing the Inmaterial Self. It discusses a recent paper in Science that describes experiments that altered the subject's experience of being a self located in the body (similar to an OBE)."
~ Cosmologists Talk Like Mystics Who've Lost It -- ~C4Chaos takes a quick look at Big Brain Theory: Have Cosmologists Lost Theirs?"
~ One Foot in Front of the Other -- "I've just found out that Michael the author of the blog One Foot in Front of the Other has died yesterday after a long struggle with cancer. I've been following his blog off-and-on for about 4 years and was always moved by his poems, his outstanding photographs and the way in which he has dealt with the inevitability of his approaching death. It has been, for me, possibly the best Buddhist-related blog out there." Deep bows.
~ My Favorite Living Teacher -- "Saradamma, as she is often called, is one of the brightest lights in the Advaitic scene, but also one of its most hidden. She doesn't teach in public, she's never sought a following, and most people have never heard of her. There's only one book out on her, No Mind, I Am The Self, written by David Godman back in the early 1980's, and nothing since. Even that book is fairly thin."
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