"When one admits that nothing is certain one must, I think, also admit that some things are much more nearly certain than others."
~ Bertrand Russell
Image of the day:
BODY~ The Hardcore Lunge -- By Mike Robertson at T-Nation. "The lunge is one of the best exercises you can do in the gym. Unfortunately, the performance of the "lunge" by your average gym-goer is about as baffling as nipples on men. Some things just don't add up."
~ Correlation Between Diabetes and Fitness Levels -- "There is a causal relationship between fitness and diabetes, but it is possible to be both diabetic and in terrific shape."
~ Grape Expectations For Healthier Wine -- "A new technique that uses ozone to preserve grapes could help prevent allergies and boost healthy compounds at the same time.... The same technique could be used in the wine-making process to produce healthier wines without the added sulphites that can cause asthma and other conditions in some people." Cool, sulfate-free wine.
~ 11 Heart Healthy Snacks -- "These snacks get our hearts pumping, literally and figuratively. They're delicious alternatives to the ho-hum bag of chips or candy bar." Good, but mostly not great -- still better than most junk.
~ Research Reveals How Antipsychotic Drugs Cause Weight Gain -- "Histamine may help spur the weight gain seen in patients taking certain kinds of antipsychotic drugs, researchers say."
~ Study: Napping Might Help Heart -- "Good News for Slackers: On-The-Job Naps Might Cut Risk for Heart Problems."
~ Canada firm touts fitness gain from 4-minute pain -- "The promise is attractive: a sweat-free four-minute workout that will give you the same results as a grueling 90-minute session at the local gym." Proof that Canadians can be as daft as Americans.
~ Copper levels tied to postpartum blues -- "Women with a history of postpartum depression tend to have unusually high levels of copper in their blood, a new study has found — suggesting the mineral may play some role in the disorder."
~ Eat Smart: Five important goals to improve your diet -- "You, too, can make a fresh start with a few easily attainable nutrition goals of your own. CookingLight.com gives you everyday ideas for ways to improve your eating habits and overall health." OK advice, aside from the grains thing -- limits all grains, even whole.
~ The Human Penis as "Anatomical Squeegee" -- Uh, yeah, read the post.
PSYCHE
~ Selectivity Is Ultimate Aphrodisiac -- "Speed daters who romantically desired most of their potential partners were rejected quickly and overwhelmingly, according to a new Northwestern University study. Conventional wisdom has long taught that one of the best ways to get someone to like you is to make it clear that you like them."
~ Excessive concern over appearance can harm health -- "A psychologist at the University of Buffalo, New York has found that some people become anxious and expect that they will be rejected by others based on their physical appearance."
~ Exploration & Exploitation Balanced by Norepinephrine & Dopamine [Developing Intelligence] -- "McClure, Gilzenrat & Cohen have an article in Advances in Neural Information Processing Systems where they propose a role for both dopamine and norepinephrine in switching behavior between modes of 'exploration" and "exploitation.'"
~ Young Adolescent Girls' Depression Is Tied To More Stressful Life Events -- "Children's conduct problems--skipping school, sneaking out of the house, lying to parents, shoplifting, or bullying other children--are a major source of concern for parents and teachers. As a potential cause of these problems, parents' marital conflict has received a lot of research attention. Now a new study finds that parents' fighting may not be to blame but rather that parents who argue a lot may pass on genes for disruptive behavior to their children."
~ Psychologists Find Danger in Parents' Praise -- The upshot, praise effort, not intelligence.
~ Twisted Thinking Two -- "Your thinking patterns are habits that set you up for success or failure, and color how you see the world. Have you thought about your thoughts lately?"
~ Extra Cortisol Protects Women's Mood Under Stress -- "Although chronic stress, which brings long-term elevations of cortisol in the bloodstream, can weaken the immune system and induce depression, this new study adds to mounting evidence that cortisol given near in time to a physical or psychological stress may lessen the stressor's emotional impact."
~ Beauty and the average girl -- A cool post from Mind Hacks.
~ James Ray Interview over at Steve Pavlina. Ray is in The Secret.
~ 207 Great Tips To Make 2007 Your Best Year Ever -- Really, there are 207.
CULTURE
~ Cinema With Soul: DVD Club Features Only Inspiring Movies -- The Spiritual Cinema Circle, if you're into the sort of thing.
~ Grading the Grammys -- "Bravo for Beyonce. Ho-hum for the Police. Josh Tyrangiel on the best and worst moments from last night's awards."
~ Is There a 'Flying While Muslim' Bias? -- "There's a new term of art, "Flying While Muslim," being used by some Islamic activist groups to protest what they characterize as discrimination by U.S. airlines against Muslim passengers."
~ The new Middle East axis of fear -- "The Saudis see the Palestinian agreement as a way to block Iranian influence in the Palestinian territories. Hamas might be extreme, they say, but it's also a Sunni organization, and the Saudis will be ready to serve as its savior, as long as it prevents Iran from playing that role."
~ The most obnoxious movie-marketing idea of the year -- "Please stop: Maybe we're too sensitive, but New Line is getting on our nerves with its efforts to draw attention to The Number 23, which opens on Feb. 23 (of course). That's the one with the poster featuring Jim Carrey looking like Charles Manson after a rough night with a Sharpie."
~ Death Threats for Councilman Who Won’t Stand for the Pledge -- "While he’s not worried about his own safety, Tom Rawles of the Mesa City Council is worried 'about the future of freedom in this country.'" I wish him well.
~ 8 Reasons to Close Guantánamo Now -- "It's time to look at the powerful reasons to close Guantánamo, both the standard ones enumerated below--and also what may be the most compelling, if unspoken, one of all: Guantánamo must be closed because the United States needs to indicate that it has decided to change course."
~ Wide open Oscar race highlights range of favorites -- "Hollywood award watchers on Monday picked comedy "Little Miss Sunshine" and thriller "The Departed" as clear Oscar front-runners, but cautioned several races remained wide open two weeks ahead of the world's top film awards."
~ Hillary, The War and Her Vote -- "Meet the Press yesterday: MR. RUSSERT: Let me turn to Hillary Clinton. She was in New Hampshire yesterday. Her first appearance there in 10 years."
~ American culture in conflict with traditional values of Hispanic male immigrants -- "Traditional family values may be strongest among immigrant men in one of the fastest growing populations of American society. A recent study by researchers at the University of Missouri-Columbia is one of the first to intently interview Hispanic immigrant men in focus groups about their opinions and concerns toward family planning in the United States."
HABITATS
~ Secondhand smoke raises heart disease risk -- "Warning signs for cardiovascular disease are higher in people exposed to secondhand tobacco smoke, adding to the link between "passive smoke" and heart disease, according to a study released on Monday."
~ Mind-Blowing Advances in New Computer Chips -- "The world's biggest chipmaker has developed a programmable processor that can perform about a trillion calculations per second, and deliver a performance of 1.01 teraflops. Even more impressive, this speedy chip consumes a mere 62 watts of power when it is running at a frequency of 3.16 gigahertz."
~ Majoring in Organics -- "By Paul Henderson, from Alternatives Journal North America's first degree program in organic agriculture models a holistic future for farming."
~ New supercomputer to be unveiled -- "A Canadian firm is claiming to have taken a quantum leap in technology by producing a computer that can perform 64,000 calculations at once."
~ China Fails to Meet Environmental Goals -- "China's environmental watchdog admitted Monday the country had failed to reach any of its pollution control goals for 2006 and had fallen further behind as the economy picked up speed." This is gonna get ugly over time.
~ Chimps Used Tools as Early as the Stone Age -- "Chimpanzees from West Africa were cracking nuts open using stone tools in prehistoric times, according to a study that suggests some chimp populations may have been using this kind of tool technology for thousands of years."
~ Scientists Use Nanoparticle to Discover Disease-causing Proteins -- "A complex molecule and snake venom may provide researchers with a more reliable method of diagnosing human diseases and developing new drugs."
~ Glaciers Not on Simple, Upward Trend of Melting -- "Two of Greenland's largest glaciers shrank dramatically and dumped twice as much ice into the sea during a period of less than a year between 2004 and 2005. And then, less than two years later, they returned to near their previous rates of discharge."
~ Swiss Officials Want to Spread Sunshine -- "A small Swiss village is considering building a giant mirror to reflect sunlight into the town during the three months of winter it never sees the Sun."
INTEGRAL/BUDDHIST
~ Resonantialism from CJ Smith at Indistinct Union.
~ heroes and heroines from Genkaku.
~ At-will employment over at Open Integral.
~ More Kronoscopes from Joe at Until.
~ The Secret - Prerational or Centaurian? from ebuddha.
~ Practices to Open Your Heart from Gary at Integral in Seattle.
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