Ethics & food

• Take surveys on what you find morally acceptable. These research studies, by Jonathan Haidt and others, construct weird dilemmas in order to understand how people "reason" about ethics.

• Do we have a moral obligation not to kill animals? Michael Pollan (author of the "eat food" article above) took on the philosophical arguments in a 2002 NYT magazine article. Given that we are unlikely to start treating animals as our equals, even if the arguments are compelling, he focuses on animal suffering, and how our animal farming industry fails miserably in that regard.

• Ignore the trends, politics, and nutritionism. "Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants." This article has gotten a lot of people talking recently.

Food & psychology

• Think you're savy enough not to be influenced by food presentation? Think again. Tricks from Cornell's Food & Brand Lab (headed by Brian Wansink), plus sidebar.

Psychology & physical health

• "I was itching the whole time I was writing this article," I recall a lead-in saying. A compelling look at psychogenic (/ psychosomatic) illnesses, by Margaret Talbot.

  Also while I note this, another such incident was reported just this week.

  Or how about psycho-somatic pregnancy (including labor)?

• Resilience--why do some people recover from childhood trauma and abuse, while others do not? A gene associated with depression (in response to stress) may have something to do with it.

• "The truth about autism" -- Wired magazine reports on a jarring YouTube video that shows an apparently quite impaired autistic woman. Midway through the video, the woman (performer, creator and editor) begins to explain, incredibly articulately (via synthesized voice), who she is, what compells her to act like that, and how autistic individuals are misunderstood and misdiagnosed with respect to intelligence.

• In progress: studies on stretching. While stretching is recognized worldwide as "important" when exercising, the reasons why we "must" do it vary by whom you ask. In some countries (or to some people) it's considered crucial for preventing injury, while in others it's thought to be done to prevent soreness; in some places, before exercising, in others, after. I can't wait to see them solve this one.

Physical health / public service announcement

• Why don't we do it in our sleeves? Humorously dorky video advising people to cough and sneeze into their sleeves, not their hands.

Psychology & perception

• Did you happen to notice a gorilla walk by? Take a look at some of the demo videos from this lab run by Daniel Simons at the University of Illinois. In particular, the 5th topic (with the gorilla), and the 3rd. Read the descriptions first.

• Bad at recognizing people? Me too! Maybe it's their faces . (I scored horribly on the quiz.)

• Implicit Association Test. Measures unconscious bias. Eye-opening to try it; in the tests I've done, I was disturbed how visibly slower I was in one configuration than the other.

• Don't be too jumpy about claiming the media to be biased: you and your opponents see more (and contradictory) bias than a neutral observer

• Punching in the laboratory: fascinating research showing that people in arguments or fights respond with more force than they realize.

• Your sense of humor can be influenced by holding a pencil in your mouth, and your mood by posture. More generally, all kinds of subtle cues can subconsciously modify our behavior.

Psychology & animals

• Elephant societies (if we're allowed to call them that) are in crisis and becoming more dangerous to humans: adolescent males are acting out, with no elders to keep them in check; and individuals have been traumatized from seeing their parents slaughtered.

• Even insects seem to have distinct personalities.

• Not only are we allowed to talk about emotion and culture for chimps now, but we have to admit they can beat us at some computer tasks! (Similar article only available if you have access to Science magazine.)

• We can even say mice have empathy: they seem to feel more pain than usual when a cage-mate is also in pain, and less than usual when a competitor is.

Genetics & animals

• Always wanted a pet fox? Researchers in Siberia perform a 40-year experiment no one else ever thought to try: can domestication of wild animals be repeated?

• A single gene governs dog size
• Removing one gene makes cautious mice into daring mice

Genetics & history

• Dinosaur genes: bits of soft tissue recovered from a Tyrannosaurus rex contained identifiable fragments of proteins! (4/13/07)

• We can now sequence and analyze Neanderthal DNA! (11/16/06)

• Surprisingly recently, possibly only 3,000 years ago, humans evolved the ability to digest milk in adulthood. (12/10/06)

Genetics & human disease

• Heart disease (5/3/07)
• Diabetes (4/27/07)
• Obesity (4/13/07)
• autism gene?

Linguistics & Culture

• Fascinating article on an Amazon tribe that's culturally as far away from the rest of the world as imaginable. They have "little interest in the advantages of civilization", "almost no signs of permanent contact with civilized people," and a language and grammar unrelated to any other. According to the linguistics and missionaries who have studied them (and here's where the academic debates begin): no numbers greater than two (nor ability to learn them), no art, little sense of the past or future or of any abstractions beyond their immediate experience.

Society & Culture

• Accidental divorces in China. Taking advantage of a bureaucratic loophole to provide a bigger housing allowance, thousands of residents of a Chinese village get sham divorces--then, "ex"-spouses decide to run off while they're at it. (I would love to see a short story written from this.)

• American Ways. A book (available online) that gets to the heart of a lot of differences between Americans and people from other countries. Equally fascinating whichever category you belong to.

• Buying a house with a paper clip. In today's internet-based world, shouldn't anyone be able to get rich off a clever idea?

Survival & Adventure

• The Castaways. This New Yorker article surprised me in two ways: first by what a jaw-dropping story it turned into, after starting off so innocently; second by sticking in my head so long afterwards, like a piece of fiction.

Crime & Punishment

• Why you should never talk to the police, according to a law professor (seconded by a police officer).
• Did Texas execute an innocent man? Another long, ultimately deeply disturbing New Yorker article.

Music

• Would Joshua Bell make it as a subway performer?

Bicycles

• Ever tried to steal a bike? Let's see how many people notice, under various conditions in New York City.

Religion

• Need a religion? Pick one here. A personal beliefs quiz that shows how well you align with about 25 religions.

(While I have it in front of me, here's how to generate a permanent NYT link, in case any of the articles that worked today, later don't: http://nytimes.blogspace.com/genlink.)

Page created 4/19/07, last updated 10/12/09