Eating meat tied to cancer risk
"Limiting consumption of meat is clearly a good idea, whether 'white' or red. A recent study found that the average American diet gets more HCAs from chicken than red meat. Follow AICR’s advice to cook meat at lower temperatures (baking, microwaving), and follow a mostly plant-based diet that keeps meat portions modest and focuses on the vegetables, fruits and whole grains that protect our health."
Remember Mike Zellers, author of those nifty vegaterianism and Yoga articles I linked to a while back? Well those pages are gone but Mike's started a blog called Spacemonk that I know I'll be watching with interest.
Francis Fukuyama thinks that biotechnology needs to be regulated so that scientists don't make some fundamental change to the human essence. I just finished reading The Age of Spiritual Machines, in which Ray Kurzweil predicts humans will begin transferring their consciousnesses into machines by the end of the century, after making heavy use of biotech implants. According to another article I read in Scientific American (The Fate of Life in the Universe, November 1999; by Krauss, Starkman), this is the only way that organisms can continue to exist. The problem is that in an infinitely expanding universe, matter density is constantly declining. At some point (probably more than 100 trillion years away, when all the stars are dead), intelligent beings won't be able to gather enough resources to stay alive. The only consciousnesses that will survive are those that exist in very low-power machines that spend eons in hibernation to conserve resources. So, if we're going to have to make fundamental changes to human nature to survive past 100 trillion years anyway, what's the point in resisting biotech now? 😉
Major lifestyle changes needed to prevent diabetes
"The prevention of diabetes requires substantial rather than modest changes in lifestyle habits," co-author Dr. Jim I. Mann told Reuters Health. "Our research has shown that to achieve the maximum benefit of exercise, it is necessary to exercise at least five times per week to an extent that appreciably increases heart rate."
So the stuff I've been working on so hard for the last few months is finally live. It's the new ecommerce system at NYTimes.com. There are still some bugs and performance issues, and I find some of the page flows annoying, but it's there. The bad news is, I got laid off. This is neither surprising (the consulting market is dead) nor a big disappointment (my plan was to start looking for a new job when I got back from Mexico, anyway). Such is life, at least I'll be able to catch up on my blogging.
"Critics of the advisory say the F.D.A. based its recommendations on outdated research about safe mercury levels in the blood, with the limit eight times higher than was deemed safe by both the National Academy of Sciences and the Environmental Protection Agency. If the F.D.A. followed the National Academy's standard, it would tell pregnant women not to eat any tuna steaks at all, and canned tuna only once a month." Link