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News Briefs 11-02-2011

By Grail-seekeron

Nothing is impossible

  • Voynich manuscript carbon-dated to early C15.
  • ‘Slight possibility‘ of SETI signal originating from an extraterrestrial intelligence, says NASA.
  • Airborne anomalies: rethinking atmospheric lifeforms.
  • Missing link theories invalidated. Were our ancestors more sophisticated than us?
  • If a slime mould or drop of oil can solve a maze with ease, could even they be more intelligent than us?
  • Giant ring of black holes.
  • Is God a social illusion?
  • Go play games with the CIA at their kids’ page, but don’t accept cookies from strangers, kids!
  • Do you believe in fairies?
  • ‘Lone wolf’ planets roaming space might harbour life.
  • The "Top 50 Essential Non-Fiction Books for Weirdos” (h/t to BoingBoing).
  • 360-degree virtual tour of Sistine Chapel.
  • A horse goes into a bar…
  • 2045: The year man becomes immortal.
  • WikiLeaks’ UFO Cables: more about Raelian cult than alien life.
  • Could this be the earliest portrait in history?
  • Choosing healthy foods now called a mental disorder.

Thanks to RPJ

Quote of the Day:

Vision is the art of seeing things invisible.

Jonathan Swift

Grail-seeker
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17 Comments

  2. The single most ignorant thing I have heard in a long time…
    Great. That’s exactly what fat-ass America needs to hear. Eating healthy food is bad for you… I was really hoping to find out this was a joke, but no such luck.

    1. obsessions
      Some people develop obsessive behaviour about healthy food. That is a mental problem.

      Some people develop obsessive behaviour about washing their hands. That is also a mental problem.

      I’m why there needs to be a special illness for each object of obsession. Seems to me the object has little to do with it – if you take away the healthy food, these people would obsess about something else.

      1. Fiber wonks

        I remember reading a very funny article about cereals.

        How decades ago a good cereal had to be bright and fun and almost let your innards glowing in primary colors. Then people started to worry about fiber. So we tried to switch to Granola; and then people pointed out that granola was full of unhealthy sugar. Seemed like the only option was to look for a cereal that was the closest thing to unprocessed tree bark —horrible to the eye and the palate, but that would let you live for a hundred years.

        Of course, if living to be 100 meant eating that stuff all your life, then it doesn’t really sound like such a great deal after all 😉

        PS: Or maybe the author of the article is a big Woody Allen fan 😛

      2. Obsession is obsession
        What I see described in that article is not obsession. Eating only live, healthy food to the exclusion of any processed food is not an obsession but a smart decision. What I see is a scare tactic. Essentially, “eat McDonald’s or die,” is in the subtext. That is consistently the tone I am seeing. This article is a perfect example of how this (I maintain, erroneous) disorder is being used:

        http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/OnCall/orthorexia-obsession-healthy-foods-leads-eating-disorder/story?id=10173614

        The second page, in particular, is full of misleading or outright false information. If you know what you are doing, you could live well on just a handful of foods, as boring as that might be. The problem is misinformation, ignorance, and as you said, obsession. What I don’t see, is why each obsession requires a specific illness.

  3. Eating unhealthy food is in the Constitution!
    I wonder who pays the wages of these “experts” (the money would come from interesting sources, I’d bet). It’s sad that a bloke like Jamie Oliver gets banned from LA schools for trying to change their eating habits for the better (sure he has a big head, but he has an even bigger heart, and his efforts are sincere). I’m surprised they weren’t protesting against Oliver with placards reading, “We have the right to bear arms against the English, and we have the right to eat crap and overburden our health system too!”. It’s just dumb.

    I admit, I have a Pepsi and a snickers bar every now and then. But like cigarettes, we know it’s doing ourselves harm… so why do we do it? Out of an irrational “no one tells me what I can’t do” stubbornness?

    It’s pretty clear who has the mental disorder.

    1. Let’s not get too carried away here
      From that article:

      In contrast to that, people who eat health-enhancing natural foods — with all the medicinal nutrients still intact — begin to awaken their minds and spirits. Over time, they begin to question the reality around them and they pursue more enlightened explorations of topics like community, nature, ethics, philosophy and the big picture of things that are happening in the world. They become “aware” and can start to see the very fabric of the Matrix, so to speak.

      Yeah, because people back in the old days, they sure ate a lot of healthy foods, and so they weren’t the gullible docile sheep we have become now. The Crusades? the Cold War? well… that’s all circumstantial and perfectly explainable 😉

      1. Only part of the picture
        Mental health isn’t solely dependent on physical health, but it is certainly a large part of the picture. What good is a healthy brain if it only has access to false information? It seems like today we have the reverse of that: good information is abundant, while physical health and the ability to utilize that information is on the decline.

        1. Dumb us down?
          So what you’re saying is that, as a countermeasure to the easy access to vast amounts of information we enjoy in our modern times, the powers at be are looking to “dumb us down” with junk food?

          1. wrong conspiracy
            You folks have it backwards.

            The conspiracy here is the health food people. They eventually want to put everyone on a low calorie, low protein diet. The low fat is just a red herring. Which you can’t have either because it has too much protein.

            This low calorie, low protein diet will eventually reduce the size of the population, to an average of about 1.42 meters, or 4 foot 8.

            This smaller population then consumes fewer resources, and their legs are too short to run away.

          2. Too much of a good thing
            Well, for one, I’m not saying that there is a vast conspiracy, just corporate and monetary interests being served. And the low protein thing is a myth. There are simple combinations, like beans and rice, that give a complete balance of proteins. I can’t speak for the rest of the world, but Americans are suffering from too much protein, not too little.

          3. too much
            Of course a vegetarian diet (for example) can, and often does, provide enough protein. But it does that only when people are careful with it.

            And do you honestly believe the people who pig out on sugar and fat will be careful with a health food diet? Of course they won’t, they will get that wrong the same way they get any other diet wrong.

            I disagree on the assumption that people get too much protein. They get too much animal fat, which some folks cannot tell apart from protein. And the fat is not the real problem either.

            The real problem is the unbalanced diet with too much sugar. The imbalance itself causes problems. Getting the vast majority of calories from carbohydrates is unhealthy.

          4. dumb cow
            I can keep a cow alive on dry grass and poor quality hay for a very long time, but that cow will start to lose it’s condition and become ill more often. It will eventually die not reaching it’s life span potential. It also acts doppier then a well balanced fed cow.

            I see no difference with the human population of the western world.

  4. Earliest portrait
    Best thing I’ve read this day:

    We look at the pyramids, and imagine them too as the monuments of a massively forbidding society. But look closer, and the culture that built these wonderful structures abounds in personality, character, and ordinary peoples’ faces, bodies, voices. Seneb is not an anonymous functionary in an authoritarian order. He is gloriously himself. His family are so recognisable and loving. Perhaps this icon of the Egyptian Museum – the very museum that is seeing such dramatic scenes and historic moments again this week – is a reminder that the democratic sense of individuality and pluralism has deep and ancient and universal roots, not least in Egypt.

  6. ET signal
    I had to rub my eyes in case I was still dreaming when I read this. NASA has admitted there’s a “slight possibility” the signal is from an extraterrestrial intelligence, that’s extraordinary from an organisation that has always been anally retentive with its skepticism.

  7. A species in the garden…

    “Nothing is impossible”

    I hold this to be a truth that will someday be self evident.

    It all comes down to manipulating energy and so too, matter. If mankind could master this, he would be God. For, in fact and indeed, it is just this very thing that makes God, God.

    I suspect that it is only a matter of time before the prodigal sons and daughters of the Creator learn the tricks of the trade. We already seek to emulate our Father in so many ways… most notably, our desire to create life and intelligence.

    If someday we also discover the soul, we will probably take a swing at that, too.

    The human condition is presently one of acute, though not malignant imperfection. But then again, that is also on our to-do list…

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