Sites that I've bookmarked this week:
Cognitive Dissonance Theory (you value more what you have to work harder to obtain)
http://www.chicagotribune.com/health/la-heb-food-hard-to-get-20111105,0,6232759.story
Fantasy world-building
http://www.sfwa.org/2009/08/fantasy-worldbuilding-questions/
The well-being of sperm
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=bpa-semen-quality
Neanderthals Live On
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=ozzy-osbourne-genome
Or maybe they don't
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=dna-sequence-may-be-lost-in-tr
Did We Mate With Neanderthals Or Eat Them?
http://discovermagazine.com/2009/nov/30-did-we-mate-with-neanderthals-or-murder-them
Motivated Reasoning (Believing what you want to believe, regardless of the evidence)
http://www.skepdic.com/motivatedreasoning.html
Critique of the Kindle and its ilk, and gobsmacking ignorance about copyright law
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=the-trouble-with-e-readers&page=2&posted=1#comments
One ripped-off author
http://www.kpho.com/news/25653553/detail.html
Ripping (Rightly) Into (an alleged) Ripper-Offer
http://illadore.livejournal.com/30674.html
http://nihilistic-kid.livejournal.com/1
A lot of good info about copyright and a who's who of professionals who care passionately about plagiarism and copyright infringement.
For Lovers Of Lists (10 Things You Didn't Know...)
http://discovermagazine.com/columns/20-things-you-didnt-know
Do let me know which you enjoyed most, if any!
All the best,
Rowena Cherry
Posts
thank you for this!
ReplyDeleteThat article about hard-to-get food being seen as more desirable reminds me of a principle regarding children and sweets: It's often claimed that withholding dessert unless the child eats the rest of the meal puts an exaggerated value on dessert and makes the vegetables seem less attractive. Therefore the child grows up to crave sweets and eat an unhealthful diet as an adult.
ReplyDeleteI don't doubt that's part of the truth. But I don't believe it fully explains our craving for sweets, which is hard-wired based on the fact that in the wild, sweetness is associated with ripe fruits, which are good for us. Refined sugar represents a supernormal stimulus, hijacking our brain reward systems linked to taste.
So just hiding the broccoli might not work. :)
Human mother's milk is sweet.
ReplyDeleteDesserts are "sweet" because they're a heavy shot of pure carbs which is designed to turn OFF the appetite.
Thus if you've eaten something sweet, you will find vegetables (which have a bitter undertaste usually) distasteful.
That's why we generally prefer a dry wine with dinner, and a sweet drink after dinner.
BTW ever seen a row of cows with their heads pushed through a fence to get at grass on the other side while the meadow behind them waves with succulent leaves of grass?
The grass is always greener ...
Jacqueline Lichtenberg
http://jacquelinelichtenberg.com