LAZINESS AND LONGEVITY LINKED

NEW RESEARCH DEFIES OLD STEREOTYPES

The new picture of health and happiness in America

(Monday April 1, 2013, NIH, Bethesda, Maryland)  In what will undoubtedly ignite a contentious debate among researchers, medical scientists, physicians and others in the health care field, the results of a recently concluded long-term study will be released later this week.  The results of the study conducted over the last 43 months by a diverse team of medical researchers and experts in fields ranging from physiology, cardiology, pulmonary medicine and kinesiology to nutrition, internal medicine and others has reportedly revealed that lazy people have a better quality of life and actually tend to live longer than their more active counterparts.  These results appear to contradict most of what has been the established medical dogma of the past 40 years.  An abstract of the complete report that will appear later this week in the renowned Journal of Aging, Living, and Dying (JALAD) was leaked to selected media outlets over this past weekend.

Essentially the results of this long-term study have indicated a very strong correlation between modest to very low activity levels and the length of one’s life.  For most of the past 50 years it has been common knowledge and accepted as medical science gospel that exercise was a key factor to living a “healthier, longer life.”  Dr. Hugh R. Stout, the lead author of the study and the Research Director of the Center for Idiopathic Epidemiology where the research was conducted, here on the sprawling campus of The National Institutes of Health, commented, “I know, I know.  We are anticipating a huge amount of blow back from the medical community and the dietary-exercise-weight loss industrial complex.  Certainly, our research debunks virtually everything they have been preaching for a good many years.”  While Dr. Stout admits his team’s results are controversial, he also is confident that “the American public will welcome the results of our work and embrace our findings.  Just letting people know it is perfectly acceptable if not actually favorable to be lazy, will add years to countless lives.”

The researchers are confident that the rigorous methodology employed throughout the almost four years of active research where they studied, in depth,  the habits and health of over 47,000 male and female participants across all  demographic groups in 5 states, will help curb the initial wave of criticism they are expecting from the mainstream medical community, Weight Watchers, Jenny Craig, and gyms, spas, and sportswear retailers to name just a few of those with “a vested interest in the status quo” added Dr. Stout.

Beginning in the early 1970’s and the “jogging craze”, the concept of personal health and fitness has blossomed into a multibillion dollar a year industry and has also been among the primary tenets of modern medicine.  From the days of the fitness industry’s infancy the stress on aerobic exercise several times a week as a means to control everything from resting heart rate, blood pressure, body composition and weight has become part of our society.  Many companies today offer their employees modest discounts on their health insurance premiums if they participate in “wellness” programs either on-site at their work place or somewhere else.  Also, cigarette smoking has decreased by over 75% since it was first strongly linked to various malignant diseases, emphysema, Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD), hypertension and halitosis, which has added dramatically to the overall health of the American public. 

But what has been miscalculated and perhaps even under evaluated is the quality of a person’s life as measured by such devices as the Life Quality Index (LQI) and other metrics that are designed to measure an individual’s overall contentment, stress level, socialization, and other components more subjectively assessed said Dr. Harrari al-Bezbhahl who spearheaded the segment of the study that analyzed a person’s happiness. Dr. al-Bezbhahl continued, “The laziest people we studied were beyond doubt the most content.  It seems that those individuals who are very concerned about their health and weight, their appearance and attractiveness live with a level of stress that is very counterproductive to their actual health.  Since lazy people tend not to worry about such concerns, they live with far, far less stress and that translates into a better quality of life and a longer life, too.  The detrimental effects of stress on the human body are well documented.  Remove sources of stress and people become healthier and happier.  It just that simple.”

Obviously even these leaked aspects of the study are already stirring controversy among doctors who have seen the abstract.  Dr. Carol M. Buetol a Professor of Wellness and Preventative Medicine at Johns Hopkins Medical Center in Baltimore commented, “This study cannot be taken seriously…I mean, really??  Everything I have read so far about this research tells me the results are beyond suspect.  I am curious to read the full report and examine closely the methodology they used.  All I can say at this point is that it seems like a big load of horse shit to me.”  Dale Kyle Furnstead, the inventor of trail mix, was reached at his mountain retreat in Golden Colorado earlier today and noted, “What a person eats does matter.  How much a person exercises does matter.  A person has a great deal of control over their health and this NIH study seems to me to be kinda nutty.  But, since I have made my living being kinda nutty in my own way, I suppose I’ll just have to wait until I get the next issue of JALAD.”

Segments of the economy that stand to benefit tremendously from these research results include the fast food retailers, snack and junk food producers, bakeries, diners, sandwich shops, ice cream parlors, beer and alcohol marketers and the grocers of America.  Kevin O’Beese, President of the Council of Deep Fried Food Vendors, a Washington DC based lobbying and advocacy group, was noticeably pleased by the results. In a gracious mood in his well-appointed office on K-Street, between bites of Beef Jerky and onion rings commented, “It’s about time science has caught up with what most people have known all along.  All this fitness and working out stuff has been just a big crock of shit.  It has been a concerted, deliberate effort by the Left wing Liberals in the Democrat Party to make people feel guilty if they smoke, don’t work out, are a bit chubby and don’t really want to spend any more time sweating than they have to.  It has been fueled by the Hollywood elites and the clothing, cosmetics and health food industries all of which have a fascist-socialist-communist influence.  Hell, I’m lazy and damned proud of it.  I’m what America is really all about.”

Other segments of the economy have greeted the news of this study’s results impending publication quite differently than those such as Mr. O’Beese.  Rex Burrlap who owns and operates a chain of high-end gyms and fitness centers from Florida to Maine was visibly angry when interviewed.  He commented, “This is crazy, right?  Is this some sort of joke?  This research actually proves that lazy people are happier and healthier than folks like those who work out in my gyms and fitness centers?  Impossible.  I cannot believe it…I won’t believe it.  I mean, personally, if I don’t work out vigorously for at least 3 hours a day, every day, I feel like a slug.  I am happy.  I watch what I eat and am very content with my life.  Just ask my therapist, my psychiatrist or my yoga guru.  They’ll tell you.”

A PARADIGM SHIFT

After a generation of being told what we must do and not do to live healthy and happy lives, it seems Americans are ready for a change.  A majority of the study participants in the age groups of 15-23 years old, 24-34 years old and the 35 and above age group said they were “tired” of feeling as if they had to “do something” to change the way they look simply because “society” was sending them signals particularly about their weight and physical appearance.  The research clearly illustrated that those participants who admitted to “sitting in a chair watching a football game” made them feel better about themselves (71%) were represented overwhelmingly when compared to only 3.7% of the participants who claimed “running, jogging, or walking on a tread mill” gave them comparable good feelings.

In a series of double blind experiments where the a selected number of study participants were housed in a closed environment that was under closed circuit TV coverage 24/7, the residents chose to eat food items such as cheese dogs, spam stew, chili, French fries, burgers, pizza, banana splits, pie a la mode, salami, bratwurst, assorted candies, cupcakes, fondue, and anything that was deep fried, twice baked, stuffed, or smothered in Velveeta instead of lettuce, baby carrots, quiche, granola, white rice, steamed beets, kale, or Kiwis.  As many times as this experiment was conducted the results never varied beyond the statistical margin of error which was miniscule.

Arnold Zyzmanski a Professor of Modern American Society and Culture at Stanford University found the results of the NIH study “very interesting”.  He commented, “laziness is as American as the recliner, as much a part of our culture as the automobile, as much a part of our lives as convenience stores.  I hope people take this research seriously because I believe once society gives us all the approval to be lazy, we will have much less violence and tension among us and we will just be a happier country.”

Zyzmanski added that Bill Gates, one of the greatest intellects of his generation and one of the people most responsible for the technological culture we enjoy today had once famously said, “Whenever I have a difficult task I always assign it to a lazy person.  I know he will find the easiest way to do it”.

TAGS: NATIONAL INSTITUTES OF HEALTH (NIH), LAZY AMERICANS, HAPPY AMERICANS, HEALTHY AMERICANS, LAZINESS AND LONGEVITY, CONTROVERSIAL STUDY, APRIL FOOLS DAY, SATIRE, HUMOR

Copyright The Brooding Cynyx 2013 © All Rights Reserved

SUPREME COURT & “GAY MARRIAGE”

RIGHT WAR, WRONG BATTLES ?

JUSTICES SEEM UNSURE OF JURISDICTION

Narrowness of cases may derail push for GLBT equality

(Wednesday, March 27, 2013.  SCOTUS, Washington, DC)  As the second of two days of oral arguments on cases regarding “gay marriage” have come to an end here, we all might be in the process of learning an advanced lesson in civics.  While public support for the rights of homosexual, bisexual, and transgender Americans is at an all-time high across all demographics, the Supreme Court may not be able to rule on the “merits” of each of the cases argued but rather may be forced to dismiss them due to legal technicalities and the strict criteria the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) demands of the cases it will or will not hear.  It seems that the two cases presented today and yesterday may not meet the rigorous standards to satisfy the Justices that these cases should have been brought before them at all.

Typically a case that makes its way to the Supreme Court has been fought in lower courts for many years.  Cases that meet the standards the Supreme Court operates by are indeed rare considering how many cases the lower courts from the District, State and Federal levels are argued annually.  Virtually all cases that have the longevity and represent issues that demand new legal precedent as only a ruling in the Supreme Court can provide are matters that apply to a broad segment of the populace or have far reaching ramifications for society.  Often cases languish in the lower courts for years and go through a byzantine labyrinth of appeals, motions, further appeals, rulings, stays, and injunctions only to become trapped in a circuitous route from one judicial level to the next and back again.  And, actually, this is how it should be.  The Supreme Court opts to hear only 40 to 60 cases per session and that is but a miniscule fraction of those they have to choose from.

What has become apparent from the oral arguments and, more importantly from the questions the Justices have posed to the attorneys on each side, is that both of these cases may be too narrowly focused and may not be suitable to be heard by SCOTUS at this point.  The proponents of the matters at hand may have gotten somewhat ahead of themselves.  In their eagerness to have the Supreme Court rule on their cases and address the broader by implication legalities, they may have taken cases that are too weak to survive the rigid scrutiny the Supreme Court is uniquely vested with to render judgment.  This may be a case (actually two cases) where the right war is being waged but these 2 individual battles may not be broad enough.

RIGHT MESSAGE, WRONG MESSENGER

Borrowing an analogy from partisan elective politics a Party sometimes is in sync with public opinion in the majority of the issues pertinent to that election cycle but, for whatever reasons, they have nominated a sub-par candidate to be their standard bearer.  With anti-Viet Nam War sentiment running high in 1972 the Democratic Party chose Senator George McGovern as their presidential candidate.  His campaign theme of ending the protracted costly unpopular war in Viet Nam was a message that resonated with most voters yet the Senator proved to be a poor candidate, a man not fully up to the challenge of conducting a tough national campaign.  Despite being right on the major issue of the day, McGovern lost in an embarrassing landslide.  Just a quick glance back at the last 50 years of presidential politics and one can see how often this has been the case.

It is becoming clear that the two cases now before the Supreme Court may not be the right cases.  Yes, they each represent the “right thing to do” and the nation is obviously supportive of the core issue which is equality.  Couched in the terms of equal rights it is difficult for most main stream Americans and even those at the fringes to find a reasonable argument to justify denying equal rights to gay and lesbian couples.  After all, they seek nothing more than that – equality.  They want to have all the rights, benefits, responsibilities and burdens under the law afforded to them just as they apply to non-same sex married couples.  They do not want a “second class status” when it comes to marriage.  And they should not have to settle for anything less than the full and absolute extension of the rights and obligations all married couples are party to in America.

Some of the questions posed by the Justices over the course of the oral arguments indicate a split in the Court where, as he has many times before, Justice Kennedy may be the swing vote and therefore the deciding factor.  His line of questioning on Tuesday revealed that he does see some “injury” (in the legal sense) incurred by the children of same sex couples and this single repercussion of withholding the same rights opposite sex married couples enjoy may be his overarching concern. 

But the problem appears to be that the Court does not see these cases as sufficiently meritorious to warrant their consideration.  This could be a setback for the GLBT community but only a temporary one.  Actually of the two cases in question here the case argued today which seeks to repeal the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act seems to be the more sound.  The Justices questions to the litigators on each side of the aisle strongly hinted that they may see that issue possessing just the scantest cloak of constitutionality.  However, the peril inherent in this case is that the Court may simply find the DOMA unconstitutional and divest themselves of authority thereby sending the question back to the states to be decided by public referendums by the voters of each state.  There is some shaky territory between the DOMA which is a federal act and the ability of each state to decide the matter individually.  Left to their own parochial politics and political devices it is possible that each of the 50 states will draft 50 different versions of the DOMA or a bastardized initiative.  This would also be a setback for the “cause” as a whole.

IT’S NOT SPLITTING HAIRS:

EQUALITY FOR ALL

As is so often the case the pundits, prognosticators and self-righteous, self-appointed guardians of our “American Values” find themselves on the wrong side of public sentiment and the wrong side of history.  No matter what the Supreme Court decides, if they decide anything substantive legally or not, the inevitability of equal rights for same sex couples is undeniable.  Historically in our past we can identify several pivotal, seminal points in time where the public opinion outpaced the laws of our land.  Progress in some of these fundamental issues was a slow, often bloody slog through the mire of prejudice, ignorance, and bigotry.  Opponents of change could readily drape themselves in their own armor of “moral certitude” which proved to be only self-evident to them.  Our history has demonstrated time and time again that justice trumps the demonetization of groups; that truth can overwhelm the shallow, false, and fear-mongering tactics of those standing in the way of progress. 

Looking back we see in stark relief how many sorrowful instances of the “old guard” futilely clinging to their biases and hatred were thwarted by the cresting wave of humanity and our innate sense of justice and equality for all.  Yes, it has been an often rocky road.  The march forward has at times been but a crawl by brave individuals who were the vanguards of a core belief that sought to have our Constitution applicable without exception.  Our courts have sometimes been complicit in denying our “inalienable rights” to some; aggressively contemptuous of the concept of equality under the law at other times.  Yet, despite the obstacles various movements have reached the proverbial “tipping point” and the weight of the collective conscience has prevailed.  And we have become a better nation, a better people because of those leaps of faith.

SUPREME IRONY

Our history as a nation is punctuated by times of codified “constitutional”   discrimination, limitation of rights, and even compromised worth as a human being.  Our Supreme Court has some very dark chapters written in to its history.  There were times that the SCOTUS established systematic denial of basic human rights based on their twisted convoluted distortion of our Constitution.  Slavery was the law of the land; “blacks” were not eligible to vote just as women had been denied that right for generations.  Forced integration in the form of “busing”, and in the aftermath of the attack on Pearl Harbor Japanese- Americans were interred in concentration camps.  The Alien and Sedition Act and Dredd Scott are two of the most infamous Supreme Court decisions ever rendered. 

The most recent instance of the Supreme Court rendering a dramatically erroneous judgment was in 2000.  In what will go down in history of one of the worst decisions ever made by SCOTUS, one with such far reaching ramifications that it literally changed the course of history was in Bush v. Gore, 531 U.S. 98 wherein the Court summarily ended the Florida recount of presidential votes and handed the presidency to George W. Bush.  The rest, as they say, is history.  The eight years of the Cheney/Bush Administration will be forever defined by its series of epic failures domestically and internationally.  That single Supreme Court decision, a blatant foray into electoral politics at the highest level virtually arbitrarily determined that George W. Bush should be the President of the United States.  The global repercussions of those dark eight years will reverberate for generations to come.  But that is another story for another time.

There has always been a measure of irony in the often contentious relationship between our Republic and her highest Court.  As is the case in every courtroom in the land when a decision is rendered there is always one party pleased while the other feels defeated. Throughout our history aggrieved parties have looked to the Supreme Court for legal recourse; disenfranchised have sought justice, and many of the most famous cases have set precedent in equality.    Many have chastised the Court for finding constitutional bases for matters that may appear to far exceed that brilliantly written document that is the spine of our society.  Some of been critical of the Court for not being more receptive to their cause, for “interpreting” the merits of their case along the narrowest of constitutional confines.  The SCOTUS has not always reflected public sentiment or even majority opinion but that is as it should be.

Our tripartite system of government with three distinct and separate branches has stood the test of time although there have been moments when it may have appeared to be shaken to its core.  Still, the balance of powers between the Executive, Legislative and Judicial branches works; it is that simple, it does work. 

AND NOW WE WAIT

The oral arguments are over, now we must wait to see what the Justices will decide.  Court observers predict there may be decisions reached and announced sometime in early June.  It will be interesting to see just how this divided Court views the issue of same sex marriage and equal rights for those who seek to become married or have already been married in one of the 8 states that have already legalized such unions.

It would be a shame if these were not the cases that should have been brought before the Court at this time.  That the legality of same sex marriage is inevitable is not the matter; when there will be federal law, federal protection for same sex couples is the looming question at this time.

We can only hope that the merits of these two cases will be considered and that a majority decision will rule against California’s Prop 8 and DOMA.  The time has come.  The majority of Americans see this as central to our core beliefs and to the word and spirit of our Constitution.  Equality for all is as defining a concept for America as any other single virtue.    Let us hope the Court reaches a consensus that affirms our most highly ideals that indeed, all men are created equal and endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights.

TAGS: SUPREME COURT, SCOTUS, CALIFORNIA PROPOSITION 8, DEFENSE OF MARRIAGE ACT (DOMA), ORAL ARGUMENTS, EQUALITY UNDER THE LAW, SAME SEX MARRIAGE, EQUAL RIGHTS, GAY/LESBIAN/BISEXUAL/TRANSGENDER (GLBT) COMMUNITY, PUBLIC SUPPORT, PUBLIC OPINION FAVORS SAME SEX MARRIAGE, COURT UNSURE OF MERITS, JURISDICTIONAL ISSUES

Tuesday March 26, 2013: California’s Proposition 8: Oral Arguments

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/27/us/crowds-camp-out-for-supreme-court-reward.html?hpw

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/27/opinion/the-california-marriage-case.html?ref=politics

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/27/us/supreme-court-same-sex-marriage-case.html?ref=opinion

http://www.newser.com/article/da58uol00/excerpts-from-supreme-court-arguments-about-california-gay-marriage-case.html

Wednesday March 27, 2013: Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA): Oral Arguments

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/03/27/supreme-court-doma_n_2952611.html

http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/on-the-second-day-supreme-court-considers-doma/2013/03/26/331bb5ae-966e-11e2-9e23-09dce87f75a1_story.html?hpid=z1

http://www.washingtontimes.com/blog/breaking-news/2013/mar/27/latest-updates-supreme-court-weighs-gay-marriage-d/

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/mar/27/high-court-told-wait-different-gay-marriage-case/

Copyright The Brooding Cynyx 2013 © All Rights Reserved

SCIENTISTS GATHER TO DEBATE NOTHING

MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING

The advantages of understanding Nothing

A Special Report on Nothing

(Wednesday March 20, 2013. The Museum of Natural History, NY, NY)  Although the United States, once the most highly educated country in the world now ranks 12^th out of 36 industrialized nations producing college graduates, there are new promising signs that that may change significantly in the next 10 years.  American colleges have seen a decline in enrollment over the past decade and are producing fewer and fewer graduates particularly in the much needed fields of the applied sciences, all engineering disciplines, the computer science and technology sector, mathematics and the burgeoning fields that will come to dominate the future of technology such as nanotechnology, robotics, and medical technology.  However positive indications that this deficit may be changing were presented earlier this past Wednesday at the Museum of Natural History in New York City where some of the preeminent thinkers, professors and scientists gathered at a symposium to discuss the theory of "Nothing".

In what was a contentious but robust debate among the attendees, Nothing received a level of scrutiny and was subject to empirical methods of defining it.  According to an article in “Live Science” written by Clara Moskowitz, “The simple idea of nothing, a concept that even toddlers can understand, proved surprisingly difficult for the scientists to pin down, with some of them questioning whether such a thing as nothing exists at all.”  Indeed at times the conference devolved into heated debates that to a casual observer bordered on the ludicrous.  After all, virtually every person can readily provide a reasonable definition of Nothing but reconciling such pedestrian definitions with the theoretical and experimental concepts of Nothing as posited by scientists, physicists, and philosophers from a broad array of applied and academic sciences appears to be no easy task.  Some questioned the rationale of spending valuable grant and research funds during these times of economic austerity exploring theoretical and applied Nothing as a waste of time, energy and intellectual effort.  Still, there certainly was no absence of passion among the participants.

Despite the provability or accuracy of some of the definitions presented by some of the more highly regarding individuals in their fields, it appeared that this conference actually produced nothing.  Dr. Harlan C. Bupkes who has been studying nothing at Duke University ever since being tenured 12 years ago commented, “Nothing is and can be something.  When you ask someone what they are doing at the moment and they reply ‘Nothing’ they are still occupying space and they are matter so they are really not doing “Nothing” because simply by their physical existence in temporal space they are something; ergo, their existence alone alters the quantum space they occupy and are therefore not doing Nothing.” 

In one of the more heated exchanges of the day theoretical physicist Lawrence Krauss of Arizona State University delivered a speech in which he claimed  there is a deeper kind of Nothing  which consists of no space at all, and no time, no particles, no fields, no laws of nature. "That to me is as close to Nothing as you can get," Krauss said.  His ideas were vigorously countered by Dr. M. T. Fields from MIT.  Dr. Fields countered that she did concede the point that Professor Krauss was familiar with Nothing because most of his academic life has been spend “doing Nothing” and she added “doing Nothing is not doing science or research.  It is simply doing Nothing.”

Philosopher Jim Holt argued his position countering Krauss’ supposition inquiring, “Is that really Nothing?" he asked." There's no space and there's no time. But what about physical laws, what about mathematical entities? What about consciousness? All the things that are non-spatial and non-temporal."  At the end of Holt’s presentation Krauss, who was seen in the lobby outside the conference room consuming large quantities of cheap scotch, shouted towards the podium that, “you are correct Jim, you really have a good grasp of Nothing because that seems all you are capable of doing – Nothing.”  When other attendees standing near a slightly inebriated Krauss tried to calm him down and questioned what he was drinking he drunkenly replied, “Oh, it’s Nothing.  I never drink anything and that means I drink Nothing.”  At this point the moderator or the event, Neil deGrasse Tyson, director of the museum's Hayden Planetarium, said, "If laws of physics still apply, the laws of physics are not Nothing." Tyson continued, “Ladies and gentlemen I believe today has been a milestone in the discussion of Nothing.  It seems we discussed Nothing and that we really don’t know Nothing.  It is an elusive force or state of nature and we may need to develop and entirely new framework, a new nomenclature for the exploration of Nothing.” 

One consensus the participants did agree on was that in their respective universities and research labs they are seeing a huge increase in students, both undergraduate and graduate level seeking positions in the field of Nothing.  “ I am bolstered by the fact that this topic is engaging college students across the country.  More students want to study Nothing and spend their collegiate years engaged in really exploring the amorphous boundaries of Nothing that, in a few years’ time we should have a very qualified pool of trained minds in Nothing who may be the ones to forge the new frontiers in Nothingness.”  Dr. Ira D. Voyd of Cal Tech added, “I have a son of my own presently in college and he is proud to tell me that he is studying Nothing and, actually, is finding ever more creative ways to doing Nothing.  That warms my heart because he was always a bit of an under achiever but it seems he’s really divided into Nothing with both feet.  It seems he’s found his calling and it is Nothing.”

TAGS:  THE PHYSICS OF NOTHING, NOTHING IN PARTICULAR, THE FIELD OF NOTHING, NOTHING’S IMPORTANCE, DOING NOTHING AS SCIENCE, THE FRONTIERS OF NOTHING, NOTHING WAGERED NOTHING LOST, COLLEGE STUDENTS SEEK TO STUDY NOTHING, NOTHING IS NEW UNDER THE SUN, NOTHING MATTERS, WHAT IS THE MATTER OF NOTHING?, SCIENTIFIC SATIRE, WEIRD NEWS, SCIENTIFIC HUMOR

LINKS:

http://science.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/03/24/17441356-what-is-nothing-physicists-debate?lite

http://news.yahoo.com/physicists-debate-many-varieties-nothingness-140000127.html

http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/observations/2013/03/22/physicists-debate-the-many-varieties-of-nothingness/

http://physics.asu.edu/news/2012/06/krauss-talks-about-nothing-colbert

Copyright The Brooding Cynyx 2013 © All Rights Reserved