July 7, 2012
Behavioral addiction is a form of addiction which does not rely on chemicals (like drugs and alcohol), characterized by a compulsion to repeatedly engage in an action until said action causes serious negative consequences to the person’s physical, mental, social, and/or financial well-being. One sign that a behavior has become addictive is if it persists despite these consequences. Behavioral addictions, which are sometimes referred to as impulse control disorders, are increasingly recognized as treatable forms of addictions. Behaviors which may be addicting include gambling, eating, intercourse, viewing pornography, use of computers, playing video games, working , exercising, spiritual obsession (as opposed to religious devotion), cutting, and shopping.
When analyzing the addiction to food for example, a published study in 2009 from The Scripps Research Institute have shown for the first time that the same molecular mechanisms that drive people into drug addiction are behind the compulsion to overeat, pushing people into obesity. In this study, scientists focused on a particular receptor in the brain known to play an important role in vulnerability to drug addiction — the dopamine D2 receptor. The D2 receptor responds to dopamine, a neurotransmitter that is released in the brain by pleasurable experiences like food or sex or drugs like cocaine.
read more »
Posted in Drugs, Health, Money |
Leave a Comment »
July 7, 2012
Me at the zoo is the first video ever to be uploaded to YouTube. It was uploaded at 8:27 pm on Saturday, April 23, 2005 by Jawed Karim, one of the co-founders of the site, under the username ‘jawed.’ Described by ‘The Observer’ as ‘poor-quality,’ the video was shot by Yakov Lapitsky at the San Diego Zoo; it features Karim in front of the elephants, explaining how interesting their ‘really, really, really long trunks’ are, and is 19 seconds long.
‘The Los Angeles Times’ states: ‘as the first video uploaded to YouTube, it played a pivotal role in fundamentally altering how people consumed media and helped usher in a golden era of the 60-second video.’
Posted in Technology |
Leave a Comment »
July 7, 2012
Metamaterials are artificial materials engineered to have properties that may not be found in nature, such as the ability to interact with and control electromagnetic waves. Naturally occurring matter exhibits behavior based on the molecules that make it up — the atomic material that composes the finished product determines what properties the product will have.
For instance, take the relationship between wood and light. Wood, like all natural matter, reflects and refracts light. But just how much light it reflects and refracts depends on how the electromagnetic waves of the light interact with the particles — like electrons — that make up the wood. With metamaterials, the sum of the parts, not the parts themselves, determines how the material behaves.
read more »
Posted in Technology |
Leave a Comment »
July 7, 2012
‘Superman: Red Son‘ is a comic book mini-series published by DC Comics that was released under their Elseworlds imprint in 2003. Author Mark Millar created the comic with the premise ‘what if Superman had been raised in the Soviet Union?’ The story mixes alternate versions of DC super-heroes with alternate-reality versions of real political figures such as Joseph Stalin and John F. Kennedy. The series spans approximately 1953-2001, save for a futuristic epilogue.
In ‘Red Son,’ Superman’s rocket ship lands on a Ukrainian collective farm rather than in Kansas, an implied reason being a small time difference (a handful of hours) from the original timeline, meaning Earth’s rotation placed the Ukraine in the ship’s path instead of Kansas. Instead of fighting for ‘…truth, justice, and the American Way,’ Superman is described in Soviet radio broadcasts ‘…as the Champion of the common worker who fights a never-ending battle for Stalin, socialism, and the international expansion of the Warsaw Pact.’ His ‘secret identity’ (i.e. the name his adoptive parents gave him) is a state secret.
read more »
Posted in Art, Politics, World |
4 Comments »
July 7, 2012
Prediction markets are speculative markets created for the purpose of making predictions; the current market prices can then be interpreted as predictions of the probability of the event or the expected value of the parameter. For example, a prediction market security might reward a dollar if a particular candidate is elected, such that an individual who thinks the candidate had a 70% chance of being elected should be willing to pay up to 70 cents for such a security.
People who buy low and sell high are rewarded for improving the market prediction, while those who buy high and sell low are punished for degrading the market prediction. Evidence so far suggests that prediction markets are at least as accurate as other institutions predicting the same events with a similar pool of participants.
read more »
Posted in Games, Money, Politics |
Leave a Comment »
The Daily Omnivore 