September 11, 2011
Placentophagy [pluh-sen-tof-uh-jee] is the act of mammals eating the placenta of their young after childbirth. The placenta contains high levels of prostaglandin which stimulates shrinking or return to a former size of the uterus. The placenta also contains small amounts of oxytocin which eases birth stress and causes the smooth muscles around the mammary cells to contract and eject milk. Although the placenta is revered in many cultures, very few customarily eat the placenta after the newborn’s birth. Those who advocate placentophagy in humans believe that eating the placenta prevents postpartum depression and other pregnancy complications. The Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists states that there is no medical reason to eat the placenta: ‘Animals eat their placenta to get nutrition – but when people are already well-nourished, there is no benefit, there is no reason to do it.’ Human placenta has also been an ingredient in some traditional Chinese medicines.
There is a school of thought that holds that placentophagy naturally occurred to hide any trace of childbirth from predators in the wild, though the fact that amniotic fluid is not similarly ingested by the mother seems to discredit this theory. Most placental mammals participate in placentophagy, including, surprisingly, herbivorous ones. Whales and seals are exceptions to mammalian placentophagy, as is the camel. Marsupials (pouched mammals) resorb rather than deliver the placenta, and therefore cannot engage in placentophagia; they do, however, vigorously lick birth fluids as they are excreted.
Posted in Food, Health |
1 Comment »
September 11, 2011
Engrams [en-gram] are a hypothetical means by which memory traces are stored as biophysical or biochemical changes in the brain (and other neural tissue) in response to external stimuli. They are also sometimes thought of as a neural network or fragment of memory, sometimes using a hologram analogy to describe its action in light of results showing that memory appears not to be localized in the brain. The existence of engrams is posited by some scientific theories to explain the persistence of memory and how memories are stored in the brain. The existence of neurologically defined engrams is not significantly disputed, though their exact mechanism and location has been a focus of persistent research for many decades.
The term was coined by the little-known but influential German evolutionary biologist Richard Semon. Overall, the mechanisms of memory are poorly understood. Such brain parts as the cerebellum, striatum, cerebral cortex, hippocampus, and amygdala are thought to play an important role in memory. For example, the hippocampus is believed to be involved in spatial and declarative learning, as well as consolidating short-term into long-term memory.
read more »
Posted in Health, Language, Science |
Leave a Comment »
September 9, 2011
Experiential avoidance (EA) has been broadly defined as attempts to avoid thoughts, feelings, memories, physical sensations, and other internal experiences—even when doing so creates harm in the long-run. The process of EA is thought to be maintained through negative reinforcement—that is, short-term relief of discomfort is achieved through avoidance, thereby increasing the likelihood that the behavior will persist.
Importantly, the current conceptualization of EA suggests that it is not negative thoughts, emotions, and sensations that are problematic, but how one responds to them that can cause difficulties. In particular, a habitual and persistent unwillingness to experience uncomfortable thoughts and feelings (and the associated avoidance and inhibition of these experiences) is thought to be linked to a wide range of problems.
read more »
Posted in Health, Language, Science |
Leave a Comment »
September 9, 2011
Malingering [muh-ling-ger-ing] is a medical term that refers to fabricating or exaggerating the symptoms of mental or physical disorders for a variety of ‘secondary gain’ motives, which may include financial compensation (often tied to fraud); avoiding school, work or military service; obtaining drugs; getting lighter criminal sentences; or simply to attract attention or sympathy. A common form of malingering in legal procedure prosecution is sometimes referred to as fabricated mental illness or feigned madness.
Malingering remains separate from somatization disorders and factitious disorders in which primary and secondary gain, such as the relief of anxiety or the assumption of the ‘patient role,’ is the goal. The symptoms most commonly feigned include those associated with mild head injury, fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue syndrome, and chronic pain. Failure to detect actual cases of malingering imposes a substantial economic burden on the health care system, and false attribution of malingering imposes a substantial burden of suffering on a significant proportion of the patient population.
read more »
Posted in Health, Politics, War |
1 Comment »
September 9, 2011
In Freudian psychology, the pleasure principle is the psychoanalytic concept describing people seeking pleasure and avoiding suffering (pain) in order to satisfy their biological and psychological needs. Furthermore, the counterpart concept, the ‘reality principle,’ describes people choosing to defer gratification of a desire when circumstantial reality disallows its immediate gratification. In infancy and early childhood, the Id (one of the three components of Freud’s model of the psyche) rules behavior by obeying only the pleasure principle. Maturity is learning to endure the pain of deferred gratification, when reality requires it; thus, the psychoanalitic Sigmund Freud proposes that ‘an ego thus educated has become ‘reasonable’; it no longer lets itself be governed by the pleasure principle, but obeys the reality principle, which also, at bottom, seeks to obtain pleasure, but pleasure which is assured through taking account of reality, even though it is pleasure postponed and diminished.’
Sigmund Freud discusses this idea, pleasure principle, and its limits in more details in his book, ‘Beyond the Pleasure Principle,’ published in 1921. In his discussion of the opposition between Eros, the life instinct, and the Thanatos, the death instinct, he examines the role of the repetition compulsion caused by the pleasure principle and of the sexual instincts.
Posted in Health, Language, Science |
Leave a Comment »
September 9, 2011
Laziness (also called indolence) is a disinclination to activity or exertion despite having the ability to do so. It is often used as a pejorative; related terms for a person seen to be lazy include couch potato, slacker, and in Australian slang, bludger.
Despite Sigmund Freud’s discussion of the pleasure principle, American psychologist Leonard Carmichael notes that ‘laziness is not a word that appears in the table of contents of most technical books on psychology… It is a guilty secret of modern psychology that more is understood about the motivation of thirsty rats and hungry pecking pigeons as they press levers or hit targets than is known about the way in which poets make themselves write poems or scientists force themselves into the laboratory when the good golfing days of spring arrive.’
read more »
Posted in Health, Language, Money |
Leave a Comment »
September 9, 2011
Acedia [uh-see-dee-uh] (Greek: ‘negligence’) describes a state of listlessness or torpor, of not caring or not being concerned with one’s position or condition in the world. It can lead to a state of being unable to perform one’s duties in life. Its spiritual overtones make it related to but distinct from depression. Acedia was originally noted as a problem among monks and other ascetics who maintained a solitary life. In the medieval Latin tradition of the seven deadly sins, acedia has generally been folded into the sin of sloth.
Moral theologians, intellectual historians and cultural critics have variously construed acedia as the ancient depiction of a variety of psychological states, behaviors or existential conditions: primarily laziness, ennui or boredom. The demon of acedia manifests itself in a range of psychological and somatic symptoms that is far broader and more complex than the familiar tradition in the West.
read more »
Posted in Health, Language, Philosophy |
Leave a Comment »
September 6, 2011
Tanning addiction is a rare syndrome where an individual appears to have a physical and/or psychological addiction to sunbathing or the use of tanning beds.In 2005, a group of dermatologists published a study showing that frequent tanners experience a loss of control over their tanning schedule, displaying a pattern of addiction similar to smokers and alcoholics. Biochemical evidence indicates that tanning addicts are addicted to an opioid release experienced during tanning. When frequent tanners took an endorphin blocker in a 2006 study, they experienced severe withdrawal symptoms, while infrequent tanners experienced no withdrawal symptoms under the same conditions.
Although the syndrome has not been officially described by the medical community, it may include the following reported symptoms: intense anxiety if a session of tanning is missed, competition among peers to see which can get the darkest tan, and chronic frustration about the color of one’s skin, with the affected person being convinced his or her complexion is constantly lighter than it actually is.
read more »
Posted in Health, Language |
1 Comment »
September 6, 2011
Slip-Slop-Slap is the name of a health campaign in Australia exhorting people to ‘slip on a shirt, slop on sunscreen, and slap on a hat’ when they go out into the sun, in order to protect themselves against an increased risk of skin cancer. ‘Seek shade’ and ‘Slide on some sunglasses’ was added a year later. It is probably Australia’s most recognizable health message. The campaign started in 1981; its mascot is a seagull called Sid. It is also used in New Zealand, where the mascot is a lobster, and some Canadian cities have also started their own Slip-Slop-Slap campaigns.
Since the campaign was introduced along with advertisements and a jingle, the incidence of the two most common forms of skin cancer (basal and squamous cell carcinoma) in Australia has decreased. However, the incidence of melanoma – the most lethal form of skin cancer – has increased. An epidimological study published in 2002 concluded that skin cancer increases could not be associated with the use of sun creams, and recommended continued use of the current campaigns as a means to reduce melanoma risk. Vitamin D deficiency has also greatly increased (which can lead to cancers, since sunblock also prevents vitamin D production in the skin. Doctors recommend spending small amounts of time in the sun without sun protection to ensure adequate production of vitamin D.
Posted in Health, Politics, World |
Leave a Comment »
September 6, 2011
Unlike sunscreen but like tanning oil, indoor tanning lotions accelerate the tanning process, by promoting the production of melanin or by increasing blood flow to the skin, thereby increasing the amount of melanin that is brought to the top layers of the skin.
Indoor tanning lotions contain no sunscreen and offer no protection from the sun.
read more »
Posted in Health, Money |
Leave a Comment »
September 6, 2011
Sunscreen (also known as sunblock) is a lotion, spray or other topical product that helps protect the skin from the sun’s ultraviolet (UV) radiation, and which reduces sunburn and other skin damage, with the goal of lowering the risk of skin cancer. However in the United States, the term suntan lotion usually means the opposite of sunscreen, and instead refers to lotion designed to moisturize and maximize UV exposure and tanning rather than block it. These are commonly called indoor tanning lotions when designed for use with tanning beds or just suntan lotion if designed for outdoor use and may or may not have SPF protection in them.
The most effective sunscreens protect against both UVB, which can cause sunburn, and UVA, which damages the skin with more long-term effects, such as premature skin aging. Most sunscreens work by containing either an organic chemical compound that absorbs ultraviolet light (such as oxybenzone) or an opaque material that reflects light (such as titanium dioxide, zinc oxide), or a combination of both. Typically, absorptive materials are referred to as chemical blocks, whereas opaque materials are mineral or physical blocks. The sun protection factor (SPF) of a sunscreen is a laboratory measure of the effectiveness of sunscreen — the higher the SPF, the more protection a sunscreen offers against UVB.
read more »
Posted in Health, Politics, Technology |
Leave a Comment »
August 30, 2011
The term anal retentive, commonly abbreviated to anal, is used conversationally to describe a person who pays such attention to detail that the obsession becomes an annoyance to others, and can be carried out to the detriment of the anal-retentive person. The term derives from Freudian psychoanalysis. People who are said to be anal retentive usually suffer from obsessive–compulsive personality disorder. In the psychology of Freud, the anal stage is said to follow the oral stage of infant or early-childhood development. This is a time when an infant’s attention moves from oral stimulation to anal stimulation (usually the bowels but occasionally the bladder), usually synchronous with learning to control his or her excretory functions, a time of toilet training.
Freud theorized that children who experience conflicts during this period of time may develop ‘anal’ personality traits, namely those associated with a child’s efforts at excretory control: orderliness, stubbornness, a compulsion for control. If these qualities continue into later life, the person is said to be ‘anal retentive.’ Conversely, those who reject anal characteristics are said to have ‘anal expulsive’ personality types. Although Freud’s theories on early childhood have been influential on the psychological community, research suggests that the overall pattern of parental attitudes has a much more concrete effect on how an infant will grow up. There is no conclusive research linking anal stage conflicts with ‘anal’ personality types.
Posted in Health, Language |
Leave a Comment »
The Daily Omnivore 