We all know the two party system is failing our country. It’s easily purchased by conflicting private interests, and each side spends 80% of it’s rhetoric pointing out the corruption and flaws of the other. One of the key motivators I hear for people’s voting choices is their terror of the other guys. Furthermore, as I pointed out with religion, one size does not fit all with questions of philosophy and morality. Since it’s widely agreed upon that the current system is broken, perhaps it’s time we looked at new systems. I am a devout constitutionalist, but I feel this is a more elegant system which may have been overlooked (factions of political parties had not been in the design of the checks and balances) or out of the reach of a non-digital civilization.

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While I expected folks to be taken off guard by my beliefs, I was a little startled over the reception it got. Religion is always such a taboo subject for so many folks, and one that is easy to offend others on. It was a great feeling to receive such warm reactions.

Now for part two of my series on religion. The questionnaire showed what the basics of my beliefs are, and the answers surely bucked the typical buckets (I have never felt a need to conform). If you paid attention you see many parallels to my political philosophies: live and let live. The astute would have found traces of Taoism and Buddhism, but the core of my philosophy would have been impossible to glean.
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Yet again, I watched a great documentary which got me thinking and thus inspired me to write. This is a new writing subject for me, despite being one that I never particularly avoid discussing: Religion. Many people would assume that I am atheist because I never talk about spirituality, don’t actively practice religion, am a junkie for evolutionary science, and am never offended by (and may even agree with) criticisms of religion. These people would be wrong. First, the documentary that inspired me to share my spiritual beliefs (which even my family is left confused to understand where I stand).
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I recently watched a documentary that got me thinking, and I felt inspired to write about it. I had already used a couple of the arguments made in this film. Anyone who knows me, knows that I put evolutionary factors on a pedestal. What better evidence do you need than millions of years of data? As I have often pointed out to vegetarians, humans evolved as an omnivorous predator. We would never have evolved intelligent brains capable of agriculture, enabling the all vegetarian diet, had we not been primarily meat eaters before hand. The next two smartest creatures in the world, Chimps & Dolphins, are also hunters. Hunting is simply a more efficient way of gathering calories, and big brains require big amounts of calories. It’s evolutionary economics.

Fat Head won me over quickly for pointing out a simple fact. In evolutionary terms, about 90% of the foods we now eat daily just simply didn’t exist. This is the same argument made by Michael Pollan, in his book Omnivore’s Dilemma, when he points out that (thanks to agricultural subsidies by our Government) corn makes up a terrifying amount of just about everything we eat (although he takes a smaller scale look, arguing that no foods that didn’t exist 100 years ago are not intended for us). Tom Naughton looks instead at what we have been told to accept as nutritional fact, despite there never having been any science to prove these claims. As a lover of science, I had known that the government and junk science are like “peas and carrots,” but I was taken off guard by the solid arguments made in this film.

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The Documentary begins as a sarcastic rebuttal to Supersize Me, but slowly shifts towards a (very libertarian) analysis on how we got to the current state of nutritional “fact.” Here are the key facts from the film off his website (I included supporting reference material, feel free to disprove or debate):

There’s never been a single study that proves saturated fat causes heart disease.

Study fails to link saturated fat, heart disease
What If bad fat is good for you?

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As heart-disease rates were skyrocketing in the mid-1900s, consumption of animal fat was going down, not up. Consumption of vegetable oils, however, was going up dramatically.

Vegetable Oil History In North America

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Half of all heart-attack victims have normal or low cholesterol. Autopsies performed on heart-attack victims routinely reveal plaque-filled arteries in people whose cholesterol was low (as low as 115 in one case).

72% according this study
“Researchers analyzed data from 136,905 patients hospitalized for a heart attack nationwide between 2000 and 2006 whose lipid levels upon hospital admission were documented. This accounted for 59 percent of total hospital admissions for heart attack at participating hospitals during the study period. Among individuals without any prior cardiovascular disease or diabetes, 72.1 percent had admission LDL levels less than 130 mg/dL, which is the current LDL cholesterol target for this population. Thus, the vast majority of individuals having their first heart attack would not have been targeted for effective preventative treatments based on the criteria used in the current guidelines.”

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Asian Indians – half of whom are vegetarians – have one of the highest rates of heart disease in the entire world.

South Asians Suffer High Rate of Heart Disease
Heart risk for vegetarians

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Kids who were diagnosed as suffering from ADD have been successfully treated by re-introducing natural saturated fats into their diets. Your brain is made largely of fat.

Can Attention Deficit-Hyperactivity Disorder Result from Nutritional Deficiency?

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Many epileptics have reduced or eliminated seizures by adopting a diet low in sugar and starch and high in saturated animal fats.

Ketogenic Diet

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Despite everything you’ve heard about saturated fat being linked to cancer, that link is statistically weak. However, there is a strong link between sugar and cancer. In Europe, doctors tell patients, “Sugar feeds cancer.”

Does saturated fat cause breast, colon and other cancers?

Cancer Loves Sugar?

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Being fat is not, in and of itself, bad for your health. The behaviors that can make you fat – eating excess sugar and starch, not getting any exercise – can also ruin your health, and that’s why being fat is associated with bad health. But it’s entirely possible to be fat and healthy. It’s also possible to be thin while developing Type II diabetes and heart disease.

Is overweight okay?

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Saturated fat and cholesterol help produce testosterone. When men limit their saturated fat, their testosterone level drops. So, regardless of what a famous vegan chef believes, saturated fat does not impair sexual performance.

Dietary and hormonal interrelationships among vegetarian Seventh-Day Adventists and nonvegetarian men

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Conclusion:

Eat naturally and in moderation with a healthy regimen exercise. Avoid processed foods, vegetable oils being no exception. From what I can tell, the USDA recommendations began as a way to push agricultural commodities (remember Margarine > Butter?). Watch the documentary, and feel free to debate it’s points.

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An excellent video, and well crafted argument, from Freedomain Radio. Artfully manages to build his metaphor over the past 2000 years of civilization and pattern the behavior of ruling power.

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By some miraculous feat I managed to have not have caught this video during the past 5 years. Being a geek, gamer, and internet addict I have 0 excuses for missing this. Needless to say, I only recently stumbled upon this but it made a lasting impression on me:

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“I’m here to do what you want me to, and I want to do.”

From his legendary San Quentin Prison Benefit Concert 1969

This is the quote that inspired me to write this piece, and was one that I felt particularly summarized the man’s (surprisingly) long career. As a pioneer of Rock and Country music, he went on to write over 1000 songs, win countless awards, and has inspired multiple generations of artists to follow him. His life has been adapted into 2 films and 2 Broadway musicals (half of which won awards as well). There are few people who are able to achieve the level of influence Johnny Cash ultimately had on American culture within their life time. The best part, and probably the reason he earned it, is that it wasn’t his goal.

“Success is having to worry about every damn thing in the world, except money.”

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“It is little short of a miracle that modern methods of instruction have not already completely strangled the holy curiosity of inquiry…. I believe that one could even deprive a healthy beast of prey of its voraciousness if one could force it with a whip to eat continuously whether it were hungry or not…” Albert Einstein (1879-1955)

Recently I read about a group of Psychology students claiming that the age of the (costly) Textbook is coming to an end, especially considering the internet is an up-to-the-minute library of everything you need to know about anything. Open Source Texts are nothing new, and there has been an increasing abundance of free education grade material on the internet. You can learn more in 1 hour wondering around Wikipedia than you could sitting in a lecture during that same time. I am of the opinion that the cost of higher education exceeds its value, especially considering you can access the same information for free. Be it degree inflation or over subsidizing education, a college degree simply isn’t worth what they charge for it.

Has the wage Gender gap been closing due to fairness laws, or have more couples been forced into dual careers to achieve the lifestyle they were raised to expect? That is for dwindling folks who are finding time to get married anymore.

Simply put, the current American Dream is of the pipe variety. Information is global the second you put it on the internet, and despite any clever methods to curtail it, people will take it, consume it, share it, and remix it (with and without paying for it). How can you compete on a global scale when we put arbitrary costs on how much learning your skills should cost? The modern student faces ~10 years of debt (if all goes well) to recoup the cost of their piece of paper with a brand name on it, while a third world competitor learns the exact same skills and knowledge for free by showing some initiative. Performance will always trump credentials, and we live in an age where individuals have an unparalleled potential to demonstrate their abilities.

I am always learning about a variety of subjects and hobbies at once, and I encourage you to also push your mind to capacity. Just because information is free doesn’t mean we should devalue it!

Get Inspired to Learn:
http://www.thersa.org/
http://www.ted.com/
http://bigthink.com/
http://www.nationalgeographic.com/
A benefit of Netflix being bullied by movie & TV studios is the awesome selection of documentaries and science programing.

Find Resources:
101 Killer Open Courseware Projects from Around the World: Ivy League and Beyond
iTunes U
Youtube
Wikipedia
Find Discussion Forums, Bookmarking Groups, Twitter Feeds, Blogs, etc, on your subject. The learning power of the crowd is an incredible thing!

“However many holy words you read, however many you speak, what good will they do you if you do not act on upon them?”- Buddha

Do!
Too much time is wasted in our society not doing anything! Apply your knowledge via some creative medium, outlet, project. Combine interests into realms of knowledge, teach yourself new skills. Experiment, try, fail. (learn)

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As a long time zombie fan, I am kind of happy there has been such a surge in zombie popularity. (I documented the steep increase in zombie movies recently) Because of the plethora of competition out there, as well as plenty of well established zombie franchises, it’s tough for a new comer to stand out from the herd.

Last year, AMC struck cable TV Gold with the Walking Dead. With the internet eating up their niche, now even non-premium movie are turning to original content to stay relevant. The Walking Dead was well executed, it premiered on Halloween, had superior production quality, and was based on a popular Graphic Novel with an established fan base. Like any other drama it hosts a diverse set of developed characters, who over the course of the season you come to better understand the back story and motivations of. Instead of being in an emergency room full of unsavable patients, the story is set in a post apocalyptic everyday world full of unsavable monsters. It was a gamble on AMC’s part, but ultimately a good one. The Walking Dead ended up being my favorite new series last year.

Now the latest fine piece of fine Zombie comercialism that inspired me to write this post. Dead Island by Techland immediately got me (and others in my network) instantly intrigued. The artfulness won over the Ad crowd, and the originality excited all of us zombie enthusiasts. I dare say that in a market where the quantity of zombie games & movies have skyrocketed, there has been very little innovation to speak of (Zombieland was the last example of supreme creativity). They’re building a lot of hype with no clear release date, so Techland better be able to back it up with a good finished product!

This teaser released this week drew in not only gamers, but all zombie fans. From a marketing perspective it’s unorthodox presentation style instantly draws in the viewer (I don’t think a “watch the whole video it’s worth it” is necessary), but manages to tell some very complex exposition without a narrator thanks to some very creative editing. The icing on the cake of this video is the soundtrack, the sorrowful and relaxing music paints a sharp contrast to the horrific scenario unfolding in reverse. The detailed characters look quite realistic (with in game graphics that portray emotion as well as an actor could), and this looks like another genre-bending cinematic video game. The question will be is when we can expect to experience it, and if the gameplay is as artful and creative as their promotional content. Enjoy.

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We recognize that a multi-billion dollar corporation decided to support the Tibetan people’s struggle and help The Tibet Fund raise urgently needed funds. The Superbowl broadcast drew unprecedented attention to the issue of Tibet at a critical time in the history of the cause. Tibetans have spent 50 years in exile from their homeland. While they have succeeded in establishing a democratic system of government and creating a settlement system to care for the refugees, continuing poverty is taking its toll on the communities in India and Nepal.

-The Tibet Fund
Who is now not getting thousands of people ushered to their site thanks to the “offended”
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