Links - 1st September 2008

"Good advice is something a man gives when he is too old to set a bad example." - Francois de La Rochefoucauld

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Diets and NY's ag footprint - "A low-fat vegetarian diet is very efficient in terms of how much land is needed to support it. But adding some dairy products and a limited amount of meat may actually increase this efficiency, Cornell researchers suggest... Fruits, vegetables and grains must be grown on high-quality cropland, he explained. Meat and dairy products from ruminant animals are supported by lower quality, but more widely available, land that can support pasture and hay. A large pool of such land is available in New York state because for sustainable use, most farmland requires a crop rotation with such perennial crops as pasture and hay. Thus, although vegetarian diets in New York state may require less land per person, they use more high-valued land. "It appears that while meat increases land-use requirements, diets including modest amounts of meat can feed more people than some higher fat vegetarian diets," said Peters."

Look Closely, Doctor - See the Camera? - "PSYCHOSIS in the 21st century looks something like this: You think your every move is being filmed for a reality television show starring you, and that everyone in your life is an actor... The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders defines a delusion, considered still to be little understood in psychiatry, as, essentially, a false belief that is not grounded in reality and that is held with absolute conviction despite proof to the contrary. The manual lists a caveat that a belief is not delusional if it is something widely accepted by other members of a person’s culture or subculture — for example, religious faith. But some psychiatrists say the exception is too vague... Psychiatrists have studied delusions like turabosis, which is the belief that one is covered in sand, and which has been documented in Saudi Arabia but would be unlikely to occur in, say, North Dakota. Another study found a delusion occurring only in rural West Bengal, India, in which women and men bitten by dogs believe they have become pregnant with puppies... The patient reported that he also came to New York to see if the Twin Towers were still standing, because he believed that seeing their destruction on Sept. 11 on television was part of his reality show. If they were still standing, he said, then he would know that the terrorist attack was all part of the script."
So... conspiracy theorists are not delusional

Beer boat scandal forces college president's resignation - "A Fourth of July celebration ended up costing a community college president his job, after a photo emerged of him on a boat with bikini-clad women, poised to pour beer from a keg into one of the young ladies' mouths."
Thanks to Political Correctness, what you do in private isn't private anymore.

There’s another word for ‘water neutrality’ - "So, after the eco-footprint and the carbon footprint, now we have the ‘water footprint’. After all those eco-exhortations that we should feel guilty about how much carbon we use, now we’re told to be ‘conscious’ (which is a PC word for feeling guilty) about how much water we splash on our faces or flush down the toilet. When even our use of water, the very stuff of life, is problematised, transformed into a symbol of mankind’s thoughtlessness and greed, then we can see what really lies behind the politics of environmentalism: not so much scientific evidence that resources are running out as a powerful feeling that humans have no right to use those resources. The new obsession with water-use reveals the discomfort with human life itself that courses through the veins of environmentalism, and the contemporary sense of shame about humanity’s presence on the planet... The idea of ‘virtual water’ or water being ‘shipped in’ is entirely metaphorical – and it’s a metaphor for humanity’s callous wastefulness. It’s a metaphor designed to make us feel guilty about everything – from the tea we sip to the clothes we wear – on the nonsensical, simple-minded, emotionally blackmailing notion that every time we use ‘virtual water’ we steal a cup of the life-giving substance from a little black baby’s lips... the idea of the eco-footprint implies that mankind is a destructive, plague-like presence on the planet... Do you know what ‘water neutrality’ really means? Death. These misanthropic eco-worriers should urgently splash some cold water on their faces. Lots of it."

Sex Worker Rights Are Human Rights - "Efforts to incorrectly equate prostitution and trafficking as the same... Changing the definition of trafficking so that law enforcement does not need to look at a person's age or experience of coercion (the heart of the trafficking crime) will put the focus squarely on prostitution, rather than on labor and prostitution situations in which people are living under a climate of fear and experiencing genuine human rights abuses. As law enforcement look for more victims, they will inevitably arrest more sex workers, and will lessen their focus on people who are trafficked into sectors other than prostitution. This will lead to untold harms to people who have been trafficked into other labor sectors and who cannot receive the help and attention they deserve; and to those who work in prostitution for reasons as diverse and complicated as any that go into deciding how to make money and build a life. At the Sex Workers Project, we find that most of our clients go into sex work because they can make more money and work more flexible hours than in other industries. In our 2005 study, 67 percent of the sex workers we interviewed did not make a living wage in other jobs such as waitressing, administrative work, or retail."
Another way feminists are making the world a better place.

Alex Balk - Outtakes - "Did you know that when Williams composes a score he comes up with lyrics in his head first and then writes the music to them, even though he knows no one will ever hear the words? For the first time ever, Williams revealed the lyric to “Raiders March,” the stirring title theme of the movies:
In-di-ana fuck-ing Jones
In-di-ana moth-er-fuck-ing Jones
In-di-ana fuck-ing Jones
Bite my ball-sack you Na-zis I’m In-di-ana fuck-ing Jones...
the words he came up with for the Superman theme, for example, were “He’s got a big cock/Su-per-man/It’s hard as a rock/Su-per-man;” which, as he explained, gives more of a sense of how others see the titular hero"

THE JAPANESE HATE THE DARK KNIGHT - "“The story is very pessimistic. It has a dark and gloomy texture that Japanese movie fans do not find appealing in a ‘comic hero’ film… Japanese movie fans expect such films to be fun and action packed, for the hero to be attractive, for the villain to be loud and outrageous, and for the movie itself to be easy to understand and light.”"

CHYOO2
HWMNBN: chyoa porn... choose your own adventure
Addendum: In 2014, they moved to Interactive Sex Stories — CHYOA

Welder put out of nut misery - "The welder who was hospitalised after he used a nut to elongate his penis was finally put out of his misery when doctors removed the offending spare part... The 20-something welder was trying to increase the length of his penis ahead of his engagement next week by weighing himself down with the nut when the nut got stuck following an erection... This is the second case in the past week involving objects stuck on penises. On Aug 25, firemen were summoned to the Universiti Malaya Medical Centre in Kuala Lumpur to cut a steel ring from a patient’s penis after numerous attempts by doctors failed to dislodge it. It is believed the patient, in his 20s, had slipped the ring onto his penis to increase his sexual prowess."
Malaysia Boleh!

'Penis-growing' grandma dies - "Reclusive Mak Erot, famed for penis extension treatment incorporating traditional herbs and Islamic prayer, died last week in Caringin village on the western coast of Java island, the Kompas newspaper website reported today."

The Straight Dope: Does average human penis length vary among ethnic groups? - "Kinsey is silent regarding Oriental endowments. But we have evidence from other quarters--columnist Bob Greene, of all people. In his book Cheeseburgers, Greene reports that during a visit to the Trojan prophylactic factory he learned that condoms come in two sizes--7.1 inches by 52 millimeters for the American market, 6.3 inches by 49 millimeters for Japan. A comforting thought. The Japanese may be smarter and better organized, but there's one place where we've still got 'em beat."

Condoms now in market oversized for Indian men - "The Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) study has correlated penis size with socio-economic status, geographical location and the overall dimensions of the male. The ICMR, which has been coordinating the study, is likely to publish its findings in early 2007 [in] the ambitious research study—'Study on proper length and breadth specification for condoms based on anthropometric measurement'. "
I looked at this in 2006 but missed some subtle aspects, like the correlation with SES and body size. HWMNBN brought it up recently and commented that racial variations may be explained by differences in body size.
Unfortunately I can't find a reference to the ICMR paper - even on their website. And predictably, the pavlovian reflex of some was to allege racism, with all the usual logical fallacies.

Lifestyle 100 Best Dishes - "In this special edition of LifeStyle, my colleagues – Tan Hsueh Yun (THY), Thng Lay Teen (TLT) and Foong Woei Wan (FWW) – and I (WAY) present our list of 100 best dishes served in Singapore’s restaurants... They are all so yummy we dream of the next time we can get to taste them again."

Apple Doesn't Have a Problem With iPhone Cut and Paste, They Just Don't Care - Not that it stops Mac whores