New information about how the brain processes social status is outlined in a study by researchers at the U.S. National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH). Using functional MRI scans, they found that different brain areas are activated when a person moves up or down in social status or sees people who are socially superior or inferior. Brain circuitry activated by important events responded to potential change in social status as much as it did to winning money. The study was published in the April 24 issue of Neuron. ‘Our position in social hierarchies strongly influences motivation as well as physical and mental health. This first glimpse into how the brain processes that information advances our understanding of an important factor that can impact public health,’ NIMH Director Dr. Thomas R. Insel said in a prepared statement. Previous research has shown that social status has a strong effect on health. For example, one study of British civil servants found that the lower a person’s rank, the more likely they were to develop cardiovascular disease and die early. Psychological effects, such as having limited control over one’s life and interactions with others, may be one way that lower […]
BEIJING — China has surpassed the United States to become the world’s largest Internet-using population, reaching 221 million by the end of February, state media said on Thursday. The number of Internet users in China was 210 million at the end of last year, only 5 million fewer than the U.S. Internet users then, Xinhua news agency said, quoting the China Internet Network Information Centre. ‘Despite a rapidly increasing Internet population, the proportion of Internet users among the total population was still lower than the global average level,’ Xinhua quoted the Information Ministry as saying. The proportion was 16 percent at the end of 2007, compared with 19.1 percent for the world average. Internet censorship is common in China, where the government employs an elaborate system of filters and tens of thousands of human monitors to survey surfing habits, surgically clipping sensitive content. But the Internet has most recently become an important tool in countering anti-China protest dogging the Olympic torch relay with an outpouring of nationalism and indignation.
WASHINGTON — Short-term exposure to smog, or ozone, is clearly linked to premature deaths that should be taken into account when measuring the health benefits of reducing air pollution, a U.S. National Academy of Sciences report concluded Tuesday. The findings contradict arguments made by some White House officials that the connection between smog and premature death has not been shown sufficiently, and that the number of saved lives should not be calculated in determining clean air benefits. The report by a panel of the Academy’s National Research Council says government agencies ‘should give little or no weight’ to such arguments. ‘The committee has concluded from its review of health-based evidence that short-term exposure to ambient ozone is likely to contribute to premature deaths,’ the 13-member panel said. It added that ‘studies have yielded strong evidence that short-term exposure to ozone can exacerbate lung conditions, causing illness and hospitalization and can potentially lead to death.’ The White House Office of Management and Budget, which in its review of air quality regulations has raised questions about the certainty of the pollution and mortality link, did not immediately return a phone call seeking comment. ‘The report is […]
Leading Muslim scholars are laying the theological foundations for a ‘Euro-Islam’ which would reconcile their religion with the challenges of modernity. But just how compatible is Islam with secular Western values? The air in the conference room is stale, and the dour mood among those present is not much better. The room smells of sweat, cigarette smoke, cold coffee — and plenty of problems. That comes with the territory at a meeting of some 100 social workers who work in flashpoints like the London boroughs of Hounslow, Eastleigh and Ealing. In their districts they often have to deal with angry youth gangs, unemployment and failed integration policies. Today, on this particular Thursday, they have gathered here in the large hall of the Holborn Bars conference center to learn that multiculturalism also has positive aspects and, most importantly, that no one needs to be afraid of Muslims. Up on the stage, Lucy de Groot, the organizer of the one-day seminar ‘Cultural Diversity and Social Cohesion,’ presents ‘with great pleasure’ a speaker whose appearance alone is enough to add a touch of brilliance to this gloomy conference room. Smiling here and nodding there, the ‘esteemed guest’ strides up to […]
The United States has less than 5 percent of the world’s population. But it has almost a quarter of the world’s prisoners. Indeed, the United States leads the world in producing prisoners, a reflection of a relatively recent and now entirely distinctive American approach to crime and punishment. Americans are locked up for crimes – from writing bad checks to using drugs – that would rarely produce prison sentences in other countries. And in particular they are kept incarcerated far longer than prisoners in other nations. Criminologists and legal scholars in other industrialized nations say they are mystified and appalled by the number and length of American prison sentences. The United States has, for instance, 2.3 million criminals behind bars, more than any other nation, according to data maintained by the International Center for Prison Studies at King’s College London. China, which is four times more populous than the United States, is a distant second, with 1.6 million people in prison. (That number excludes hundreds of thousands of people held in administrative detention, most of them in China’s extrajudicial system of re-education through labor, which often singles out political activists who have not committed crimes.) […]
Remote Viewing the Year 2060
