War may be coming to Mid-East
I must admit that I was totally surprised by the 11. September 2001 attacks. I had seen that terrorist in the preceding years had hit increasingly bigger assets of the USA. Unfortunately the standoff with IRAN may lead to war this year and then all bets are off what this will mean for our daily lives. Read what the British foreign secretary said in an recent interview.
Iran risks nuclear Cold War By Robert Winnett, and Benedict Brogan in Daily Telegraph
Iran’s pursuit of weapons of mass destruction is threatening to trigger a “new Cold War” that poses an even greater threat of nuclear conflict than the stand-off between the USSR and the West, William Hague warns.
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The Limits of Empathy
David Brooks describes in the NY Times his key lessons from reading Steven Pinker’s new book.
We are surrounded by people trying to make the world a better place. Peace activists bring enemies together so they can get to know one another and feel each other’s pain. School leaders try to attract a diverse set of students so each can understand what it’s like to walk in the others’ shoes. Religious and community groups try to cultivate empathy. As Steven Pinker writes in his mind-altering new book, “The Better Angels of Our Nature,” we are living in the middle of an “empathy craze.” There are shelfloads of books about it: “The Age of Empathy,” “The Empathy Gap,” “The Empathic Civilization,” “Teaching Empathy.” There’s even a brain theory that we have mirror neurons in our heads that enable us to feel what’s in other people’s heads and that these neurons lead to sympathetic care and moral action.
Continue ReadingWhy you need to take naps
I welcome any scientific evidence that proves what I am doing is healthy. Readers of my blog will remember that I took a strong position againt the so-called “power-nap killers.” New scientific research shows that naps help your brain to learn better. I sometimes even take two naps to rejuvenate my body and mind. If your boss does not believe in powernaps, show him or her the evidence and say: Don’t you want me to be more productive!
An afternoon nap markedly boosts the brain’s learning capacity By Yasmin Anwar
If you see a student dozing in the library or a co-worker catching 40 winks in her cubicle, don’t roll your eyes. New research from the University of California, Berkeley, shows that an hour’s nap can dramatically boost and restore your brain power. Indeed, the findings suggest that a biphasic sleep schedule not only refreshes the mind, but can make you smarter.
Continue ReadingLetting Go: What should medicine do when it can’t save your life?
Atul Gawande, a doctor and staff writer of the New Yorker, has already received numerous awards for this writing. Now he has penned in the New Yorker (August 2, 2010) a report on how American medicine handles the final stages of our lives. This is the most difficult story I have read in many years, perhaps ever. But I forced myself to read it all the way to the end. You owe it to youself to do the same. Gwande deserves the Pulitzer Prize for this article.
Read “Modern medicine is good at staving off death with aggressive interventions—and bad at knowing when to focus, instead, on improving the days that terminal patients have left” here.
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How to Train the Aging Brain
Here are some useful tips for middle aged people on how to get their brain to perform better.
By BARBARA STRAUCH (NY Times)
I LOVE reading history, and the shelves in my living room are lined with fat, fact-filled books. There’s “The Hemingses of Monticello,” about the family of Thomas Jefferson’s slave mistress; there’s “House of Cards,” about the fall of Bear Stearns; there’s “Titan,” about John D. Rockefeller Sr.
The problem is, as much as I’ve enjoyed these books, I don’t really remember reading any of them. Certainly I know the main points. But didn’t I, after underlining all those interesting parts, retain anything else? It’s maddening and, sorry to say, not all that unusual for a brain at middle age: I don’t just forget whole books, but movies I just saw, breakfasts I just ate, and the names, oh, the names are awful. Who are you?
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