Brains Are More Active During Meditation

For thousands of years, people have been meditating. For just as long, scientists have wondered what actually happens in your brain during meditation. But recently, research of meditation has sharply increased. To me, mediation seems like a waste of time. Many more important things could be getting done and I would rather be doing something productive than sitting with my eyes closed.

I recently read this article and it turns out that your brain is actually extremely active during meditation. Jian Xu, a physician researching meditation, states, "I was surprised that the activity of the brain was greatest when the person’s thoughts wandered freely on their own, rather than when the brain worked to be more strongly focused."

Judging from Xu's research, when you just sit thinking, dazing off, your brain is actually doing more than when you're concentrating on solving a math problem. This reminds me of freshman year when KW classes had "relaxation days" where you could just lay in silence. Sometimes I would sleep, and other times I would just lay there thinking. These days would leave me feeling so relaxed and rested. But little did I know that my brain was most active during these "relaxation days".

How will education, test taking, and school in general change now that we know this? It is possible that this newfound research will stimulate schools to incorporate some sort of relaxation/free period into students' schedules. Though this seems bizzare and unlikely, it will probably have positive effects on stress levels of students and, ultimately, their grades 

Further research on the effects of meditation on academics will almost surely take place within the next couple of years and I look forward to the results of this research

Vegetarians Are Taking Over

Last night when I was researching possible topics for my Junior Theme, I came across some interesting information proving that more and more people are becoming vegetarians. My first thought was that there must be some sort of religious shift that requires more people to refrain from eating meat. There is a possibility that this may be true, but in my opinion there hasn't been a large enough change in religion that would cause this. In fact, I think more and more people are choosing to not practice religion strictly. But that's a whole other topic.
After some thinking, I decided that the fast food industry has had the most affect on people's diets. Although some people choose to eat less healthy options now that McDonald's, Burger King, and other greasy fast food restaurants have become more popular, these horribly unhealthy restaurants (to me they're more like toxic waste warehouses) have, in my opinion, actually raised awareness about health.
I'm sure many people at New Trier have seen the movie "Food Inc.". This movie revealed to the public for the first time the disgusting things that go on behind the scenes at McDonald's and the like. Its viewers got a whole new perspective on food, and personally, I decided to become a vegan (though it only lasted for a few days). After "Food Inc." became more frequently watched in health classes, pictures like this>

went viral. This is a before and after picture of McDonald's chicken nuggets. If this doesn't disgust you, then I don't know what will.
I think that after the public was exposed to what they're really eating at fast food restaurants, people have become more conscious of what they're putting in their bodies. Many think that the easiest way to prevent eating chicken-nugget-type foods is to not eat meat at all, assuming that it is most likely processed in the same fashion.

Will Humans and Machines Eventually Converge?

After watching the movie "Her" starring Joaquin Phoenix, I started thinking about our relationship with technology. It is no secret that Americans have become somewhat reliant on smart phones, television, computers, and the like. Will there ever be a time when we are not only reliant on technology but on a higher level of interaction with it? Will we ever become "friends" with technology?

AI (artificial intelligence) expert and Google's leading engineer, Ray Kurzweil, does. In fact, he predicts that by 2029, robots will be able to "flirt, learn from experience, and even make jokes". Now this seems a little far-fetched, but after reading this article, I'm starting to become convinced. In 1990, he predicted that a computer would be able to beat the world champion in chess by 1998. This actually happened in 1997, a year sooner than predicted.

Perhaps the most intriguing of Kurzweil's ideas is that of "the singularity": the prediction that at some point in the future, "humans and machines will apparently converge". Many improvements have been made to robots as we approach "the singularity" such as PetMan, a robot that is able to walk like a human, balance itself, sweat, adjust its temperature, and perform an array of calisthenics similar to that which a soldier would do during war. PetMan is used to test chemical proof suits that will be implemented into chemical warfare.

As you can see from this video, PetMan acts eerily similar to a human. For now, he is only used to test chemical proof suits, but I think this definitely shows how we are on our way to "the singularity" that Kurzweil predicted. Though this might be excellent for Kurzweil because it allows him to save countless lives on the battlefield, many others find it frightening, feeling that this kind of advance in technology is a nightmare. What are your thoughts?

Companies Encouraging Eating Disorders

Recently, body image has become a big issue with teens in the US. I think this is mostly due to the fact that advertisements depict women as having a perfect, skinny body. Health classes have been talking more and more about body image and misleading representations of the female body that companies advertise. Many women in magazine advertisements are starting to look fake, like this Ralph Lauren model:

 

Teenage girls are definitely affected by advertisements like these. After seeing them over and over, the girls start to believe that this is what they should look like when in fact, the models themselves don't even look like this.

 

Jennifer Ouellette from California has a daughter who is recovering from anorexia. She is very invested in not only helping her own daughter recover, but helping other teens in her community recover from anorexia as well. When she came across a sunglasses company named "Anorexxxy" (because of their "slim" shape) she was outraged, claiming that this company is "mocking a deadly disease" and encouraging teens to lose weight as if they are trying to make anorexia trendy.

 

Jennifer got about 15 other moms together, some with daughters that had died of anorexia, and rallied on social media against Anorexxxy. They constantly tweeted on Twitter and posted statuses on Facebook to raise awareness against eating disorders and to alert others of this company's horrible name. Immediately, the Anorexxxy changed its name to "AXXXEXXXY" and claimed that it "never wanted to upset anyone". It is sickening to hear this from a company that was clearly associating its product with an eating disorder. Companies like this and many others are indirectly encouraging eating disorders and body image insecurities through sly (and not so sly) advertising tactics.

Obama Reaches New Audiences

Many people have probably heard of Zach Galifinakis' web show called "Between Two Ferns", but for those of you who haven't, it's basically Zach Galifinakis briefly interviewing celebrities and making passive aggressive jokes about them while sitting between two potted ferns. The celebrities appear to know about these jokes beforehand; the show seems somewhat scripted. This web show generally has a younger audience, an audience that would be more likely to enjoy Zach's humor.

Some of the past interviewees that have been on the show are: Bradley Cooper, Justin Bieber, and Bruce Willis. On the most recent episode, President Barack Obama was brought on as the interviewee. This episode has received a substantial amount of views, 17 million, and has really got people talking.

Here is the web show

The Presidency has traditionally been a ceremonial job with highly controlled media contact, but by participating in this interview, President Obama speaks out with a much more informal tone in a new venue: a web TV show. He knew he was opening himself up to potentially rude jokes and criticisms, things that people typically wouldn't say to the President. Of course the President's critics jumped on this as an inappropriate use of the President's time.  Also the buzz seems to have brought in more views from older people who tend to be less supportive of the president than the younger viewers more likely to support obamacare.

Do you think this was an effective way to get his message out to an intended audience?  Did it backfire?

Teens are Better Behaved Than Ever

I don't know about you guys, but I always hear from the older generation that our generation is lazy and up to no good. It seems like everywhere grandparents are remarking how sexually active and reckless teenagers are. There always seem to be drug scandals at high schools and even in junior highs and middle schools. Just earlier this year, the North Shore witnessed a sexting scandal that caused one girl to transfer schools. Things like this make our generation seem like it fits what older generations say about us.

Actually, our generation isn't the "worst". According to statistics our generation is the "best"! "Best" is kind of a weird word though... What makes a generation the "best"? Well, our teen birth rate is the lowest it has been in quite a while - just 29.4 births per 1,000 women ages 15-19 compared to 89.1 in the 1960s. High school seniors' use of illegal substances has also decreased - only about 40% of seniors drink alcohol compared to 72% in 1980 - and they are barely using cocaine at all. Although marijuana use has increased slightly within the next past 10 years, it is still much lower than it was in the 80s. So what are kids doing instead of drugs? Exercising. 29.7% of students meet federal exercise guidelines compared to just 18.9% in 1998.

So the next time anybody tells you that teenagers nowadays are all corrupted druggies, you can prove them wrong and tell them that their generation was actually worse behaved than ours.

Should Snowden Return Private Documents?

I'm pretty sure everyone out there right now knows about Edward Snowden, the man who publicized to the American people what they didn't know about the government. He made everyone aware that the NSA has been spying on billions of innocent Americans. For the most part, the American citizens think of him as a kind of "hero" for telling them what they should know.

The US government, however, has not been so happy with him. This past Wednesday, the head of the U.S. intelligence community called Snowden in and requested that he return all the documents that he has not made public yet.

After reading a recent article, I have found out that Snowden has received sharp criticisms from many government employees saying that by releasing private information he has: caused allies to cut off cooperation with the US, caused changes in communications by terrorist networks, and has put the lives of intelligence operatives at risk.

Here is the link to the official transcript of the hearing.

As citizens, we have lost trust in our own government, but I think it is better to know the truth than to live on our lives in ignorance. The government realizes now that they messed up and are trying to prevent their reputation from getting any worse. There is a possibility that Snowden hasn't even released the worst of it yet, and that is why the government is so nervous about the rest of the information being released. But who knows?

This relates to the Vietnam War presentation today with regards to freedom of information and the Pentagon Papers. The government was extremely angry at Daniel Ellsberg for releasing private information to the public, but the public was glad to finally know what was really going on in the Vietnam War. After the conversation we had in class, do you think it was "patriotic" for Edward Snowden to reveal the government's secrets? Should Snowden return the unreleased documents?