News You Can't Use: 'Hacking' the Brain

If there's one disappointing aspect of the old flesh, bone and fluid prison we've been mercilessly locked into it's that the so-called "executive functions" or "brain" if you really need it dumbed-down, have proven themselves to be extraordinarily resistant to attempts to manipulate or "hack" them. What I'm getting at here is that there must be at least One Weird Trick, but so far this has proven elusive. That is until some computer job in LaLa-Land discovered that simple things like withholding food and taking "smart drugs" can in fact trigger massive increases in productivity, which should be your main life ambition if you're a total and complete idiot.

Employees at San Francisco startup Nootrobox don't eat on Tuesdays.

Thirsty Thursday is bad enough, why do we need starvation Tuesday? It's like checking yourself into a monastery, just with all the spiritual benefits stripped away and replaced with "Time is money!" existential cancer.

"We're actually super productive on Tuesdays," co-founder and CEO Geoffrey Woo said. "It's hard at first, but we literally adopted it as part of the company culture."

I have a graph with a jagged line going primarily upwards to prove it. Can I interest you in some securities, dirt cheap?

Woo and other entrepreneurs are using fasts and other tricks to "hack" their brain chemistry like they would a computer, hoping to give themselves an edge as they strive to dream up the next billion-dollar idea.

It's 2016 and we still have to pretend that no one understands how a computer works or how it might be used as a metaphor for the human mind. Also, sorry to disappoint, but the next "billion-dollar idea" is going to be more Generation Zombie members milling about aimlessly while fixating on tiny glowing screens. Sorry to bear this bad news.

Known by insiders as "biohacking," the push for cognitive self-improvement is gaining momentum in the Silicon Valley tech world, where workers face constant pressure to innovate and produce at the highest levels.

Seriously, this stock isn't going to buy itself. Can I put you down for 10,000 shares?

Some use vitamins or other nutritional supplements known as nootropics or "smart drugs" to improve their cognitive function. Others have a more expansive view of brain-enhancers, taking off-label prescription drugs, small doses of LSD or Russian pharmaceuticals not approved for consumption in the U.S. 

I'm ruining my health and causing permanent brain damage, but flying off on a flashback from taking The Ticket is more than justified by the exciting "Touch screen to make sex" innovations that are resulting.

"Entrepreneurs and executives and investors are not normal people," said San Francisco-based Dr. Molly Maloof, who emphasizes nutritional supplements with her biohacking clients.

They are, instead, pathetic broken shells living in a haze of poor nutrition and krokodil side effects. 

"They are like high-performance race cars that are nonstop moving, and they need pit stops more often than normal people."

Quick, pour this bag of sugar into the gas tank, it's sure to make the car run better!

Research into the cognitive benefits of nootropics is still in its early stages, and some experts worry about the long-term health effects of ingesting potent synthetic smart drugs, which are largely unregulated. 

On the other hand, productivity!

"I have not heard of much in the way of exciting evidence that supports these products to a point that I would routinely be recommending them to patients."

Leave it to the hopelessly backward medical establishment to come down against the Moscow Miracle.

For Woo, who founded nootropics company Nootrobox, biohacking poses one central question: "Can we enhance humans?"

The answer is "no."

It's pseudosciencetastic!

The purpose of the fasts is to achieve a state of ketosis, which means the body has run out of carbohydrates and instead is burning fat for fuel. Ketosis has been shown to affect the brain in various ways -- it helps prevent seizures in children, for example -- and some biohackers say it keeps them focused and alert. 

I'm not thrashing around like a freshly landed walleye, so it must be working.

"By the end of the day I just have way more energy," said Katie Fritts, founder of San Francisco-based Underclub, an underwear subscription service.

Since joining the "Underwear of the Month Club" I've become less burdened by crushing despair than ever!

Full Article. 

Aaron Zehner is the author of "The Foolchild Invention" available in paperback and e-book format. Read free excerpts here and here.

News You Can't Use: Obese to Wear Waist Sensors for Federal Study

Despite the seemingly endless run of that fat camp television show we've still got a big (haw haw) problem with obesity in America. Somehow watching food victims waddle up stairs to a giant scale for forty-five advertisement riddled minutes has done little to change the gorging and lazing habits that represent the closest thing we have to a shared national vision. Fortunately, our government is on the case and we've all seen their track record of success. We're going to attach sophisticated sensors to people with real bodies not like those Hollywood sticks and will, presumably, get real-time "Are you allowed to have a jelly doughnut?" updates or something.

The National Science Foundation (NSF) is spending $1.7 million to monitor how and what obese families eat, tracking their eating via sensors they wear on their waists.

I guess we could just ask them, but you know how physical and moral failure walk arm-in-arm, so sensors must be deployed. Who is agreeing to this? "Hey fat boy, how would you like to wear an electronic device on your bloat that will document your pathetic lack of self-control?" Who could say no to that?

The research, conducted by the University of Southern California (USC) and the University of Virginia, began this month. Families will be monitored for months at a time.

I...want...my...fancy...degree. Man, that ain't working, you do the research at the Uni-verse-it-tee. That's the way to do it, grants for nothing and unearned respect for free. Let me tell, them guys ain't dumb. Maybe get a blister on your sensor finger, maybe get some chocolate stains on your thumb. What's that? Obesity studies? He's banging on a table like a chim-pan-zee.

A leading researcher on the project said the study is a “novel” approach to fighting childhood obesity.

Yeah, I suppose that's one way to describe this massive waste of time and money that might, if we get lucky, reveal that obese individuals take in more calories than they expend.

“Recent advances in remote sensing have provided a new paradigm for tracking human behavior, but obesity-related efforts focused directly on diet and activity have been hampered by not only the accuracy of behavior tracking (especially dietary intake) but also the lack of behavioral theories and dynamic models for personalized just-in-time, adaptive interventions (JITAIs),” according to a grant for the project. 

Let's try to parse this word swamp into vernacular English. "The rise of big brother and 'we are the dead' technology is giving us new ways to treat people like lab rats but when it comes to fatties [impenetrable and meaningless academic babble] so please give us money." Sorry, that was the best I could do.

“Current behavioral science suggests that family eating dynamics (FED) have high potential to impact child and parent dietary intake and obesity rates.”

LOL., FED amirite? USC and Virgina, master trolls messing with old Uncle Sucker.

The project will use wearable wireless sensors to track the family’s eating habits, in the hopes of bring about “behavior modification.”

We'll play some Beethoven, show you a video of someone eating a cake and inject drugs that make you physically ill.

Maybe sensors could help explain it.

The project, dubbed M2FED, is using a system of “in-home beacons, wireless and wearable sensors, and smartphones” to collect real time data of what the research subjects are eating. 

Everyone staring into tiny electronic devices is fixing every other aspect of our society so it makes sense to deploy it here.

USC has received $1,047,961 so far for the project. The University of Virginia received $689,315.

Thanks taxpayers!

“It is a pretty ambitious project, but the data that we accrue will be absolutely novel and informative,” she said. “We are going to learn many new things with this proposal about how family systems function dynamically around food and eating, and how this impacts eating behavior.”

Think of the "most of it actually gets into the mouth instead of flying off as crumbs" breakthroughs we'll be making!

Spruijt-Metz’s Obesity Research and Mobile Health Lab at USC uses technology to develop “culturally sensitive, evidence based approaches to promote health behavior change.”

It's like solving the world's hardest mystery, while walking on eggshells to avoid offending anyone.

Spruijt-Metz is also leading a $1,131,922 study for the National Institutes of Health that turned First Lady Michelle Obama’s White House garden into a video game.

Escape the Witch's Garden of Evil before she can seize our beloved grease food! Dodge foul-tasting "nutritious" government meals and earn big points for grabbing those yummy cheeseburgers!

Don't visit the ad-intensive source: http://freebeacon.com/issues/obese-to-wear-waist-sensors-for-federal-study/

Aaron Zehner is the author of "The Foolchild Invention" available in paperback and e-book format. Read free excerpts here and here.

News You Can't Use: Florida John Offered Salad In Return For Sex

The economy is bad, just ask any story written on the subject since about 2006. Despite this truism, there are still people of vision in the world, people who attempt to win friends with salad. And by "friends" I mean a very good friend for the next ten to fifteen minutes who will then vanish forever. Yes, it's time for more wacky antics from the same "Florida Johns" that cost Al Gore the presidency and provide South Beach eye-ipecac.

Meet Alonzo Liverman.

Sounds like the subtitle for a proposed "Pretty Woman 2" sequel that was promptly shouted down in favor of another "sexy White collar criminal" film.

Short on cash, the 29-year-old Floridian allegedly offered to provide a salad to a prostitute in exchange for oral sex, according to cops.

We in the "industry" call this the "dinner and a show." Well, a rabbit dinner, anyway.

Liverman was arrested Monday morning during a reverse sting that netted nine other men for soliciting a prostitute.

I don't see what exactly makes this sting one of the "reverse" variety. Wouldn't a reverse sting try to entrap with criminal activity but instead of punishing anyone reward those who said "no" with government gimmes for their high moral character? That really doesn't sound so far-fetched these days.

The hookers in question were actually undercover Daytona Beach Police Department officers.

This is why you're supposed to be all "I gots a salad here. You ain't no cop, bay-bee?" instead of just the first part.

While negotiating a liaison with a female officer, Liverman--who was “operating a bicycle”--revealed that he did not have any money.

When you're using a ten-speed bike to try to pick up girls "broke as a joke" is probably a safe assumption.

“I’ll give you a blow job for a salad,” the cop declared.

This might be the greatest single line of literature ever penned in human history. We can all go retire, there's no topping this.

The document does not detail the location of Liverman’s salad (or its street value).

The "I got these cheeseburgers" guy from "Menace 2 Society" finally finds someone he can look down on.

Liverman was busted because he and the cop “agreed upon the sexual act in exchange for food,” investigators reported.

Not sure how this is different from this thing we call "dating."

It won't help you "do the Clinton" either.

Liverman was sentenced to two days in jail and fined $500.

The "reverse sting" cost the city $50,000.

Full Story.

Komment Korner 

Actually, it was her idea

cops are scum

He should have offered to take her to Dunkin Donuts. Then everyone would have gone home happy.

By offering the salad he was in essence saying "Lettuce Alone"

Maybe he should try offering a Big Mac next time.

Check Out My Books!

Aaron Zehner is the author of "Posts from the Underground," now available in paperback and e-book. Read a free excerpt here.

His first novel The Foolchild Invention is also available in paperback and e-book format. Read free excerpts here and here.

News You Can't Use: Exercise Data Reveal a Couch Potato Nation

Americans are fat. This is not news. But hey, we've got "science" in the form of attaching hungry, hungry citizens of this great republic to various probes and sensors and then recording the lethargy. The results, predictably, paint a picture of real women with real curves, real men with real sleep apnea issues and a nation that would never leave the couch, ever, if such a paradise was somehow obtainable.

Americans are stuck in chairs and on the couch, spending eight hours a day with their metabolic engines barely idling

And that isn't even counting the so-called "sleeping" that wastes another eight hours.

According to data from sensors that scientists put on nearly 2,600 people to see what they actually did all day.

"Can't I just write down what I do and report back? I think my word should be good enough."

"No. Sensors."

The results were not encouraging: Obese women averaged about 11 seconds a day at vigorous exercise

This exercise consisted of opening various food containers.

11 seconds? How is that even possible? It's been awhile since I've had an 11 second vigorous exercise and the truth is it happens to all men sometimes so stop looking at me like that and let me go to sleep.

While men and women of normal weight exercised vigorously (on the level of a jog or brisk uphill hike) for less than two minutes a day, according to the study published in Mayo Clinic Proceedings.

While not quite a two pump (of knees while hiking uphill) chump, it's not especially good, either.

I'm guessing the land whales used in this study thought the "mayo clinic" was some sort of mayonnaise research center and by the time they figured out it wasn't the medical devices had already been attached.

If you included moderate exercise, such as yoga or golf, folks of normal weight logged about 2.5 to 4 hours weekly, according to the data. In part, that’s good news: federal recommendations for adults include 2.5 hours of moderate-intensity aerobic activity coupled with muscle-strengthening exercise.

So really, everything is fine.

Still, the data sketch a nearly supine population profile, with days marked by long hours of sedentary behavior, particularly for those who are overweight or obese.

One nation, fully prone, gasping for breath, with assorted salty snack items and sugar syrups for all.

Edward C. Archer, a nutrition and obesity researcher at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. “How you spend your day determines whether you store your food as fat or store your food in your muscle, healthfully.” 

I don't think it's possible to be an "obesity researcher" in the USA and not be constantly on the verge of a violent meltdown.

Time for those eleven seconds of vigorous exercise.

For the obese, the study confirms what has been known for some time -- they are stuck in a “vicious cycle” of  inactivity and weight gain, said Archer.

We have now proven the "what goes around come around" hypothesis and are close to a unifying theory of how you can't have your cake and eat it too.

The difference between those who were overweight and those with a normal range body mass amounted to four to six minutes of moderate to vigorous activity, the study showed.

If we could just get everyone to climb a sheer cliff face while weighted down with 100 pounds of gear as quickly as possible for a lousy six minutes a day we would solve this problem.

Although socioeconomic data were not included in the paper, previous research has shown that low-income people, particularly single mothers, are most likely to falling into a low-exercise lifestyle, in part from the demands of work and from the condition of recreational facilities in their neighborhoods.

Although the article is pretty much over I thought I'd throw in this irrelevant digression that has vaguely political undertones for no good reason.

“Ultimately the greatest inequalities we have is in our health behaviors,” he said.

"If only there was some way to redistribute exercise using coercive methods via a state-controlled apparatus, perhaps after a bloody revolution where the 'health nobility' are targeted."

“Unfortunately, we live most of our life going from chair to chair to chair. And if we can change that, just a little bit, we can have a massive impact on our healthcare costs.”

Just remember, you are the sum of the value you create minus the costs of sustaining your life and that's it. For the good of an impersonal and often hostile system, shape the hell up.

Full Article.

Komment Korner  

There is a long political tradition of abusing fat kids

JUST A ROUTINE AUDIT, CITIZEN-UNIT...

Getting down to the floor also allows for greater mobility as one streches and moves the body.

Yeah, and their new model is Planet Fitness, where serious fitness buffs are excluded, uninvited, and overtly discouraged from membership.

I've noticed the three most prominent "fat jobs" are goobmit, deadumacation, and hellth care.

Shill Section

Aaron Zehner is the author of "Posts from the Underground," now available in paperback and e-book. Read a free excerpt here.

His first novel The Foolchild Invention is also available in paperback and e-book format. Read free excerpts here and here.

News You Can't Use: ‘Cotton-Ball Diet’ Rotten, Say Nutritionists

Fad diets are here to stay. Whether it's something sensible like only eating swine products, something wacky like combining exercise with balanced nutrition or something so wicked sexy I'm almost ready to go right now like the "Eat whatever you want...for three minutes...once a year" diet there's plenty of options and more on the way. In a land with a strategic soda reserve that would last for decades and what could uncharitably be called hippos of the, well, hungry variety, we need it.

Doctors and nutritionists are warning against what may be a new weight loss fad…the “cotton-ball diet.”

Leave it to so-called "experts" to find fault in consuming something that, strictly speaking, isn't edible.

Several Youtube videos have been popping up claiming it’s a good way to lose weight, reports MedicalDaily.com.

Did I read that in an accredited medical journal or see it in a two minute video filmed in a trailer's bathroom? The answer to that question actually may have some baring on the value of the health and lifestyle advice you just received.

In the videos, young girls girls soak cotton balls into orange juice or lemonade in order to add taste.

I'm not a big lemonade fan, but do you really think cotton wadding would improve the flavor?

The idea is to eat the cotton balls to limit the amount of food a person eats during the day.

Other strategies include gluing your mouth shut, having someone choke you unconscious whenever you're tempted or hooking all the pastries in the house to electrodes that will deliver power, behavior-shaping shocks.

Extreme dieters say the cotton expands in the stomach and tricks the body into thinking its full.

Let's take this thing to the EXTREME!!!!!!11111oneoneone Wooooo!!!! Cotton down the throat!!! Watch this radical skateboard stunt!!! Aw yeah! 23 Skiddoo!

“The problem being that taking the non-nutritive foods is you’re not getting the vitamins, the minerals, the calories, the proteins, the fats that our bodies need to survive off of,” manager of Fairwinds Eating Disorder Program, Kourtney Gordon, told WTSP. “So you can have a lot of growth and development issues, you can have complications of being malnourished.”

I never really thought of personal care items, or for that matter other objects like, say, tables, as "non-nutritive foods" but I certainly will from now on.

Cotton ball man says, "Hey kids, eating me isn't cool!"

Your usual ad-laden CBS site containing the original story, don't visit for any reason: http://atlanta.cbslocal.com/2013/11/22/cotton-ball-diet-rotten-say-nutritionists/
 

Komment Korner  

Do the cotton balls make it a high fiber diet?

Kids today are so fat compared to yesteryear.

Can you buy cotton balls with the EBT card?

Wonder what Obama eats to fill HIS Kenyan skull?

In fact, there's a whole category out there called "actual food."

Shill Section  

Aaron Zehner is the author of "Posts from the Underground," now available in paperback and e-book. Read a free excerpt here.

His first novel The Foolchild Invention is also available in paperback and e-book format. Read free excerpts here and here.