Wednesday 17 October 2007

Titbits

I have a four hour computer tutorial to go and give in exactly twenty-three minutes, so I had better be quick about this. There are three things that I have seen on the Internet today that I thought I would share with you (well, there were other things too, but these were the three that piqued my interest).

Firstly, George Lucas has said that he has started work on the Star Wars live action series. I love Star Wars, I really do, but this is not news... OK, the fact that he has started work on it is news, but the actual article barely qualifies as news: there is virtually no new information that was not already known, the rest is just recycled or restated from other articles. I think that there should be some kind of filter against news like this, or some kind of pecking order so that it is automatically dropped down the news page (come on Web 2.0!).

Also on the BBC News website is news of a report that says obese people are not responsible for their obesity. I accept the argument that work in the "modern world" and processed energy rich foods are big factors, but you can still work against these factors. I even take on board the evidence that humans biologically store excess calories as fat with incredible efficiency, but that doesn't mean that we can't do something about it. What else does a government have to do in order to get the message through to people? Every other week a new report comes out that says "Guess what? People are fat!" but in our "It's not my fault" culture we're just passing the buck all the time. Face facts people: barring certain medical conditions, if you are obese it is because you have consumed more calories than your body could use for fuel, and you have done this often enough that it has made a visible impact on your body. YOU CAN DO SOMETHING ABOUT THIS.

Finally this wonderful comic from Overcompensating has a punchline that really made me smile in a semi-horrified way:



Six minutes before the tutorial - I've even got time to get a drink and read through the problem sheet.

Cheerio for now!

3 comments:

noisms said...

What, you're advocating that people should be responsible for their actions? Madness, I tell you.

Actually I remember watching a myth-busting documentary a while back that looked at two best friends, one fat, the other thin. The obese woman's excuse was that "my friend eats the same as me but just has a faster metabolism"; but she was told in no uncertain terms that actually, no, you just eat more than her and do less exercise.

It ain't rocket science.

NathanRyder said...

I'm fully prepared that my radical theory is going to rock the boat, possibly tip it right over, but this is what the world needs to hear.

By the way, is your uni email address still working? Or have you moved on to a different one?

(this is not a covert way of asking why haven't you replied to any emails I've sent for ages?)

NathanRyder said...

PS - I saw that documentary. Eye-opening.