1. Position of the American Dietetic Association on Vegetarian Diets
A translation of a huge article on vegetarianism and veganism. As the title suggests, the source is authoritative, and there are a ton of links to scientific papers. Obviously, the site itself is vegan, and therefore needs to be treated with a grain of salt, but if they haven't lied or omitted anything anywhere, it's pretty impressive.
The takeaways?
The position of the American Dietetic Association on vegetarianism is as follows: appropriately planned vegetarian diets, including total vegetarian or vegan diets, are healthful, nutritionally adequate, and may provide health benefits in the prevention and treatment of certain diseases. Well-planned vegetarian diets are appropriate for individuals during all stages of the life cycle, including pregnancy, lactation, infancy, childhood, and adolescence, and for athletes.
If anyone has anything to say about this, I'm always open to information.
The article is worth reading for anyone who is at all interested in vegetarianism, or wants to dispel their prejudices. The rest can keep living in their post-truth world, or just believe the conclusions right off the bat.
2. The male Pill is coming - and it's going to change everything
They've been developing male contraceptives, similar to female ones, for many decades now, but things haven't budged an inch. Here is yet another attempt - in the form of a fairly simple injection under local anesthesia once every few years. They promise it will hit the market within a few years. However, as we know from other fields, especially CD-DVD media and batteries, research is one thing, and hitting the market is quite another. Those 100-terabyte optical wonder-disks never appeared, nor did the wonder-batteries with 100 hours of battery life.
Instead of a revolution, we got evolution – but even so, all this is a marvel of progress and very impressive. Especially since the Indians are already mass-testing contraceptives in pill form.
Now all that's left is to make magical pills for loneliness!
3. Consciousness Began When the Gods Stopped Speaking
About the life and the single book of Julian Jaynes. He is famous for the fact that, while still an amateur, he dreamed up a bunch of interesting ideas about human consciousness and wrote them down – unexpectedly, his book became a bestseller, and continues to stir minds to this day.
The main idea of the book The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind is that humans were not rational and did not possess consciousness in our current understanding until about 3,000 years ago. At that time, the two parts of the human brain communicated with each other in the voices of gods and mythical creatures, giving advice in difficult situations, and only later did an inner narrative gradually appear.
The book isn't exactly scientific, but it has had a major influence, including on scientists. It's an interesting, informative read, I recommend it.
4. Inceptionism: Going Deeper into Neural Networks
A tech-heavy story about Google's DeepDream, so beloved by the hearts of psychonauts and the general public alike, that is, a neural network that sees in pictures whatever it is told to see. Read the article to find out how it works.
5. It Pays to Be Nice
… even when other people are screwing you over.
Being generous and honest pays off even in business – or so says Yale University researcher David Rand. Even when you've been screwed over. Whether he's convincing or not – decide for yourselves.