Miscellaneous stories that caught my eye in today's New York Times:
First, on the science sdie of things, a long article about how people are living longer, not to mention bigger and healthier, than their ancestors. It compares medical records for Civil War veterans with people of similar age today, and finds amazing reductions in all manner of health problems. This is attributed to better pre-natal and early-childhood nutrition and medical care.
I hope this is on the radar for the various medical types here at ScienceBlogs, as I'd love to hear the opinions of real live doctors on this. It sounds sort of plausible, but it's not remotely my field.
(More below the fold.)
Somewhat closer to my area of expertise, the Times has a special section today on higher education, including an article on less well-known colleges that "are on equal or near-equal footing with brand-name universities." Which is worth noting mostly because it mentions my employer. If Union hadn't made the list of "hidden gems," would I be talking about it? Probably not...
Finally, a story that's already much linked on ScienceBlogs, about a pastor disavowing conservative politics:
Before the last presidential election, he preached six sermons called "The Cross and the Sword" in which he said the church should steer clear of politics, give up moralizing on sexual issues, stop claiming the United States as a "Christian nation" and stop glorifying American military campaigns.
"When the church wins the culture wars, it inevitably loses," Mr. Boyd preached. "When it conquers the world, it becomes the world. When you put your trust in the sword, you lose the cross."
After that, he lost about 1,000 members of his 5,000-member congregation, but is cheerful and un-fazed, at least in the article.
This story has provided a hook for a lot of people to bash religious extremists, but honestly, my initial reaction is that I'm tempted to send him fifty bucks. We could use more preachers like him.
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not to mention bigger
Maybe my Campaign for Higher Doorways will finally start to get enough support, then. Anyone else have this problem?
My former school made that list of colleges as well, so I approve you mentioning it.
I glanced through this article and thought it was pretty interesting too. You'd think one would attribute the increase in longevity and lower rate of chronic disease to better health care over time, but the final study they site, where Douglas Almond compared the health of people born during the 1918 flu epidemic to those born before and after, sounds pretty convincing. You just wouldn't expect people born before the flu to be healthier if it was a time-dependent effect; i.e. treatment gets better over time.
There's lots of room for confounding in these types of studies and I obviously haven't read any of the papers, but this sounds pretty good from the description. I agree that it's a very interesting effect. And it has implications for promoting health in developing countries ...
And by the way, I studied in Iowa and was very happy to see that two of the small colleges they recommended are in Iowa. Great state.