Research has linked obesity with how much sleep you get.

“At least two dozen studies have documented that people tend to weigh more if they sleep less, says Sanjay Patel, M.D., a researcher at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland. In a 16-year study of almost 70,000 women, Dr. Patel and his colleagues found that those who slept five hours or less a night were 30 percent more likely to gain 30-plus pounds than those who got more rest…

Researchers at the University of Chicago allowed people to sleep five and half hours one night and eight and a half on another, then measured how many free snacks the participants downed the next day. They ate an average of 221 calories more when sleepy—an amount that could translate into almost a pound of fat gained after two weeks! ”

(Via).

The proposed mechanism:

Sleep-deprived animals eat excessively, and humans subject to sleep deprivation show increased appetite and an increased Body Mass Index, the standard measure of excessive weight. The apparent mechanism for this phenomenon is the effect that sleep deprivation has on at least two hormones that influence appetite: leptin and ghrelin. Sleep deprivation causes a decrease in leptin, which boosts appetite and produces obesity, and increases ghrelin, a potent stimulator of hunger and appetite. A study led by J.P. Chaput and published in the International Journal of Obesity this spring found that children who slept an average of 10.5 to 11.5 hours a night were more at risk for obesity than children who slept between 12 and 13 hours a night. Kids who slept only eight to 10 hours a night were at still greater risk. The study had methodological weaknesses (small sample size, data mostly by parental report, absence of correction for age). Still, the trend is striking and suggests that sleep deprivation is associated with obesity in children as well as adults.

– Sydney Spiesel, Slate, Why We’re Fatter.

Of course, sleeping more has lots of other benefits.

The QOTD, on food:

“Perhaps because we have no such culture of food in America almost every question about eating is up for grabs. Fats or carbs? Three squares or continuous grazing? Raw or cooked? Organic or industrial? Veg or vegan? Meat or mock meat? Foods of astounding novelty fill the shelves of our supermarket, and the line between a food and a ‘nutritional supplement’ has fogged to the point where people make meals of protein bars and shakes. Consuming these neo-pseudo-foods alone in our cars, we have become a nation of antinomian eaters, each of us struggling to work out or dietary salvation on our own. Is it any wonder Americans suffer from so many eating disorders?”

– Michael Pollan, The Omnivore’s Dilemma, page 301.

Chomsky: The film opens with Galadriel speaking. “The world has changed,” she tells us, “I can feel it in the water.” She’s actually stealing a line from the non-human Treebeard. He says this to Merry and Pippin in The Two Towers, the novel. Already we can see who is going to be privileged by this narrative and who is not.

Zinn: Of course. “The world has changed.” I would argue that the main thing one learns when one watches this film is that the world hasn’t changed. Not at all.

Chomsky: We should examine carefully what’s being established here in the prologue. For one, the point is clearly made that the “master ring,” the so-called “one ring to rule them all,” is actually a rather elaborate justification for preemptive war on Mordor.

- McSweeney’s, Unused Audio Commentary by Howard Zinn and Noam Chomsky, Recorded Summer 2002, for the Fellowship of the Rings.

The QOTD, on NPR:

300 people were shown either a real or altered photo of two different protests, and then asked to recall what happened back then. The point of this study was to show that altering a photograph will change how the events are actually remembered (in this case, as bigger and more violent.)… But, here’s the thing: these subjects weren’t actually at the original protests. Their original memories also came from images– hopefully not altered images, but certainly selected images. Right? The TV newspeople didn’t pick the boring pictures, did they? I get that doctored photos are bad. But how much of our memories and knowledge of the past are largely determined not by “reality” but what, or how, we were shown it in the first place. Obviously, a lot. Therein lies the question: is it worse to see a doctored photo, or doctored reality?

Here’s an example: search your mind for recollections about the Tiananmen “episode” in 1989. Can you remember anything– anything at all– other than that guy standing in front of the tanks? Do you remember who was protesting? Why? The question isn’t why you don’t remember anything, hell, it was 20 years ago and a solar system away; the question is why you do remember that guy. Are you better off for knowing this? Are you smarter? Or do you carry the false impression that you know something about which you really know nothing? That’s the Matrix– not only do you have false memories, but you get to feel good about being a knowledgeable, aware, citizen of the world.

NPR runs a cult this way. It offers an eclectic mix of topics, selected on purpose to allow you to think you are getting depth. You listen to NPR, and you think you’re learning, growing, becoming a Renaissance Man. You’re not. Sure, it beats CNN, but that’s not a battle anyone is supposed to lose. Its target audience is insecurely intelligent people who want desperately to be intellectual and well read but who don’t actually want to read too much. What NPR offers is sentiment; the feeling that you know something.

– The Last Psychiatrist.

The QOTD, on religious fundamentalism:

But isn’t all this just endorsing a wholly outmoded and discredited fundamentalism, that condition than which, according to many academics, none lesser can be conceived? I fully realize that the dreaded f-word will be trotted out to stigmatize any model of this kind. Before responding, however, we must first look into the use of this term ‘fundamentalist’. On the most common contemporary academic use of the term, it is a term of abuse or disapprobation, rather like ‘son of a bitch’, more exactly ‘sonovabitch’, or perhaps still more exactly (at least according to those authorities who look to the Old West as normative on matters of pronunciation) ‘sumbitch’. When the term is used in this way, no definition of it is ordinarily given. (If you called someone a sumbitch, would you feel obliged first to define the term?) Still, there is a bit more to the meaning of ‘fundamentalist’ (in this widely current use): it isn’t simply a term of abuse. In addition to its emotive force, it does have some cognitive content, and ordinarily denotes relatively conservative theological views. That makes it more like ‘stupid sumbitch’ (or maybe ‘fascist sumbitch’?) than ‘sumbitch’ simpliciter. It isn’t exactly like that term either, however, because its cognitive content can expand and contract on demand; its content seems to depend on who is using it. In the mouths of certain liberal theologians, for example, it tends to denote any who accept traditional Christianity, including Augustine, Aquinas, Luther, Calvin, and Barth; in the mouths of devout secularists like Richard Dawkins or Daniel Dennett, it tends to denote anyone who believes there is such a person as God. The explanation is that the term has a certain indexical element: its cognitive content is given by the phrase ‘considerably to the right, theologically speaking, of me and my enlightened friends.’ The full meaning of the term, therefore (in this use), can be given by something like ‘stupid sumbitch whose theological opinions are considerably to the right of mine’.

It is therefore hard to take seriously the charge that the views I’m suggesting are fundamentalist; more exactly, it is hard to take it seriously as a charge. The alleged charge means only that these views are rather more conservative than those of the objector, together with the expression of a certain distaste for the views or those who hold them. But how is that an objection to anything, and why should it warrant the contempt and contumely that goes with the term? An argument of some kind against those conservative views would be of interest, but merely pointing out that they differ from the objector’s (even with the addition of that abusive emotive force) is not.

– Alvin Plantinga, Warranted Christian Belief (available online for free, here), pg. 244-45.

Apparently the idea that building muscle aids in weight loss is functionally a myth:

[D]oesn’t exercise turn fat to muscle, and doesn’t muscle process excess calories more efficiently than fat does? Yes, although the muscle-fat relationship is often misunderstood. According to calculations published in the journal Obesity Research by a Columbia University team in 2001, a pound of muscle burns approximately six calories a day in a resting body, compared with the two calories that a pound of fat burns. Which means that after you work out hard enough to convert, say, 10 lb. of fat to muscle — a major achievement — you would be able to eat only an extra 40 calories per day, about the amount in a teaspoon of butter, before beginning to gain weight. Good luck with that.

– John Cloud, Why Exercise Won’t Make You Thin, Time Magazine, August 9, 2009, via Megan McArdle.

The QOTD, on the epistemology of religion:

“And here we see the ontological or metaphysical or ultimately religious roots of the question as to the rationality or warrant or lack thereof for belief in God. What you properly take to be rational, at least in the sense of warranted, depends on what sort of metaphysical and religious stance you adopt. It depends on what kind of beings you think human beings are, what sorts of beliefs you think their noetic faculties will produce when they are functioning properly, and which of their faculties or cognitive mechanisms are aimed at the truth. Your view as to what sort of creature a human being is will determine or at any rate heavily influence your views as to whether theistic belief is warranted or not warranted, rational or irrational for human beings. And so the dispute as to whether theistic belief is rational (warranted) can’t be settled just by attending to epistemological considerations; it is at bottom not merely an epistemological dispute, but an ontological or theological dispute.”

– Alvin Plantinga, Warranted Christian Belief, pg. 190.

Regardless of what one thinks of the gay rights/defense of marriage debate, this much should be unassailable:

“If marriage is redefined, its connection to organic bodily union and thus to procreation will be undermined. It will increasingly be understood as an emotional union for the sake of adult satisfaction that is served by mutually agreeable sexual play. But there is no reason that primarily emotional unions like friendships should be permanent, exclusive, limited to two, or legally regulated at all. Thus, there will remain no principled basis for upholding marital norms like monogamy.

A veneer of sentiment may prevent these norms from collapsing but only temporarily. The marriage culture, already wounded by widespread divorce, nonmarital cohabitation and out-of-wedlock childbearing will fare no better than it has in those European societies that were in the vanguard of sexual ‘enlightenment…’

Candid and clear-thinking advocates of redefining marriage recognize that doing so entails abandoning norms such as monogamy. In a 2006 statement entitled Beyond Same-Sex Marriage, over 300 lesbian, gay, and allied activists, educators, lawyers, and community organizersincluding Gloria Steinem, Barbara Ehrenreich, and prominent Yale, Columbia and Georgetown professorscall for legally recognizing multiple sex partner (polyamorous) relationships. Their logic is unassailable once the historic definition of marriage is overthrown.”

– Robert P. George, Gay Marriage, Democracy and the Courts, Wall Street Journal, August 3, 2009.

When Professor George says that “norms such as monogamy” will be abandoned, I take him to be referring to the historically prevailing cultural attitude that sex is only permissible within a married relationship. I do not think, though perhaps I am wrong, that he means to say that non-traditional (e.g., polyamorous, temporary, or otherwise non-monogamous) relationships will replace monogamous relationships as the “norm.” Although non-traditional relationships will doubtless increase, they will increase only insofar as there is demand for them, and something in the human makeup seems to drive the great bulk of us towards a desire for monogamy. Instead, I take Professor George to mean that non-traditional relationships will become “normalized” in the sense that they will be accepted and the stigma against them removed or reduced.

Viewed in this light, the comments quoted above seem unassailable. The question is not whether this will happen, but simply whether it has already happened (as a consequence of the divorce, cohabitation, and out-of-wedlock child bearing he mentions) and, if so, whether it can or should be reversed.

(As always, I do need to add the caveat, per Stanley Fish, that there is not and never has been a “principled basis” for upholding marriage norms, if by “principled” one means a basis which is distinct from the substantive values one holds and wishes to impose on the world.)

The QOTD:

“One thing I’ve learned over the past 20 years of studying about four issues in great detail is that it takes an enormous amount of work to have a meaningful opinion on any complicated issue.”

– Paul Campos.

About a year ago, Michael Pollan (author of the Omnivore’s Dilemma), gave a talk a Google which I think is very interesting. The upshot is that the “scientific” approach to nutrition that emphasizes the ingestion of certain nutrients rather than certain whole foods doesn’t work. The evidence suggests that our current scientific understanding of nutrition, digestion and health is shaky at best and misleading at worst. So the best practical advice at this time is to avoid the proto-scientific theories of nutrition and eat whole, natural foods based on a few very clearly understood principles (e.g., eat lots of vegetables).

As Pollan notes, “Culture has been greatly undervalued in the era of science, but it’s still, I believe, a repository of terrific wisdom.”

Over that the National Review, Ed Whelan has publicly “outed” anonymous blogger publius of Obsidian Wings. This is in retaliation for some blog posts that were critical of Whelan.

Regardless of the rights and wrongs of their respective political positions (and regular readers will know that I am far more likely to favor the National Review’s take on any given political subject than Obsidian Wings’), what Whelan has done here is shameful. If Whelan cannot endure public criticism, then he shouldn’t be in politics. I am embarrassed to share a political party with such a petty man. The NRO should be too.

Update: Ed Whelan has apologized. Good for him. It is hard to do a heel face turn when one has made a public mistake. This speaks highly of his character.

So. I have celiac disease. I think that in time, as I learn more, I’ll start blogging about gluten free cooking and living without wheat.

For now, however, I wanted to notice an odd, anecdotal correlation I’ve noticed between (a) lawyers who are unhappy as lawyers, and who seem to have temperaments that are similar to mine, and (b) problematic autoimmune disorders that manifest in the stomach. For example, both Amateur Content and Sherry (whose thoughts on the practice of law are gathered, in part, at her old blog) have recently been diagnosed with Chron’s disease. Chron’s and celiac are very similar autoimmune diseases which are often mistaken for one another.

This is, of course, not the entire story: celiac is at least partly genetic, and there appears to be at least some hereditary component to chron’s. But I wonder if the old wive’s tale about suppressed emotions causing stomach problems doesn’t contain a grain of truth.

(Not that I’m planning to leave the law. Quite the opposite: I enjoy the practice of law. I just don’t enjoy practicing in the environment that I’ve been in for the past several years).

I’m frankly still in shock at the Chrysler debacle:

“Fleecing lenders to pay off politically powerful interests, or governmental threats to reputation and business from a failure to toe a political line? We might expect this behavior from a Hugo Chávez. But it would never happen here, right?

Until Chrysler…

The Obama administration’s behavior in the Chrysler bankruptcy is a profound challenge to the rule of law. Secured creditors — entitled to first priority payment under the “absolute priority rule” — have been browbeaten by an American president into accepting only 30 cents on the dollar of their claims. Meanwhile, the United Auto Workers union, holding junior creditor claims, will get about 50 cents on the dollar.

The absolute priority rule is a linchpin of bankruptcy law. By preserving the substantive property and contract rights of creditors, it ensures that bankruptcy is used primarily as a procedural mechanism for the efficient resolution of financial distress. Chapter 11 promotes economic efficiency by reorganizing viable but financially distressed firms, i.e., firms that are worth more alive than dead.

Violating absolute priority undermines this commitment by introducing questions of redistribution into the process. It enables the rights of senior creditors to be plundered in order to benefit the rights of junior creditors.

The U.S. government also wants to rush through what amounts to a sham sale of all of Chrysler’s assets to Fiat. While speedy bankruptcy sales are not unheard of, they are usually reserved for situations involving a wasting or perishable asset (think of a truck of oranges) where delay might be fatal to the asset’s, or in this case the company’s, value. That’s hardly the case with Chrysler. But in a Chapter 11 reorganization, creditors have the right to vote to approve or reject the plan. The Obama administration’s asset-sale plan implements a de facto reorganization but denies to creditors the opportunity to vote on it.

By stepping over the bright line between the rule of law and the arbitrary behavior of men, President Obama may have created a thousand new failing businesses. That is, businesses that might have received financing before but that now will not, since lenders face the potential of future government confiscation. In other words, Mr. Obama may have helped save the jobs of thousands of union workers whose dues, in part, engineered his election. But what about the untold number of job losses in the future caused by trampling the sanctity of contracts today?”

– Todd Zywicki, Chrysler and the Rule of Law, Wall Street Journal, May 13, 2009, via .

Commenting on a related facet of this mess, Megan McArdle provided the best summary:

This move has shown potential partners that government funds are dangerous, and potential lenders that union firms are risky bets; both have probably cost American citizens more than they saved. So why did the government risk so much for so little gain?

You know the answer, don’t you? Because they’re planning to do it again.

The QOTD:

“There is a major cultural schism developing in America. But it’s not over abortion, same-sex marriage or home schooling, as important as these issues are. The new divide centers on free enterprise — the principle at the core of American culture.

Despite President Barack Obama’s early personal popularity, we can see the beginnings of this schism in the “tea parties” that have sprung up around the country… [T]he tea parties are not based on the cold wonkery of budget data. They are based on an “ethical populism.” The protesters are homeowners who didn’t walk away from their mortgages, small business owners who don’t want corporate welfare and bankers who kept their heads during the frenzy and don’t need bailouts. They were the people who were doing the important things right — and who are now watching elected politicians reward those who did the important things wrong.”

- Arthur C. Brooks, The Real Culture War is Over Capitalism, Wall Street Journal, April 30, 2009.