16/11/2007

Suger High

There is only one drug that everyone does. That drug is sugar. It's not like heroin or anything, but the danger with sugar is that it works in the same way, just on a much smaller scale. What happens when we eat sugar is that the brain releases all these substances that stimulates the nerves in such a way that you feel good. That's is of course not a bad thing. What is, is that since we eat such incredible amounts of sugar these days, it's in bread, pasta, in most about everything essentially, it fucks up the brain in a very small, but crucial way. When we eat sugar, the brain releases opioids. Opioids is the same thing that the brain releases when we use heroin or morphine, though of course in a much larger scale. The problem with sugar is that we can eat it all the time, and therefore keep the amount of opioids constant, we get addicted to the brains own chemicals essentially. However, this has yet to be proved to be the case on humans. Tests on rats has confirmed that they develop an addiction to sugar, and suffer from withdrawal when denied it. It is however quite likely that this is also the case with humans, since there is not that great of a difference in the brains between mammals. Though, there is of course a difference between our sugar and natural sugar. Our sugar is purified several times, treated with different chemicals, and heated amongst other things. These processes are mainly to make the sugar look good. However, they also remove all the good things with the sugar. It is however true that sugar is important for the brain. Natural sugar, that is. The natural sugar contains vitamins and minerals, amongst other things, which makes it quite healthy for us. Natural sugar is also built in a different way than processed sugar. This is important because our brains use sugar as its only fuel. However, too much is not good for it, since that actually prevents it from receiving the much needed sugar. Natural sugar is constructed in such a way that it is not directly absorbed by the body, the process takes a while, and maintains the level of sugar in the blood fairly even. Our artificial sugar, we might as well call it that, since that's essentially what it is, is absorbed almost instantly, almost as if injected into the blood. This of course causes the sugar level in the blood to peak, the body releases insulin to store this extra sugar, but the insulin levels take much longer to drop than the sugar does. The liver can't absorb all that extra insulin very fast, and don't normally need to either. The only natural source we have for that much sugar is honey, which naturally is very hard to come by. The simple fact is that our bodies does not evolve as fast as either our society, science, and brains does. And with these kinds of sugar levels, our brains won't get much further anyway. So, what should we avoid then? Mainly candy and soda, it's that easy. Eat breakfast, a real one, not waffles or anything like that. Check out these links if you want to know more about sugar, and what it does with our bodies: befreetech.com Princeton Franklin Institute

07/11/2007

Hobbes in the US?

I was recently writing a paper on Thomas Hobbes and John Locke, and started thinking about modern day society's that resembles their political views on how the perfect society should look. I almost instantly draw a line between the American government and Hobbes ideas about the social contract. This contract is agreed upon by the individuals, and by giving up some of their rights and freedoms to one single ruler, the society gain is stability and becomes safer for the citizens of said society. So, giving up parts of your freedom to gain security? Made me think of the Patriots Act straight away, though I must admit that I have not read the document myself, so I might be a bit off. Anyway, from what I've understood, the document gives the government the right to deny the citizens some of their rights in order to make life safer and more stable in the country. This also means that the citizens have to believe that their government will do only just that, work towards safety and stability, since it would be just as easy for them to work towards other goals as well. It's essentially a matter of control, the people give some of their control for safety, which means the government is given more control, which can also be used to restrict the control of the people further. What I'm getting at is basically that no government should be unrestricted in it's actions, even if the people made these actions possible. A government that works for itself and not it's people is no longer the peoples government. But would it work the other way around then? If we take my country, Sweden, as an example... We have a coalition government, consisting of several different political parties, which is mainly the case because of our political system. The problem with a government such as this, is that it does not have the same kind of power as the American government has. On the upside is the fact that this government is restricted because of the fact that the people have more control over it, but this might not be a very valid comparison because of the difference in size between the two country's. After all it also affect the size of the government in itself, but also how close most people can get to the government. If a majority of the people in a country is politically active it decrees' the possibility of the government to get too much control. If there is a an uninterested attitude towards politics, the government can do pretty much what it pleases, as long as it keeps the people happy. As you might suspect by now, I'm more in favor of Locke than Hobbes, though there is of course good and bad things with both their views... As there usually is in life.

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