Biblical strongman was plagued by mental illness, says UCSD psychiatrist Eric Altschuler, who finds he demonstrated six out of the seven cardinal criteria for antisocial personality disorder. As a clinical psychiatrist myself, I hate these constant attention-getting attempts to retrospectively diagnose historical, artistic and spiritual figures with mental illnesses. You might think it’s just an innocent intellectual pastime of my colleagues, but the sensationalistic publicity about these pronouncements perpetuates an irresponsible image that diagnosis can be done at a distance from “surface” features in the absence of access to reports of the subject’s experience. More than that, it “feathers the bed” of the field by pushing the envelope of pathological explanations of extraordinary talents or exploits. New Scientist

Brain Regions Impaired by Alcoholism Identified By fMRI Studies in Young Adult, Female Alcoholics. While neuropsychological testing of which cognitive functions are impaired in long-term alcohol abuse had previously zeroed in on the right frontal and parietal regions, this study uses functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to demonstrate in real-time the malfunctioning of specific brain regions involved. Among other findings, the functional deficits persisted even in the three of the ten women scanned who had been abstinent from alcohol for at least six months. Women apepar to be as sensitive to the adverse effects of alcohol as men even with shorter exposure.

Our friends electric. ‘One in eight people find
computer glitches more
vexing than the break
up of a relationship, a
recent survey on
“office rage” found.

Advocates of “affective
computing” say this
problem stems from the
gulf between
touchy-feely
humankind and cold,
aloof technology.’ They propose computer interfaces and robotic applications that respond to the user’s emotional states. BBC

Scores to attend priest’s ritual Pokemon burning ceremony: “Pokemon magazines and dolls are to be ritually burnt in
Mexico because of their alleged evil influence on children.” Ananova

Sub had civilians at controls. This is no news to anyone anymore. What appeared originally to be a tragic unfortunate accident starts to reek of coverup and ineptitude, US military might at its musclebound worst killing schoolchildren and other innocents. The Navy’s spokesperson certainly ‘doth protest too much’ in the form of denying perseveratively that the civilians at the controls could have had any effect. What troubles me, in the coverage I’ve read of this, is that no one is offering an explanation of, and apparently no reporters are digging for, exactly who these civilians are and why they were being given such a little-boy-with-his-big-toy fantasy treat. Seattle Times
Addendum: While I still haven’t heard this in the American press, the BBC reports that, as I suspected, this was a reward for large Navy donors, in this case to the restoration of the battleship U.S.S. Missouri, ironically the site of the signing of the Japanese surrender at the end of WWII. Apparently, these patronage perqs have not been that uncommon.

McDonald’s Hit by Spitting Email Hoax: A broadly-circulated email states that a South African TV show has footage of McDonald’s workers “spitting on white people’s hamburgers when ordered”, but the TV show denies it:

“An urban legend relating to a well-known hamburger fast-food chain
is currently circulating in SA. This false rumour states that Carte
Blanche has captured hidden camera visuals of the fast-food chain’s
employees allegedly mishandling food meant for customers,” the
Carte Blanche Website states today.

“The programme does not have such footage in its possession.
Should we acquire such footage, we will be the first to broadcast it.”

A source reports McD’s took a 20% revenue hit as a result of the news, but company representatives denied that the email had had any effect. The Register