Tired of the NYtimes telling you that you have already viewed your 10 free articles this month?

Go Incognito (Ctrl+Shift+N) and read as much as you would like. And never feel guilty.

So Death is a Disease and the Human Body is Flawed...Right.

A riposte on anti-aging research. (Read my former post)

The average consumer with private insurance now spends more on anti-aging prescriptions than they do on medications to treat actual chronic diseases, according to the American Public Health Association.

The lengths we take to defy the natural effects of aging - slowing mental alertness, sexual dysfunction, menopause, aging skin, balding, etc.- signal a shift in the social perception of aging. These ailments are thought to be the symptoms of a progressive degenerative disease that without treatment can lead to *gasp* death.

This looming fear of death has justified a market for anti-aging research. Scientists our now looking within the human body to extend life.  We are treating the natural changes in hormone levels and gene expression as we did bad sanitation - as flaws worthy of manipulation. We frame life-shortening genes as though suspects of murder. When in reality, they are considerate executioners of a body about to suffer the ailments of inevitable death. 

I think it is extremely dangerous to challenge the wisdom of our body mechanics, whether you believe it has been created from God's perfection or from evolution's pursuit of perfection. 

Maybe as a young mind and body I am in no position to judge our changing perceptions of aging. But it just seems silly to me to spend billions of dollars worth of research to delay something as inevitable of death.  Maybe it is just the inner Camus (whom I am reading now) that is speaking. I highly recommend his classic existentialist novel, The Stranger, in which he states:

Bottom-line: the purpose of medicine is to manipulate the biochemistry of an unhealthy body so that it may become normal again. Death isn't abnormal or avoiadable. Let's stop treating it like a disease.

Why Reading Fast is Overrated

Saturday Mornings were then Torturous.

Mother would have her day off. She would use this day to Discipline Us. 

1 hour Math Tutoring

1 hour Science Studying

1 hour Read Aloud

Repeated for her Four Children, each one dreading the end of the former's session - signaled by mother's Shrill Calling voice that she saved Just for Us, so we could not reasonably pretend to have not heard.

The Read Aloud session was Most Painstaking. Over the course of an hour, we would read perhaps just five to ten pages. Reading for Content, but more importantly, Reading for Language. And never, never for speed.

She would have us read a sentence, then she would repeat it, emphasizing each noun and each verb. And what did they mean? We weren't sure. So we would write down the "juicy" words and sentences in a notebook, define them, memorize them, appreciate them. We would learn.

Growing up in Pakistan, Mother was one of 8 children. 

Aware of surrounding poverty and illiteracy, and aware of her comparatively privileged life, she would never let knowledge to pass her without absorbing and analyzing its every aspect. Still, she takes incredible value in every word, every sentence, studying the infinite beauty in which authors seamlessly connect each idea to one cogent whole. She reads.  She re-reads. She writes. She re-reads the written. She memorizes, appreciates, learns, and connects. 

In this day and age, information is ubiquitous and infinitely more available than it was during my  mother's day and age. With all this information, more things slip than stick, enslaving our God-given drive for depth and meaning to the allure of More, Faster.

As a precursor to the science journalism that I will attempt in my upcoming posts, this post delineates some of my underlying goals of this blog - dedication, depth, and deliberation.

Maybe this blog is just a pathetic attempt to one day reach just half the level of depth that my mother has achieved. 

Time will Tell.