found_drama

I just finished reading Christopher McDougall’s Born to Run^[1]—which is a great read and a great^[2] book.  The book has been tremendously popular and has reached many people^[3], and there are tons of reviews out there, many of them with the same glowing endorsements and focusing on the same synopsis of the book:

…an epic adventure that began with one simple question: Why does my foot hurt? In search of an answer, Christopher McDougall sets off to find a tribe of the world’s greatest distance runners and learn their secrets, and in the process shows us that everything we thought we knew about running is wrong. [...] For centuries [the Tarahumara] have practiced techniques that allow them to run hundreds of miles without rest and chase down anything from a deer to an Olympic marathoner while enjoying every mile of it. Their superhuman talent is matched by uncanny health and serenity, leaving the Tarahumara immune to the diseases and strife that plague modern existence.

So aside from that quote from the inside flap of the dust jacket, I’m not going to go on about the barefoot running.  I’m not going to harp on that.

I am (however) going to harp on a certain apparent contradiction.  Or if not a contradiction, then at least an intractable, difficult-to-reconcile inconsistency between points raised in the text.

It hit me around page 243, right around the time that chapter 28 was wrapping up^[4].  What hit me was:  there seem to be two different messages about what the “good stuff” to eat is.

But let’s back up for a moment here.

Throughout the text, the message seems to lean toward vegetarianism.  The Tarahumara don’t seem to eat much meat; every time McDougall describes their diet, it’s mostly beans and pinole—and aside from a mention of a soup with beef broth, I can’t find another place where they consume an animal product.  There is a passage where Scott Jurek’s diet is described, and how the coaches of his youth insisted on “lean meat” for muscle development but how as an adult he had stripped down his intake to be bean proteins and raw veggies and the complex carbohydrates from stuff like uncooked oats.  Then there is Dr. Ruth Heidrich’s “simple rule” as espoused to McDougall:

…if it came from plants, she ate it; if it came from animals, she didn’t.

In other words, everyone seems to go vegetarian.  Or vegan.  Or “raw”.

And this is a pretty consistent thread in the overall narrative, right up until chapter 28.

When we get to chapter 28, McDougall starts to talk about the human animal as a running animal, and there is a substantial discussion on the advantages of bipedalism^[5] and quite a bit of speculation on the evolutionary arc that led to the success of Homo sapiens as a species^[6].  McDougall focuses on a hypothesis by David Carrier^[7] that Homo sapiens turned into this explosive success because persistence hunting^[8] gave them improved access to food (i.e., meat)—and persistence hunting would not be possible without a biology that makes endurance running easy.

If I’m following the text correctly, then the basic idea is this:  (1) Homo sapiens and Neanderthal are competing for resources.  (2) Homo sapiens has a more efficient means of running and can use this efficient running to execute this “persistence hunting”—which basically means that they run their prey to exhaustion.  (3) This strategy somehow permits easier access to food year-round.  (4) Not only that, but the improved access to meat provides a concentrated high-protein food source that allow for rapid brain development and an otherwise improved probability of long-term survival.

So… running gave us better access to meat which was crucial for our species’ evolution and long-term.  And yet we argue that a vegetarian diet is the ultra-marathoner’s ace-in-the-sleeve? …the key to longevity and beating cancer etc.?  But the meat is what got us here in the first place?

Hmm…?

Now before anyone goes all Michael Pollan on me^[9], bear in mind that what I find obnoxious here is that there doesn’t seem to be much effort to reconcile these conflicting ideas.  Page 244 rolls around and it isn’t about diet anymore; diet becomes about running, and running is what carries the narrative.

So instead we’re left wondering:

• Is the meat just a gateway?  Break on through the big-brain barrier and you don’t need it anymore?  Or, as much?
• Did it really not have anything to do with the meat, but instead more to do with the improved strategy combined with Homo sapiens omnivorousness?  Because if the speculation is true and Neanderthal really was exclusively a carnivore, then there’s another advantage we would have right there.  (Which minimizes the importance of the easy-access meat.)
• Do we need to divorce the arguments?  Is the vegetarianism “right” for the runner’s diet?  And the meat is more to do with the brain development?  (That doesn’t sound right to me at all.)

I’m sure there are more questions to be spawned as I continue to meditate on this.  But as it is not nearly reconciled in the text, I suppose I’ll have to work to reconcile it on my own.

1. Subtitled: “A Hidden Tribe, Superathletes, and the Greatest Race the World Has Never Seen”. [↩]
2. And possibly even life-changing? [↩]
3. Especially runners, and people interested in running. [↩]
4. Not to mention giving me this utterly perverted desire to run.  What the fuck is that all about? [↩]
5. Especially w/r/t/ the efficiency of respiration in a bipedal running organism. [↩]
6. As opposed to (say…) Neanderthal or some off-shoot of that species. [↩]
7. And/or Dennis Bramble.  Pretty sure the idea originates with Carrier, who was working with (for?) Bramble at the time.  Anyway, the truthy tale (as opposed to strict hypthesizing) about running an antelope to death with the Kalahari Bushmen?  That’s all Louis Liebenberg. [↩]
8. Not that you can prove such a thing in the fossil record. [↩]
9. I know and love the credo: “Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.” –Michael Pollan, 2007. [↩]

AN INTRODUCTION BY WAY OF HYPERBOLIC SENTIMENT: The Elegant Universe is “The Bible” of superstring theory^[1].

I close the covers of The Elegant Universe with powerfully mixed feelings. On the one hand, Brian Greene gives us a lucidly-written layman’s-terms explanation for high-concept modern physics, providing an excellent survey of 20th century science and painting a vivid picture of a promising strategy for reconciling the discrepancies in the otherwise dominant theories. On the other hand, about half-way through the text, it devolves into (what feels like) a navel-gazing vanity project that fails to connect that promising strategy with the target audience (i.e., the layman that actually gives a damn about modern science).

To be clear:

Read the rest of this entry »

1. Let’s hear it for faith-based science? [↩]

I still don’t understand this whole hybercube/tesseract thing but I sure am fascinated by it.  And let’s face it, that animation is wickedly mesmerizing.

First and foremost: an uncritical read of this book will leave you feeling cynical and a bit cheated. It ranks up there with E.O. Wilson’s Sociobiology and Richard Dawkins’ The Selfish Gene^[1]. It would be very easy to find yourself getting defensive about the material presented in here; especially if you believe humans to be some special exception among animals. 

Meanwhile, with a more critical approach, you will find that you cannot get Robert Wright’s The Moral Animal out of your head: it is insightful, intellectually rigorous, even-handed, and at times palpably funny. Plus, you will find that it informs a great many (all?) of the human discourse (verbal or otherwise) that you encounter daily — how certain traits and behaviors came to be and the functions they serve. 

Don’t ask about their intentions though; we need to remember that evolution is goal-less, after all. Put most succinctly: 

We are built to be effective animals, not happy ones.

Read the rest of this entry »

1. Though I will readily admit that I know these two texts primarily by reputation, having only read excerpts and not their entireties. [↩]

Dr. Amy C. Chess, PhD in the Psychological and Brain Science.

Nice one, babe. Green robes and all.

Via afoundobject.

1. Hot damn. Beyond the Beyond has been a treasure trove this week.
2. Via B^2: “Bradbury denies free speech message in Fahrenheit 451″ — Doctorow writes:
   

   Fahrenheit 451 was seminal for me, the book that turned me into a believer in free speech, a cause I’ve devoted my life to. It’s pretty heart-breaking to hear Bradbury repudiate the political subtext of the book. [...] On the other hand, I’ve had my own books subjected to critical scrutiny in which critics pointed out symbolisms and subtexts that I wasn’t aware of when I was writing.

   Argh. The ultimate question of who ultimately “owns” those subtexts and whether the reader writes them in or if the author can reject them.

3. DreamHost security compromised? Noted in my control panel first. Since then following mostly through Daring Fireball. My account did not appear to be effected, which is encouraging; bummer for those reporting otherwise. I don’t buy the argument that they were blowing it off because it was not mentioned in the newsletter; those things are pre-written and timed to go out ahead of time. I’m sympathetic to those who had their ish cracked into. It’s frustrating but (from my vantage point) DreamHost is trying to make good on their blunder and it’s not as bad as it could have been. I left my previous host because they refused to even acknowledge that they had potentially compromised my account security — so it’s not like I don’t take this seriously. But it’s not always as simple as just up and leaving. That said, I suppose that I’m not really in any position to talk because it’s not like someone inserted spammy links into my index.php, either.  It’s disappointing and hopefully everything will right itself when the dust settles.

The above image will not be appearing in this NowPublic.com story. When I first saw the request, I was a bit flattered. Neat, I thought. Then I read the story and thought Hmm… seems to miss the point.

In the spirit of the Creative Commons license that I use for my Flickr’d photos however^[1] I figured that it would be okay anyway as long as they gave the due attribution. And I followed that up with my rebuttal.

The photo will not appear on the site however because they require folks to register as users first.

Did I hear someone say Totally Weaksauce?

In any event, my rebuttal would go something along these lines:

Regardless of how many resources it takes to produce either vehicle, the H2 (on the road) produces far more CO tonnage than the Prius. The argument that you’re going to drive a mile-for-mile more environmentall-friendly vehicle in the H2 is a garbage argument. Especially when they start adding the “miles to the life of the vehicle” aspect in there. 300,000 mile life expectancy on the H2? Highly doubtful when driving habits are factored in.

That being said, my rebuttal should scarcely be taken as a pro-Prius argument. Between the Sudbury-mined nickel, the on-going debates about battery disposal^[2], and the not-quite-resolved high-voltage hazards posed to first responders, it seems silly for me to bother mentioning drivers’ habits again. Those Priuses trucking along on the highway at 85mph with a single occupant? Yeah, those guys are getting their fuel economy returns in a big hurry.

As usual: walk if you’re close enough, public transport if you’re not, and ask your friends and co-workers about rideshare options.

1. Attribution-NonCommercial -ShareAlike 2.0. [↩]
2. Sorry, no citation here. Had one at one point but the link is long-gone and the only things I’m finding in the Google are pro-hybrid “battery bounty” stroke-fests. [↩]

• Bots on The Ground

  via washingtonpost.com (via Pete)

  (tags: robot science politics tech research todo)

Via Jalopnik: “Hybrids drive their way out of car-pool lanes“:

Giving free solo trips in the commuter lanes has successfully clogged up those commuter lanes that were intended to ease traffic. Also, the way stickers are allocated was flawed — it was based on when new hybrid owners received their license plates in the mail. There’s no guarantee when plates will arrive — often, it could take as long as three months. Perhaps the DMV should’ve based it on when the car was purchased, making it clear if people qualified. Instead, when the current program ended, the DMV had 700 more applications than stickers. Some owners out there won’t be happy campers.

So my hat is off to California…  Sort of.  This practice of permitting hybrid drivers to utilize the HOV lanes is a horrifying practice and those states that are out there doing it should stop it.  While we can all be delighted that gasoline-electric hybrid vehicles typically exhibit greater (and in some cases far greater) fuel economy than your typical internal combustion engine, someone tooling around solo in one of them is still not really doing us any favors.  Just because you’re sucking less gasoline than the rest of us is a nice start.  But you’re still contributing to sprawl, still contributing to traffic, still requiring as much petrol for your tires and engine lubricants…  And what about that “other” battery that you happen to have?  And what about all the factory resources expended to manufacture your hybrid?

So if California’s goal was to introduce people to the hybrid vehicle concept…  Well, then I guess they’re getting nice checks in the mail from Toyota and Honda?  (I didn’t realize that the HOV lane was a marketing tool!)  Anyway…

The hybrid is a nice start at cutting back the carbon emissions.  But for wholesale reduction plans, nothing beats the “reduce” plan.  And there’s no quicker way to cut it back than to carpool.  Or use public transportation.  Or walk.