Double Arrow Metabolism

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Re-link-uishment April 6, 2017

Genetically modified organisms are safe to eat. Period. Anyone who tells you otherwise is misinterpreting the data or deliberately misleading you. But food safety is only part of the picture. Some uncertainty remains about the safety of the organisms to the environment. Agricultural monoculture, with hundreds of acres repeatedly planted to one, two, or three crops, is surely a bad idea. Reducing pesticide use with GMO crops is surely a good idea, but it has the specter of downstream effects that may currently be unknown hanging over it.  

Would Silicon Valley rather make death less likely or life better? Evidence seems to point to #1; most social media and apps turn out to be tools for either wasting our precious time or toys for rich people. 

Is it foolish for a woman to cycle alone across the Middle East? It is stories like this that make me miss social media. But not enough to go back to it.

Levothyroxine didn't make older people with subclinical hypothyroidism feel any better in an RCT. Huh.

Switching poorly controlled people with type 1 diabetes to an insulin pump before "optimizing" their diabetes education may not be helpful. The training only took five days, and at 24 months, both groups (pumpers vs. educated) had similar reductions in their HbA1c level. "These results do not support a policy of providing insulin pumps to adults with poor glycemic control until the effects of training on participants' level of engagement in intensive self management have been determined." How to determine their level of engagement seems to be the bugaboo, then.