Avifauna in the News:

(1) Outside of Medina, North Dakota, 27,000 white pelicans mysteriously disappear from Chase Lake National Wildlife Refuge; (2) along a strip of road in western England, a buzzard (which, for AmE speakers, is a hawk) terrorizes passing motorists and cyclists; and (3) in London, researchers found, ducks are noisier than their countryside brethren, most likely owing to the need to be heard over the many airplanes, trains, and police sirens found in the city.

UPDATE on (2): the dive-bombing bird, much to the dismay of many, including one of the cyclists who was attacked, is no more.

(AP: “Pelican disappearance drawing widespread interest; still unsolved” [June 15, 2004]; Reuters: “Angry Buzzard Terrorizes English Country Road” [June 11, 2004]); Reuters: “If It Quacks Like a City Duck, It’s a City Duck” [June 9, 2004]; Reuters: “Dive-Bombing Buzzard Flies Last Mission” [June 18, 2004])

• Somewhere, a headline-writer has earned her wings. So, the low-carb cult, yes it’s been beaten into the ground much in the same manner as a long-deceased equine. But the carbs of this diet aren’t the ones you’re thinking of, and it can’t really be called a diet. Nonetheless, a low-hydrocarbon “diet,” trimming energy use in key areas (transportation, residential heating & cooling, and industry), could actually allow for massive $$$ savings in things like paper and household appliances and lighting. Not a massively interesting article by itself, but you have to credit them for the unique hook. (Science Daily / Cornell University: “Low-carb Energy Diet, Using 33 Percent Less Hydrocarbons, Would Trim U.S. Consumer Fuel Costs By $438 Billion, Cornell Ecologists Claim” [May 25, 2004])
• I always wondered. Michael Quinion (of World Wide Words fame) explains (in an excerpt from his soon-to-be-published book) why we say silly things like “dressed to the nines” and the “bee’s knees.” Almost as interesting for the myths it debunks as it is for the facts of where these phrases actually come from. (Daily Telegraph: “How the bee got his knees” by Michael Quinion [May 31, 2004])
• Higher Status = Longer Life. Sort of. Maybe. While other factors certainly come into play, Michael Marmot claims (with 30 years of research behind his claim) that status—your position in a social hierarchy—has a definite impact on the quality of your health. Curiously, however, it’s actual status—where you stand in relation to other people—more than your income that helps to determine your health and general well-being, e.g.:
  

  “And just a small difference in social status can have a big effect on health, he says. For example, people with doctorates live longer than those with Master’s degrees.”

  Granted, it’s a devilishly complex correlation to try to match up, and I’m sure there are any number of different interpretations of the results. But it’s an interesting thought. (NewScientist: “Higher status leads to a longer life” by Shaoni Bhattacharya [June 8, 2004])

• Sneaky Doors Threaten Humans. For the record, I’ve always been wary of revolving doors. (BoGlo: “After death, many injuries, Japan wary of revolving doors” by Peggy Hernandez [June 12, 2004])

• Blinded By The Internet. Apparently, some kiddies are frightened of the internet because they believe it “could put them at risk from bomb-making, blackmail, HIV, asylum seekers, aliens and blindness.” (Guardian: “Schools urged to smash internet myths” by David Batty [June 7, 2004])
• Phantom Fat. Obesity researcher Dr. Jeffrey Friedman thinks the craze about Americans getting fatter and fatter is bunk. Not totally, mind you; the “massively obese,” he says, are getting fatter. And yes, there’s some increase in weight—an average of 7 to 10 pounds across the spectrum—but on the whole, people are not getting as radically fat as the media would have you believe. He puts it like this:
  

  “Imagine the average I.Q. was 100 and that 5 percent of the population had an I.Q. of 140 or greater and were considered to be geniuses. Now let’s say that education improves and the average I.Q. increases to 107 and 10 percent of the population has an I.Q. of above 140.

  “You could present the data in two ways… You could say that the average I.Q. is up seven points or you could say that because of improved education the number of geniuses has doubled.

  “The whole obesity debate is equivalent to drawing conclusions about national education programs by saying that the number of geniuses has doubled.”

  Sure, there’s some disagreement on this point. But when the opposing side uses such nuanced reasoning as “[e]veryone notices that there are more overweight people now,” (an actual quote, by the way) you ought to be at least somewhat inclined to give Dr. Friedman some consideration.

  (NYT: “I Beg To Differ” by Gina Kolata [June 8, 2004] – fair-use text copy of article here)

• Traffic Facts. Bogotá, Colombia has a problem. But it’s not so much a problem-dilemma as it is a problem-mystery: the streets of this metropolis of 7+ million inhabitants and 1+ million cars are strangely (mysteriously, you might say) free of traffic jams. Once again, science has the answer. It looks like the answer lies in the agressive, daredevil driving style assumed by motorists in the city. Maybe. (The Nature article says that the drivers are “simply more aggressive than their counterparts in London, New York and other huge metropolises,” but this could very easily be a vague and baseless assertion, as I couldn’t find any mention of New York or London in skimming the original journal article.) (Nature: “Bold motorists clear roads” by Michael Hopkin [June 8, 2004]; Olmos, L. E. & Muñoz, J. D.. Int. J. Mod. Phys C, arXiv preprint, http://arXiv.org/abs/cond-mat/0406065 [2004])