What I'm Reading (Aug. 9)

Much has been said and written on gender disparities. For a long while, women were deliberately left out of scientific protocols because of concerns about the effect of the experiments on pregnancy and fertility. In much the same way that children are not merely smaller adults, women are not just different size men. You would think that now that we are ‘woke, that wouldn’t be as much an issue. You would be wrong. 99% Invisible, the podcast that just keeps on giving, discusses the problem of gender invisibility in daily design – designs that impact all of us. Here is the podcast, or for the time-challenged a summary. 

Here on Long Island, the push to ban disposable plastics is well underway. It is five cents a bag at the market, but more importantly, plastic straws are being eliminated from nearly all food venues; and the eastern end of Long Island has a lot of food choices. Like the first electric Prius, there is status in demonstrating your conservation ‘creds,’ Elaine Schwartz shows us just a few of the unintended consequences of the switch away from plastic straws. (2-minute read)

While tick season and its companion Lyme Disease is underway, it is always mosquito season somewhere. And mosquitos have a much worse track record concerning human disease than those ticks; by some estimates, most of the 22,000 people who died building the Panama Canal died from mosquito-borne Yellow Fever. That said, our interactions with mosquitos go back centuries, as do our attempted cures. From Timothy Winegard, a professor of history and political science at Colorado Mesa University, How Mosquitos Have Shaped What We Eat and Drink( (5-minute read)

And finally, have you ever wondered about those laser made holes in capsules, meant to quicken the release of the medication and subsequent relief? Aeon has a short video that doesn’t so much explain how it happens, as demonstrates pills dissolving. Think of it as a bit of eye-candy.  (2-minutes)

Images:

Straws Courtesy of bridgesward on Pixabay

Gin and Tonic Courtesy of Tomas on Flickr

Dissolving Capsule Courtesy of Aeon