For Ted!

No comments.... ;)

Picture: All the ladies love me by missing.

Seriously

Ciça, chega. Seriously!
No, seriously. Pass me the salt!

Ciça, seriously. This is awesome!

Ahh...

What is this thing about me and uploading 3,000 pictures?

Picture: Robot by hello-big-fish.

Happy Thanksgiving!!!!!

Picture: Thanksgiving Bears by hannabearr.

Leaving...

Less than 3 weeks to leave Italy. I will really miss this place...

The Loneliness of the Long Distance "Hunter"

Picture: Loneliness by Maria Cecilia C. Dadalt

“(…) In a single cracking instant we were endowed with a universe that was vast (…), possibly any size up to infinite(…). Bill Bryson on A Short History of Nearly Everything

I have always been drawn to the topic of loneliness. Truth to be told, I have bit of weirdness in me. Not by chance I used to visit cemeteries because loved the peace, quiet, mystery, and… reading epitaphs. Not by chance I grew up on poetry and classics. They are filled with tears and blood shed in the name of love and desperation, and not the least: loneliness.

When I read an article in BBC News (I previously posted it on “Loneliness Could be in Your Genes”) talking about loneliness and its genetic roots, my curiosity was aroused. I cannot say I went much further on the scientific side of the story. Cannot say I went much further on the psychological or sociological sides either. Actually I did not go much further in any direction. But it made me think and made me want to write a bit more about it, nonetheless.

Today, the theme of the night is: LONELINESS! Let’s start this from the beginning. The definition of Loneliness in the dictionary is:
1. The condition of being lonely; solitude; seclusion.
2. The state of being unfrequented by human beings; as, the loneliness of a road.
3. Love of retirement; disposition to solitude.
4. A feeling of depression resulting from being alone.

All of us felt lonely at least once in our lives. The sensations vary, but in general we experience on of the listed:
1. Emptiness or hollowness inside;
2. Feeling of isolation or separation from the world;
3. Vague feeling that something is not right;
4. A very intense deprivation and deep pain;
5. There is no one with whom to share feelings and experiences;
6. Feeling of disconnection and alienation from the surroundings and others;
7. Life seems pointless without people to share it with.
8. Feeling uncomfortable being by yourself and with yourself;
9. Feeling that there is no one in your life who really cares;
10. Being without friends or a companion;
11. Feeling like you don't have anyone who wants to be with you;
12. Feeling abandoned and left out;
13. Being unable to connect with anyone on either a physical or emotional level.

Social causes of loneliness have been broadly studied and discussed. Now scientists are coming with a new insight: loneliness might be in our genes. It can be anthropologically explained although the genetic proof remains to be searched.

“The researchers write that loneliness may have developed early in human evolution as a response by hunter-gathers facing conditions of undernourishment who may have decided not to share their food with their families. By surviving a famine, those early ancestors would be able to propagate during periods of plenty, the researchers theorized. In developing loneliness as an adaptation to survival, these early humans also developed dispositions toward anxiety, hostility, negativity and social avoidance, they said.”
(http://news.softpedia.com/news/Loneliness-Could-Be-Hereditary-
12218.shtml)

So, our hunter antecessors might have guaranteed our existence by excluding themselves from the social context. It is indeed interesting. But let’s not forget that social systems were not created by chance. It was a natural response of humans, and all other living creatures for that matter, to the problem of security hunting. By choosing the path of exclusion, our antecessor might have saved us from the fate of nonexistence, but also might have created a great portion of the social problems we now face.

The idea that our lonely hunter antecessor might have changed the way we behave and interact is supported by Darwinism. Chances are that the hunter, by not sharing his food, would survive and pass on through his offspring the necessary genetic survival kit fully equipped with selfishness and loneliness. Since then we learned that it was necessary to live in groups, but also necessary to be a bit selfish and fend for yourself if we want to survive.

The Loneliness gene also goes quite well with the Alpha Male gene. Main males like to be alone, I mean, with no other male competitors around. I doubt that anyone could disagree with the fact that alpha male behavior (which also applies to females in a slightly different way) is still a human trait. We already have quite an explosive mix without even considering any other human traits. On the other hand, which of our responses to our environment does not become part of our genes? Where does our behavior cross the line and becomes a genetic heritage? I clearly remember having long debates in high school and sociology classes in college dedicated solely to distributing the blame of our acts on either genes or environment.

Having Darwin at my side again, I am confident to say that a lot in our genes came from our antecessors responses to their environment, if not all. The winners survived and passed on their heritage. Our genetic heritage is completely made by slow changes in species behavior and physical characteristics (which can be caused by behavior and can cause behavior). Those changes made us who we are. So, it would be a pretty safe bet to say that our predisposal to be lonely is genetic. Some might be more predisposed than others, the same way some people have darker eyes than others. Hm… Finding the gene might be a tad more difficult than unlearned divagation, I would imagine.

I wonder if we already carry in our genes some piece of information that tells us how to pick up a phone… Up to what point are our genes programmed to instinctively react? In what point of our evolution are we? After how many generations a certain behavior becomes genetic? Ok, this is already too long! We already covered enough ground on genetics and our past. Next step will be talking a bit more about the present… And loneliness. And the same old question: are we all alone in the Universe?

More later...

More links on the Genes x Loneliness:
http://www.webmd.com/content/article/115/111553?src=rss_psychtoday
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/4426184.stm
http://news.softpedia.com/news/Loneliness-Could-Be-Hereditary-12218.shtml
http://health.dailynewscentral.com/content/view/0001906/31/
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/11/10/health/webmd/main1036338.shtml
http://www.rxpgnews.com/research/psychiatry/psychology/behaviouralscience/
article_2833.shtml

The "Retarded of The Year Award" goes to...

I've always known that I lack some grey mass in my brain. Did not need the GRE's to prove me that! No sir!
But what I really did not expect was to be retarded enough to put pepper in my coffee. Yes, you read right. Instead of putting pepper on the tomatoes I put it IN MY COFFEE!

QI= -2!!!!!

Loneliness x Bill Bryson

Random trivia: " The word ‘set’ has 126 different meanings as a verb, 58 as a noun, and 10 as a participial adjective.

More on that later and also on loneliness!

Picture: Yeah, I am still waiting by Sam Brown.

Loneliness could be in your genes

Here is an interisting article that might explain a lot about a lot of people:

Loneliness could be in your genes

Loneliness may run in the family, researchers have suggested.

Teams from the Free University in Amsterdam and the University of Chicago looked at data on 8,000 identical, and non-identical, twins.

They found genetics had a significant influence on loneliness.

The researchers, whose study appears in Behavior Genetics, said it showed helping lonely people was not simply a matter of changing their environment.

Loneliness has been linked to heart disease as well as emotional problems, such as anxiety, self-esteem problems and sociability.

The researchers suggest that loneliness may stem from prehistoric times, where hunter-gatherers may have deliberately shut themselves away from others so they did not have to share food.
That would have meant they were better nourished and therefore better able to survive and have children.
But they added that the strategy had a downside, in that it also developed dispositions towards anxiety, hostility, negativity and social avoidance.
'Control'
In the study, the twins, who have been surveyed regularly since 1991 when they were aged 13 to 20, were asked if they agreed or disagreed with certain statements, such as "I lose friends very quickly" and "nobody loves me".
The researchers compared the responses of adults in identical, and non-identical, twin pairs, all of whom had been brought up in the same households.
They found less difference in loneliness ratings between identical twins.
They suggest this means that genes play a major role in determining whether or not people will experience the feeling throughout their life.
Professor Dorret Boomsma, who led the study, told the BBC News website: "This kind of knowledge will help because it shows it's not as simple as saying that if you change someone's environment, it will have the same effect on everyone."
But Dr Arthur Cassidy, a psychologist at the Belfast Institute, said people could learn behaviours from their families.
"They may have a very pessimistic outlook and interpret things in a very negative way, so people can learn to become pessimistic and therefore to become lonely.
"But it is possible to unlearn behaviour, using Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT) and psychotherapy."

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/health/4426184.stm

Published: 2005/11/11 11:40:29 GMT

Picure: I am stupid and I am happy by Sam Brown.

My Pedro...

There is Life After Love!!!

Here I was poundering about my own frustration with love & cia. when I started chanting the same old mantra of the sad and lonely: "there is always someone sadder than I am"! While I was looking at funny pictures and browsing funny blogs, I found the answer to my chanting. And because I do not lie, I am presenting you with proof: The "Dear Economist" column.
Since the The 'Dear Economist' column is in the Financial Times and it answers readers' personal problems, you all can imagine the way the questions are answered!

Dear Economist,

I do not know whom to turn to. A few months ago I discovered that my wife was having an affair with my boss. I lost both wife and job in quick succession. My wife also took the dog. As I cannot afford my mortgage repayments, I am about to lose my house as well. Betrayed and homeless, I feel very depressed. I have become so desperate as to consider taking my own life. Please help.

- A.W., Dulwich

Dear A.W.,

Don't do anything rash. You are on the verge of making a terrible mistake, albeit one often made by naive practitioners of cost-benefit analysis.

Presumably you are contemplating suicide for the usual reason: a net-present-value calculation suggests that the future benefits of living are outweighed by the future costs. You will have considered the low probability that you will ever love again, the disadvantages of your poor credit record, and the difficulty of securing a new job, especially if applying from no fixed abode. While this cost-benefit analysis may appear to be a rational approach, it neglects advances in the field of real option theory.

Many decisions are irreversible but can be postponed to gather new information. The quintessential example is that of exercising a stock option, which allows the purchase of a share at a particular price. It would seem to a naive investor that an option to buy a share for £5 should be exercised immediately the market price of the share climbs above that level. But this is a mistake: the share may climb much further, or may fall, so while the option remains open there is a value to holding on to it while more information comes in.

Real option theory extends the idea beyond financial investments and into the real world. Apparently rational irreversible decisions to buy houses, build factories, or, indeed, to take one's own life, should often be postponed to gather more information. Your decision to kill yourself would deny you the opportunity to take advantage of any change of fortunes.

The latest economic theory therefore strongly recommends that you postpone your suicide indefinitely. It may be hard to believe, but there is every chance that you will again find true love and a satisfying job.

This week's Economist is Tim Harford, an FT leader writer.