Is China's flu pandemic the next big one? China's flu pandemic: The big one? Laurie Garrett Foreign policy 24 april 2013 Ten years after Sars, a new virus strikes China, perhaps more deadly, and certainly harder to contain. The H7n9 flu now evolving in China has a lethality about nine times the mortality rate of the Great Influenza of 1918-19, which claimed at least 50 million lives. It's not a bird flu, but what is it, and where does it hide? One week, no food S Abbas Raza Aeon 1 may 2013 Couple fast for seven days. Water only. No dramatic outcomes, at least in physical terms, but a distant effect on mental performance:""My reactions were slowed down very noticeably by evening. If my wife asked me a question, it took about five seconds for it to register and another five before I could formulate and deliver a reply Â. Biggest surprise: the amount of time freed up by no meals and much less shopping. The autistic brain Temple Grandin Slate 1 may 2013 Book extract.""In 1947, the diagnosis of autism was only four years old. Almost nobody knew what it meant. When Mother noticed in me the symptoms that we would now label autistic oe destructive behaviour, inability to speak, a sensitivity to physical contact, a fixation on spinning objects, and so on oe she did made what sense to her. She took me to a neurologist. The diagnosis: brain damage.  Where uniqueness lies Gary Marcus Nautilus 29 april 2013 Advances in genetics, biology, neuroscience, anthropology, tend to point up how similar humans are to other animals, not how different. Whatever sets us apart, it isn't very much.""Humans will never abandon the quest to prove that they are special. But nor can we escape the fact that our minds are a modest tweak on an ancient plan that originated millions of years before we came onto the scene. Home away from home Nick Carr Rough Type 29 april 2013 What Facebook reveals about itself through its advertising. It pretends to be about connection, but it's really about distraction, alienation. The contradiction is out there in the open. Facebook knows it is living a lie, and it doesn't care. The corporate spirit is cynical nihilistic.""For Zuckerberg, and for Facebook, Ëoesincere'and Ëoeinsincere'are equally meaningless terms. Everything is bullshit.  Who can stop these adorable pigs? Jesse Hirsch Modern Farmer 25 april 2013 Feral pigs are overrunning America. Radioactive feral pigs are threatening Europe. Destroying crops, spreading diseases.""Once a wild pig is full-grown, it is invulnerable to almost all forms of predators angry alligators being one possible exception Â. Boars are smart, fast, hard to hunt.""We're not going to shoot or trap our way out of this. Lethal removal just doesn't take the numbers that you need to control the population.  The mind of a con manyudhijit Bhattacharjee New york times 26 april 2013 Admired Dutch psychologist admits to faking a whole career's worth of academic research.""Everybody wants you to be novel and creative, but you also need to be truthful and likely. You need to be able to say that this is completely new and exciting, but it's very likely given what we know so far  Why your supermarket sells only five kinds of apple Rowan Jacobson Mother Jones 26 april 2013 Meet John Bunker,"apple whisperer  of Maine. America had thousands of varieties in the 1800s before industrial agriculture crushed diversity. But apple trees live for 200 years: the old ones are still there to be rediscovered by new enthusiasts.""Bunker is determined to save as many as he can before they, and he, are gone.  The debt to pleasure Anonymous The Economist 26 april 2013 Discussion of a paper from Nobel-prize-winning economist Daniel Mcfadden, arguing that, to understand consumer choice, we need a"new science of pleasure  incorporating psychology, neuroscience and anthropology. Economics has taken too narrow a view: Human decision-making isn't all about self-interest and revealed preferences. It is shaped by memory, experience, mood, trust, and brain chemistry. What if we never run out of oil? Charles Mann The Atlantic 24 april 2013 Fracking and shale gas have transformed America's energy balance. In another decade, led by Japan, we may well be recovering natural gas oe methane hydrate oe from beneath the oceans, tapping reserves perhaps twice as big as all other fossil fuels combined. In short, humanity may well have all the fossil fuels it can possibly use for lifetimes to come. Which would be great news oe if not for climate change. How not to die Jonathan Rauch The Atlantic 24 april 2013 Humbling, enlightening essay on end-of-life care.""Unwanted treatment is American medicine's dark continent. No one knows its extent, and few people want to talk about it. The US medical system was built to treat anything that might be treatable, at any stage of life oe even near the end, when there is no hope of a cure, and when the patient, if fully informed, might prefer quality time and relative normalcy to all-out intervention.  For more articles worth reading, visit The Browser. If you would like to comment on this article or anything else you have seen on Future, head over to our Facebook page or message us on Twitter
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