Thursday roundup

Killer Buddhists demonstrate that violence prefers no denomination.

Violence against women is a global epidemic.

In this debate about the "seriousness" of women's magazines, can we first establish that gender-neutral magazines are not men's magazines? Sure, Glamour isn't the Economist, but neither is Maxim.

Who the hell are the people sending misogynistic hate mail to Rebecca Watson? (Besides Richard Dawkins; that's a given.)

Past research about the decline in women's fertility (with age) is flawed. Our bitter friends are right, we (women) have been sold a bill of goods, but it's not that we can have everything; it's that we can't.

Lisa Murkowski has competition for most moving change-of-heart statement. WOW. That is some seriously heart-felt, meaningful stuff.

Less (meat) is more (food security).

I agree with a lot of this, but I'm still for labeling (for reasons I feel no need to repeat).

Tom Sietsema really did not like this La Tagliatella. Especially since he warns us that it's hard to avoid cream and pork there, I'll take his word for it.

The significance of Whole Foods in Detroit.

The perils of treating obesity as a disease:

A recent review of studies on conditions like addictions and other psychological problems that can have genetic causes found that such classification generally does reduce the blame heaped on people with the disorders, both by themselves and society. But the labels also increased pessimism about recovery, probably because people assume that as diseases with biological and genetic bases, they are immutable. One study on alcoholism, for example, found that the more people bought into the idea that addiction was a “chronic relapsing disease” over which they were “powerless,” the worse their relapses were. Although the label didn’t increase relapse itself, it made it worse if it did occur— and the majority of people with alcoholism will relapse at least once.

Dunkin' Donuts doesn't care about people like me:

.@DunkinDonuts to offer gluten-free donuts. Screw that, we want egg-free! http://t.co/YHjaq0bIn7
— Vegan (@vegan) June 20, 2013

I'm much more concerned about hens in battery cages and male chicks in grinders than I am about gluten in my intestines. @DunkinDonuts
— Vegan (@vegan) June 20, 2013

Another interesting comment on the science and humanities debate echoes what I've taken issue with: science may be a tool for understanding the world, "But while that tool can produce very good data, it can't really tell us exactly what we should do with that data, or how we should think about it."

See also Adam Gopnik's piece on Galileo (yes, I know Gopnik is not my favorite writer, but the substantive/factual part of that article is very good, and pertinent to our discussion of science and philosophy).

Of all the Times trend stories, this is the one I got to experience for myself?

Um, no, weddings are not about fundraising for one's life.

A cool map of place names made literal.