DREAMS NOIR FOR OLDIES
"Do you dream in black and white? If so, the chances are that you are over 55 and were brought up watching a monochrome television set," Richard Alleyne writes in The Daily Telegraph. "New research suggests that the type of television you watched as a child has a profound effect on the colour of your dreams. While almost all under-25s dream in colour, thousands of over-55s, all of whom were brought up with black and white sets, often dream in monochrome - even now." Eva Murzyn, a psychology student at Scotland's Dundee University, carried out the study. She said: "It suggests there could be a critical period in our childhood when watching films has a big impact on the way dreams are formed. What is even more interesting is that before the advent of television all the evidence suggests we were dreaming in colour."
HAPPY HOUR FOR ARTISTS?
"Across the arts, consensus has yet to emerge about what the [global recession]may bring," John Harris writes in The Guardian. "There is anxiety about ticket sales, sponsorship and subsidy - but also, in some places, optimism about a rising public need to seek solace in a music download or a trip to the cinema. Lean times, many observers point out, tend to lead to a surge of creativity. The Roaring Twenties have their fans, but plenty of people prefer the stuff that came in the wake of the Wall Street crash: the politicized plays of Clifford Odets, John Steinbeck's novels, the songs written by Woody Guthrie, even Charlie Chaplin's Modern Times."
GUARDING THE FIDDLE
An Italian concert violinist has been given a gun permit so he can protect his $12-million Stradivarius violin, Ananova news reports. As well as a 357 Smith & Wesson Magnum, 36-year-old Matteo Fedeli has a team of bodyguards wherever he goes with the instrument; they plan his route and make sure he is not followed. However, the violinist notes: "Anyone who tried to steal a rare instrument would be a bit silly, though, because they have satellite alarms built in and it's not as if they could just go and sell it at an auction."
MONDO BONOBO
"Contrary to the long-standing image of female bonobos as the peaceful matriarchs of their species," Karen Kaplan reports in the Los Angeles Times, "scientists have observed the creatures capturing, killing and eating young monkeys in the lowland evergreen forests of Salonga National Park in the Democratic Republic of Congo. The discovery undermines the conventional wisdom that hunting among primates is an outgrowth of male dominance and aggression, according to a study reported [last week]in the journal Current Biology. Chimpanzees were the only nonhuman primate species known to hunt monkeys, and scientists had surmised that the jaunts were an elaborate male-bonding exercise. Bonobos are the closest cousins of chimps and humans, but because bonobo society is dominated by females, researchers had figured that their peaceful demeanour made them disinclined to hunt prey larger than squirrels, rodents and duikers, a small antelope species."
HOW TO BE A VIRTUAL GENT
Some tips on manners while using social-networking websites, from a GQ magazine compilation:
In general, someone should be your friend before they're your "friend."
Please: No updates on who or what you're feeling.
Rather than lash out every time someone tries to poke or zombie-bite you or subject you to a personality quiz, just say you're not interested ... then delete them from your friends list.
Be certain that your virtual presence is always smaller than your actual presence in the lives of people you are really friends with.
Not everything that happens to you is blog worthy.
Don't write anything on somebody's Facebook wall you wouldn't say in the presence of everyone on that person's friends list.
WHO WILL BE OBESE?
Obese people may owe their excess weight not to an undue love of food, but to brains that find eating less rewarding, research has indicated. Scientists have found that a blunted response to food in the reward centres of the brain can predict which young women are likely to gain weight, and that this may in turn be linked to genetics, The Times of London reports. A U.S. study suggests that some people may become obese because they need more food than usual to activate the brain's reward pathways, and thus to sate their appetites. Lead researcher, Eric Stice, of the University of Texas and the Oregon Research Institute, said: "This research reveals that obese people may have fewer dopamine receptors, so they overeat to compensate for this reward deficit."
THOUGHT DU JOUR
"In the usual (though certainly not in every) public decision on economic policy, the choice is between courses that are almost equally good or equally bad. It is the narrowest decisions that are most ardently debated. If the world is lucky enough to enjoy peace, it may even one day make the discovery, to the horror of doctrinaire free-enterprisers and doctrinaire planners alike, that what is called capitalism and what is called socialism are both capable of working quite well."
- John Kenneth Galbraith, 1949