When I first heard accounts of film producer Harvey Weinstein’s predatory behavior, my mind devised punishments fitting for Renaissance Europe or the film A Clockwork Orange: Cover his face with a shame mask widely used centuries ago in Germany; shock his frontal lobes so that he’d start empathizing with the women he’s preyed on. When we learn … Continue reading »
Stopping college football is a moral imperative
The University of California, Berkeley must stop systematically and irrevocably damaging the human brain. It is unethical. Cal should cease supporting American football. Earlier this year we learned that 110 out of 111 former American football players had evidence of chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE). Early last week we learned that young boys playing American football … Continue reading »
The false media focus on violence: If it bleeds it still leads
On Sunday, August 27, in downtown Berkeley, I witnessed thousands of protesters raising their voices against a planned white supremacist “Patriot Prayer” rally. In my decades as a documentary filmmaker of activism and now an academic studying movements and media, it was one of the most positive, diverse and unifying gatherings I ever experienced. While … Continue reading »
What is your purpose in the face of white supremacy?
Yesterday, I published an essay in UC Berkeley’s Greater Good magazine about how the science of purpose can help explain the rise of white supremacy. Writing that piece led me to explore my own sense of purpose — which the research helped me see is tightly linked to my identity. I am a writer and … Continue reading »
Senate Republicans’ health bill especially hurts the lowest-income Californians
Co-authored by Ken Jacobs, chair of the UC Berkeley Labor Center The health bill released by Senate Republicans today would be devastating to low-income Californians and their access to health coverage. While the proposed Senate bill, the Better Care Reconciliation Act, is largely similar to the American Health Care Act passed by the U.S. House … Continue reading »
Energy drinks are killing young people. It’s time to stop that.
Co-authored by Wendi Gosliner, a project scientist at the Nutrition Policy Institute. Last week, a 16-year-old tragically lost his life after consuming an energy drink, a soda and a latte — drinks routinely consumed by and often intensively marketed to youth — all within a few hours. According to the coroner, the boy’s heart simply … Continue reading »
Gamification for global health
Gamification is popping up everywhere in our daily lives, with applications to management, commerce and health. Why? Because the evidence suggests that it works. Now it’s being studied in an HIV prevention program for young gay and bisexual men.
The sick logic behind the Republican health care plan
The AHCA would not only change how many people have health insurance, it would also affect who has health insurance and at what cost. The bill would make coverage more affordable for those who are younger and healthier—and prohibitively expensive for many who are poorer, older, or have pre-existing conditions, according to an analysis by the Congressional Budget Office
This NIH program is crucial to global health — and its future is in danger
Co-authored with Madhukar Pai, MD, a Canada Research Chair in Epidemiology and Global Health at McGill University in Montreal. A little-noticed cut in President Trump’s proposed “budget blueprint to make American great again” would eliminate the Fogarty International Center, which is part of the National Institutes of Health. That would be a big mistake for the … Continue reading »
‘Does what I study even matter now?’ Yes, it does. Here’s why.
Every once in a while, I have an existential crisis. I question my career, my relevance, my purpose. Why, I ask myself, am I doing research when there are so many more immediately important things going on? Why do I agonize over articles that so very few people read? Who cares about our ivory tower … Continue reading »
Brazil: Zika, Chika, coup d’état
The Brazil Olympic games just ended their two-week run. Cal athletes were well represented, and on Berkeley’s campus we are celebrating Cal student Ryan Murphy’s third gold medal in Rio de Janeiro. Yet, as we cheer on one of our own and take part in the pageantry, we read about the alleged mugging of another Olympic medalist, … Continue reading »
Is protecting public health now a partisan issue?
Congress seems to be unable to come up with funding for an effort to combat the Zika virus. Instead, congressional leaders told the government to use existing funding, so it has been forced to divert hundreds of millions of dollars from fighting ebola. (You remember that Congress was completely frenzied about the risk of Ebola … Continue reading »
Two steps nearer a football-free campus
Eventually, hell has frozen over. Jeff Miller, the National Football League senior vice president for health and safety policy, has told members of Congress that playing American football can lead to chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE). The NFL has switched from the criticizing the research of medical scientists who demonstrated that playing football can scramble a … Continue reading »
King Henry VIII and the Super Bowl
Henry VIII, famous for abandoning the Catholic Church and marrying six times, liked jousting. Jousting is martial sport where two horsemen in armor gallop towards one another at breakneck speed holding wooden lances. The aim is to strike your opponent and if possible unseat him. Henry was concussed several times, the most severe battering occurring 1536 … Continue reading »
Structural racism in Flint, Michigan
On Jan. 16, 2016, President Barack Obama signed an order declaring a state of emergency in Flint, Michigan.[i] It was not because of a tornado or hurricane, flooding or landslides, as was the case in South Carolina or Mississippi a few weeks before, or any other natural disaster.[ii] Rather, it was a response to a … Continue reading »
A history of health and health inequalities
The increasing delay of death for Americans over the last century or so has been extensive and consequential, probably in many profound ways that we do not fully appreciate. In the late 19th century, a newborn white boy would be expected to live, on average, to about 40; now, such a newborn can be expected … Continue reading »
Special guest lecture: ‘Is a sustainable global economy possible?’
Like every university, UC Berkeley is home to an intellectual chasm that makes the Grand Canyon look like Strawberry Creek. Classical economists teach a world where economic growth is sacred, perpetual and always good. Those in the life sciences and some physical sciences, such as energy and astronomy, understand that our world is small and finite. Faculty … Continue reading »
Does stress reduce empathy?
On Monday, the UC Berkeley Greater Good Science Center published a research brief, “How Anxiety Reduces Empathy,” that provoked some conversation and disagreement among readers. “I thought empathy increases stress and anxiety,” wrote one person — especially, she believed, if we empathize with people in a bad situation that we don’t have the power to … Continue reading »
The road not taken: How the migrant crisis in Europe could have been ameliorated
I was visiting my family in Kent in southeast England. I rounded a bend and there was a queue of cars and trucks. Obviously an accident. I bumped over the median, read my map, and found another route. Another vehicle queue as far as I could see. Another accident? No. This was a tiny part of … Continue reading »
Good science gone wrong?
Most scientists want to tell the truth. We want to help people by answering important questions, and sharing what we learn. But the research endeavor is big and messy. And as we’ve learned from the climate change and HIV/AIDS debates, there will always be folks who favor controversy, dogma, and press coverage over scientific consensus. … Continue reading »