Warning: Labels

According to them, the institute for public policy research (ippr) is "the UK's leading progressive think tank". The emphasis must be squarely on "tank" judging by this article, to which I was directed by the alert editors of TravelMole, an online travel trade rag. According to "new research", the government should "introduce cigarette-style health warnings on all advertising for air travel, holidays that include flights, and at airports". Warnings? like what, you wonder? "Large and clearly visible warnings such as Flying Causes Climate Change". I kid thee not - click on the link (for blog novices, that's the underlined words "this article" in the second sentence, above) and you'll see mark speaketh not with forked tongue. Apparently, all that thinking is causing severe damage to cerebral cortices at ippr. By their logic, we would have warnings on pretty much everything - after all, that healthy looking can of baked beans arrived at your grocery store courtesy of a truck that was spewing exhaust from an engine running on, *gasp* fossil fuels. Better stick signs on all cars in car showrooms, eBay car ads and craigslist, too. Oh, and what about crematoriums (crematoria?) - Cremation Causes Climate Change. Got a ring to it, you gotta admit!

What is this "new research" that is claiming the effectiveness of warnings, anyway? Ah well, you see, large written warnings "prompted more smokers to attempt to quit" than smaller ones. How do they know? Ah, yes, more advanced psychological testing has shown "The percentage of smokers who noticed warning labels ‘often’ or ‘very often’ increased from 42 per cent in 2002 to 81 per cent in 2003". So there you are, you see, the smokers notice the warnings more when the warnings are bigger! Thus showing smokers to have an average intelligence greater than ippr employees. Further diligent experiments revealed - wait for it - "Around 90 per cent of smokers and 70 per cent of non-smokers recognised a change to health warnings on cigarette packs just weeks after introduction." Goodness me - it only took a few weeks to notice that the warning signs got bigger! And the non-smokers, who presumably never buy cigarettes, noticed it too - that is smart! Now, some of you may be wondering deep down whether anyone actually quit smoking as a result of the warnings, after the weeks of getting used to the bigger labels. After all, ..er... wasn't that the intention of the labels (mere general knowledge of the serious health risks not being sufficient deterrent - go figure)? Good news, folks: "13 per cent of smokers indicated that they were less inclined to purchase cigarettes as a result of the new warnings". What, they bum them off friends instead, now, do they? But there's more good news: "Within weeks of introduction 71 per cent of smokers had claimed to have discussed the warnings and this level of interest was proved not to have waned after four months". Ha! Four months! What do you say to that, then, you, you sceptics? You want more proof? OK, fasten your seat belts: "26 per cent of smokers who ‘intended to stop at some stage’ felt that the warnings increased their motivation to quit....8.6 per cent of smokers said they were smoking less as a result of the warnings. Only 0.7 per cent said they were smoking more". Oops, how did that "smoking more" thing get in there, oh well, never mind, I'm sure you're now entirely convinced, as the ippr is, that the labels on fag packets worked, and if they worked there, they will surely work when you see those words staring up at you from your airline ticket: Flying Causes Climate Change. (don't tell the ippr folks we'll be completely e-ticket by 2010).

Just a word of warning about warnings, however - we should not expose the elderly to them. According to the folks at Action on Smoking and Health, "older smokers have reported that they start to become afraid of the warnings after seeing them on cigarette packets every day". (And you thought "older smokers" was an oxymoron!). We certainly don't want those flight detail emails to strike fear in the perhaps shaky hearts of our elderly frequent fliers !

Leaps

What's the smallest Leap in the world? 2 points if you said "quantum leap" (aka quantum jump). Although the phrase is sometime used in business circles to mean a big, perhaps orthogonal change, in physics it's the smallest leap possible, when an electron "leaps" from one energy "shell" to another in an atom (emitting or absorbing a photon in the process, a photon being the light quantum proposed by Einstein). Strictly speaking though, it doesn't seem to "leap" at all - rather, it disappears from one place and instantaneously appears in another. The ball of quantum physics was started rolling by Planck in 1900, as a solution to what was then an annoying little problem called black body radiation. Planck had no idea that he solution would unleash the most mysterious yet productive theory ever; in fact he had a hard time accepting some of its implications, as did Einstein.

So what's the largest leap in the world? No points for leapfrog, one for leap of faith, and congratulations if you said "leap to faith". This leaping concept is due to Kierkegaard, and again his leaps are "instantaneous" - for example, he describes Adam's leap from being sinless to sinful as moving directly from one state to the other, never possessing both qualities. The leap to faith is where one similarly leaps from being without faith to being with faith (and becoming a Christian). That's why it's not a leap "of " faith - that can only happen when you already have faith! So why is this giant leap necessary, according to K? Because Christianity is full of paradoxes - one of the chief being that Jesus was both totally Man and totally God. Wait a sec, that sounds familiar - ah yes, quantum physics, which asserts that light (or electro-magnetic radiation in general) is both totally a wave and totally a particle. Perhaps it's no wonder Einstein denied he was an atheist!

BirthWrite - Beeswaxing

It's been a busy week for birthday's - my daughter was 5 this week, and we parents faced the Dilemma of the Bees. The first B is for Barbie and whether they are suitable for young girls. We think they are ok. Yes few female homo sapiens actually possess pegs of such proportions, but this seems a harmless exageration, and the doll itself is actually rather bland and generic - perfect for a child whose main interest is dressing and undressing something. And the clothes to do so are roughly the kind that law-abiding, ordinary women might wear. Compare that with the next Bee on offer - Bratz. Bratz goes way beyond dress-up. Bratz come with lips, eyes, attitude and clothes that make Courtney Love look like she's off to have tea with the Queen. Their web site says it all - as the Flash code is loading, the as-you-wait message is "please wait...it takes time to look this good".

We won't be buying Bratz for our Beloved. We're worried about the killer Bees - body image, and, naturally, Boys. Five is way too early to be concerned with these bees - but that's the point. What the Bratz and their ilk threaten to do is to prematurely have young girls concerned about how ideal their bodies are and starting to see boys as something other than classmates who like Spiderman. I think perhaps we should give our girls the chance to grow up first, and as they do, experience the wonders of the world beyond bodies and boys. That's our goal for our girl, anyway. In the meantime, we're boycotting Bratz (and Flash players!).

BirthWrite

I have just been informed that Paul McCartney is 64 (remember When I'm Sixty-Four?), Elton John is 60 (remember Sixty Years On) and my kid brother Richard is 50 (remember when he was a little freckly kid with curly hair?). I'm trying not to panic, after all Winnie the Pooh is 80 and doesn't look a day over 56. And Roger Daltrey is still singing in public.

I should look on the bright side and offer some words of wisdom to my sibling on this auspicious occasion. And if I had any, I would, of course, offer them up forthwith; instead I have this:

* remember that while time marches inexorably onward, your girth doesn't have to
* you are no longer "Richard Hopkins", you are "Matthew's Dad" (soon to be also "Sarah's Dad"). This will ensure eternal youthenasia.
* I'll write more often if you will!

Happy Birthday, Kid! (next thing you know, they will be telling me my sister's 40!).