Helmets, flashing lights, and soy

[da]

Two pieces of interesting bike research, and one nutjob:

Seen via a comment elsewhere via signsoflife: http://community.livejournal.com/bikes/182986.html points to research showing that flashing bike lights may draw people's eyes to them, causing car drivers to steer involuntarily into them. What a pain. Googling "the moth effect" suggests there's evidence that it affects different people differently, and I'm on the fence about switching my tail-light to solid-red instead of flashing. Needs more research.

Another bike-related bit, a researcher at the University of Bath has found that bicyclists who wear helmets are crowded by cars, more so than bare-headed bicyclists. That's what we get for looking more competent.

Speaking of competence, via The Journal of Improbable Research, "proof" that soy is making kids gay. I can't follow his leap from isoflavones to super-strong estrogen, but maybe that's what makes him a NUTJOB.

Comments

[dr-tectonic.livejournal.com]

Plus there's all that evidence from Asian countries where they've consumed lots of tofu and soy products for centuries! Why, just look at their... uh... reproductive rates? All the gay men in China and Japan? How non-sexist and homophilic Asian cultures are?

Hmm...

[da-lj.livejournal.com]

Hee hee. I posted my comment to kraig before I saw yours.

Though I suppose just because a culture was full of soy-feminized men, it wouldn't necessarily be non-sexist/homophillic. Maybe they'd merely be less likely to have to prove their masculinity by driving huge gas-guzzling muscle-cars.

...Hm.

[dr-tectonic.livejournal.com]

It could make for an interesting sci-fi short story. How *would* a culture be different if a large fraction of the male populace was feminized by some endocriniological bugaboo? Or vice-versa?

[da-lj.livejournal.com]

I'm sure I've read something like that; I'll get back to you if I can dredge it from my memory...