The adverse effects of prolonged sitting are thought to be mainly owing to reduced metabolic and vascular health. Prolonged sitting has been shown to disrupt metabolic function, resulting in increased plasma triglyceride levels, decreased levels of high-density lipoprotein cholesterol, and decreased insulin sensitivity, which appear to be at least partially mediated by changes in lipoprotein lipase activity. It has also been suggested that sedentary behavior affects carbohydrate metabolism through changes in muscle glucose transporter protein content. Results from molecular biology and medical chemistry studies have suggested that physical activity and sedentary behavior have different influences on the body, supporting their independent effects on health. Our findings suggested not only an association between sitting and all-cause mortality that was independent of physical activity but, because the findings persisted after adjustment and stratification for BMI, one that also appears to be independent of BMI.

At least in North America. And there’s the rub. The studies quoted here–their underlying data and ontologies and cultural realities–are absolutely Anglo-Saxon in orientation. Marche cannot disentangle himself from the very American mythos of autonomy. And perhaps he doesn’t want to. The article begins as a criticism of how Facebook amplifies loneliness and concludes with a call for solitude. Solitude is not the same as loneliness, of course; in fact, Marche makes precisely this point near the beginning of the article. But one senses behind the writing a human being who seeks the pleasure of both. “We are lonely,” Marche observes, “because we want to be lonely.”

There are many quotable passages. I’ve highlighted my favourite ones in this Evernote clip:

But I don’t always want to be typing or thumbing on my iPad. And, sadly, it doesn’t look like there are any plans to create a 2Do web interface. However, 2Do syncs with a service called Toodledo, which does have a web interface. (A very clunky one..)

Fortunately, you can make any website (including Toodledo) look way better using an addon called Stylish. And so I set out trying to duplicate simulate evoke the 2Do interface.

Click here to install the style (and the Stylish addon if you don’t have it yet).

To fully evoke the 2Do look and feel, you should…

• Use the latest version of Firefox (version 11 and above) or Chrome, or another browser that supports CSS 3 and the Stylish addon.
• Purchase a pro version of Toodledo so that you can show subtasks. It was about 14 USD a year last time I checked.
• Set Toodledo to display subtasks as Indented (Show > Subtasks : Indented)

It’s not perfect, but until an official 2Do web client is developed, this will keep me happy. Let me know if you find it useful!

Before styling

After styling

It is worth closely reading these three. Overall, I am convinced that dissent and debate are useful for generating more ideas than a kind of pure, uncritical open-endedness. However, one important idea from the rebuttal article is that “the intention of brainstorming is not to eliminate critique, but simply to postpone it.” This is significant. Brainstorming is not the only (or even necessarily the most effective) tool in the arsenal. And these tools can be wielded in quick succession, or even concurrently, so that they can work in the most optimal way.

Something else bothered me about the study. The experiments were conducted in the US and France. In the US study, 265 volunteers participated, all of whom were the same sex (women). Eighty-five percent of the 207 participants in the French study were women. The groups were segregated into same sex groups, presumably to factor out any effects of gendered criticism. It’s a fairly contrived set of circumstances. In most of the groups I deal with, there is usually a diverse mix of genders, and I find that I notice that gender, gender relations, and gender performances play a significant role in the way that people dish out and receive negative feedback. One can only wonder whether the same sex setup might have had an effect in the outcome. Ideally they should have had at least one group composed of mixed sexes. I find it surprising that there was no attempt in the discussion of the results to at least explain their decision to segregate via sex and to hypothesize how this might have affected the outcomes..

The rebuttal article also makes a great point that the “debate group” was actually given both the instructions to brainstorm and to criticize ideas. I think the overall lesson from this is that to generate ideas effectively, all rules should be made explicit. This idea is in fact borne by one of the findings of the study: a group that was given no instructions other than to come up with ideas (no mention of whether criticism was encouraged or discouraged).

I remember reading somewhere that in psychology, researchers particularly often aim to arrive at conclusions that contradict common sense or very well-established findings. The more surprising the claim, the more cachet it potentially has. It is worth keeping this in the back of our minds when reading research reports in psychology.

Just for the record, one of my favourite writers of all time, Kurt Vonnegut, says “no“. I’m beginning to wonder if he was right.

MAN: Vangie, call my girlfriend.
VANGIE: Girlfriend? Weh.
MAN: Yes.
VANGIE: Yes?! Yes ka diyan! Hello! Boom pak, confeermed! Kasama mo kaya si Jun-jun kahapon! Magkaholding hands kayo! Nagkiss pa nga kayo, e!

WOMAN: “How much sugar do I put?”
VANGIE: “Ubusin mo na yan! Ayan. Tapos lagyan mo ng …. ketchup. Taktak mo pa yung ketchup. Taktak mo pa! Lagyan mo ng hatdog! Tapos paghalu-haluin mo lang yan, pasok na sa banga!! O diba masaya? Sarap!”

In the the interview, the folks at Gung Ho discussed the “not so subtle messages” embedded in the Vangie videos. “Fix your (own) life,” Vangie instructs. Instead of doing your bidding, Vangie might decide to crack the whip, forcing you to take personal responsibility for your needs and your actions. Need someone to interpret a weather forecast for you? Do it yourself. Are you cheating on your partner? Better come clean. Are you in the closet? Try coming out. (Incidentally, the actor who plays Makati-type guy in the closet is super cute.)

Incidentally, my brilliant friend and anthropologist Pamela Cajilig just wrote a sharp analysis of the Vangie videos and how they address locality, technology, and power relations in the Philippine context.

Here are the Vangie videos so far.

Computation and embodied experience

In this talk, I discuss some of the research currently being done in the Art, Performance, and Technology Laboratory at Simon Fraser University’s School of Interactive Arts and Technology. We deploy digital tools to investigate some of the hidden cognitive processes that performers and audiences rely on; we develop artificially intelligent systems that explores questions around cognition, consciousness, and creativity; we investigate how the embodied experiences can be used to design and evaluate digital technologies. Finally, I talk about my particular research, which focuses on liquid dance, a genre of dance that emerged from the North American underground electronic dance music scene in the 90s. Liquid dancers have been cultivating a particular approach to human movement that is sophisticated, expressive, conceptually and corporeally well-defined, and deeply theorized by many of its members. (Translation: they are incredible dancers and you should come to this talk just to see the videos I’m going to show.)

And if you’re wondering what wasak/wsk is, join the club. I see it as a contemporary, Filipino relative of Dada. Lourd de Veyra would probably disagree.

During the all-candidates debate last week at Langara College, I worked with other members of RJ’s campaign team to make students, staff, and visitors at Langara aware of the upcoming elections by appropriating my newest, coolest internet purchase: a remote-controlled mini-blimp in the shape of a clownfish. Here it is in action:

Cool as this toy is, the problem is that the novelty wears off eventually. But then I realized that this was a perfect campaign tool to grab people’s attention!

As you can imagine, we got lots of attention from everyone. I think the coolest moment of the day, though, was when a sharply-dressed woman who looked about fifteen years older than me came up to me and complimented us on our election tactic. When I asked her if she had decided who she was voting for, she said, “Yes, I have, but I’m voting for the NPA. But you know, the important thing is to get people out to vote.” It was a warm, fuzzy, cross-partisan moment.

The feeling of goodwill had faded by the time, a couple of days later, someone brought to the attention of the COPE campaign team a flier that was being distributed by NPA’s Suzanne Anton. The flier was innocuous-looking enough; in fact, it captured what looked to be another warm and fuzzy moment between Anton and two super-cute Filipino kids. What was wrong with it? I’ll let the COPE press release speak for itself.

Anton Uses Photo of Children in Campaign Literature Without Parental Consent

Vancouver- NPA Mayoral candidate Suzanne Anton has sparked anger from two Filipino families after she used their daughters’ faces in her campaign literature without the parents’ consent.

The leaflet features Suzanne Anton posing with two Filipino girls at a cultural event.  The parents however, were never consulted about the picture being taken, or published.  The photo is featured in the NPA’s promotional material, and is being distributed by Anton herself, across the city.

“Doesn’t she have her own supporters to take pictures with?” asked Cliff Belgica, the father of one of the girls featured in the photo. “Why does she need to steal our children?”

“It’s not right,” he continued. “We were never even asked. It is very shameful behavior – especially for someone who wants to be mayor.”

“We demand an apology from Anton herself, and assurance that this leaflet will no longer be handed out,” added Belgica.

The family is seeking legal counsel on the matter and is considering legal action.   “We want to ensure that the NPA doesn’t use any other children or families for their material, when they aren’t aware of it, and do not want to be associated with the them,” said Belgica.

-30-

Media Contact: Mae Price – 778.986.5863 – media[at]cope[dot]bc[dot]ca

Anton has been reported to have apologized for the flier, but the slip in judgment is pretty eyebrow-raising.

Participants are united by a common grievance: that a small group of corporations hold massive amounts of wealth and decision-making power, while the majority of the population suffers from enormous debt, unemployment and unaffordable health care and housing. The movement still lacks concrete demands, but protesters seem to pride themselves more in the process than the outcome. General assemblies, where decisions about the occupation are made through consensus, are held twice a day.

The movement “challenge[s] corporate greed, corruption, and the collusion between corporate power and government… and oppose[s] systemic inequality, militarization, environmental destruction, and the erosion of civil liberties and human rights.”

Over the past few days I’ve been asking my (middle-class, university educated) friends and colleagues whether they were going to participate in Occupy Vancouver. I was surprised that many of those that I assumed would go weren’t planning to, and some of the reasons that I got were interesting: “It makes sense to occupy Wall Street, but Canada is different from the USA, and we have a stable economy… Vancouver is a great place to live, what’s wrong with it?… It seems that movement is led mostly by white men… We’re already on illegally occupied Coast Salish land… I’m not really the protesting type even though I think the movement is important…” Some of the objections were general and based on not having been part of the first general assembly.

I have are four main reasons for participating in Occupy Vancouver.

Reason 1: We get to decide what the movement is about

When I attended the General Assembly Meeting for the Occupy Vancouver movement at the atrium of the Woodwards complex on October 8, I had no idea what to expect. I just came to check it out. Although there were “only” 200 people there, I was moved by the attempt to build the movement from the ground-up through consensus, which, to be used with a large group of people, needed the technology of the human microphone. (And what a cool technology it is! Here’s Joseph Stiglitz using (and being amused by) the human microphone technique at Occupy Wall Street.)

The most contentious issue from the meeting was what the statement of unity for the Occupy Vancouver movement would be. The facilitators of the meeting wanted to postpone the discussion until the day of the protest, and emphasized that the agenda should be built from the ground up starting from the day of the protest. The audience was divided on this. I was also apprehensive. But now, after talking to my friends, I realize that this is probably a sound move, because it opens possibilities for people (or at least the people I have been communicated with) to stake their claim in the process.

Reason 2: There is space within the Occupy movement to link the excesses of capitalism with histories of colonization

During the general assembly, people took pains to acknowledge the fact that we Vancouver is illegally occupied native territory. For instance, trying to offer a statement that everyone could get behind on, Sara Kendall spoke up during the assembly, and made the point that because Vancouver is Coast Salish land that is illegally occupied, it’s problematic to talk about “occupying the occupiers”, so why don’t we talk about kicking out the occupiers instead and rally behind a theme of “Decolonizing Vancouver”?

I brought up the idea with an SFU student who subsequently set up a Facebook group for students and staff at schools, colleges, and universities. He asked me to clarify what the notion of decolonizing Vancouver would have to do with, say, the Occupy Wall Street movement and its ideas around fiscal prudence. I warned him that I wasn’t a political theorist, but this is the way I have come to understand this problem:

Many things exist in Vancouver (or for that matter in Canada and elsewhere in the world) are the result of some force (often through the instruments of war and policy) claiming the right to destroy, take over, and replace existing things, often without the consent of the people who used to be there before. These things could be physical (as in human-made structures) or abstract (ways of doing things, exchanging goods and services, or relating with the environment).

The concept of decolonizing can be applied in many ways, but to me it it boils down to undoing the harm done by the unilateral and often unlawful forces of colonization.

Much of what we have has come to accept as normal or uncontroversial in daily life is linked to the values propagated by the powers-at-large. Capitalism can be seen as instrument of colonization in that it reflects the colonizers’ attitudes towards the attainment of wealth, the value of labor, the accumulation of capital, property, and theft.

Reason 3: Vancouver and Canada are great places to live… but they aren’t perfect

Income disparity in the Vancouver is one of the largest in Canada. The “extreme unaffordability across all housing types” housing in Vancouver compelled the Royal Bank of Canada to place it in “a class by itself” in a August 2011 report on housing in Canada.

But there are even more compelling reasons. Check this Facebook album out on the ten reasons why we should “Occupy” Canada.

I am 71 and well off. But the economic woes of others impacts my well being. We are linked to one another --- and only as strong as the weakest among us. I too am the 99%.

Reason 4: We are all connected

This is paramount. What happens in Wall Street affects us all, not only pragmatically—in that the global financial system affects the flow of goods and services and impacts employment trends everywhere—but also on a human, empathetic scale: The well-being of others is something that I care about.

My sense of who I am isn’t embedded in just my own body, but it is instead distributed within the bodies of those in my community. Some people have more bits of me than others, but I think we all have bits of ourselves in other people, whether we like it or not, whether we acknowledge it or not. To borrow a metaphor from contemporary computing: the data that matters to me is not located on a single computer, but it is distributed in the cloud.

Participating in Occupy Vancouver is also my way of telling forming solidarity with other Occupy movements: “I have heard what you are going through, and I am here to tell Vancouver, Canada, and the world that I support your struggles.”

Getting Involved

The protest will start at 10 am on October 15th at the Art Gallery. Some groups will branch out quickly from there to camp out in other areas of the city. Vancouver doesn’t really have a financial district, but there are places/buildings that represent economic and political power.

Here’s the Facebook group for the protest. There’s also a Facebook group for students and staff at schools, colleges, and universities.

If you’re on Facebook and you want to come to the event, please confirm your attendance. You can also sign up to help out with any of the committees by visiting their website and looking at their list of committees. Email occvanwebteam@gmail.com with your name and contact email if you wish to join a committee.

(The general assembly. October 8. Original image from The Province. That’s me and my friend Yasser.)

Some keywords are: human rights, democracy, Philippines, women, youth, discrimination, marginalization, exploitation, oppression, expression, creativity, communication, leadership, advocacy, Angeles City, Olongapo City.

To give you an idea, here’s the introduction of the proposal:

The proposed project aims to empower marginalized women and youth in two sites in the Philippines through three linked strategies: enhancing their awareness of and reflectiveness around human rights and democratic processes; supporting their ability to creatively communicate their lived experiences; and capacitating their ability to speak on and advocate for human rights and democratic processes within and outside their respective communities. Each strategy is translated into specific objectives that are tangible and measurable; each objective is defined by a set of activities. Ultimately, the project aims to enable marginalized youth to tell their stories and communicate how their rights-claiming posture has helped them overcome their difficulties, in the hope of inspiring others.

In consultation with local community leaders and school administrators, WeDpro would selected  a total of 30 women leaders, out-of-school, and in-school youth from urban poor communities in two cities—Olongapo City in the province of Zambales, and Angeles City in the province of Pampanga— to participate in discussions and guided reflections around human rights. Twenty individuals would then be selected to participate in storytelling and digital media creation workshops which would enable them to express their experiences of human rights violations and communicate how their rights-claiming posture have helped them overcome their difficulties, in the hope of inspiring others. A leaders’ pool would be developed from among the participants; they would be capacitated to do speaking tours in the project sites and other areas in the National Capital Region to bring the message of why it is important to defend human rights and democratic processes.

Thanks!