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One of the most important things about Christmas is giving. We want to choose the perfect gift for everyone on our list, so we often get them a gift card, so they can pick out what they want. But a philosophy professor says it’s better to buy them a BAD gift, instead.

Philosophy professor Steven Gimbel says, “The gift card?sends the message that happiness is to be found in acquiring the things you want, not in being close to people who care about you?”

Art credit: freeimages.co.uk
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Both Denver Airport and London Heathrow have been closed due to extreme weather conditions, and both US national travel and travel worldwide have been severely affected. United Airlines alone has cancelled 2,000 flights, and manytravelers are not expected to be accomodated in Denver untilnext Wednesday. At Heathrow, dense fog has repeatedly shutdown the airport for extended periods, forcing the cancellation of over three thousand flights so far.

Denver Airport is scheduled to re-open fully on Friday, andtravelers stranded in freezing concourses without power haveresorted to making shelters out of cardboard boxes. Limitedoperations will begin today.
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When big business mixes with medicine and/or public policy, the results can be good?or disastrous. In two recent cases, having to do with breast cancer in women and AIDS in men, it has been both.

In 2003, breast cancer incidence in the United States dropped sharply, and researchers now think that this decline may largely be due to the fact that millions of older women stopped using hormone replacement therapy (HRT) in 2002. Another study has been stopped early due to preliminary results indicating that medical circumcision of men reduces their risk of acquiring HIV during heterosexual intercourse by 53%.
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Feet, rather than fists, are the most dangerous bodily weapon. When researchers looked at the records of 25,000 patients in Wales who were hospitalized due to violent altercations, they found that for those people who had been attacked with someone’s feet were the most likely to be injured. This is valuable knowledge for men who fear being attacked by stronger bullies.

Almost two thirds of the patients studied reported being attacked by just one assailant, and around one in five injuries were inflicted using a weapon of some sort, about equally divided between sharp and blunt objects. The use of weapons was significantly more likely to cause serious injury than the use of body parts, so your feet won’t be much of a help if the other person has a weapon.
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