If [Jaroslav] Flegr is right, the “latent” parasite may be quietly tweaking the connections between our neurons, changing our response to frightening situations, our trust in others, how outgoing we are, and even our preference for certain scents. And that’s not all. He also believes that the organism contributes to car crashes, suicides, and mental disorders such as schizophrenia.
…
Schizophrenia did not rise in prevalence until the latter half of the 18th century, when for the first time people in Paris and London started keeping cats as pets. The so-called cat craze began among “poets and left-wing avant-garde Greenwich Village types,” says Torrey, but the trend spread rapidly—and coinciding with that development, the incidence of schizophrenia soared.
…
In a 2011 study of 20 European countries, the national suicide rate among women increased in direct proportion to the prevalence of the latent Toxo infection in each nation’s female population.

… but probably not…

Indoor cats pose no threat, he says, because they don’t carry the parasite. As for outdoor cats, they shed the parasite for only three weeks of their life, typically when they’re young and have just begun hunting. During that brief period, Flegr simply recommends taking care to keep kitchen counters and tables wiped clean.

However, it is another potential reason to be terrified of your own mind. And your cat.

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1. Linkwad.
2. Here, kitty kitty kitty.
3. “It rubbed off. From friction.”

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3. Linkwad.

• All together now, “Waaaaaaah!”
• I think this is a bit of false equivalence, as Iowa doesn’t currently have the kind of repressive voter ID law that he’s complaining about (That said, voter ID laws are transparently bullshit).
• If alternative energy weren’t a culture war touchstone, faced with this kind of information about oil (and gas), people would agree that we need other energy sources. But it is, so we don’t.
• More awful stories from North Korean defectors.

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3. How to win friends and influence elections.

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2. The conservative, civil midwest.
3. I am only slightly embarrassed to be from Iowa.*

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• Android fragmentation visualized. The lesson here: buy a nice phone with a clean Android install, like, say, a Nexus One (Except you can’t buy these new anymore. Pick up a Nexus S or wait for the Galaxy Nexus, I guess–or just buy an iPhone).
• Climate skeptic accidentally buttresses climate change data.
• I’m with Doug Farrar–Penn State absolutely deserves the NCAA’s “death penalty” for covering up Jerry Sandusky’s abuse. I’d also just like to point out that, despite plenty of evidence of the Catholic Church protected/still protects sexual predators, I haven’t seen any bishops in handcuffs. Also, his autobiography was named Touched. So…
• I saw Louis CK on Sunday. As usual, he was funny, insightful, and earnest (Won’t spoil anything–the set is going to be his next special). Here’s Alyssa’s writeup.

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3. Delicious.

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• We are the 99 Percent tumblr.
• While CEO pay rises, thanks to repeated “above-average” contracts (via Yglesias). When San Jose police and fire unions did this, city government basically went bankrupt.
• The short of this long article: forests store carbon, slowing global warming. Global warming kills forests, and could accelerate.
• What? Racism’s not a thing anymore, though!

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Here’s “Minister of Longitude.”

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