The sunshine is streaming through the windows of our sun room. There are wispy white clouds high above. The wind rocks both the pine and leafless deciduous trees. Emerald Lake's surface shimmers. A large puffy female cardinal sits on a branch directly in my view. There is an aroma of split pea soup simmering on the stove with the ham bone from this Christmas past. Tick tock the Grandfather clock marks the passing of time.
I was reading the Wall Street Journal this morning and had to pause to get my Webster's American Dictionary College Edition to look up a word before continuing to read an article. I had to pause again and then again looking up words to finish the article: animas; miscreatant; heuristic. Having finished section A of WSJ I went on line and read a New York Times article on the most important determinates, WORLD WIDE, of long life and good health. Whether it is England, Denmark, Sweden, the USA, the number one determinate of Long Life and Good Health is: Education. Education is far out infront of the second determinate, socail networking, and these two are ahead of wealth, universal health insurance, race, stress and a host of others factors. The effects of early education is the most important determinent even when other factors are added later on in life such as: wealth and univeral health insurance. Modifiers to the education determinent are prenatal and early years of life nutrition and cigarette smoking. Education seems to provide the ability to Problem Solve life's challenges and allows us to anticipate the future through delayed gratification.
Interesting, social networking is a distant second. Relavance? I am reminded about another article I have read some time ago, having a pet in a nursing home, increases the life span and general wellbeing of the pet owner. So, I am thinking about my own recent loss of Shag and how she was involved in my social networking. Like, the people I met walking Shag on our morning two mile "constitution" talking to people and relating most days. How she required me to be mindful of how and where she was on a minute by minute basis, concious or unconciously aware; long range planning for her care, feeding and wellbeing.
I am proud of you all and enjoy the feeling that encouraging you to higher education is likely to promote a long and healthy life for you. I am reminded that myown social network involves you, and that the loss of Shag this week rearranges that social network.
2 comments:
Hi dad. It's interesting that education and health are strongly correlated. We need to be careful how we interpret that information though. First, that doesn't necessarily mean that education leads to good health: it could be the opposite: health leads to better education, or that there is a third "hidden variable" which leads to both. As with many of these things, I think the causality goes in both directions, and that there are also many hidden variables which probably weren't controlled for.
But more importantly, I think its important to remember that education increases our probability of being healthy not because the education in itself makes us healthy, but because it makes us able to make more healthy choices for our life. It is still our responsibility as individuals (as opposed to statistics) to make those healthy choices. This may seem obvious, but I often find I have an tendency to believe that being in a particular subset of the population, in and of itself has a direct effect on me, but that effect is actually indirect and statistical in nature.
Anyways, that's great to know.
RJ's comment is interesting. I was going to recommend a book that supports your general idea: Three Cups of Tea. You can read more about it at www.threecupsoftea.com.
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