How drinking vodka makes you more creative

A new study suggests that a couple of swigs of the clear spirit can make a man think quicker on his feet. Time to break out the Belvedere? Too much vodka will make anyone slur his sentences, but groundbreaking new research suggests that just the right amount could make a guy wittier with his words. Thanks, science? Here's what you know should you choose to imbibe… for creativity's sake, of course:    

How much vodka are we talking?
Not a lot. Researchers tested 20 men using a "moderate" amount of vodka mixed with cranberry juice, cutting the volunteers off when their blood alcohol level reached 0.075 percent (or just below the legal limit in the United States).

SEE MORE: Are red wine's health benefits 'wishful thinking'?

How did they test something as subjective as "creativity"? 
The study, called "Uncorking the Muse," is detailed in the journal Consciousness and Cognition. But researchers administered a word association test to a group of 20 sober men and to a second group of 20 guys drinking vodka cranberries. Both groups sat through an animated movie while the alcohol set in. When given the test afterwards, the men were presented with three words ("peach, arm, and tar," for example) and then asked to come up with a fourth word that formed a phrase with each example ("pit").

How did the drinkers fare?
On average, sober men took 15.4 seconds to come up with the correct response. The men who drank vodka, on the other hand, only needed 11.5 seconds.

SEE MORE: America's 'alarming' binge-drinking problem: By the numbers

Why is this?
Researchers have a few ideas. It's possible that "a moderate buzz loosens a man's focus of attention, thus making it easier to find connections among remotely related ideas," says Bryan Nelson at the Mother Nature Network. Another explanation is that intoxication might aid "verbal creativity partly by lowering the ability to control one's thoughts," making the test subjects less afraid to make mistakes. In any case, this test "lends weight to the idea that artists and musicians are more creative when they've indulged," says Jamie Condliffe at Gizmodo. For others, it's another nice excuse to have a drink.

Source: Gizmodo, Globe and Mail, Mother Nature Network

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A drinking age for soda?

Doctors argue that sugar is a potentially deadly poison like alcohol and tobacco — and that we ought to treat it like one

Everyone knows that eating too much sugar is bad for you. But researchers are now going much farther, arguing in the latest issue of the journal Nature that the sweet stuff is downright toxic, just like alcohol and tobacco. People who devour a lot of junk food do face an elevated risk of heart disease, stroke, cancer, and diabetes. The solution? Researchers suggest going after sugar the way we do alcohol and tobacco — with laws to reduce sales in schools and low-income neighborhoods, and even an "age limit (such as 17) for the purchase of drinks with added sugar." Do we really need a drinking age for soda?

What a preposterous idea: Here we go again, says Thomas Lifson at The American Thinker. The champions of the nanny state have now decided that we're all "too stupid" to make our own choices about what to eat, so they're going to make our decisions for us. In a democratic society, where people are "sovereign over their own lives," that sort of freedom-trampling government interference is just not acceptable. Maybe we should "start to think about regulating hubris, instead of sugar."
"Here it comes: sugar as a regulated substance"

Well, we have to try something: If there's one main culprit behind the current obesity epidemic, it's sugar, says Barbara Kay at Canada's National Post. "It's time to acknowledge that fact and act on it." We can't treat it exactly like tobacco — setting a soda-drinking age is excessive. But we should mount aggressive "educational campaigns to wean households" off sugar. And imposing taxes is fair "because we all pay for the health care of people" who eat too much sugary poison.
"Evil is among us. And it’s called sugar"

It's a worthy idea, but unworkable: Other countries have tried to shoo people away from sugary sodas with taxes, and 20 U.S. cities and states are considering it, says Bonnie Rochman at TIME. But a 2010 study suggested such policies don't bring "significant weight loss" because people find ways to get their fix. Why? "Sugar, for so many people, is love." And as long as a warm chocolate chip cookie provides comfort and happiness a stalk of celery can't provide, "regulating sugar will prove particularly tricky."
"Should sugar be regulated like alcohol and tobacco?"

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