Obesity Rates Level Off
Americans Hit Limit Of Corn Syrup Consumption
Americans may not be able to consume more corn syrup.
The leveling off of childhood obesity rates reported Wednesday was not caused by an increase in exercise or a change of eating habits by the nation’s young, say researchers. Instead, it is the result of an event unforeseen by scientists – Americans apparently just cannot digest any more high fructose corn syrup.
“Have you seen more kids exercising?” asked Dr. Vivian Tanworthy, a scientist at the Center for Disease Control. “Because we sure haven’t. Unless looking at your friends’ profiles on Facebook or downloading songs in iTunes count as exercise. And by the way, if any kids are listening – they don’t!”
Although health officials originally hailed the news as a sign that public education programs about nutrition and healthy lifestyles were finally having an effect, the consensus now seems to be that something else is at work. Even though Americans are now consuming more than sixty pounds of the syrup per person annually, it seems there is a natural limit to the amount of mass-produced sweetener the human body can absorb.
“We’re calling it the high fructose barrier,” explained Dr. Tanworthy. “The mechanism is rather technical, but it seems that by the time you get to your third sixty-four ounce bottle of Pepsi, that’s it, you just can’t metabolize any more of the stuff.
Tanworthy said she doubted obesity levels would actually decline unless, as she put it, “someone turns off the Internet.” But the good news is that they will not continue to rise as they have for the past two decades. “That’s right,” she said. “It doesn’t matter what we eat now – Americans just can’t get any fatter.”
Monkeys Use Brain To Control Robot Arm
83 Percent Vote For McCain
Monkeys prefer Senator McCain by a wide margin.
Scientists have been able to teach monkeys to control robot arms using only their brain waves, it was reported in the journal Nature. During one experiment, eighty-three percent of the monkeys used the robotic arms to vote for Republican John McCain.
Alvin Cephas of the University of Pittsburgh was in charge of the team who performed the experiments. “We’d been having them grab treats with the arms,” he explained in a phone interview. “Then someone, I think it was Bernie the grad student, had the idea of letting them vote on electronic voting machines.”
The remaining monkey vote was split between Libertarian Bob Barr and Representative Ron Paul.
“That’s right,” confirmed Mr. Cephas. “Who would have guessed that monkeys are all Republicans? I guess they’re not as smart as we thought.”
