That is a valid point, and where things probably get hazy in the study. While I don't really believe using a computer actually burns many calories, it sure as hell burns more than watching TV.

The brain can account for about 20% of daily energy usage, so if the child in question just sits around all day and doesn't exercise, it is plausible to guess that doing something that requires more ''thinking'' than TV will have some difference as far as calorie burning goes.

I doubt it is the only factor though

Thanks for not giving me the benefit of the doubt.

We're comparing two gas tanks here genius. The point is that both are probably filled equally.

I don't think food has anything to do with it, more of how ''active'' someone is. Even just websurfing you have to be thinking about something and making cognitive decisions. The brain is a energy intensive organ, and studies have shown that ''thinking'' increases energy needs. Like you said, watching TV turns you into a vegetable.

What I would like to see is a comparison of watching TV and using something like youtube or hulu. One would hypothesize that they would begin to show similar results.

That is one reason it has been so difficult to be officially approved, but now that it is at least starting, this information will begin to come out. New procedures always involve risk. It is unfortunate when 1 in a 1000 treatments kill or adversely affect a patient, but if you want to walk again and are faced with those odds, I think the choice is clear.

Regardless, these kinds of procedures are routine or nearly so already in other animals, I see no reason why it would be much different in people.

Have you ever seen what happens when cat's mate? I haven't, but I've heard it. Sure sounds like death to me.

Another bigger/meaner cat will still take care of that one too :p

Well in my part of Texas, we don't have winter, we have what I would call ''fronter''. While the north is cold, we experience a balmy 80 degree weather, then a cold front blows through, dropping it to perhaps mid 30's. Then it goes back to 70-80 for a few days. Repeat for October through mid February.

We sit right at where all the air currents collide, bringing a wonderful mix of allergens. Many people I know didn't have allergies until they came here, including me :/

Makes it so hard for the poor weatherman, he's wrong so often about rain that he might as well consult a psychic.

It only depends on how you do it, just like anything else you have to learn to work the system. Go to a community college for all the classes you can, get good enough grades to go into a larger university, buy your books on amazon or anywhere else cheap, and work while you go to school (best way is to get a job on the university, talk and show interest to your professors and I guarantee they'll get you some lab job with flexible hours within a year). If you can't handle a large load of classes, so what, you'll be saving yourself time later by not being in debt.

I started that late, and I'll be graduating and starting grad school with under $10,000 in debt, all subsidized loans so I don't even pay interest. Granted, I have had some help from family, but not much the past two years, which has been where I accumulated all of the little debt I have.

But most college students want to party one way or another so they end up with that much debt or more in their first year. Like someone mentioned below, most people who will be successful probably don't need college, and those that don't really want to go but are only going because they want a job that pays for them to keep screwing around probably aren't ganna do nearly as well as they'd like.

Living in basements is for poor college students and nerds. Oh wait, I'm both......

Wrong. The control of the cottony cushion scale was a complete success, with the introduction of a beetle and a fly. They were virtually gone within a few years, and no one has found any bad side effects to date.

Not to say that we should start throwing species all over the place, but it can work incredibly well in certain cases.

First off, to the Australian solution, fire ants here have multiple queen colonies, sometimes dozens. Makes treatment a little more complex.

Also, the phorid flies are great, but one thing a doctoral student (my boss) found in his research was that fire ants can detect the fly, hide from it in the day, then overcompensate at night (because the flies rest and won't move at night). So the ants won't forage in the day, but they go on a frenzy at night and forage more than they would have otherwise.

So anyways it is arguable they they only aggravate the problem.