usually associated with being hung-over. Arthritic pain, lower-back pain, and the chronic pain associated with fibromyalgia can all result from not drinking enough water. Water is essential for healthy digestion, and drinking enough of it ensures you will digest your food properly and not get heartburn in the process. Not drinking enough water lowers your metabolism by about three percent, which doesn’t trans- late well for the waistline. Keeping your ” gut well saturated also keeps you regular. I’m sure even the most unpredictable of us would agree that this is one area where it’s good to be regular. Which reminds me of this one sum- mer I spent working at an archaeology camp where the cook didn’t use salt in our food. Not being one to add salt to my din- ner, I learned the hard way that it’s important to balance that precious elixir, water, with enough salt to prevent it from just flushing straight through you. It took me four painful days to realize the source of my discomfort. If you find yourself complaining of any of the above problems, try drinking a glass of water before you turn to the aid of painkillers, antacids, or diuretics. It’s cheaper, much better for you, and if it doesn’t work, there’s no harm done. Here are a few more reasons to inspite you to stay hydrated: water helps maintain healthy teeth and bones and proper mus- cle tone, it’s good for the complexion, and it can help control your weight. It can even turn a frown upside down by elimi- nating an irritable mood. So get out there, enjoy the sun, work up a sweat, and even pour yourself a beer. But don’t forget to make up for it by drinking more water. Add some ice cubes; spruce it up with a wedge of lemon, a sprig of mint, and a little umbrella. Meanwhile, I'll be at the beach, soaking up the sun, and—you guessed it—drinking plenty of water. ghades of Gray Dominate Science Science Matters David Suzuki, David Suzuki Foundation n a world where things are usually I presented as either good or bad, us versus them, or black versus white, complicated issues about science and nature can leave the public confused, ambivalent, or both. And that’s not good for anyone. It’s human nature to categorize. Our ability to group a complicated array of items and issues into conceptual cate- gories helps us understand the world and enables us to strategize and perform com- plex tasks over time. At its most basic level, it has helped us survive. One way to describe this ability is “framing.” Frames are like mental short- cuts that take advantage of what we already know to categorize new informa- tion. The media take advantage of this inherent desire to categorize complicated issues quickly by presenting them in black and white terms. Politicians tend to do the same thing, presenting issues as though there are really only two choices—the right one and the wrong one. You’re either with us or against us. But nothing in nature is simple. Take the confusing issue of global dimming, Most people already know about the problem of global warming—pumping out heat-trapping gases into the atmos- phere has put the planet’s greenhouse effect into overdrive. As a result, we’ve june 8/2005 disrupted our climate—leading to rising temperatures, shifting weather patterns, and an increase in extreme weather events. Global dimming, on the other hand, is another phenomenon referring to the amount of sunlight penetrating the atmosphere. This amount has actually decreased by about five percent since the late 1950s because of all the light-block- ing soot we’ve been putting in the air from fires, smokestacks, and tailpipes. But lately, studies have shown that the earth is actually brightening again—most likely because the amount of pollution in the atmosphere has dropped since the col- lapse of the Soviet Union. That’s good news—at least at first glance. Unfortunately, scientists also tell us that without this pollution in the air, more light and heat will get to the surface of the earth. And since we have more heat-trapping gases in the atmosphere, that heat will tend to accumulate—thus potentially making global warming worse. Then again, that extra heat and sunlight might also increase evaporation and cloud formation, which could increase global dimming once again. It’s complicated. Climate contrarians—people who insist that, despite all the evidence, global warming is an urban myth—like to use this sort of complexity as evidence that scientists don’t really understand our cli- mate. In reality, it just doesn’t boil down into a neat sound bite. Our climate is a very complex system that is influenced by a number of “climate forcing’ mecha- nisms, including greenhouse gases and aerosols like soot in the atmosphere. There’s no shortage of challenging sci- ence topics—from climate change to stem cell research, cloning, euthanasia, and more. Genetically modified crops are hardly discussed in North America, where they are widely grown, but they have been hotly debated in Europe because they are created using a radical new technology, and many people feel that they should undergo rigorous long-term testing before being released into the environ- ment. However, genetic modification could also be beneficial. Farm research in China on a genetically modified rice with built-in pest resistance has found that this partic- ular variety can slightly improve yields. More important, it can greatly decrease the amount of pesticides farmers use. This seems like a great win, but no one knows how long this pest resistance will last, or if it will cause any other health or environmental problems. And how does this system compare to organic farming, which uses no chemical pesticides and also has strong yields? Again, there are no easy answers. Our tendency to frame complex issues as either good or bad is convenient, but it’s preventing real debate from taking place. The sooner we stop trying to over- simplify these issues and develop a common language to discuss them, the better off we will all be. Take the Nature Challenge and learn more at www.davidsuzuki.org www.theotherpress.ca | 7