Jeff Nobbs is the co-founder and CEO of Zero Acre Farms. Jeff writes about health, nutrition, and sustainability at jeffnobbs.com and @jeffnobbs.
Today, vegetable oils make up 20% of our daily calories and are the most consumed food in the world, after rice and wheat. Put simply, vegetable oils are everywhere, from nearly all packaged foods like chips, crackers, salad dressings, and coffee creamers to most restaurant meals, whether it’s fast food or Michelin-starred.
Oils extracted from crops like sunflower, soybean, palm, and canola were only widely introduced to our diets in the last century and have experienced a meteoric rise in prevalence. In the United States, the consumption of soybean oil alone has grown 1,000-fold since the early 20th century.
In fact, the single greatest change in the human diet since the onset of widespread chronic illness and obesity is our increased consumption of vegetable oils. While diet-related chronic diseases were once rare, 60% of Americans now have a chronic disease such as diabetes or heart disease.
Vegetable oils, which contain high levels of omega-6 fats, have been linked to a laundry list of health issues, including inflammation, obesity, heart disease, diabetes, cancer, and more. Meanwhile, vegetable oils are leading drivers of mass deforestation, biodiversity loss, soil erosion, water consumption, and other environmental problems.
The solution to the massive problem of vegetable oil production and consumption may lie in the ancient culinary art of fermentation. While fermentation has been used for thousands of years to produce foods like cheese, wine, yogurt, and bread, some companies are using fermentation to make healthier oils and fats, with a fraction of the environmental footprint. Cultured Oil from Zero Acre Farms is one such product.
Just as there are microbial communities, like sourdough and wine cultures, which convert sugars into entirely new foods, there are also oil cultures. An oil culture converts sugar into the healthy fats that make up products like Cultured Oil.
While vegetable oils introduced unprecedented levels of omega-6 fats, which have been linked to health issues, companies like Zero Acre Farms are taking cues from what humans evolved to eat.
Thanks to fermentation, companies like Zero Acre Farms can produce environmentally-friendly oils with extremely low amounts of the inflammatory fat omega-6, and high amounts of the healthy fats that humans have eaten for hundreds of thousands of years. Products produced by fermentation, like Cultured Oil, for example, contain higher levels of heart-healthy monounsaturated fats that have always been abundant in our diets and are routinely shown to improve health outcomes in human studies.
The beauty of fermentation is in its ability to displace vegetable oils at scale by delivering products that are better than vegetable oils in every way. That means products that aren’t just healthier or more sustainable but also better for our taste buds, home cooks, chefs, and ultimately our wallets.
The online launch of Cultured Oil, and the use of fermentation as a tool to produce healthier, more sustainable oils and fats, marks an important step towards a healthier world, free from destructive vegetable oils.
A single door can open up a world of endless possibilities. For homeowners, the front door of their house is a gateway to financial stability, job security, and better health. Yet for many, that door remains closed. Due to the rising costs of housing, 1 in 3 people around the world wake up without the security of safe, affordable housing.
Since 1976, Habitat for Humanity has made it their mission to unlock and open the door to opportunity for families everywhere, and their efforts have paid off in a big way. Through their work over the past 50 years, more than 65 million people have gained access to new or improved housing, and the movement continues to gain momentum. Since 2011 alone, Habitat for Humanity has expanded access to affordable housing by a hundredfold.
A world where everyone has access to a decent home is becoming a reality, but there’s still much to do. As they celebrate 50 years of building, Habitat for Humanity is inviting people of all backgrounds and talents to be part of what comes next through Let’s Open the Door, a global campaign that builds on this momentum and encourages people everywhere to help expand access to safe, affordable housing for those who need it most. Here’s how the foundation to a better world starts with housing, and how everyone can pitch in to make it happen.
Volunteers raise a wall for the framework of a new home during the first day of building at Habitat for Humanity’s 2025 Carter Work Project.
Globally, almost 3 billion people, including 1 in 6 U.S. families, struggle with high costs and other challenges related to housing. A crisis in itself, this also creates larger problems that affect families and communities in unexpected ways. People who lack affordable, stable housing are also more likely to experience financial hardship in other areas of their lives, since a larger share of their income often goes toward rent, utilities, and frequent moves. They are also more likely to experience health problems due to chronic stress or environmental factors, such as mold. Housing insecurity also goes hand-in-hand with unstable employment, since people may need to move further from their jobs or switch jobs altogether to offset the cost of housing.
Affordable homeownership creates a stable foundation for families to thrive, reducing stress and increasing the likelihood for good health and stable employment. Habitat for Humanity builds and repairs homes with individual families, but it also strengthens entire communities as well. The MicroBuild® Initiative, for example, strengthens communities by increasing access to loans for low-income families seeking to build or repair their homes. Habitat ReStore locations provide affordable appliances and building materials to local communities, in addition to creating job and volunteer opportunities that support neighborhood growth.
Marsha and her son pose for a photo while building their future home with Southern Crescent Habitat for Humanity in Georgia.
Everyone can play a part in the fight for housing equity and the pursuit of a better world. Over the past 50 years, Habitat for Humanity has become a leader in global housing thanks to an engaged network of volunteers—but you don’t need to be skilled with a hammer to make a meaningful impact. Building an equitable future means calling on a wide range of people and talents.
Here’s how you can get involved in the global housing movement:
Speaking up on social media about the growing housing crisis
Volunteering on a Habitat for Humanity build in your local community
Travel and build with Habitat in the U.S. or in one of 60+ countries where we work around the globe
Join the Let’s Open the Door movement and, when you donate, you can create your own personalized door
Every action, big and small, drives a global movement toward a better future. A safe home unlocks opportunity for families and communities alike, but it’s volunteers and other supporters, working together with a shared vision, who can open the door for everyone.
To your left, the self-checkout area: a collection of blinking, beeping, whirring, computer-speaking machines with bright LED screens and audible prompts to “please select a payment type.” To your right, a single lane with a human cashier…and a line that snakes into the next aisle and out of sight.
You look down. You have six things; the math is obvious. The kiosks will be faster.
But somehow, you and your little basket find yourselves at the back of that winding line.
What’s going on here? If you have ever steered your cart away from self-checkout, even when it is the faster, more efficient option, you are not alone. It may seem like a simple preference on paper: You’re either a “kiosk person” or a “not-kiosk person.” Optimized or old-school. But for many shoppers, that choice is rooted in a human desire for connection and emotional safety, and a small, stubborn refusal to do more work under cameras.
A ritual quietly disappears
Within a single generation, grocery shopping moved from “you hand your stuff to a person” to “you become the person.” For most of the 20th century, buying groceries meant interacting with at least one other human: You chose the lane, loaded items onto the belt, and handed your entire life—cloves of garlic, wine that costs $2, strawberry ice cream, tissues infused with lotion and Vicks VapoRub—to another person. They scanned, bagged, and told you, “Have a good night.”
Today, 40% of checkout lanes at major U.S. grocery chains are self-checkout. They are everywhere: In 2026, 96% of grocery stores in the U.S. offered self-checkout technology, while 86% of consumers claim to use it. You scan. You bag. You look up codes for organic green onions. You do all this on camera, with a disembodied voice ready to tell you about an “unexpected item in the bagging area.”
There was a time when a “full-service checkout” meant that someone else—a trained professional—handled everything. They asked about your day, made sure that egg cartons never wound up at the bottom of your bag, and sometimes carried everything out to your car. It felt like being taken care of.
Self-checkout machines didn’t just replace a series of tasks. They erased the human at the end of a grocery trip.
The importance of “weak ties”
So, you avoid self-checkout lines. Psychologists say a few different things are going on here.
Researchers use the term “weak ties” for the small, casual relationships we maintain with people we don’t know well: the kind cashier who always smiles, the guy behind the fish counter who saves his best salmon for you, and the bus driver who recognizes your face even if they don’t know your name.
Weak-tie connections make you feel important in the world. Photo credit: Canva
Brief, ordinary, easy to overlook—and, for many people, irreplaceable. Toni Antonucci, a professor of psychology at the University of Michigan, explained the significance to the Daily Mail: Weak ties are “somebody who makes you feel important in their world—somebody who makes you feel human.”
When self-checkout replaces the cashier, it eliminates one of the last reliably recurring weak-tie interactions in many people’s daily lives.
Studies on social connectedness show that these fleeting moments play an important role in our day-to-day lives and measurably improve our mood and sense of belonging, particularly for people who otherwise move through their days in relative isolation.
Imagine the person who works from home or whose apartment falls quiet by 9 a.m. When that cashier remembers something they mentioned weeks ago, they experience the “weak-tie connection.” It’s not friendship. But on certain days, it’s the only exchange that reminds them they exist outside their apartment. It’s a microdose of belonging: proof that they still live in the minds of others.
When habits don’t meet expectations
Researchers who study checkout behavior note that many shoppers—particularly older ones—carry a strong expectation that being served by a person is simply part of what it means to be a customer. It is not entitlement in the pejorative sense. It is a social contract that made sense for decades: You bring items to the cashier, and they handle the transaction. When a kiosk breaks that contract and hands the transaction back to you, it is not just inconvenient; it feels like a small breach in the way the world works.
If you have spent 50 years handing your groceries to a human, your nervous system quietly codes that as “how this is supposed to work.” A touch screen, no matter how “user-friendly,” does not feel like a convenient feature. It makes many older shoppers ask, “Wait, why am I suddenly doing this part myself?”
“These systems aren’t really about innovation or collaboration between companies and consumers,” said Mathieu Lajante, a business management professor at Toronto Metropolitan University. “They’re about maximizing profits while weakening social norms of reciprocity and responsibility.”
Layer tech anxiety on top of that—worrying about “doing it wrong,” getting stuck in the bag selection menu, holding up the line—and the kiosk feels antagonistic. It is an intrusion into a ritual they have followed for decades.
“Am I supposed to be doing this? Really?”
People who do not like self-checkout often hold a strong sense of how labor should work. They remember when a grocery trip included a checker, a bagger, and sometimes even someone who walked your cart out. In their mental contract, paying for groceries includes paying for human help: people who do the things you’re bad at, like the game of Jenga happening in your brown paper bag.
Handing that job to a machine—and, by extension, back to them—can feel like a tiny erosion of what they’re owed as a customer.
When they say, “I’m not doing that—that’s not my job,” it’s not “self-entitlement” or brattiness: it’s a fairness instinct kicking in. They’re refusing to do unpaid work.
All the small stuff in between
Research shows that people who prefer human lanes are often at least partly extroverted: They get energy from small talk, feel safer in familiar social scripts, and like the feeling of being known in their regular spots. Even if they’re shy in other areas of life, the grocery line gives them a structured stage where they know their role and the beats.
And for some, there’s a softer motive: protection. They want to preserve human workers and, by extension, a way of life. They’ve watched their local supermarket cut hours, close lanes, and replace faces with screens. Choosing a cashier feels like a tiny act of solidarity: “If I keep standing here, maybe this job doesn’t disappear as fast.”
3 big reasons you might be right
Then there are the people who see that same setup—self-checkout kiosks to the left, a single checkout lane, and a long line to the right—and make the opposite call.
You know them: the person who snakes past the full‑service lanes and beelines for the one open machine. They move at their own pace, bag their groceries the way they like (frozen together, produce on top, no smashed bread), and skip the part where they talk to a stranger. They can buy late‑night junk food, an embarrassing product, or six cans of cat food and wine without bracing for a comment.
“When you’re at a cashier register, the cashier sees everything you purchase. When you’re at self-checkout, you can control what others see, so you might be more likely to buy embarrassing items.” – Becca Taylor, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign
Plenty of introverts and people with social anxiety describe kiosks this way. They don’t hate people; they have a limited social battery, and they’d rather use it for work, friends, kids, or a long Lyft ride to the airport. A machine that lets them coast through in near‑silence feels like mercy.
1. You’re doing unpaid labor
Here’s where the research complicates the convenience story. Across four separate experiments, researchers found that shoppers using self-checkout felt less rewarded, less satisfied, and less likely to return compared to those who used a staffed lane.
According to these studies, when you do everything—scan, bag, troubleshoot—this extra effort can shrink the feeling of reward. That means dollars saved and loyalty points don’t hit the same when you’ve had to work for them. You feel like you’re owed something.
Santiago Gallino, a professor at The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, states this plainly: “For retailers, it’s a combination of cutting labor and adding flexibility. It’s not to make checkout more efficient. They are basically transferring the labor to the customer.”
Self-checkout didn’t show up because shoppers begged for more chores; it showed up because it lets stores shift paid labor onto us without lowering prices. We didn’t vote for fewer workers; we voted for the only thing the store put in front of us.
2. It’s possible you’re being watched while you work
Self-checkout stations rely on a kind of slightly menacing, almost dystopian level of ambient suspicion: overhead cameras, weight sensors that double-check every bag, pop-ups that demand an attendant’s key before you can move on. AI-based loss-prevention systems increasingly use computer vision and facial recognition to flag suspected shoplifting.
Retailers say this is necessary—theft occurs at a much higher rate at kiosks than traditional lanes—but the solution includes treating everyone like suspects. When you use a self-checkout kiosk, you can see yourself on a little security screen in the corner. So can their security team, and they’re watching closely.
Psychologists would call this a fairness gap: doing more work while being trusted less. Investigations have found that these cameras and the AI systems running them mis‑flag people of color more often, which makes every beep feel a little more loaded.
“AI technologies frequently mirror existing inequalities as they are developed by individuals in environments lacking diversity, which prevents the technology from being fair. If the same stereotypes that are used to profile Black individuals in daily interactions are integrated into algorithms, the resulting facial recognition systems will perpetuate those stereotypes as a human would.” – Shaun Harper, Forbes
3. The plight of the kiosk keeper
Meanwhile, the workers who once stood at a single lane are now sent to babysit the self-checkout kiosks, responsible for eight machines at once. They half‑jog from flashing light to flashing light while a walkie‑talkie crackles in their ear and apologize for errors they didn’t cause. Helper and hall monitor, all in one fluorescent vest. The employee who runs the self-checkout corral holds an impossible dual role: be warm, be helpful, and also watch for theft while fielding the frustration of kiosk users who all think their machine is broken.
Research from the Harvard Shift Project, which surveyed tens of thousands of service-sector employees, found that stores with self-checkouts were more likely to be chronically understaffed and that understaffing drove higher rates of customer hostility aimed at the employees who remained.
Let’s be clear: self-checkout lanes aren’t evil. But when we reduce everything to “convenience,” we miss what’s really at stake.
That little fork in the floor—screens on one side, a person on the other—has become one of the everyday places where we decide how much work, how much watching, and how little conversation we’re willing to accept in exchange for speed.
We’ve all been there: it’s 90 degrees outside, absolutely sweltering, and you’re walking home from a new smoothie shop less than a mile away from your apartment, and everything is melting. The smoothie in your right hand. The açaí bowl in your left. Your old, broken headphones slowly slip off your head as a song you’ve never heard before blares through the speakers. Your willpower is diminishing by the second, and no one is around to help you.
Okay, that might be a bit specific (and precisely what happened to me about an hour ago). Still, you’ve likely had a similar experience: an encounter that left you annoyed, frustrated, or feeling hopeless.
But what if I told you that, according to Mo Gawdat, a former Google executive who has spent the last 20 years researching the mechanics of happiness, you only need to endure that emotional roller coaster for precisely 90 seconds?
Meet the man behind the 90-second rule
It’s time to meet the man who is revolutionizing our understanding of our emotions by giving us all a science-backed way to hit the reset button on our worst days.
Mo Gawat isn’t your typical wellness guru peddling crystals and manifestation journals. This is a guy who spent years as Chief Business Officer at Google X, the company’s “Moonshot Factory,” where he pursued ambitious, high-risk but potentially world-changing projects that tackled large-scale global problems like climate change, healthcare, and communications. But his most profound discovery about human happiness stemmed from his darkest hour.
When Gawdat’s 21-year-old son Ali died from preventable medical negligence during what should have been a routine surgery in 2014, he faced a darkness that would define the rest of his career. A clear choice emerged. He could either let this grief consume him, or honor his son by dedicating his analytical mind to a path Ali had always encouraged him to pursue: spreading happiness to as many people as possible.
Seventeen days after losing his son, Gawdat sat down and began writing Solve for Happy: Engineer Your Path to Joy. Through this book, he uncovered a revolutionary truth: our emotions aren’t permanent. They have expiration dates.
The fascinating brain science behind your emotional meltdowns
Here’s where things get fascinating. When developing what would later be known as the “90-second rule,” Gawdat stumbled upon the findings of Harvard-trained neuroscientist Dr. Jill Bolte Taylor. Similarly, her research was also formed in the pressure cooker of an unexpected, dramatic life experience: the moment when she underwent a massive stroke.
As Dr. Taylor’s left brain hemisphere shut down, she gained unprecedented real-time insight into how emotions function in the body.
What she discovered is that when something triggers you, be it a spilled smoothie or a coworker’s passive-aggressive “per my last email” message, your amygdala (think of it as your brain’s overly cautious security guard) floods your system with stress hormones like cortisol and adrenaline. Your heart starts to race as if you’ve just spotted a bear and begun to run, your muscles tense up, and that instinctual fight-or-flight response surges through your body.
However, this chemical cascade has a built-in timer. As Dr. Taylor discovered, it takes approximately 90 seconds for these stress hormones to be flushed from your bloodstream. Meaning that, after that initial surge, the physical component of your emotional reaction is over.
But why doesn’t it feel like that? Why do we marinate in our emotions (anger, sadness, confusion, delusion) for hours, days, or more? That’s because, after those 90 seconds, we make a choice, usually without realizing it, to keep those emotions going by mentally rewinding and replaying the triggering event.
Why do we keep choosing emotional suffering?
“What happens is, you run the thought in your head again, and you renew your 90 seconds,” Gawdat explains. It’s like poking a bruise that’s formed on your knee, or hitting refresh on your personal stress response button. Every time you mentally revisit a stressful event, analyzing what you should have said, reimagining confrontations, and crafting the perfect comeback, you’re essentially retriggering that same potent chemical reaction that occurred in the first place.
So, while that 90-second episode of emotions ends quickly, we end up ruminating about what happened: over and over and over and over again.
This is more than a mere annoyance. Ift’s rewiring our brains in a bad way. Research shows that rumination doesn’t just prolong our bad moods, it intensifies them and can lead to anxiety and depression. We’re thinking ourselves into extended mental states simply by focusing too much on the past.
The three questions that reality-check your brain
What happens when you’ve successfully coasted through those initial 90 seconds but still feel like the world is out to get you? Gawdat developed a handy three-question reality check that serves as an emotional fact-checker for your brain:
Question 1: Is it true?
Gawdat claims that “90% of the things that make us unhappy are not even true.” Think about it: your partner seems distracted during dinner, and suddenly your brain spins an entire narrative about how they’ve fallen out of love with you. But how much of that is real? And what percentage of your little daydream can be chalked up to your brain being its usual dramatic self?
At best, our brains are excellent storytellers. The problem is that they’re prone to writing fiction and presenting it as truth.
So, the next time you find yourself spinning up a stressful “what if?” situation in your head, take a beat, and ask yourself a different question: “Is it true?”
Question 2: Can I take action?
If the answer to question one is “Yes, it is true,” then move on to Gawdat’s second question. Are there steps you can take?
If you have a real problem on your hands, then perfect! Channel that energy into solving it rather than drowning in it.
Question 3: Can I accept it and still create a better life despite it?
Here’s where things get tricky. If you can’t do anything about the situation, the final question before you becomes about “committed acceptance.” No, not passive resignation, but actively choosing to move forward and build something better despite the circumstances.
This can be difficult (remember, this process began with Gawdat searching for a way to make sense of his son’s death) but these questions aren’t about forcing toxic positivity or pretending like problems don’t exist. They help your brain make sense of what’s happened, distinguishing between productive and unproductive emotional energy.
Your brain: the overprotective parent
To understand how this works, it helps to think of your brain as an overprotective, hovering parent who sees danger everywhere. “Your brain isn’t your source of truth,” Gawdat explains. “It’s just a survival machine. A search party. It throws thoughts at you, hoping something will protect you. But that doesn’t mean any of them are true.”
Your mammalian brain evolved to keep you alive, not happy. When modern life presents you with stressful situations like traffic jams, work pressures, and particularly hot and evil temperatures, your ancient survival systems register these “threats” with the same emotional urgency as a saber-toothed tiger attack.
Putting the 90-second rule into practice
So, what does this really look like in real life knowing the science is only half the battle?
Step 1: Notice the surge
When you feel that familiar rush of anger, frustration, or anxiety, create a mental note. “Okay, this is a chemically induced wave of emotion,” you might say to yourself without judgment.
Step 2: Set a timer, literally
For the first 90 seconds, your job is to observe. Feel every emotion to its fullest: your heart racing, your muscles tensing, your breath shortening. Acknowledge these physical sensations without trying to fix or stop them.
Step 3: Breathe and wait
Deep breathing can help calm your nervous system after an onslaught of chemical reactions and prevent your brain from fueling the emotional fire mentally.
Step 4: Choose your response
When those 90 seconds pass, you have what Gawdat calls a “buffer,” a moment of clarity when you can decide what to do next.
Step 5: Apply the three questions
If you’re still upset after the initial wave, run through Gawdat’s reality-check framework.
The 90-second rule offers a unique perspective on relating to your vitally essential emotions. Emotions provide information about the environment and motivate us to take action. The 90-second rule helps us experience our emotions fully without letting them hijack our entire day or our entire life.
The happiness equation connection
This framework connects to Gawdat’s broader “happiness equation,” which posits that happiness equals life events minus expectations. Much of our suffering comes not from what happens to us, but from the gap between the triggering event and what we think should happen.
As Gawdat puts it, “Life doesn’t give a damn about you. It’s your choice how you react to every one of [life’s challenges].” Which may sound harsh, but when put into practice, can prove quite liberating.
The next time you feel yourself crashing out, remember: you have 90 seconds to feel as irrational as humanly possible. After that? You get to decide how to spend the rest of your day.
This article originally appeared one year ago. It has been updated.
Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson is seemingly driven by an endless amount of curiosity. Whether it’s the tiniest sea quark or the biggest black hole known to astronomers, he wants to dig in and make it make sense. And what’s especially unique is his need to not only understand the science around us, but to make us understand too.
In a recent clip posted from the account of Tyson’s popular podcast StarTalk, we see Tyson giving a quick rundown of where “energy” goes when we die. With a chyron reading, “You don’t disappear. You transform. Some of you returns to Earth. Some of you travels the universe,” Tyson leans in and speaks directly to the camera. “In death, you’ve got pretty much two choices in modern society.”
When we are buried
He makes a case for being buried, as we see a traditional coffin being lowered into the ground. “You can be buried. That’s my choice, so that the energy content of my body—which is still there when you die—your molecules were built up from your lifetime of eating and exercise, and the building of your organs and your muscles and other tissue. In death, those molecules still contain energy.”
The clip cuts to a graveyard as Tyson continues. “If I’m buried and I decompose, all that energy gets absorbed by microbes, by flora and fauna dining upon my body the way I have dined upon flora and fauna my whole life. And that way, giving back to the Earth.”
When we are cremated
We then see a fire moving in warm yellow, orange, and red tones. Tyson explains what happens during cremation. “If you’re cremated, the energy content of those molecules doesn’t go away. It gets transferred to heat that then radiates infrared energy that was once the molecules of your body. It radiates it out into space, moving at the speed of light.”
He adds a most intriguing thought, which is that one could conceivably track that energy after cremation. “After somebody has been cremated, you can keep a timeline.” A photo of an AI-generated video of a milky, gaseous star system swirling around a bright light is shown. Tyson continues, “Where has their radiant energy been by now? If they were cremated four years ago, they would have reached the nearest star system, Alpha Centauri. So that, in a way, you’re still a part of the universe, just in a different form.”
In his piece, “What Happens to Your Atoms After You Die?” chemical/mechanical engineer Arvin Ash gives a specific step-by-step as to what happens to our atoms after we pass on. In cremation, he explains, “What are these ashes composed of? Phosphate and calcium make up your bones, so that’s where these atoms come from. What happens to these ashes? These ashes are likely to make their way eventually to soil, where they will be incorporated into the structure of plants. These plants will be eaten by animals and humans, and end up back in your body. Eventually, tiny bits of you will end up in your great-grandchildren’s morning cereal or hamburger.”
And he too believes that some of our atoms will reach the farthest corners of the universe. “Your body also has a tiny amount of radioactive elements. Tiny amounts of thorium and uranium will eventually become lead. But along with this decay, some atoms of helium will also be formed. Earth’s gravity isn’t strong enough to hold helium to our planet, and so tiny bits of what once was you will float off into space. So some of your atoms are in for a fantastical and exciting journey, forever floating to the farthest reaches of the universe until the end of time.”
On the Facebook, where this clip was also posted, this received over 3,000 comments, many of whom seemed fascinated by the cross-section of science and spirituality.
“Green burial”
Many had their own two cents to add. “Cremation, but then the ashes are used in a bios urn to plant a tree. You get a twofer… radiant energy from cremation to travel the universe, and then your ashes are used as nutrients for the tree.”
Some note that even though the video clip showed a coffin, they believe Tyson was most likely referring to a “green burial.” After one Facebooker asked, “How does your ‘energy’ get out of that sealed coffin to feed flora and fauna?” another answers, “That is exactly the point—in a traditional sealed casket and concrete vault, it doesn’t… at first. It actually delays that natural cycle for decades. That’s why there is such a growing interest in green burials or human composting; they remove those barriers so our nutrients can actually rejoin the ecosystem and support new life immediately. Over a long enough time, the coffin will probably decay too. Most things do.”
American food doesn’t have a reputation for being very spicy. But if things keep going the way they have over the past 20 years, that could change. America is going through a spicy renaissance that is hard to miss at fast-casual restaurants, drive-thrus, and in the snack aisle.
As of 2025, 19 out of every 20 restaurants in the United States offer at least one spicy item. Frito-Lay now sells at least 26 varieties of Flamin’ Hot snacks, and as of last year, more than half of Americans were likely to buy an item listed as “spicy,” compared to 39% in 2015.
While this massive shift in American tastes sounds like it is bound to cause more pain than pleasure, research suggests the opposite. In fact, multiple studies associate eating spicy food with living a longer life. A 2025 study published in the Chinese Medical Journal found that people who ate spicy food at least once a week had a lower risk of vascular disease than those who rarely or never ate it.
A 2017 study from Larner College of Medicine at the University of Vermont found that Americans who ate hot red chili peppers had a 13% lower risk of death. Here is the big one: In 2020, research presented at American Heart Association Scientific Sessions, using data from more than 570,000 people, found that those who regularly consumed chili peppers had a 26% lower risk of death from cardiovascular disease and a 25% lower overall risk of death.
The studies show that eating spicy food is associated with greater longevity, but they have yet to pinpoint a direct cause. Correlation is not causation, so other lifestyle factors could be involved. However, capsaicin, the compound that gives peppers their heat, has been found to have numerous health benefits that may directly affect longevity, particularly heart health. Plus, it binds to receptors throughout the body, so its greatest benefits may yet be discovered.
According to Mayo Clinic, capsaicin has been found to increase the body’s ability to burn calories. It is also known to fight low-grade inflammation, which may contribute to heart health. One study found that capsaicin significantly reduced risk factors in adults with low HDL cholesterol levels.
“Chili peppers have many life-extending benefits and can be used in many meal preparation strategies,” Dr. Philip Goglia told Your Tango. “Capsaicin, which can be found in chilies, has been shown through past studies to have antibacterial, anticarcinogenic, and anti-diabetic properties. Additionally, it can reduce cholesterol levels in obese individuals.”
In a world where things that taste good are often bad for your health, this is great news for people who love food with a kick. It is a great excuse to carry a little bottle of Tabasco wherever you go. If you are not into spicy food but want the health benefits of capsaicin, take it slow by trying a little spice here and there, and you may build a tolerance. Before you know it, you could be graduating from mild chicken wings to Molten Lava Atomic Inferno sauce and cruising down the road to longevity.
Beth Lunn was doing what hairstylists do: examining a client’s hair, moving pieces up and checking the texture and color. Then she stopped. She picked up another section. Looked closer. And then, without any prior conversation about it, asked her client, “Are you pregnant?”
The video she’d been recording for her Instagram page, @honeylunnhair, cut off there. The client, later identified as Chanelle Adams, laughed nervously and kept asking, “What? Why?” Lunn asked again. Adams repeated, “Why?” A few rounds of that, and then Adams looked straight at the camera and said, “Not in the video,” before Lunn ended the recording.
Within three days, the clip had reached 126 million views and 5 million likes, with one question dominating every comment section: how on earth did she know?
The answer, it turns out, is rooted in real biology. Lunn followed up with a second video after being flooded with questions, sharing photos of a client who was five months postpartum and walking through the science. As she explained it, “hormonal change causes an increase in estrogen and progesterone, which can alter the hair’s pigment (melanin).” She was careful to note that results vary from person to person, and that there is no “scientific evidence” that coloring one’s hair while pregnant causes harm to the baby, though she leaves that decision to her clients.
The hormonal explanation holds up. According to experts at BehindTheChair.com, elevated estrogen and progesterone during pregnancy can prolong hair growth cycles, change density, and shift the way hair looks and feels entirely. Texture, color, and even how it takes dye can all change.
On the question of coloring specifically, the NHS notes that most research shows it’s safe to dye or color your hair while pregnant. The chemicals in permanent and semi-permanent dyes could cause harm, but only in very high doses, and the amount absorbed through the scalp during a normal appointment is very low. Still, many people choose to wait until after the first 12 weeks, when the risk is lower. Worth knowing: if you’re in your second or third trimester, your hair may react differently to color than it normally would.
Commenters who watched the original video had their own theories about exactly what Lunn saw. @nicole.marie44 wrote, “Your hair tells you so much about your health! She probably saw banding in her hair, and that is common with pregnancy.” @asmaiel_soulvane put it simply: “If she could tell someone is pregnant from their hair. She’s worth the money hands down.”
Lunn hasn’t revealed exactly what visual cue tipped her off, which probably explains why people keep watching.
You can follow Beth Lunn (@honeylunnhair) on Instagram for more entertaining and hair-related content.
The traditional American breakfast of cereal, pancakes, and waffles is basically dessert in disguise. It’s extremely high in sugar and carbohydrates, low in fiber and protein, and designed to give you a momentary boost of energy that can lead to a big-time crash by the time you get to work.
To get your day off to the right start, your body really needs protein, whole grains, fruits, vegetables, and healthy fats. That’s why a new breakfast trend is taking hold in America: soup. It’s an easy way to get the nutrients you need, it’s easy to digest, and it’s great for people in a hurry or on a budget.
Popular food influencer Suzy Karadsheh, creator of The Mediterranean Dish, shared the benefits of soup for breakfast and a recipe for chicken and vegetable soup in a TikTok video earlier this year.
Soup for breakfast might sound unconventional, but it’s actually one of the most nourishing ways to start your day! In many Mediterranean (and Asian) cultures, mornings begin with something warm and savory — a bowl of soup wakes up your digestion gently, hydrates your body after a night of rest, and gives you real nourishment before the day gets busy. That’s exactly why this Chicken Vegetable Soup works so well in the morning. It’s light but satisfying, made with chicken, vegetables, fresh herbs, and broth. Nothing heavy — just clean ingredients. Why soup for breakfast just makes sense: 1. It’s easier to digest than most breakfasts 2. It hydrates + nourishes at the same time 3. It keeps you full without the crash If you’re curious to try a savory, comforting breakfast that actually supports your energy and digestion, this Chicken Vegetable Soup is a great place to start! Ingredients: ▢1 tablespoon olive oil ▢1 to 1 ½ pounds boneless skinless chicken breast ▢Kosher salt ▢Freshly ground pepper ▢3 carrots peeled, small dice ▢3 celery stalks, small dice ▢2 Yukon gold potatoes, small dice ▢1 medium onion, diced ▢1 bay leaf ▢1 teaspoon dried thyme ▢1/2 teaspoon oregano ▢1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes, or more to taste ▢3 large garlic cloves ▢1 (14.5 ounce) can of petite-cut diced tomatoes ▢1 small zucchini, sliced into half quarter moons ▢8 cups (64 ounces) chicken stock ▢1/2 cup chopped parsley Season & sear the chicken: Heat a large Dutch oven over medium with 1 tablespoon olive oil. Season chicken generously with salt and pepper. Add to the pot and cook until golden, about 12 minutes per side, until fully cooked (165°F). Transfer to a plate. Cook the vegetables: Add carrots, celery, onion, and potatoes to the pot, scraping up any browned bits. Add bay leaf, thyme, oregano, red pepper flakes, salt, and pepper. Cook undisturbed for 15 minutes. Add garlic and cook 5 minutes more. Finish the soup: Add tomatoes, zucchini, and chicken stock. Bring to a boil and simmer 15–20 minutes, until potatoes are tender. Shred the chicken and return it to the pot to warm through. Garnish & serve: Stir in chopped parsley and serve. #breakfastsoup#soupforbreakfast#breakfastideas#souprecipe#soups
“It’s a soup for breakfast kind of morning, guys. And if it sounds weird to you, let me tell you, soup for breakfast is an ancient remedy. It’s been around for centuries,” Karadsheh said. “First of all, it’s a great way to fight inflammation, especially that morning inflammation right away. And it hydrates way better than water. And it’s also a great way to kick start my digestive system without that sugar crash.”
Soup is great for hydration
Soup is great for staying hydrated because, in addition to being a good source of water, it can be rich in salt and electrolytes that help you retain water. That’s a major reason we eat chicken soup when we’re sick and why it can make us feel better.
Nutritionist Kat Chan, author of Full Serving, is a big believer in soup for breakfast.
“I love that it breaks the breakfast rules,” she wrote. “It’s cross-cultural, and there are no specific guidelines other than including protein, fat, and fiber. A warm, protein-rich, hydrating bowl – with a broth base – stabilizes blood sugar, supports digestion, and helps people feel more settled going into the day.”
She says that a bowl of soup in the morning is a great way to get your digestive system up and running.
“From a nutritional therapy standpoint, warm meals are often easier to digest than cold ones, especially if you’re already feeling the chill,” Chan continued. “Eating something warm first thing gives your body a solid hit of protein, fat, and fiber—the kind that keeps blood sugar steady and energy smooth.”
Eating soup for breakfast offers a warm, nutrient-dense, and hydrating start to the day that supports digestion and provides sustained energy. It is a gentle way to nourish the body, reduces, and helps stabilize blood sugar, making it a highly effective alternative to sugary morning foods. -Improve digestion and hydration -Sustained energy and satiety -Nutrient dense and low calorie -Weight management -Convenience and versatility It may sound unusual at first, but hear me out: soup isn’t just for lunch or dinner. It’s nourishing, convenient, and energizing, offering a satisfying way to fuel your morning. Breakfast soup delivers a range of vitamins, minerals, fiber, and protein in a single, easy-to-digest meal. It’s not only filling but also gentler on the stomach and can help your energy and mood, and keep your blood sugar stabilized. Soup for breakfast also has cultural roots worldwide. In Japan, miso soup is often paired with rice and pickles; in China, congee is enjoyed with savory toppings; and in Korea, hearty soups like Seolleongtang are common first meals. Starting the day with a warm, nutrient-rich bowl is a time-honored tradition. #soupforbreakfast#chinesebaddie#healthyfood
Soup is also a great way for people on a budget to have a nutritious breakfast. A healthy can of soup can cost as little as $2 for a bowl, and if you make it at home, a big batch with fresh vegetables, broth, and a bit of protein shouldn’t set you back more than a few bucks.
At first, switching from cereal to soup may make a lot of folks do a double-take, but once you get past the fact that it’s a major break from the American cultural norm, it makes a lot of sense. Maybe the weird part isn’t eating soup in the morning, but the fact that we ever thought Frosted Flakes was a great way to start the day in the first place.
Among the thousands of runners participating in this year’s London Marathon, one figure stood out in a way that was impossible to ignore. As 30-year-oldJordan Adams completed the race with a 25-kilogram (55-pound) fridge secured to his back, heads turned at every mile.
Yes, it was unusual, but the heartbreaking reason behind it gave the moment a depth that stayed with those who witnessed it.
Adams took on the challenge to bring attention to frontotemporal dementia, a condition that has shaped his family’s life for years. His mother, Geraldine, was diagnosed in her 40s when Adams was a teen, and died after living with the illness for six years. Since then, multiple relatives have also been lost.
He and his brother Cian later learned they both carry the same genetic mutation.
“I am a carrier. I have a 99.9% chance of getting familial FTD. It’s not a matter of if. It’s a matter of when,” Adams told the BBC, according to the Bristol Post. “And I just want do as much as I can in the time that I have to help those living with dementia, those impacted by it, so that I leave this world, hopefully in a better place when dementia does take my life.”
The fridge was never about pure spectacle. It was meant to represent something less visible but viscerally felt nonetheless.
“Because that’s what it feels like sometimes – like you’re carrying something heavy that no one else can see. I’m doing this to make dementia visible,” Adams said, according to LAD Bible. “But more than that… to show you that whatever you’re carrying, you don’t have to carry it alone.”
A moment shared with thousands
Running a marathon under normal circumstances demands months of preparation. Doing so with added weight required an even more careful approach, from building strength gradually to repairing equipment when it failed during training.
Still, it was the atmosphere on race day that left the strongest impression. Cheers from the crowd helped carry him through the most difficult stretches, turning an intensely personal mission into something shared by many.
“Honestly, it felt like the whole of London was with me and I’ve never experienced anything like that. I probably never will [again] in my life,” Adams recalled.
What comes next
The finish line in London marked the start of another challenge. Within hours, Adams traveled to begin a 32-day run across Ireland, completing a marathon in each county alongside his brother.
Beyond raising awareness, Adams shared that the “FTD Brothers” had an additional goal: “to try and raise a million pounds before we die of dementia.” This money would go toward research and provide support for families affected by the illness.
“We’re on a mission because we have a clock kind of ticking against us, and we want to make as much of a difference in the next 10, 15 years that we have and the time that we have left,” Adams said.
Living with that knowledge hasn’t been easy. Adams has spoken openly online about the emotional toll of his diagnosis, including periods of depression and uncertainty about the future. What helped him through it most was the encouragement he received from those around him. He now aims to provide that kind of hope to others facing similar realities.
“Losing my mum the way I did changed everything,” he told the Irish Examiner. “Now being diagnosed myself, I had a choice and I chose to do something that shows life doesn’t stop here.”
How to help the mission
Donations to the FTD Brothers’ GoFundMe have already climbed rapidly as more people hear their story.
If you want to help, you can donate directly to the FTD Brothers’ GoFundMe page here. Every contribution, no matter the size, supports dementia research and resources for families facing the same diagnosis.
Death: It’s hard to talk about, and sadly, even harder to avoid. That’s why everyone wants to know how long they will live and there are many indicators that can show whether someone is thriving or on the decline. But scientists have yet to develop a magic formula to determine exactly how long someone should expect to live. Which, let’s be real, is probably a good thing. Knowing exactly how much time you have left to enjoy your life could cause a lot of anxiety, to say the very least.
NBC News medical contributor Dr. Natalie Azar appeared on the TODAY show on March 8, 2023, to demonstrate a surprisingly simple test that may predict how long someone aged 51 to 80 has to live. The test is called the sit to stand test, also known as the sit-rising test or SRT, and it takes less than a minute to perform.
How to take the sit to stand test
The test is pretty simple. Go from standing to sitting cross-legged, and then go back to standing without using any parts of your body besides your legs and core to help you get up and down. The test measures multiple longevity factors, including heart health, balance, agility, core and leg strength and flexibility.
You begin the test with a score of 10 and subtract points on your way up and down for doing the following:
Hand used for support: -1 point
Knee used for support: -1 point
Forearm used for support: -1 point
One hand on knee or thigh: -1 point
Side of leg used for support: -1 point
Two studies, 13 years apart, came to the same conclusion
The study was conducted on 2002 people, 68% of whom were men, who performed the SRT test and were followed by researchers in the coming years. The study found that “Musculoskeletal fitness, as assessed by SRT, was a significant predictor of mortality in 51–80-year-old subjects.”
Those who scored in the lowest range, 0 to 3, had up to a 6 times greater chance of dying than those in the highest scores (8 to 10). About 40% of those in the 0 to 3 range died within 11 years of the study.
What does your score actually mean?
Azar distilled the study on TODAY saying: “The study found that the lower the score, you were seven times more likely to die in the next six years.”
“Eight points or higher is what you want,” Azar said. “As we get older, we spend time talking cardiovascular health and aerobic fitness, but balance, flexibility and agility are also really important,” she stressed. A score of eight or nine means you’re allowed to roll forward onto your knees and then rise, which a lot of people will find more comfortable. If you can rise that way, you’re still in a pretty good spot health wise.
One should note that the people who scored lowest on the test were the oldest, giving them a naturally elevated risk of death.
Dr. Greg Hartley, Board Certified Geriatric Clinical Specialist and associate professor at the University of Miami, told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution that we should take the study with a grain of salt. “Frailty, strength, muscle mass, physical performance: those things are all correlated to mortality, but I would caution everybody that correlation doesn’t mean causation,” he said.
And of course, the test doesn’t take into account injuries or disabilities that may make doing the test impossible. But one of the study’s authors says that the study is a call to take our mobility seriously.
“The more active we are the better we can accommodate stressors, the more likely we are to handle something bad that happens down the road,” Dr. Claudio Gil Araujo, told USA Today.
Even low-impact exercise like yoga can increase your mobility and flexibility and, thus, your SRT score. Photo credit: Canva
What to do if your score is low
What should you do if you can’t manage a good score on the SRT? First of all, don’t panic! It’s never too late to improve your overall health, fitness, and strength, so regular exercise is a great thing to incorporate if you’re not already doing it.
A couple of specific skills that will help are boosting your ankle flexibility, hip mobility, and core strength. Trainers recommend incorporating squats, lunges, and planks into your regular routine. Just using your own bodyweight is plenty to get started, though if you’re up for incorporating any added loads, the strength training will do wonders for your bone density, as well.
But remember that the SRT is just a measure of strength and mobility, which could correlate to an older person’s likelihood of suffering from a fatal fall. It doesn’t do anything to measure your cardiovascular health (vitally important especially in older people), for example. And it may not even be the most reliable longevity test out there. It has been criticized for its extremely unnatural range of motion. For starters, rising by pushing up on the sides of our ankles with our knees pointed outward is certainly not representative of a real-life situation. Some doctors insist that your comfortable walking speed is a better indicator of health and longevity, while others say grip strength is the key measurement.
Remember, it is never too late to start healthy routines for a better quality of life.
This article originally appeared three years ago. It has been updated.
