Man Fatally Shot Near 40th and Market– Shortly after 1 a.m. Sunday morning, a policeman heard gunshots from his car and saw a man fleeing south near Market before collapsing on Preston. The man, pronounced dead at 3:15 that morning, had no identifying information and the police are still looking for his shooter. This heinous crime was just one in a violent weekend spree that included three other deaths and six shootings, as Philly.com reports.
New Study: We’re Probably Going To Die Young And Unhappy
But we’re all going to die anyway, so what’s the problem? It seems like some newfangled study that turned up in this month’s Journal for Applied Psychology indicates that the young and ambitious on the prestigious education-competitive profession track (that’s us!) often die young and unhappy. As HuffPo College reports, the case is even worse for ambitious underachievers, whose consistent poor performance yet high expectations frequently lead to low life satisfaction. This makes us feel sad, but also determined for a better future, so we’ll probably die…next month? Mmmkay.
Mind you, the study was carried out solely on 717 Californians born at the beginning of the last century, and there’s a lot of room for debate over the definitions of “ambitious,” “young,” “selective,” “prestigious,” and “underachiever”; but though the relevance of the findings may only be marginal, the wider implications may still ring true for us. In any case, between this and the 2012 apocalypse, it’s becoming clear that the goddesses are VERY angry with us.
Man Killed At 39th and Market Identified– In an update to yesterday's post about the man killed from bullet wounds Sunday afternoon, the DP reports that the 21-year-old has been identified as Frank Trower. At this time, it is unknown if Trower is identified with Penn in any way. Keep checking back for updates as they come in.
Penn Prof Talks Dirty To New York Times
No, not that kind of dirty, ya PERV. Paul Rozin, a psychologist and emeritus professor here at Penn was featured in an article in today’s New York Times for his expertise regarding the evolution of disgust as an emotional response.
According to the article, disgust, which up until recently was not fully understood from a psychological perspective, is one of the most universally elicited emotions–more so than anger and even fear. Initially, disgust evolved so we would avoid putting dirty things in our mouths (as if that’s ever stopped anyone). Rozin and his colleagues conducted research to elaborate this hypothesis, finding that another reason disgust exists is to separate ourselves from animals–which explains why we (well, some of us) find behaviors like pooping, dying and sex super icky.
The rest of the article reflects on the immunological response to disgust and how it’s used to promote cleanliness in advertising. Yay, science! Yay, Penn! And most of all: YAY, POOP.
Penn Senior Dies After Half Marathon
We wanted to compile the information on this tragic turn of events for you all, so here’s what’s going on. As The DP reports, a 21- year old male Penn student collapsed at the Philly Marathon this afternoon and died shortly after being taken to Hahnemann University Hospital. The student was Wharton and Nursing senior Jeffrey Lee, and there will be a support session tomorrow night at 8 p.m. in the Ben Franklin Room of Houston Hall. As always, students in need of extra support can visit CAPS, the University Chaplain’s Office and the Vice Provost for University Life.
Definitely check back into the DP article for more information, statements from people who knew Jeffrey and updates.
The Worst Thing To Happen To A Class Ever
How annoying is it when you drag yourself out of bed to class and the professor isn’t there? You’re all like, what the hell is this guy doing, worst class ever, etc… and then you find out, via an email sent while you’re waiting in class, that the professor isn’t there because he died. And the department forgot to tell you.
That’s what happened in PSCI-291 last week. After the jump, read the awkward email explaining the “oversight” of not telling a class that the professor had passed away over the summer.
A Drexel Student Died Last Night-- He was stabbed while allegedly trying to break into a West Philly apartment. Please everyone, be careful!
Afterwards, They Sell Your Soul To Google Cache
February is shaping up to be a rough month for Facebook. First, we learned that the use of our beloved social networking site leads to Prozac, then our parents ruined our favorite procrastination technique, and don’t forget that whole debacle about how Facebook tried to own us for a while (by the way, has anyone checked out Google’s “privacy policy” lately?). So maybe it shouldn’t come as much of a surprise that in addition to its whopping list of negatives, Facebook will also probably kill us.
A new study shows that social networking might give you cancer. Apparently the increased isolation that comes with hours of stalking your friends, tagging photos, and playing online Scrabble changes your hormones and immune system functions to the point where too much Facebook can lead to dementia, heart disease, and a myriad of other health problems that make meningitis and measles pale in comparison.
So maybe it would be best to step away from our Facebooks from a while. But look at the bright side: there will be plenty of time to screw around on the Internet once you finally reach the Great Social Network in the sky.