On Aug 21, 2004, at 3:20 PM, Erik Reuter wrote:
Alcohol doesn't "keep your body warm". It produces a feeling of warmth
by enhancing blood flow near the skin's surface. But in reality, your
body heat will then dissipate into the environment more quickly. To keep
your body warm in a cold ambient, you need insulation between your body
and the ambient. Such as a coat.
Perhaps the alcohol clouded their minds and kept them from realizing this simple fact?
Ah, but that wouldn't have been a "simple fact" to anyone born before medical science had progressed past leeches and phrenology. :\
Because alcohol *does* cause a sensation of warmth, it was associated with being warm for centuries, and even today it's used for the purpose of "warming up" among people who don't know every simple fact in the universe. (But who can talk -- for days -- about ice fishing. ;)
Alberto's ancestors are not unique; IIRC it's still common today in rural areas of Europe for wines to be served at every meal, the vintage diluted with 50% water for the kiddies. Whether it has anything to do with keeping warm (or cool, or anything else) is really a null point; it's just how life is lived there.
I'm still curious about the "immoral" aspect of giving booze to kids, though (and I can't recall who said it was) -- I find it an interesting assertion, one that needs some support before I can accept it as even being a point that can be argued. At least as a blanket, all-inclusive and arbitrary declaration.
But then, that's *always* my problem when I come across the word "immoral" (or "moral"), which is why I prefer to think in terms of ethics. Morality, to me, suggests the presence of an all-powerful superbeing dictating absolutes, which is something I'd be hard-put to accept as even a rational conjecture.
-- WthmO
If obesity is genetic, why are so many American dogs fat too?
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