In 2006, a provocative article in Trends in Plant Science claimed plants handle information in ways that resemble sophisticated animal nervous systems, even though they don't have brains.

Sorry vegans, you are eating another form of sentient life, creatures that can feel happiness or sorrow or pain, make decisions and even possess consciousness.

But the chances of that are “effectively nil,” retired plant biologist Lincoln Taiz and colleagues write in an a Cell article.

Millennials can't be blamed for lower alcohol consumption, that's just smart health thinking. But they are a barometer of future drinking habits.

Across all age groups, around 40 percent of 1,166 U.S. adults say they're drinking less than they were five years ago. A year ago 31 percent of drinkers said they were drinking less while 56 percent said they stayed the same. Of course, that means up to 11 percent could be drinking more but even that is an improvement over two generations ago, when the majority in their 20s increased alcohol consumption.

Until about 8,000 years ago, the British Isles were instead a peninsula attached to mainland Europe by a now-submerged world archaeologists call Doggerland. As the Ice Age ended, sea levels rose and former villages were swamped - but one event turned the slow rise of the sea into an apocalyptic terror. An underwater cliff collapsed along the edge of the Norwegian continental shelf that runs for six hundred miles along the Atlantic Basin and over 50 Mount Everests, of rock broke off and slid into the deep ocean, reaching a speed of 90 mph underwater. 

A decade ago, if you wanted to find a wealthy neighborhood, you looked for a Whole Foods. They knew that if they stuck a store in a wealthy location they would also find opposition to science, medicine, and agriculture - their ideal customers.

Now things are less clear. A new national study of grocery stores' impacts on nearby home values found the biggest payoff in neighborhoods with a Trader Joe's. The average home value near Trader Joe's is $608,305, compared to $521,142 near Whole Foods. They also sell lots of organic stuff but don't have employees pretending you're bad parents if you don't buy it, so perhaps that is why more wealthy people are going there. Which makes them open more stores which will allow them to sell Two Buck Chuck.

Chick-Fil-A has dethroned In-N-Out as America's favorite fast food restaurant. I actually thought In-N-Out was just California so I was surprised they could win any poll, but I learned they are in Arizona, Nevada, Texas, and Utah as well.

Alligators prefer men who live in Florida over tourists.

There are numerous confounders in this. It may be that Florida men get bit more often because the stereotype of Florida people is based on a kernel of reality.

The Great British Beer Festival banned drinks with 'sexist' names. Sorry, Slack Alice fans, social justice has prevailed.

Living in California, I don't know what the wine industry would do if provocative names were banned. If my town is any indication, women would revolt.

It seems awfully heavy-handed to ban certain names because some women said they wouldn't buy them. 

If only someone would invent a free market where consumers could ban products they dislike, by simply not buying them. We can only dream.