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: Althouse

Google co-founder Sergey Brin blogs on Google-owned Blogger in the Minima template.

It's a new blog, called Too, and he's using the black version of the Minima template, which I use in white. (I use black Minima on my extremely minimal Me Blog.) Brin has made it super-basic with no side bar.

He's only got 3 posts. One to introduce the blog, a second to drive traffic to charities, and a third, longer post about his discovery that he has a genetic predisposition to Parkinson's Disease. This post also serves to publicize his wife's business, 23andMe, which does DNA testing. There is some reflection on the use of knowing that you are more likely than the average person to get a particular disease:

I know early in my life something I am substantially predisposed to. I now have the opportunity to adjust my life to reduce those odds (e.g. there is evidence that exercise may be protective against Parkinson's). I also have the opportunity to perform and support research into this disease long before it may affect me.

(Brin has $15.9 billion.)

And, regardless of my own health it can help my family members as well as others.

I feel fortunate to be in this position. Until the fountain of youth is discovered, all of us will have some conditions in our old age only we don't know what they will be. I have a better guess than almost anyone else for what ills may be mine -- and I have decades to prepare for it.

I don't know if Brin means to keep blogging here or if the blog was created simply to make the announcement about his genetic condition. I found the blog via the NYT, which said that Brin made the announcement through the blog.

Would you get genetic testing to find out about your predisposition to a diseases that you could do nothing about?

ADDED: Brin isn't a very clear thinker. This statement is obviously false:

Until the fountain of youth is discovered, all of us will have some conditions in our old age only we don't know what they will be.

Not everyone lives to old age. Moreover, some people remain healthy into old age and then die suddenly of a heart attack, stroke, or ax murder. He has fallen far short of making the argument that we should all want the product his wife's business sells.

Full post as published by Althouse on September 19, 2008 (boomark / email).