Dang you guys are really still going at this huh? Just so we're all on the same page, you are aware that we eat bananas, right?

As before, even just compared to normal potassium ingestion alone (nevermind commercial air flight or medical x-rays), this is nothing, both in volume and in energy level. Our bodies' normal repair mechanisms can shrug off this small amount of low-energy radiation without breaking stride. This is like ducks panicking about a light rain; you literally live constantly immersed in the stuff, this is not making any kind of difference whatsoever.

In both relevant senses of "powerful," yes, this is a non-story. Not only is the amount of remaining radiation fairly small to begin with, being diluted like crazy, and being immediately and harmlessly absorbed by the water it's in, but on top of that tritium decay is also far lower energy (and therefore both less penetrating and less damaging) than most other nuclear decay, to the point where it can't even penetrate human skin in the first place.

That's not exactly right either; by default we tend to decide if we like something in the first few seconds, which is precisely why pop music producers spend so much time and effort perfecting that first part. Once the opinion is formed, it's mentally more work to change it than to affirm it, and casual listeners aren't going to want to bother putting that effort in.

Structurally very similar, one has an OH group on the 2nd-to-last carbon, the other instead has it on the very last carbon in the chain. Chemically pretty similar as well. But biologically not very similar at all, because enzymes are extremely shape-specific.

No, gamma-hydroxybutyrate has an extra hydroxyl group (OH) in the gamma position (3rd carbon in a chain).

Eh, imo this perspective is overblown and a symptom of societal dysfunction. Kids playing games is not escapism, it's (socially) normal behavior and (evolutionarily) a safe way to learn and practice basic skills (motor coordination, hand-eye coordination, basic logic, etc).

The quality of the specific games they play should be under scrutiny, certainly--most mobile games for example don't teach anything beyond addictive compulsions--and they should be accompanied by physical play behaviors as well (eg sports), but there's nothing inherently wrong with even fairly heavy gaming.

Plus, leisure is an important facet of human psychology and you could conversely argue that gamers are more happy simply because any leisure activity improves mental well-being. You might even argue further that these leisure activities are especially critical during childhood, because the minor dysfunctions of having no leisure time compound throughout childhood and produce a very dysfunctional adult. Top this all of with the fact that the most antisocial thing any child can do by definition is simply to not fit in, and consider the fact that gaming is an extremely popular leisure activity.

My point here of course is not that gaming should be especially encouraged or anything, but that human psychology is not simple and children are not made of glass, so until the science is in on the lifetime harm/benefit ratio, parents should drop the hubris and focus on gaming (or whatever else the kids enjoy doing) with their kids (even if that sometimes just means watching them fall off the same ledge 500 times in a row).

Before anybody reports this for violating comment rule 4: they really didn't control for socioeconomic status beyond "food poverty," as this was less of a study and more of a data dredge performed on existing survey data.

So, question for our resident experts: to what extent was this already known? Obviously it's not totally new information since we prescribe SSRIs for depression, but does this tell us anything new or just confirm what we already suspected?

Maybe; research-to-market is usually more in the neighborhood of 10 years, but this is relevant to a big profitable industry so it may indeed get there faster than is typical.