BS: What scientists think about

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: Bill D
Date: 17 Oct 06 - 02:57 PM

"In recent years, more and more human behaviours that once were thought to be learned are found to have a genetic component."

Yep! I have been following this trend in discoveries for a few years now. I would add "...that once were thought to be learned and/or freely chosen.."

Brain chemistry and DNA tracing have shown many traits to be seriously influenced, if not controlled, by genetics.

(soon we may have to conclude that Shambles can't help himself...and neither can we who respond)

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: Amos
Date: 17 Oct 06 - 04:01 PM

A thought devoid of value, I warrant. Dancers inisist they have no choice, because the music moves them, once played; but they often forget how it came into being at all, being enthralled by the very dance.

A

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: Mrrzy
Date: 18 Oct 06 - 12:18 PM

Actually, Spaw, Mitochondrial Eve is twice as old (150,000 years ago) as Y-Chromosome Adam (75,000 mya) - now how does THAT work? Was Eve Adam's great-(...)-grannie?

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: Amos
Date: 18 Oct 06 - 12:26 PM

Wouldn't be the first time that sort of hijinks hid behinmd the skirts of respectability.

A

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: GUEST,ibo
Date: 18 Oct 06 - 04:32 PM

Testing their tubes

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 18 Oct 06 - 06:05 PM

One of many "explanations" for the difference in age for Mitochondrial Eve and Y-chromosome Adam may be seen at What, if anything, is a Mitochondrial Eve?.

The key point is that in both cases the "common ancestor" is the most recent individual from whom all currently living humans are directly descended. The notion that these two are the "first persons ever" is completely falacious, and is something to "get over."

If the current MRCA(Eve) [= Most Recent Common Ancester - female] had more than one daughter, then two separate lines of descent diverge from her. If all the matrilineal descendants of all but one of these daughters die off (fail to produce female descendants) then the daughter whose line continues becomes the new MRCA(Eve).

The same (mathematical) condition applies to the male line. The more recent MRCA(Adam) simply means that the paternal lines of descent of all but one of the males alive at the same time as the female MRCA failed to continue to produce currently surviving male descendants, moving the "title" of MRCA(Adam) to a more recently appearing male.

In one sense, the determination of a date for a MRCA measures how recently the descendants of other humans, of the same or prior generations, became extinct. It is NOT a measure of "how old humans are."

John

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: Paul Burke
Date: 19 Oct 06 - 03:37 AM

I still think Mitochondrial Eve is worth a celebration, if only we knew when Mitochondrial Day was.

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 26 Oct 06 - 12:19 AM

The November-December issue of American Scientist describes current efforts and plans to detect and measure gravity waves. The passage of such waves should produce "space distortions" detectable as changes in the distance between two objects. Crude "detection" has been reported, but the size of the distortion depends on the distance between the two objects, and terrestrial distances are too small for adequate sampling.

The plan is to toss multiple "laboratories" into space, each carrying a small reflecting object that will be "floated" within the carrying vessel. The vessel will control it's own position to "stay clear" of the reflector mass, so that the object is affected only by gravity.
To achieve the detection objective, at least two such masses will need to be placed approximately 5,000,000 kilometers apart (5 Gm) and the "motions" of the sensing masses must be measured to within around 0.00000000000005 meter (0.05 pm ).

The ratio between the distance between sensors and the change in distance that must be measured is about 10²³:1.

They think they can measure it.

Safest access to the article is probably at American Scientist, select the article The Sounds of Spacetime.

Direct link to the articles may open at Sounds, but there are some access limitations based on membership and/or subscription status. (It works for me, but I have a cookie from them.) The article in pdf format is available, but it's free only to Sigma Xi members, $5 to nonmember Am Scientist subscribers, and $12 for the general public.

If you get to the Table of Contents (first link) there may be other articles of interest, but most of them appear to require "credentials."

John

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: Amos
Date: 26 Oct 06 - 12:26 AM

I have to say that these orders of magnitude and the thought of measuring them just makes my brain wilt and shrivel. Boggling!!!


A

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 26 Oct 06 - 02:15 AM

The article does compare the resolution required, the 0.05 picometer, not to the diameter of an atom but to the diameter of the nucleus of an atom.

The resolution is about (within an order of magnitude - x10) what I got in some thesis experiments as a student, but I didn't have to stand quite 5 million km from what I was measuring.

The actual instrument design, construction, and deployment is obviously more of an engineering challenge than pure science. The "science" is understood, and the article gives some (very elementary) hints at the scientific justifications and explanations for it all.

John

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: Wolfgang
Date: 16 Nov 06 - 05:59 AM

Ancient genomics is born

The reality of a complete Neanderthal genome draws near, as two papers report the sequencing of large amounts of Neanderthal DNA. The results will help to answer some central questions on human evolution.

If true, it should win them a Nobel prize in some years.

Wolfgang

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: Bunnahabhain
Date: 16 Nov 06 - 11:03 AM

Getting the world, or at least journalists, to accept and use standard form when it's sensible. Long strings of 0's are impossible to read.


At least I'm sort of a scientist, and I'll think this at least twice a week, when the media mangles whatever science story is about...

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: Bill D
Date: 16 Nov 06 - 11:45 AM

It might show whether the was (or could have been) any cross-breeding between Neanderthals and Homo sapiens. (one infant skeleton was found that 'seemed' to show characteristics of both).

DNA has already allowed tracing of many lines of humans and helped date when they appeared in various parts of the world, thus showing the 'map' of migrations and development.

It is fascinating to follow 'us'.....

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: Amos
Date: 16 Nov 06 - 12:39 PM

I got the impression that interbreeding between Neanderthal and Sap was generally ruled out? Maybe the Neanderthals were too liberal for Homo Sap's taste?


A

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: Bill D
Date: 16 Nov 06 - 03:13 PM

"ruled out"?....I think it's been more like (up to now) many doubting that one bit of circumstantial evidence was enough...that's why this latest breakthrough might settle it.

(I HAVE seen folks that made me wonder...*wry smile*)

We have, relatively, so few examples of our various ancestors that only general conclusions can be drawn about dates and lines of inheritance. DNA, when available, is about the best indicator we can get. It can sure help us rule OUT some things, anyway.

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 16 Nov 06 - 03:34 PM

I've seen more than a couple of recent "news bits" claiming the discovery of a particular segment of the human genome that has "mutated rapidly" in humans but not, apparently, in any other critters. The segment, or at least a very similar one, is present in a few others, but hasn't undergone the mutation.

The researchers are postulating that mutation of this particular bit of DNA "explains" the sudden (on the evolutionary time scale) increase in brain capacity in humans.

They have confirmed (subject to verification?) that the segment codes for development in the brain, and that it codes for production of an RNA component rather than directly for DNA or other "building block" materials.

Something to watch, perhaps. Reports I've seen as of now are too scattered and vague to merit citation.

One wonders about the plans to "inject" the segment into mice for further confirmation. What does one do with a mouse who's smarter than the one running the experiment?

John

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: Bill D
Date: 16 Nov 06 - 07:08 PM

" What does one do with a mouse who's smarter than the one running the experiment?"

Flowers for Algernon

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 16 Nov 06 - 08:53 PM

Bill D -

After I posted it occured that I sould have said "...once again."

The best report I've seen was in a "marginal note" in Technology Revew, where it won't be posted on the web. Tweaks the interest but we'll have to wait for a decent report before there'll be anything to link up to.

John

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: Old Guy
Date: 16 Nov 06 - 10:55 PM

I was telling my wife about a TV show I saw where they fixed a camera on the nose of an alligator and fed it to a python. You could see the insides of the snake as it went in.

She said only a scientist would want to know what it looks like.

I said why would it matter what it looked like except to the gator and he woul be dead shortly.

I wonder why we expend time and money on such bullsh.. err unnecessary endeavors when the money could better be spent on something more pressing and bebeficial to mankind like Darfur or fighting drug drug traffickers.

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: Rowan
Date: 16 Nov 06 - 11:11 PM

I went to a seminar yesterday (when Mudcat was down) and heard Debbie Argue, a PhD student from the ANU, discuss her analyses of the various pieces of Homo floresiensis and Mike Morwood discuss archaeology of hominin evolution and island biogeography around the Wallace Line. Great stuff!

When Mike was first discussing where "Flo" fitted into our understanding, the best explanation of (what was then known about) Flo's anatomy seemed to be that insular dwarfism had been operating on an isolated population of Homo, of a species that predated H. sapiens and the best candidate was H. erectus. Debbie has been able to use quite a few data from Australopithecines, more specimens of H. floresiensis, and lots of H. sapiens (including pygmies and microcephalics) argued (I bet she's tired of that) that her analyses support H. floresiensis as a species quite separate from H. sapiens but also probably separate from H. erectus. Of the two possible explanations, she seemed to think the better would involve the radiation out of Africa of a species with lots of australopithecine features but still part of the genus Homo.

Mike went on to give an account of how the occurrence (and lack of occurrence) of island faunal elements might be explained. The lack of investigation of palaeo- material from east Asia generally and southeast Asia specifically came in for some criticism, as did the 'notional' acceptance, by Australlian archaeologists, of a 50k year 'basal date' for human occupation of Sahul.

And, having read various comments above about "species", I though it worth saying that bacteriologists, palaeoontologists, botanists and zoologists all use slightly differing definitions of "species". When bacteriologists talk about horizontal gene transfer, they're in a different world from palaoontologists and comments about species evolving need to be carefully explained and defined to those whose understanding might be from a different discipline or even a different era.

Cheers, Rowan

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: DougR
Date: 17 Nov 06 - 08:15 PM

I read today that they are going to fire cannons loaded with pollution s into the stratusphere to cool the earth. And all this time I thought that was what was causing global warming! Strange right?

DougR

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 18 Nov 06 - 02:12 AM

I've seen only "news media" reports on the injected pollutants theory, but the limited babbling there indicates that the media have their usual cluelessness in high gear.

In greatly oversimplified terms, global warming is presumed to be caused by release of polutants that absorb infrared radiation and thus trap heat in the atmosphere causing it to accumulate and increase the earth temperature.

The separate effect of depletion of the ozone layer removes the ozone that's the main absorber of ultraviolet radiation, leaving us with no protection at the surface from this separate harmful solar radiation.

It's not clear which of these two vastly different effects this proposed addition of new pollutants is intended to correct, or even that those proposing it clearly understand which problem their modelling programs are intended to study.

"A stupid man's report of what a clever man says can never be accurate, because he unconsciously translates what he hears into something he can understand."(?)

Anybody got a decent summary of the proposition from one of the clever ones?

John

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: Peace
Date: 18 Nov 06 - 02:29 AM

Ya'd have to be as smart as Bertrand Russell to answer that.

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: Rowan
Date: 18 Nov 06 - 11:38 PM

From a radio broadcast of a science journalist's comments I gather the proposal is that the "pollution layer" is intended to diminish insolation reaching the earth and that the layer would need to be far enough away from earth as to be outside the moon's orbit. Which means we'd still be able to see the moon OK but astronomers and their instruments would be looking at stars as through a dark glassly. So would the rest of us.

Cheers, Rowan

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: Wolfgang
Date: 19 Nov 06 - 03:33 PM

Geoengineering is the word I have recently read for that approach.

Wolfgang

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: Mrs.Duck
Date: 19 Nov 06 - 03:37 PM

Scientists think about the washing! Geoff tells me on a daily basis that he is a scientist but the rest of the time he talks laundry!

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 20 Nov 06 - 02:12 AM

Mrs Duck -

Is it that he lacks the expertise to accomplish that minor task in properly efficient manner, or is the low-life cur objecting to the way you do it?

Either way, a proper study documenting tools and equipemnt, materials, methods, schedules, and costs is in order - and quite obviously he's the GIHOM best qualified.

John


(Genius In His Own Mind)

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 20 Nov 06 - 09:12 AM

Re: Pollution to stop global warming.

Save Earth from warming by using pollution?, Associated Press story via MSNBC.

The scientist who proposed this "possible action" states quite clearly that he intended it to sound bizarre, as a "wake-up" to those who are ignoring the problem.

Apparently quite a few others are taking it more seriously than he intended, but I suspect at this point he's not too upset with that.

Several minor gotchas in the concept that those eager to "do something right now" hopefully will pick up on before they start launching the acid rain generators.

John

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: Crystal
Date: 20 Nov 06 - 10:12 AM

What scientists think about no. 98:

Hmmm I could probably earn more money stacking shelves at Tescos.

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 21 Nov 06 - 03:24 PM

An update on the effort to sequence the DNA of Neanderthals appears at Neanderthals.

An earlier bit of blather on the subject, at Cavemen, Chimps, and Us (July 2006).

This appears to be a spin-off effort triggered by the very recent discovery that "hard tissues" that are commonly fossilized do contain DNA in some cases, especially for fairly "recent" (<100,000 y.o.?) fossils. Previously it was just accepted that only soft tissues would have such information, and no real attempts were made to examine fossils.

Until some fairly complete results are produced, it will be questionable whether the DNA obtainable from fossils will be "complete" enough to give much information; but it's an open territory being explored.

John

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 22 Nov 06 - 04:50 AM

"PARIS - Nations representing half the world's population signed a long-awaited, $12.8 billion pact Tuesday for a nuclear fusion reactor that could revolutionize global energy use for future generations.

"The ITER project by the United States, the European Union, China, India, Russia, Japan and South Korea will attempt to combat global warming by harnessing the fusion that runs the sun, creating an alternative to polluting fossil fuels."

If anyone's looking for a long-term job, they estimate that a demonstration reactor may be ready by 2040.

John

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 24 Nov 06 - 03:24 AM

Wheat gets genetic boost from the past
Modern strain crossed with wild variety to enhance nutrition
By Will Dunham
Reuters
Updated: 1:13 a.m. CT Nov 24, 2006

WASHINGTON - Scientists have found a way to boost the protein, zinc and iron content in wheat, an achievement that could help bring more nutritious food to many millions of people worldwide.

A team led by University of California at Davis researcher Jorge Dubcovsky identified a gene in wild wheat that raises the grain's nutritional content. The gene became nonfunctional for unknown reasons during humankind's domestication of wheat.

Writing in the journal Science on Thursday, the researchers said they used conventional breeding methods to bring the gene into cultivated wheat varieties, enhancing the protein, zinc and iron value in the grain. The wild plant involved is known as wild emmer wheat, an ancestor of some cultivated wheat.

Wheat represents one of the major crops feeding people worldwide, providing about 20 percent of all calories consumed. The World Health Organization has said upward of 2 billion people get too little zinc and iron in their diet, and more than 160 million children under age 5 lack adequate protein.
...
In making the wheat more nutritious, the researchers did not change how it tastes, Dubcovsky said. "We're not changing the composition or anything very dramatic in the grain," he said.
"I don't think a simple step like this will solve hunger in the world. I'm not that naive. But I think it's heading in the right direction," Dubcovsky said.

The gene made the grain mature more quickly while also boosting its protein and micronutrient content by 10 to 15 percent in the pasta and bread wheat varieties with which the researchers worked.

"What this gene does is it uses better what is in the plant already, so rather than leave the protein and the zinc and iron in the straw, we've moved a little bit more into the grain," Dubcovsky said.

The wheat varieties bred by the scientists are not genetically modified, which could help them become accepted commercially, they said.

Copyright 2006 Reuters Limited.

[Doing it the old-fashioned way still works sometimes.]

John

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: bobad
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 09:37 PM

Levitating small animals

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: Bill D
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 10:57 PM

Who was it said "Man does not live by bread alone."? Seems like he might now!

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: Wolfgang
Date: 10 Jan 07 - 05:47 AM

Across cultures a narrow waist indicates feminine beauty

The finding is not new. Theories that body indicators of health (e.g., symmetry) determine who we consider beautiful people in our species have found a lot of empirical support. (BTW, that is not restricted to visual cues. Females judge the body odor of immunocompatible men as more pleasant.)

The method was new to me. They did make a literature search in three cultures and at least as many languages some centuries back to find descriptions of female beauty. They did find some dozen positive descriptions of a narrow waist and not a single other.

Abdominal obesity, as measured by waist size, is reliably linked to decreased oestrogen, reduced fecundity and increased risk for major diseases....Even without the benefit of modern medical knowledge, both British and Asian writers knew intuitively the biological link between health and beauty.

Wolfgang

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: *daylia*
Date: 10 Jan 07 - 09:44 AM

So, the smaller the waist the healthier and more beautiful the woman, according to scientists?

Hmmmm ... so that's why pregnant people are so ugly! Must be real sick, too.   

And anorexics/bulimics must be the loveliest and healthiest of all.

Oh well, guess most of us will never make the grade.

Thanks for the thoughts, scientists.

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: Bill D
Date: 10 Jan 07 - 12:53 PM

no, *daylia*, those are not the logical implications of the finding. You are impliciting inserting your own (unstated) premises in order to cast doubt on the study.

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: *daylia*
Date: 10 Jan 07 - 02:17 PM

Actually, I woke up in a grumpy mood this morning (been dealing with a injured shoulder and in pain lately) ... and just the idea that the smaller a woman's waist is the more beautiful and valuable she's considered to be, across time and cultures even --- well, that made the bad mood worse.

My apologies.

But no, Bill, I was not trying to cast doubt on the study. Its most likely perfectly valid. In fact, I've been up against these scientifically measurable attitudes all my life, just like everybody else.

I just don't like it.

End of story.

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: Amos
Date: 10 Jan 07 - 02:25 PM

It's a subconscious association with reproductive potential, Daylia. It is part of protoplasm's most cherished mission to find opportunities to replicate. It may not be analytical anymore than "V* ower!" is a good reason to buy a Hummer, but it stirs the instincts of the limbic brain. :)


A

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 10 Jan 07 - 02:37 PM

daylia -

One "study" reported many years ago showed a large number of pictures of women of all sizes and shapes to a large number of people - mostly college students, and concluded that the critical indicator of "sexy" was the presence of a visible waist. It made no difference how large or small the waist was, but it had to be at least visibly smaller than the adjacent (above and below) body parts.

Wolfgang's link takes me to a point where a registration is needed to get in, and it's not clear where I would go once in, so I'll defer attempting to look at the details now; but the "conclusion" is not unexpected.

More and more "scientists" are recognizing that "anorexics and bulemics" are not sexy. The "fashion model look" is not intended to be attractive. It's intended to make the model less noticeable than the clothes.

For an opinion probably closer to Wolfgang's link, try the recent Sexy people play the symmetry card: Balance, not body type, is key in fashion and attraction. This is an opinion from a "fashion designier" (the "science" of selling fashion?) and does reflect some opinion that "his styles are better than their styles" but actually is in line with what numerous studies have reported for decades.

John

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: Rowan
Date: 10 Jan 07 - 04:06 PM

The reports on the studies I saw gave a slightly more complicated picture, John; I think they were reported in a series of issues of New Scientist in around 1996/7. The symmetry stuff pre dates that and (to me) has been undisputed for yonks. The waist stuff is much more interesting; various investigators were trying to see whether there was any sort of objective measure that could then be analysed in a natural selection methodology.

At first they took the "vital statistics" of all the Miss America, Miss World and Miss Universe winners, as reported in the press, on the basis that they represented at least a group of 'judged' and thus 'objectively accepted' beautiful shapes. The only common rating (stay with me) applicable to all of them was the Hip:Waist ratio, from memory about 1.2:1. Breast size & shape was irrelevant, apparently and the recorded weights of the women involved had decreased by about 2 stone (28 lbs in American money) from 1944(?) when the first of these competitions had occurred to ~ 1995. But despite these changes, the hip:waist ratio of "the most beautiful" had stayed the same.

Thinking that others might regard this as biased due to America (and western) fondness for displays of nudity, they checked their findings in Indonesia, where Playboy routinely had black bars printed over anything nude that wasn't a male chest. They used only silhouettes of women's figures and the preferred images all had the same hip:waist ratio. There was more but that's all I can recall.

I might add that this article was only one of series that New Scientist ran over a couple of years that weas most interesting from a human biology perspective.

Cheers, Rowan

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: Bill D
Date: 10 Jan 07 - 05:41 PM

Whatever the accuracy of the study, it is merely an 'indicator'- a description perhaps of a bell-shaped curve. I'm sure that I, as a male, would not register very high on a strictly 'rated' view of male sexiness..*grin*...broad shoulders and muscles and...ummm..other things.

   Quite apart from what is 'sexy',(that is, what will win beauty contests), an analysis of what members of both sexes find attractive in members of the opposite sex is a quite complex matter.
   I have seen beauty contest winners that had 'ideal' measurements that I found dull and unpleasant in bearing and totally uninteresting as theoretical 'partners'. Yet, I have seen and met women both fat and thin who would never even get IN a beauty pageant that were glowing, attractive, happy, pleasant, desirable individuals.

(I'm sure all this should be obvious, but it seemed like it needed to be noted in this context.)

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: Amos
Date: 10 Jan 07 - 09:47 PM

Well, Bill, de gustibus non disputandum is what this proves. And likewise, chacun å son mauvais gout.


A

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: Bill D
Date: 10 Jan 07 - 09:59 PM

You do, and you'll clean it up!

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: Bill D
Date: 10 Jan 07 - 10:06 PM

oh...well, I guess them furriners DID make some points... ;>)

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: Rowan
Date: 11 Jan 07 - 01:24 AM

With typical reductionism they were trying to limit the subjectivity of their variables. Some of the later NS articles went into some of the more physiological aspects of "attractiveness". One described the effect of attractiveness on how much semen was "stripped" (I kid you not) from men during intercourse and ejaculation. Without going into boring detail, they found that no matter how attractive the males rated their female partners for such activities (even using hip:waist ratios) it was the more Rubenesque ladies (ie, slightly overweight to "modern" eyes) that routinely stripped the most semen from their partners.

The inference drawn from this was that, despite any 'conscious' deliberations by the male, the women with just that little bit extra subcutaneous fat (already known to be a marker of higher fertility) were better able to get their partners to "deliver" in the fertilisation stakes. All very Darwinian!

Just thought you'd like to know.

Cheers, Rowan

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: Amos
Date: 11 Jan 07 - 05:49 PM

"

Best dressed women have babies on their mind

13 January 2007

From New Scientist Print Edition.

"DRESS to impress, goes the maxim. "Dress to conceive" might be more accurate. Women take greater care over their appearance when they are at peak levels of fertility.

Working with a group of 30 women aged 18 to 37, Martie Haselton of the University of California, Los Angeles, and colleagues took two full-body photographs of each woman, one close to ovulation when the woman was highly fertile, and one at a point of low fertility in the menstrual cycle. Volunteers were then invited to decide which of the two photos showed the woman trying to look more attractive. They chose the woman in her "high fertility" photo some 59.5 per cent of the time more often than would be expected by chance (Hormones and Behavior, vol 51, p 40).

Though not in the same class as the obvious physical cues other primate females give when they are ovulating, it is the first evidence that women openly advertise their fertility. Interestingly, all the women in the study group described themselves as being in committed relationships with men. So why go to the trouble of dressing up? Perhaps to attract other men.

"Women with high fertility tend to feel attracted to men other than their primary partners," says Haselton. "

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: GUEST,heric
Date: 11 Jan 07 - 06:13 PM

Trivial aside: "They chose the woman in her "high fertility" photo some 59.5 per cent of the time more often than would be expected by chance."

What a bizarre sentence - There were only two photos. Did they pick the high fertility photo 59.5% of the time? Or 79.75% of the time?

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 11 Jan 07 - 06:51 PM

Rapaire told us:

Darwinian evolution requires species to become extinct so that new species can replace them.

I have to raise my eyebrows at this! This sounds highly teleological, at least as phrased.

I admit that Darwin, in The Origin of Species, (which I just finished re-reading) phrases things in teleological-sounding terms too. But clearly, from context, he means (and sometimes says outright) that species necessarily will become extinct in the process of natural selection, as they are pushed out by the new and improved species.

So, to paraphrase your sentence above, Darwinian evolution causes species to become extinct as new species replace them.

But to "require species to become extinct" so that something else can happen is illogical. It puts the extinction before the development of the new species, and logically implies a creative intention, a choice of final target, so to speak, behind the whole process. Which Darwin certainly never states exists.

Dave Oesterreich

Subject: RE: BS: What scientists think about
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 11 Jan 07 - 06:59 PM

Amos commented:


If they can get 80% of the pain relief from the placebo effect, why don't they just learn to implement the placebo effect? Surely training someone to heal himself through self-suggesting a placebo effect is more empowering than increasing his dependency on chemicals?

Shamanism has within it a large proportion of just that, Amos.

Dave Oesterreich