Science & Society

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Major Histocompatibility Complexes - A Genetic Clue To Why Opposites Attract In Human Mate Selection

Science & Society News Account |
Professor Maria da Graça Bicalho, head of the Immunogenetics and Histocompatibility Laboratory at the University of Parana, Brazil, told the annual conference of the European Society of Human Genetics that people with diverse major histocompatibility complexes (MHCs) were more likely to choose each other as mates than those whose MHCs were similar, and that this was likely to be an evolutionary strategy to ensure healthy reproduction. Yes, opposites attract.   Even genetically.   The MHC is a large genetic region situated on chromosome 6, and found in most vertebrates. It plays an…
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Harry Benjamin Syndrome Revealed: The naked bigotry of some transwomen against others.

Science & Society Hontas Farmer |
Harry Benjamin Syndrome, at first a uncontroversial and innocuous idea that transsexual brains are different from other brains, has morphed into a platform for some to denigrate others under a cloak of true pseudoscience proposed by laypeople and supported by not one reputable sexologist, psychologist, or psychiatrist.  What some of them have done is take to attacking anyone who does not fit with their ideal of what a real "woman born transsexual" is (Like a transsexual who does not want sexual reassignment surgery.)  All they while complaining about how oppressed they feel. …
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Twins: One Mom, Two Dads - Uh oh, Someone Has Some S'plainin' To Do

Science & Society Anonymous |
The birth of twins is a genetic oddity in itself - only happening in about one out of  every 90 births.  But adding a large twist of unexpected to an already unlikely event - this week it was announced that a mother in Dallas, Texas gave birth to a set of twins last year that aren't actually paternal twins, but instead are half-brothers.  Yes, they both clearly have the same mother - but  it has since been determined that the boys have two different fathers. Mia Washington gave birth to two boys seven minutes apart, 11 months ago.  However, as the boys, Justin and…
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"Angels & Demons" - No Laughing Antimatter

Science & Society Hank |
What happens when a guy married to an art historian who dislikes religion writes a book using science?   "Angels&Demons", that's what.   It's the book Dan Brown wrote that made even less sense than "The DaVinci Code", because it was written before that blockbuster hit, even though the new movie seems like a sequel.   Because it was written three years earlier, he had yet to refine his craft of jumbling vaguely non-specific pop social science with revisionist history - though he still knows he dislikes Catholics enough - and basically works in the expected conspiracy theory…
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What is Language ?

Science & Society Patrick Lockerby |
What is Language ? We are tool-using social  animals. The most powerful tool known is the one we use to build every other tool: language - spoken or written. But tools can be used with little or no skill to turn out mundane artifacts and garbage. By honing your skills with language you - yes, you - can craft masterpieces. A study of linguistics can help you acquire such skills, but be warned: the pursuit of linguistic knowledge is highly addictive. ... consider the consequences of adopting, as an understanding of education, the ability to tell rubbish from Reason. Nothing more. Nothing…
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Pushing Science to Extreme Openness

Science & Society Michael White |
Georg, over at Lattice Points noted a piece about open science in Physics World: The adoption and growth of scientific journals has created a body of shared knowledge for our civilization, a collective long-term memory that is the basis for much of human progress. This system has changed surprisingly little in the last 300 years. Today, the Internet offers us the first major opportunity to improve this collective long-term memory, and to create a collective short-term working memory — a conversational commons for the rapid collaborative development of ideas. Physics World offers an example of…
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The ACLU, Myriad Genetics And The Future Of Biotechnology

Science & Society News Account |
The American Civil Liberties Union action in filing a lawsuit yesterday against Myriad Genetics is going to lead to one of the most important legal battles in the history of biotechnology, asserts Genetic Engineering&Biotechnology News(GEN).   The ACLU charged that the patenting of two human genes linked to breast and ovarian cancer will inhibit medical research.   The organization also claims that the patents are invalid and unconstitutional, though the ACLU didn't disclose which clause of the Constitution it violates. "This is going to turn into one of the watershed events in…
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Elitism Is Back, Baby (Star Trek Is Proof)

Science & Society Hank |
I have a confesson to make; I'm probably smarter than you. Don't take it badly, I am smarter than most people and I am not saying I am definitely smarter than you, because I don't know all of you and that would just be ridiculous hubris. But I am smarter than most of you, yet I have been forced by societal norms to keep it quiet. Oppressed, even.   Still, it comes out even if I try to hide it.   I am always convinced I will be the smartest guy in every room I enter and most of the time I am right, without even saying a word. I am part of the elite.  If you are reading…
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What Spore should have been

Science & Society Michael White |
The evolution game Spore was somewhat of a critical flop - especially among scientists. The game has glitzy graphics, but, for a game billed as being somehow connected to science, the science sucked.  What's more important, many of us thought the game play could have been improved with better science.Well, if the Spore guys had gotten together with the creator of Swimbots, (or GenePool - not sure which is the real name) the result might have been amazing graphics, gameplay, and science: It's a computer simulation where hundreds of virtual organisms evolve swimming skills. These organisms…
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Teleportation Using Einsten-Podolsky-Rosen Entanglement

Science & Society Garth Sundem |
Okay, my last blog was a list of Spam haikus. I offer this post as self-flagellation before the scientific community at large. Traditionally, the crux of teleportation has been its seeming contradiction of the Uncertainty Principle, which states that you can never measure and thus know all the information contained within an atom (the more you measure, the more you disturb, until the thing no longer looks like what you started with). Without knowing the make-up of the original object, how could you replicate it across space? The answer is spooky, or to be precise, spooky action at a distance…
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