Humans are so well designed!

I saw this snippet on my New Scientist RSS feed. Some researchers, investigating methods to improve IVF success rates, have discovered that contrary to popular belief, chromosomal abnormalities, and hence miscarriages, are not abnormal occurrences, but are in fact the norm.

As women age, their eggs are more likely to have the wrong number of chromosomes, which can lead to miscarriages. But when Joris Vermeersch from the Centre for Human Genetics in Leuven, Belgium, and colleagues examined 23 embryos from nine young, fertile couples who were undergoing IVF for screening purposes, they found that 21 had chromosomal abnormalities, suggesting these are in fact the norm (Nature Medicine, DOI: 10.1038/nm.1924).
I can only presume god was just being mean when he said 'go forth and multiply' - since he must have known that our ability to multiply was broken.

Continue ReadingHumans are so well designed!

Why it matters that humans are animals.

I have written numerous posts advocating that because humans are animals they should be recognized as such (for example, see here , here, here , and here). For zoologists and others who study animals, it is obviously true that we are animals. We do hundreds of things that the other mammals do, plus a few extra. You can see it every day when you eat, breathe, emote, poop, become fatigued and fall asleep. Yet millions of Americans are horrified by the thought that human beings are animals. Consider that we aren’t simply animals. Our species is a carefully defined type of animal. We are apes. Frans de Waal explains:

Darwin wasn't just provocative in saying that we descend from the apes—he didn't go far enough . . . We are apes in every way, from our long arms and tailless bodies to our habits and temperament.

If you want even more detail on what type of animal humans are (we are in the ape sub-division of primates), watch this brisk video by Aron-ra. Again, this sort of information is really disturbing to many people, especially religious conservatives. So why don't I simply leave religious conservatives alone? Why do I persist on standing on rooftops and proclaiming this message that humans are animals? Why don't I just whisper this sort of information only to my closest of friends: "Pssst. Human beings are animals." Why don't I just let it be, and keep it all to myself? What could possibly be at stake that I feel compelled to spread the word that human beings are animals? I was in the process of assembling my own list when I just happened to read Chapter 12 of Mark Johnson's new book, The Meaning of the Body: Aesthetics of Human Understanding. Johnson is well known for his work with metaphors and embodied cognition with George Lakoff. Chapter 12 of his new book contains a section that leaped out at me: "The Philosophical Implications of the Embodied Mind." In that short section, Johnson sets forth nine reasons why it really and truly matters for people to acknowledge that they are animals and to fully accept that their minds are embodied, not free-floating entities independent of physical laws. Johnson's biggest target is the "objectivist theory of meaning," the idea that meaning "gets defined without any connection to the experience of the creature (i.e., the human) for whom the words are meaningful. Johnson points out that those who follow the objectivist theory of meaning believe that words and sentences somehow "carry" meaning without even trying to explain how words and sentences ever come to acquire meaning. It should send up immediate red flags that the predominate theory of meaning relies on floating thoughts, a theory of meaning that is not biologically anchored. Reacting to (and rejecting) this objectivist approach, Mark Johnson premises his analysis "with a mind that is not separate from or out-of-ongoing-contact with its body and its world." His worldview includes a specific definition of body and his impressive list of why it matters for human beings to take seriously "the embodiment of mind and meaning." Here are those reasons (I will be borrowing liberally from Johnson's book with these descriptions, beginning at page 279):

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Fair To A Fault: Secularist Chastised For Bashing Religion In School

The next time someone says to you that religion is under attack by the courts in the schools because of the separation clause, consider this high school history teacher who has been found guilty of insulting Christians in class.

James Corbett, a 20-year teacher at Capistrano Valley High School, was found guilty of referring to Creationism as “religious, superstitious nonsense” during a 2007 classroom lecture, denigrating his former Advanced Placement European history student, Chad Farnan.

The problem with this is that, basically, Mr. Corbett only told the truth, and appears to have talked almost exclusively about Creationism, not Christianity. The judge made the immediate connection between the two, however. U.S. District Court Judge James Selna's claim that he can find "no secular purpose" in Corbett's statements is either thick-witted or disingenuous---it would seem to be a teacher's job to point out to students something that is, well, idiocy. However, I expect an appeal on this, because it is also clear that the judge in question has something of a bias here. But it's instructive---rather than take the idea of Creationism as what it has lately been packaged, namely Intelligent Design, and examine it as a claim of "science" as its advocates insist it is, Selna understands immediately that this is a bogus proposition. That, in fact, Intelligent Design is a religious idea in a new wrapper. Corbett's dismissal of Creationism can only then be an attack on religion. Which, by the letter of the law, is a violation of the separation clause. Those who advocate against secularism and insist religious ideas have no defense in this modern state should look at this as an example---not in their favor, because it still won't allow for the introduction of religion into public schools---of the fact, oft-stated, that the Constitution requires even-handed exclusions. Secularists can't even say nasty things about a bogus idea that has only association relevance to religion. You can't even bring it up to say it's wrong. Personally, I do think this is a bit idiotic, but---what's that old phrase---it is fair to a fault.

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Bad news for Creationists: archeologists have discovered yet another transitional fossil

Archeologists in Canada have discovered the fossil of a previously unknown species that shows features of both land- and water-dwelling mammals. Though not a direct ancestor of modern seals, the fossil nevertheless gives clues to how today's water-dwelling mammals evolved. One begins to wonder how complete the fossil record needs to be before Creationists admit they've been wrong all along. Something tells me no amount of completeness will ever satisfy them.

Continue ReadingBad news for Creationists: archeologists have discovered yet another transitional fossil

New scientific center to study altruism

Consider the mission statement of CCare:

[T]he Center for Compassion and Altruism Research and Education, is an innovative initiative of the Stanford School of Medicine within the Stanford Institute for Neuro-Innovation and Translational Neurosciences that will employ the highest standards of scientific inquiry to investigate compassion and altruism.

The Center will draw on many disciplines (including psychology, neuroscience, economics and contemplative traditions, including Buddhism) in order to

To explore ways in which compassion and altruism can be cultivated within an individual as well as within the society on the basis of testable cognitive and affective training exercises.

The center will be run by James Doty, a physician who is also a professor of neuroscience at Stanford. According to a recent article in Science (April 24, 2009, p. 458), the Dalai Lama provided $150,000 of the start-up funding. Unknown to many, the Dalai Lama has long has a keen interest in cognitive science. According to the article in Science, the aim of the Center seems to be finding that part of at least one religious tradition that actually works to make people compassionate:

[t]o take a centuries-old religious practice and extract from it a set of mental exercises with no religious overtones that can be scientifically proven to change the way people treat each other.

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