Humans as an aquatic species

Writer and evolutionary theorist Elaine Morgan starts her TED talk by describing the ongoing paradigm: Chimps stayed in the trees and humans hit the savannas. She argues that humans are just too different than the chimps to justify the ongoing paradigm--for instance, look at our naked (hairless) skin and bipedality. We didn't evolve on savanna. Something else must of happened. She explains that there is a close connection between all of the naked animal species and water. Water life could also explain bipedality. Consider our distinctive layer of fat, which can't be found in other primate species. Again, life in water would explain that layer in us (just like it explains that fat layer in whales). Consider also our speech. How is it that we can speak so well? Only the diving animals and diving birds have such incredible control of their breathing. Morgan argues that it's time to destroy the ongoing paradigm and declare that humans evolved in the water. According to Morgan, almost everybody likes the aquatic theory but almost everyone officially declares that it's "rubbish." But this is one of those cases where everyone could be wrong. She mentions David Attenborough and Daniel Dennett as recent converts to the aquatic ape theory. [Note: some scholars have given detailed criticism of the aquatic ape hypothesis. For instance, see this entry at Wikipedia].

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I saw a nipple.

While walking to the Missouri State Court of Appeals today, I thought I saw a nipple.

Then I got closer . . . I DID! I DID see a nipple!There it was, prominently displayed in a building housing a prestigious courthouse, a court run by the government of the "Show Me" state of Missouri!!

Now, that’s odd … A prominent agency of my federal government (the FCC) is spending huge sums of money trying to punish a TV network for displaying a part of a nipple of Janet Jackson. My state government is simultaneously and shamelessly displaying that same forbidden body part.

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This Just In: Hannah Montana May Have A Clitoris!

What are we to make of this latest flap over a teen icon revealing herself as a potentially sexual being?

I was only dimly aware of Hannah Montana till the Vanity Fair scandal (if scandal is the word). Now it seems I can’t get away from her, which is, of course, the goal of marketing—to make something inescapable for the general public. There are elements of the incident that require less froth and more examination. The accusations of “whose idea was it in the first place and how was Mylie Cyrus manipulated?” are loud and in many ways naive.

First off, Hannah Montana is a Disney product. I don’t think we’re yet quite comfortable with the idea of a person—even a fictional one—being a “product” like a box of soap or a car, but this is indeed what the character is. Designed, engineered, and road tested, Hannah Montana is a money-making machine for Disney and the various participants in the show and franchise.

Pause for a moment and consider: Disney.

It is difficult to imagine a marketing machine that is better at what it does. Which means the chances of something being done with one of its properties that it (a) doesn’t know about and (b) doesn’t approve are next to zero. Especially when you add to that:

Vanity Fair.

Big magazine, famous magazine, a magazine people in show business lust to get into. In the vernacular, Lot A Bank there.

So we’re talking about two major corporate entities, …

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Remind me why I should care that Lindsay Lohan is going to appear nude in a movie.

It must be very important that “LiLo” is going to “lose her clothes,” in an upcoming movie, because this story about her nakedness is one of the top headlines on today’s homepage of MSNBC.  Here’s the essence of this important “news”:

Set to play a “nymphomaniac waitress” in “Florence,” Lindsay purportedly countered the producers’ request for a topless sex scene with a “full frontal” offer. “She is fully aware of the potential of her body,” a Tinseltown pal insisted. “Lindsay wants to build up an image as a mature, responsible actress.”

Why is Lohan’s nudity so worthy of this prominent headline?  Is it because she is pretty?  MSNBC includes this photo in case you need to see her to comprehend the story:                                 lilo-photo.jpg

Yeah, she’s pretty, but pretty women can be found in many places and most of those sightings are not newsworthy.  Is all of this media attention occurring because Lohan is a woman who will be appearing naked?   No, seeing a naked woman is cheap and easy (for instance, I’ve heard that one can Google “naked women” and find lots of photos and videos of naked women on the Internet. Caveat: In no way am I suggesting that all of the naked women you might find on the Internet are also pretty). 

I think this media attention regarding Lohan is because a lot of people will be “getting what they covet” when they see Lindsay Lohan naked.  I’m reminded of being in high school, where one of …

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Continue ReadingRemind me why I should care that Lindsay Lohan is going to appear nude in a movie.