Pope Francis has a new book out. Ever wonder what he thinks of trans people?
The head of the Catholic Church has claimed people who ‘manipulate’ their bodies are similar to ‘Herods’ that ‘destroy, that plot designs of death, that disfigure the face of man and woman, destroying creation.’
It’s also MDs who avoid the “E” word. A survey of the literature found an interesting shift in usage:
The results of our survey showed a huge disparity in word use between the evolutionary biology and biomedical research literature. In research reports in journals with primarily evolutionary or genetic content, the word “evolution” was used 65.8% of the time to describe evolutionary processes (range 10%–94%, mode 50%–60%, from a total of 632 phrases referring to evolution). However, in research reports in the biomedical literature, the word “evolution” was used only 2.7% of the time (range 0%–75%, mode 0%–10%, from a total of 292 phrases referring to evolution), a highly significant difference (chi-square, p < 0.001). Indeed, whereas all the articles in the evolutionary genetics journals used the word “evolution,” ten out of 15 of the articles in the biomedical literature failed to do so completely. Instead, 60.0% of the time antimicrobial resistance was described as “emerging,” “spreading,” or “increasing” (range 0%–86%, mode 30%–40%); in contrast, these words were used only 7.5% of the time in the evolutionary literature (range 0%–25%, mode 0%–10%). Other nontechnical words describing the evolutionary process included “develop,” “acquire,” “appear,” “trend,” “become common,” “improve,” and “arise.” Inclusion of technical words relating to evolution (e.g., “selection,” “differential fitness,” “genetic change,” or “adaptation”) did not substantially alter the picture: in evolutionary journals, evolution-related words were used 79.1% of the time that there was an opportunity to use them (range 26%–98%, mode 50%–60%), whereas in biomedical journals they were used only 17.8% of the time (range 0%–92%, mode 0%–10%).
I did! It was an origami microscope, with a single simple lens added. Here’s what it looks like:
It’s called a Foldscope, and I got it as part of a beta test program. It’s a bit like the original Leeuwenhoek microscope, which you held up to your eye to see a magnified image.
Carl Zimmer wrote a good article on bedbugs as an example of evolution. In their shift to human victims, they’ve acquired a new morphology and new physiological requirements, and are distinctly and clearly different from their ancestors that fed on bats.
Answers in Genesis, though, has this idea that their perspective is just as valid as that of scientists: they claim to be viewing the same evidence just as fairly, but through the lens of the Bible rather than those crude human-made texts (I think you can see a problem right there).
The behavior of the University of Minnesota keeps sinking to new lows. In the case of Dan Markingson, they recruited a mentally ill young man into an experimental pharmaceutical treatment, his condition worsened, and he committed suicide. He was a person who needed help, not to be roped into the position of a guinea pig, but you know there is big money behind clinical trials sponsored by pharmaceutical companies (but not enough, apparently, to cover adequate monitoring and care for test subjects).
My university has made a statement about another test patient.
(via Earth Matters)
The Atlantic takes a look at Minneapolis, which is an outlier in several ways: it’s doing relatively well economically (it’s no Detroit), but at the same time, it’s managed to avoid extreme disparities — there’s affordable housing without the overpriced real estate at the top (it’s no San Francisco, in a good way). How do they do it?
Among other factors, it’s all about…wealth redistribution.
That quote is from a good article in Nature on how sex is non-binary — my only quibble would be with that “now”. You’d have to define “now” as a window of time that encompasses the entirety of my training and work in developmental biology, and I’m getting to be kind of an old guy. Differences in sex development (DSDs) are common knowledge, and rather routine — and coincidentally, I’m giving an exam on sex chromosome anomalies today.
But if it isn’t enough for you yet, here’s another one: I was interviewed for the Phil Ferguson show.
A song that could be silent. An ocean that could be dry. How about a book that could be nothing but deepities? That last one exists: it’s called A God That Could Be Real: Spirituality, Science, and the Future of Our Planet
