Pretty virus

What do you think? Should I show my cell biology students this 7 minute video before they go off to congregate with their disease-infested families for Thanksgiving?

That’s so beautiful and the sequence of steps so intricate that I’m impressed, even if it is trying to kill me. The video also demonstrates a lot of the cellular phenomena we’ve been talking about in class!

Good morning!

I forced myself to step away from my work yesterday, and refused to even think about classes for a day. It was marvelous! I spent the day only doing things that sparked joy…which for me is setting a very low bar, so I tidied up my home office — there are still a lot of cables around here, but at least they’re tucked away — and went for a walk and read a book (fiction!) and cooked a light dinner and went to bed around 10, and even my dreams spurned any consideration of lectures and labs.

This morning I continued the trend and went into the lab for a while and tended to the spiders (still sparking joy), and now I’m relaxing in front of my better organized computer, enjoying (???) the news. Twitter continues its decline, with Musk lifting the bans on Jordan Peterson and Donald Trump, becoming even more of a garbage dump. And I don’t care! I think I’ll continue my policy of blithe sanguinity for the rest of the day. Tomorrow I’ll have to slap myself back into dogged work and cynical disappointment in the state of the world, but that’s tomorrow. Today, I play a little more.

Quiet quitting sounds like a good idea

In case you were wondering where I’ve been, this has been a killer of a week. Grading, multiple committees and meetings, registration advising, lots of late nights at work, little sleep, and getting ready for finals in a few weeks…and yesterday was just peak awful. I was just focused on classes all day, trying to get everything in shape.

So today I have resolved not to do my job at all. No classwork. No cell biology prep. Nothin’. I’m going to go for a walk in the snow, and then kick back and relax all day by, for a change, forgetting that I’m employed at all. I’ll think of something fun to do…although, I’m also thinking of maybe cleaning up my home office desk. Cables are taking over everything.

Students smarter than their teacher

Here’s a teacher having an old, tired, familiar argument with his students…and the students getting the better of him.

It’s not clear what happens between the first and second clip, but context clues suggest the teacher told the students that he used to be racist but had since stopped being racist, in his own opinion. In the next clip, another student says, “So are you trying to say you used to think that?”

“Yes, sometimes,” the teacher said.

The student who asked to go to the bathroom told the teacher, “You said ‘I am racist,’ that means right now,” suggesting that this was not something he had put behind him. The children continued to try to get him to say whether or not he is racist. “So you are a racist,” a student says.

“Damn, how many times do I gotta say it?” the teacher said, adding, “I’m frustrated with this conversation,” after the kids called him out for swearing.

“You guys don’t think that I’ve made peace with all this stuff? You think I’m still walking around prejudiced against people?” the teacher asks. One can assume they probably did.

In the final clip, the teacher explains, “Deep down in my heart, I’m ethnocentric, which means I think my race is the superior one … I think everybody thinks that and they’re just not honest about it.”

The students explain to him that no, not everybody thinks that. The teacher says he believes that “on that level” everybody is racist. The students then tell him that they have lost respect for him, to which he responds to by telling them that they should have more respect for him now, because of how he is honest.

I’ve had that argument applied to me, too. The racist likes to claim that he’s not so bad, because everyone thinks their race/ethnicity is superior. But it’s not true! That’s just projection. I’ve never felt that being white makes me better than anyone else — I admit to sometimes feeling superior to individuals, but that’s just because I too often find myself in the company of creationists, never because of my complexion.

That final claim, that the racist is better because he’s honest about his racism, is just more bullshit.

The teacher is in Texas…no surprise there, although there are bad teachers everywhere. This one isn’t a teacher anymore, at least temporarily — he’s been placed on administrative leave.

Fright Night is a pretty cool movie, but dude…spoilers

Herschel Walker on the campaign trail keeps topping himself.

I was here watching a stupid movie late at night hoping it’s gonna get better it don’t get better but you keep watching anyway. Cause the other night, the other night I was watching this movie — I was watching this movie called Fright Night, Freak Night or some type of night but it was about vampires. I don’t know if you know but vampires are some cool people are they not? But let me tell you something that I found out: a werewolf can kill a vampire did you know that? I never knew that. So I don’t want to be a vampire anymore I wanna be a werewolf.

But then anyway as I’m watching this movie and then you tell how stupid it is cause it’s one in the morning. So I’m watching my TV of these kids watching their TV of a vampire killed on their TV. So you know it’s kinda stupid, but I’m still watching though. As I’m watching this show what was funny was these kids had a vampire in their attic at their house. So they were watching their TV, now I’m watching my TV, they’re watching their TV, they see the vampire killed on their TV. So they win this contest to bring this actor — now y’all gotta stay with me — bring this actor who’s a vampire killer from that TV to get rid of this [unintelligible] vampire in their attic. So this actor comes into their home, he got all the right stuff. He got all the right stuff. Because you know, gotta have a stake, gotta have a thing to kill him in the heart. And he’s got a necklace of garlic, cause that work. I don’t know what it does but it work. Gotta have a cross, cause it burns, I know that works.

And then all of a sudden, this is what’s so funny about it: as they’re walking through the house, this, this guys got the holy water and he’s blessing the house, this actor now he’s all faith. He’s blessing the house with his holy water. He walked upstairs and this vampire looking real good in his black suit, whoa that sounds like Senator Warnock doesn’t it? Looking all good in his black suit. Floated from the ceiling , he floated from the ceiling looking good and cool. And I’m thinking “Whoa, they better get out of that house.” If somebody float from your ceiling, get out of that house. That’s not your house. But as he floated from the ceiling the kid jumped behind their hero, and they jumped behind their hero, the guy jumped in front of them with this holy water threw it on the vampire forehead, he covered his eyes. Then he took his hand away and started laughing. And he said “that don’t work.” He took the cross and put it on the vampire forehead and the vampire didn’t even do anything he said “that don’t work.” And that’s where it is in our life. It don’t even work unless you’ve got faith.

I read that and had to instantly convert to Christianity, because of the cool vampires. Also because that monologue pithed my forebrain.

It’s shocking that this bozo has a chance to win a run-off election

Seriously, why would anyone vote for a guy who says, If we was ready for the green agenda, I’d raise my hand right now. But we’re not ready right now … What we need to do is keep having those gas-guzzling cars, ’cause we got the good emissions under those cars? It makes no sense. It’s stupid.

Republicans understand it, though, because that’s how stupid they are, and they will vote for him.

Triple nipple pubs!

One never knows where research might lead, and I’m not going to disparage work that attempts to quantify what seems to be a trivial and obvious conclusion. I do find it weird that such work can justify three (3) published papers, though, even if the three do have clearly different goals. Welcome to the world of women’s erect nipples.

The Point of Nipple Erection 1: The Experience and Projection of Perceived Emotional States While Viewing Women With and Without Erect Nipples

Given the research that suggests men attend to nipples and that nipple erection is triggered by sexual excitement (among other triggers), we questioned whether men see nipple erection as a sign of sexual interest. Our findings indicate that men (but not women) see women as sexier when they have nipple erection and also see themselves as sexier, supporting the idea that nipple erection is perceived signaling arousal or sexual interest.

The Point of Nipple Erection 2: The Effect of Nipple Erection on Intended and Expected Altruism

This study shows that men are more likely to do things for sexualized women, in this case, women with nipple erection. Women, however, would prefer to avoid women with nipple erection socially. This can have implications for sex and dating strategies, and female interaction in social settings.

The Point of Nipple Erection 3: Sexual and Social Expectations of Women With Nipple Erection

Nipple erection is a cue that triggers sexualization and objectification of women; women with nipple erection are thought of as less intelligent, less moral, and more promiscuous by both men and women. Women cannot control their nipple erection, yet these data show that it is used by men and women to make presumptions about women’s character and behavior.

I don’t usually notice such things because, you know, clothing, and it seems to me that clothing choice might be a stronger signal for all the things measured than involuntary smooth muscle contractions. Also, here in Minnesota, it might be more a product of being cold.

Then I read the methods. All three papers were based on a variant of this detail from the first paper.

Eighty-five men (average age 22.6 years,SD 7.33) and 355 women (average age 20.7years,SD 3.79) were surveyed. Participants were primarily White (83.4%) from a regional public university in the northeastern United States.

I recognize the pattern. Psych 101! You recruit the students from an introductory psychology course, give them a survey-based procedure, and then stat the hell out of the numbers you get. It’s the laziest kind of psych study. You’re quizzing young men and women about erect nipples in this case, and probably had no shortage of volunteers.

Then you publish it in a journal titled “Evolutionary Behavioral Sciences”, even though it has no evolutionary implications at all, and maybe, at best, measures socialized, conventional behavior in a single population of horny college-aged students with a mundane protocol designed more for the convenience of the investigators rather than probing deeply into the basis of the behavior. Come on, psychologists, do better. At least sample multiple diverse populations before making conclusions about human behavior.

It is rather depressing that one result is that showing signs of arousal is interpreted to mean a person is less intelligent and more promiscuous. Human beings, do better.