Hmmm…I found the moral philosophy of chimps more convincing

My colleague in the philosophy department here at UMM, Tamler Sommers, has a couple of interesting interviews online, one with Frans de Waal and another with Jonathan Haidt. de Waal is good — there’s some cool stuff in there about altruism and politics. Haidt … well, again, I find myself with mixed feelings about his work. The “social intuition” model, where people make emotional judgments and then makes intellectual rationalizations after the fact, sounds reasonable to me. But then, he goes on to make these arguments about “four pillars of morality” — harm, fairness, purity, and duty — that sound like intellectual rationalizations after the fact, too. He justifies some behaviors, such as female genital mutilation, because within a particular culture they may well be supported by a moral pillar like purity or duty, and suggests that people who lack those particular pillars (as many in the West do) cannot then criticize those behaviors.

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Complexin…not so inconsequential anymore

Researchers at MIT’s Picower Institute for Learning and Memory may have found the key to controlling how the brain is wired while studying the bursts of activity that occur after communication between neurons.

First, I will give an overview of neural communication. Neural cells communicate with each other at a synapse, which is the point of contact between the cells at which signals are transmitted. The action potential stimulates the input cell (presynaptic) to release neurotransmitters. These neurotransmitters travel across the synaptic cleft and bind to neurotransmitter receptors on the receiving (postsynaptic) cell. However, the action of the neurotransmitter needs to be controlled so that the cell is not continually activated.

That is where this new research, conducted by Sarah Huntwork and J Troy Littleton, comes in. These scientists have identified a molecule, called complexin, which acts as a gatekeeper to help control the release of neurotransmitters. As it turns out, a few cells will continue to release neurotransmitters even after the major electrical stimulus has passed. They call these events “minis”, which are regulated by complexin. However, they have discovered that in the absence of complexin, these minis can occur without regulation, and when they do, it can lead to rewiring of the brain and synaptic growth.

So what does this mean in terms of neurological diseases? The activity of complexin can be controlled, and if properly regulated, may allow synaptic growth to be stimulated and rewiring of the brain to occur.

Who’s morally pernicious?

I read this headline — “Mary Midgley argues that opponents of intelligent design are driving people to accept it” — and my first thought was that surely some editor had mangled the sense of an interview. No one could be that blatantly nonsensical. And then I read the first paragraph and discover that it was an understatement, and that Midgley is much more extreme.

People are not going to accept scientific fact if they think it is morally pernicious. When people are asked why they are persuaded by intelligent design, they often say that it’s the only alternative to scientific atheism and Darwinism which are pernicious moral doctrines; they see it as the only refuge from this anti-human bloody-mindedness. It’s at the level of attitudes to life that these choices are made. And people will think scientists as a whole believe this. As Professor Winston has said, science becomes discredited by this kind of stuff.

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Breasts of all kinds are beautiful

Facebook has done a stupid thing: they’ve started deleting photos and accounts of breastfeeding women. Tara is leading the charge here on scienceblogs — this is a ridiculous and demeaning decision, reflecting a mindless prudery on the part of the facebook administrators. Give them hell.

Alas, Tara succumbs to her own biases and cites my breast as an example of offensive photography. Nay, I say, we must regard every expanse of torso as equally lovely. I think I have a few more shots of the masculine mammary in question; to prove my point, if Facebook can’t come to their senses, I may have to post them to my facebook page. If they had to start deleting every bare-chested college man’s photoset to justify scouring those pictures from their servers and their nightmares, it would serve them right.

Also, I’ve got too many friends anyway. That would clear that problem right up.

You people are sick, sick, sick. Rather than scaring you away, putting that picture on my facebook account means I’ve gotten a flood of friend requests.

This bodes well for my future career in porn when the theocrats shut down the universities.

You know, authorities are only as good as their arguments

Paul Kurtz is an intelligent and interesting fellow who has done commendable work in advancing the cause of skepticism and freethought. He can be rightly considered one of the heroes of the atheist movement, and he’s one of the reasons that the sobriquet “New Atheist” grates — Kurtz has been writing this stuff for decades.

Now, suddenly, he’s being trumpeted as an advocate of “silencing the New Atheist Noise Machine.” This is weird on so many levels.

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Soul Made Flesh

One of the requirements for PZ’s neurobiology class is reading Carl Zimmer’s book Soul Made Flesh. While reading this book, I am continually struck by how religion resists change in science. Why? Science and religion don’t even address the same issues in a culture. Robert Boyle seemed to think they should be separated as well. Perhaps that is why he managed to make some significant advances in science and the scientific method. Any thoughts?

How to organize against a creationist lecture

Got a creationist coming to your town or school? A commenter from Oklahomans for Excellence in Science Education left an excellent summary of how to counter these travelin’ frauds effectively. The key is simple: recruit. Get the information out. Don’t let them come in and babble unopposed or with an audience imported from the local fundie churches — get informed people there, and the creationists will crumple easily.

Notice that this isn’t about suppressing their information (or even expelling them) — it’s shining the light of open public criticism on their shenanigans.

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