You aren’t bad, neither is your phone…but the capitalists who abuse it are evil

I get all kinds of awful advice from the internet. Just now, on my work email account, I got a message from the Star Tribune telling me how to Make your smartphone dumb, and other tips to break social media addiction. Maybe the first thing I need to do is tell the Star Tribune to stop sending me this crap.

You could switch to a flip phone. You could quit social media. But there are also ways to make your smartphone dumber, with apps and hacks and old-fashioned mindfulness.

First, you have to understand why social media is sucking you in. Studies show that engaging with social media can produce oxytocin and trigger tiny releases of dopamine, said Kit Breshears, an instructor with the Earl E. Bakken Center for Spirituality and Healing at the University of Minnesota. Apps feature a pulldown refresh mechanism that functions a lot like a slot machine.

No, I can’t do that. My phone has gradually become an essential tool for working with teaching and administrative materials — I can’t shut it off, since I have to deal with push notifications in order to log in to official university web pages, and because my students contact me through the phone (yes, I gave out my personal phone number to my students) to tell me if they need help at the genetics lab, any time of day. I can’t make my smartphone dumber, without compromising my work!

I’m also prejudiced that this advice is coming from the Center for Spirituality and Healing. Here’s an idea: shut down that palace of quackery.

But also, I have a problem with placing the blame for the problem on the user, and making it our responsibility to police the corporations that are sending out the addictive poison. I would love to be able to get a little dose of oxytocin and dopamine at will. What’s wrong with that? Taking a break and looking at cat photos (or in my case, spider photos) might be beneficial to our emotional well-being. The problem isn’t that we can self-administer mild pleasure with a click of a button, it’s that that mechanism has been hijacked by capitalism. You want a little relaxation, and it’s always accompanied by companies using it to sell you something, or make you feel bad for what you are doing, so that you have to buy the cure they are selling. This one article mentions a $59 device to block signals in your home, and an app you can download to reduce your phone to a “minimalist phone”. Fine. But the problem isn’t that I have a device that can access the internet at any time, it’s that the internet has been shittified to such a remarkable degree that it’s painful to use it.

You know, I was just noticing something recently: my habit is to charge up my phone when I get home from work, and then put it by my bedside overnight, in case there’s an emergency. I’ve felt like I’ve got infinite battery, because it almost never drops below 90% charge, unless I’m away on a long trip. Apparently, I’m not addicted to endless doom-scrolling. It’s possible to be a hopeless nerd who loves his fancy gadgets and not be the kind of fool who follows the advice of a quack from CSH.

Mainly, though, stop blaming your phone for your own problems with technology and capitalism.

First hint this wasn’t going to work out: he’s a pastor

Despite my enduring fondness for the great state of Oregon, I hadn’t been following the politics there, so I missed an amazing turn of good news from the 2025 elections in Oregon.

November’s election told the Oregon Republican Party it needed a fresh start. While voters nationally returned President Donald Trump to the White House, it was a different story in Oregon, where Republicans lost the 5th Congressional District seat; lost all statewide contests; and lost a seat in each legislative chamber, returning the Democrats to supermajorities in both.

Wow. We have to do that in the next election for all 50 states.

As the article points out, the Republicans have had to do some soul-searching and fix what’s wrong with them. I don’t think they can, but it’s good that they’re at least trying. The first step was to find new chairman for the Oregon GOP. They found a guy.

In a Feb. 16 YouTube interview with a GOP political consultant, the eventual winner, Gerald “Jerry” Cummings, 51, a pastor and insurance agent from Columbia County, sketched out a path to success for his party in Oregon, saying Republicans should spend less time “tangled up in social issues” and focus on building the party rather than on angry rhetoric and internecine warfare.

I guess that’s a promising start, but “pastor and insurance agent”? Yuck. I’d put a big red flag on him. But too late, they did more digging and found a few little problems, like his poor relationship with creditors. And his wife.

Court records provide details from a long-running divorce and custody case, which stretched across three counties and lasted nearly a decade, that raise questions about Cummings’ ability to set the tone his party desires. More recently, lawsuits filed by Cummings’ creditors undercut his suitability for a role that requires managerial acumen and financial skills.

Bob Tiernan, a former lawmaker, GOP party chair and the runner-up in the 2022 GOP gubernatorial primary, says he’s disappointed that Cummings is leading the party. “We need the strongest possible people there,” Tiernan says. “We need somebody that doesn’t have damaging accusations against them—whether they are true or not.”

It was an acrimonious divorce. Cummings is a sicko.

In court records, which have never been previously reported, Cummings’ ex-wife, a pastor’s daughter, said the couple met in the Portland area when she was 16 and he was 26 and an associate pastor. “On occasion, he would visit [her] when her parents were out of town and take her to hotels,” a trial memo filed by her attorney says. “He persuaded her that her parents did not truly love her as only he did, and that having sex with him at such a young age was appropriate.”

The couple married in 2003, when she was 19. “From the beginning of and throughout their marriage, [Cummings] would tell [his then-wife] about his sexual fantasies with young girls while they were having sexual intercourse,” the trial memo says. “He promised not to act on those fantasies so long as [his then-wife] allowed him to do whatever he wanted in their sexual relationship.”

But in a handwritten application for a restraining order coinciding with the divorce filing, the woman said her husband’s behavior spun out of control.

“I was handcuffed and hit with hangers,” she wrote. “Early in the marriage, he had a whip he hit me with.”

She added other allegations, including spousal rape. “He forced me to have sex with him and caused injury,” Cummings’ ex-wife wrote. “He has threatened if I don’t perform sexual activities, he will perform sexual activities on minors and he mentions them by name.” (OJP is not naming Cummings’ ex-wife because of her allegations of sexual violence.)

He denies all the allegations, except, of course, that he committed statutory rape on a 16 year old, and he does admit that he was a terrible husband, and [she] and I, both victims of early sexual assault, had a very unhealthy marriage.

It’s good that he claims he never acted on his pedophilic/hebephilic desires, except of course the fact that he had sex with a 16 year old when he was 26, but still…what is it with conservative authoritarians and their fantasies of having sex with children? Speaking for myself, I’ve never felt that — if anything I’m repelled at the idea — but I guess if you’re Republican, it’s just normal.

Anyway, it’s telling that when the Oregon Republicans decided to dive back into the pool of candidates and find someone new and fresh and full of healthy ideas to reinvigorate the party, all they came up with is another rotten apple. I guess if all you’ve got is a big barrel of rotting fruit, you’re not going to find a shiny clean unblemished representative by rummaging through it.

This goes for the Democrats, too — we’re less likely to come up with a pedo, but instead will find a shriveled, nearly mummified old gomer who will persist in pushing the failed ideas of the past.

A wall looms before me

I’m a little bit panicky — the semester is almost over. There’s three weeks left, but two of those are committed to an exam and student presentations, so I’ve only got ONE WEEK to cover mitochondrial inheritance and epigenetics. I’m resigned to the fact that I can only give an introduction to those topics, but otherwise, sure, would all the students like to sign up for another year of genetics so I can cover everything adequately? No? You plan to graduate instead? OK.

It hurts to shut up and stop lecturing for two weeks, but I consider it essential to give students a voice. I think this quote from a terrible movie about genetics to be relevant:

You were so preoccupied with the fact that you could that you never stopped to think if you should

So all my students are going to be discussing cool things that modern science can do with genetics, and answering the question of whether we should.

And then we stop. Last day of classes is 2 May. Then I’ve got the summer free to work in the lab, and big bonus, I get a fall sabbatical (to be spent working in the lab) and don’t come back to teaching until January 2026.

I have to get through these next few weeks, though.

Support real wolves, not genetic abuse

Many years ago, we took our young daughter to Wolf Haven, a sanctuary near Olympia, Washington. She loved it. She got called up to the stage to do a wolf call, and she nailed it — the entire place was echoing with wolf howls as the animals responded. They are spectacularly beautiful — and fierce — animals.

Bad news today, though: wolves are not thriving in Washington.

Washington’s overall wolf population in 2024 decreased by at least 9.44% and the number of successful breeding pairs declined by 25%, according to figures released today by the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife.

Today’s report indicates that at the end of 2024, the state had 230 wolves in 43 packs, 18 of which had successful breeding pairs. This marks a decrease from the end of 2023, when the state had 254 wolves in 42 packs, 24 of which had successful breeding pairs.

In case you’re wondering what is causing the decline…it’s people. You probably already guessed it. People suck.

Today’s report shows that at least 37 wolves died in 2024, 31 of which were human-caused. Of all 37 reported deaths, five were killed for livestock conflicts — four by the department and one by a livestock owner. Nineteen died from Tribal hunting by the Confederated Tribes of the Colville, which retain tribal treaty rights for hunting on their reservation and on ceded lands, and by the Spokane Tribe.

Two died of natural causes (one was killed by a cougar and the other was killed by other wolves), one died from ingesting plastic, which perforated its intestine, two died from capture-related trauma while the department was capturing wolves to collar them, and one was shot in an alleged self-defense and likely died, though its body was never found and no charges were filed.

In addition, there were seven known illegal killings, which remain under investigation. Scientific research has shown that that for every illegally slain wolf that’s found, another one to two wolves have been killed and remain undiscovered.

I think it’s ironic that today, the media are all fired up about three fake “dire wolves” ginned up by pointless and expensive genetic manipulation, when what we ought to be caring about is maintaining a natural population.

I made a small donation to Wolf Haven. I’m not a billionaire, I don’t have a coven of silicon valley tech bros following my every move, but I am a biologist who feels some shame about those capitalist mad scientists at Colossal who need their priorities straightened out.

Dire puppies

My genetics students are working on presentations that they’ll give at the end of the semester. One group was very enthusiastic about discussing the idea of Pleistocene rewilding, the idea that we should resurrect extinct species and turn them loose on the Dakotas, and the most dramatic species to de-extinctify was the Wooly Mammoth. Colossal Biosciences is claiming to work on exactly that, although, honestly, I think Colossal is nothing but a hype factory.

Now, though, Colossal has announced that they have successfully resurrected on extinct species, the dire wolf. But have they, really? I don’t think so.

Modern gray wolves are not descended from dire wolves, but that’s the stock they started from. They made a piddling 20 gene edits to a mere 14 genes (that’s a bit unfair, that really is a good technical accomplishment), which is not sufficient to turn a wolf into a completely different species. What they’ve really done is made a mutant wolf and claimed it is a dire wolf.

That’s just as well, because there is no modern habitat to support a dire wolf population — if they had successfully reconstructed the full dire wolf genome, and successfully inserted that into a wolf surrogate, George Church wouldn’t be snuggling up with a cute puppy, and they wouldn’t have a place to release them, and since even modern wolves struggle to survive in the modern world, it would be a population doomed to rapid extinction. I don’t think even Canadians would be nice enough to not take them out with a hunting rifle or a trap.

Further to my argument that it’s all hype, they had to sequence more of the dire wolf genome, since what was known was inadequate, and they’re in the process of publishing that sequence. George R.R. Martin is one of the authors. You know he had nothing to do with the work, so that is just a PR stunt. The wolf puppies are spectacularly white, which was probably not true of the ancient dire wolf…they specifically deleted two pigmentation genes, a trait not present in the dire wolf genome, to get that cosmetic feature.

I asked my students who are researching the idea of Pleistocene rewilding exactly what they would do with woolly mammoths if they could resurrect them. Their answers: build a kind of glorified zoo, like Jurassic Park, but this would have to be a zoo without any ecological/environmental purpose, and I doubt that zoos have the kind of profitability that would allow them to spend tens of millions of dollars to get a single animal that would also have unknown induced genetic disorders. The fall back position was a safari game park, where billionaires could get their jollies gunning down hulking great mammoths to get a unique trophy.

I didn’t have the heart to tell them that after the revolution, the billionaires will be extinct, too.

Georgia Purdom explains sex

As everyone knows, it’s all about the size of the palps

The creationists (and a few scientists) are unhappy that there isn’t a simple, single, concrete factor to differentiate the sexes. They looked to the scientists, and were not satisfied with the answer.

at its annual meeting in 2023, the American Anthropological Association (AAA) canceled a session that aimed to explore biological sex as an analytic category in anthropology. The AAA justified its decision by stating that “there is no single biological standard by which all humans can be reliably sorted into a binary male/female sex classification.”

That’s not the answer they wanted, so they turned to Georgia Purdom, the ex-molecular biologist working for Answers in Genesis to provide that single biological standard by which all humans can be reliably sorted into a binary male/female sex classification. The single criterion! What will it be, you may wonder.

From a genetic standpoint, biological sex is determined by our chromosomes. I often say, “No Y, no guy.” Females typically have two X chromosomes, while males have an X and a Y chromosome. This chromosomal distinction provides a clear biological marker for sex.

The creationist has spoken.

Except…

It’s important to note that sexual development disorders do occur, and we must approach these situations with compassion. However, chromosomal analysis remains a reliable method for determining biological sex.

Except when it isn’t. She’s not keeping up with the times; all the cool kids are saying it’s all about gamete size. Or hormone titers. Or the morphology of primary or secondary sexual characteristics. Or pelvic dimensions. Or muscle mass. Or bone density.

At the very least, they ought to admit that the American Anthropological Association was correct: there is no single biological standard. And all the standards have exceptions and gray areas or ambiguities, sometimes contradict each other, or even conflict with each other. People are complicated, and anyone who claims there is a single obvious parameter that defines sexuality in such a way as to create a simple binary categorization is full of shit.

I wonder how Georgia plans to evaluate the chromosomal complement of everyone who wants to use a public restroom?

This man served in the North Dakota senate for 54 years

The state of Minnesota would like to put up a wall along our border with the Dakotas. Or, at least, we’d like you to know we don’t have anything to do with them. I don’t know, I kind of cringed away to the east learning about this story.

Prosecutors said Holmberg traveled at least 14 times from 2011 to 2021 to Prague, Czech Republic, to pay for sex with adolescent-age boys. In court last year, Holmberg admitted to paying young male masseuses, some of whom he had sexual contact with at an alleged brothel. But he claimed not to know for certain how old they were.

Acting U.S. Attorney Jennifer Klemetsrud Puhl said the crime was “an assault of the dignity of many young boys.” And the majority and minority leaders in the North Dakota Legislature described Holmberg’s crimes as “evil” in a statement that vowed additional resources to law enforcement to help combat increases in criminal sexual assaults and human trafficking, KFGO reported.

Not just the Czech Republic: he was a roaming predator, criss-crossing the country and traveling abroad to abuse boys.

Records previously obtained by The Associated Press show that Holmberg made dozens of trips throughout the U.S. and to other countries since 1999. Destinations included cities in more than 30 states as well as Canada, Puerto Rico and Norway. At least one of Holmberg’s trips to Prague was state-funded through a teacher exchange program, the Klemetsrud Puhl wrote in court filings last week.

“Holmberg’s offending conduct over the course of decades … can only be described as corruption,” she wrote. “That is, he used his position to serve his own ends.”

His position is what makes this even worse: he has a long history as a distinguished state senator in the North Dakota senate.

Holmberg served 45 years in the North Dakota Senate. He resigned in 2022 after The Forum of Fargo-Moorhead reported on his many text messages with a man in jail in connection with child sexual abuse material. Holmberg chaired two powerful legislative panels, including the Senate’s budget-writing committee.

Because he’s wealthy and privileged and a Republican, and also 81 years old (he’s been playing this vile game for a long time), lawyers tried to argue that he should only get a 3 year sentence. The judge would have none of it, and he’s going away for ten years. That’s still not enough, given this one final twist:

In 2012 and 2013, Holmberg posed as a teenage boy in an online chatroom for teens who had undergone circumcision, and misled and manipulated a 16-year-old Canadian boy into sending him explicit photos, the filing said.

The full story of the relationship is unclear because the boy later took his own life in 2021, “but no doubt Holmberg’s conduct contributed to his struggles,” Klemetsrud Puhl said.

Yeah, he can die in prison. No loss.

Would you believe he was reimbursed by the North Dakota senate for his sex vacations? He was. He led the senate and personally approved all of his expenses.