I like science. Sure, it has many practical consequences. For example, I much prefer to send RSVPs for upcoming events by email rather than pony express. But I also like science for another reason: as entertainment. Being exposed to new findings is exciting. It’s not unlike intellectual travel. I get to see things I’ve never seen before. So to speak. Science . . . I can feel jumps sparking over the relative canyons of my neuronal synapses right now.
In the spirit of travel, let’s take a brief cruise this very minute. Shall we?
First stop: The Origin of Morality
Where does our moral sense come from? Good question. Many argue “from religion.” But this can’t be, for psychological studies and anthropological research has shown that people without religion have morals and behave as morally as those with. Even other primates and some animals show a rudimentary moral sense. A new study suggests that the capacity for a “moral faculty” evolved out of more mundane forms of cognition and emotion.
Specifically -
Scientists at Harvard University have found that humans can make difficult moral decisions using the same brain circuits as those used in more mundane choices related to money and food. [source]
Who gets the last piece of pizza? It seems how that question is answered might tell us a lot about where morality comes from.
Second Stop: A Transient Gender Difference
In a new paper in the Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, we find — hold onto your hats now — Study suggests boys and girls not as different as previously thought
Say it ain’t so! (Being facetious here.) Thinking of females as large, living Barbi-s, males as large, living G.I. Joes, just got a bit more antiquated.
Here’s the surprise -
Although girls tend to hang out in smaller, more intimate groups than boys, this difference vanishes by the time children reach the eighth grade.
So some gender differences are a mere flash-in-the-years? Could be.
Final Stop: A Less-Explored Dark Side to Vitamins
Okay, this destination could be a bit of a bummer for some. Like visiting a war memorial. Only what could be said to have been slain here is the hope of easy, natural health improvement — without drawbacks and dangers — provided by . . . vitamins. Vitamins? Doesn’t the very world have pure and uplifting connotations only? How could vitamins be bad?
Truth is, any substance that can influence our biology in good ways can also have side-effects or even outright detrimental influences under certain conditions or in a specific individual/population.
One such case gets spelled out with this headline: Vitamin A increases the presence of the HIV virus in breast milk.
Oh darn. That’s not good. Clearly spelling out the danger we’ve got this lead paragraph -
Vitamin A and beta-carotene supplements are unsafe for HIV-positive women who breastfeed because they may boost the excretion of HIV in breast milk—thereby increasing the chances of transmitting the infection to the child, a pair of new studies suggest.
And there you have it. Brief intellectual travels completed. I like to think that besides providing entertainment, such travels also bring an increased understanding of the world. Which has lasting benefits.
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