[recycled post - first appeared here]
Roughly one in ten children husbands raise are not their own.
It seems that tidbit of information is mistaken. And I am guilty of passing it along. Fortunately, I did so in spontaneous chatter and not as something chalked onto a blackboard.
Still. I was wrong. Fortunately, I have learned of the mistake and will repeat it no more. Can I get an Amen! for education?!
In Y Chromosome And Surname Study Challenges Infidelity ‘Myth’, I learned -
“People often quote a figure of one in ten for the number of people born illegitimately,” says Professor Jobling. “Our study shows that this is likely to be an exaggeration. The real figure is more likely to be less that one in twenty-five.”
The authors of the study dug up some good, hard data, that their conclusion is based upon.
Am I sad to have been wrong? Not really. Mostly I’m glad to learn what is “more right.” A continuing education keeps you on the exciting, cutting edge of knowledge. Makes me wish that the millions of people who read the Bible every week would seek new sources of information. They, too, might learn something.
A recent science finding and few questions -
The finding: Dogs’ anxiety reflects a ‘pessimistic’ mood
Many dogs become distressed when left home alone, and they show it by barking, destroying things, or toileting indoors. Now, a new study reported in the October 12th issue of Current Biology, a Cell Press publication, suggests that this kind of separation anxiety occurs most often in dogs that also show “pessimistic”-like behavior.
Gotta love those quotation marks around pessimistic and the addition of like.
The questions:
Dogs certainly can have temperamental qualities. In fact, some breeds are known for their temperamental qualities. Golden retrievers for being more gentle and good for families with children (on average); pitbulls for being more aggressive, etc.
My wife and I have cared for both a golden retriever and, presently, a pit-bull mix, and I can say that in our limited experience, those general temperaments have held true.
But can dogs experience anxiety? Why not? They have the necessary neurophysiology, etc. (In fact, our pit-bull mix, Tilly, has a severe case of thunderstorm phobia. When a severe storm approaches and then rages she’ll quiver and pant until her tongue nearly turns purple. We’ve yet to find a good treatment for her, besides our best attempts at limiting her sensory exposure. We put her in the inner bathroom, no window, with the bright lights on — to visually drown out lightning flashes that might be seen from under the door — and we run the exhaust fan to provide white noise. Unfortunately, Tilly seems to sense the change in barometric pressure just as much. She is, in fact, a very reliable early-warning system. When we see her quivering in a corner on an otherwise sunny day, we know what’s coming.)
Do dogs also experience moods? Again, although we customarily use that term to refer to humans, I don’t see why not. (In Tilly’s case, every evening after dinner she gets into a playful mood. If no one throws her squeaky toy for her to chase down, she’ll run around the house tossing it herself. She bites into it while prancing around, flips her head upward, and lets go. For a four-year-old, she is remarkable playful. She is also extremely affectionate, once she trusts you. Love that dog. But I would not recommend her kind to families or plain idiots.)
Back to the science. The news release also contained this linguistically interesting sentence:
The researchers conducted the study with 24 dogs, both male and female, that had recently entered into one of two animal re-homing centers (shelters) in the United Kingdom. Each dog was first tested for separation anxiety-related behaviors. (emphases added)
Just 24 dogs? That’s a small sample size.
As noteworthy, to me, was the wording “re-homing center.” Is that a new, verbally correct way to refer to pet shelters? In a sense, it is more accurate, in terms of the goals of these shelters. But is it any way misleading, or a veiled socio-political gesture?
Mind you, my wife and I have gotten all our pets via . . . re-homing. Still, the term strikes me as odd. But maybe it’s just new to me, and I’ll adjust just fine. As all our pets have adjusted over time to us and our household.
Things have heated up today over at the Discover Blogs comments. Apparently I’m a neo-atheist. Whatever that is. It seems to be a bad thing. Also, someone seems to think that in the time, I would have been pro-inquisition. What?!
What did I do to deserve it? Okay, I may have been insistent and a tad condescending. But what about the gist of the arguments?
If you care to read more about my and others’ thoughts on the compatibility (not) of Religion and Science, click here.
I like puzzles. Including solving verbal puzzles and spotting gaffs in reasoning. I wonder if my readers do.
The other day I encountered a boo-boo in an email-subscription article by Valerie Tarico (soon to appear on the Huffpo): “Healing Gaia—One Tree at a Time.”
The whole earth as a single, living organism issue aside (Gaia), I encountered a line that caused me to bring down the wrath of my red pen upon it. (Doesn’t everyone read the serious stuff in paper form with pen in hand?) But before I explain why, see if you can spot it. This sentence was in a paragraph about human evolution as it pertains to our relationship with trees.
Later ancestors left the trees to walk upright out of the Great Rift Valley and then to cross the seas, but never stopped depending on them.
Can you see the flaw? I’ll provide some white space as a place for you to mull it over -
?
?
?
Correct! (Well maybe not all of you.) Evolution is not purpose-driven. As if the goal of our development was to become who we presently are. Ancestors didn’t so much as leave the trees to fulfill a destiny as they did out of some immediate necessity. Food, water, sex, predation. Otherwise, the small steps toward upright walking would have never benefited from a gene-selecting pressure.
Some view evolution as a progress toward better. That we complex creatures have graduated suma cum laude from the school of life forms. Personally, I can view it as just the opposite. The most “primitive” species might be described as being the most successful through the millions of years they have existed. They have not needed to undergo one change after another to survive. They fit their particular niche just fine, thank you. And that’s what drives evolution — fitting an environment. Survival. Because our kind has nearly “lost” the struggle so many times, we have developed into very complex creatures. Picture a one-room shack with a slap-dash mansion built around and atop it.
Species will seemingly go to great lengths to survive. Envision birds with bills longer than their bodies. But they only go the distance if they need to. Otherwise they stay home and relax. So to speak.
What are human beings, then, than the current “biggest losers”? We have nearly lost time and time and again. And look at us now: it is written all over the gaudy complexity of our bodies.
You think?
How do I feel? What do I think? Which way is the wind blowing?
No, my thoughts and feelings aren’t completely fickle. Yet. Yet they are influenced by my personal physiology, history, and present social and physical context. As one schooled in psychology, I can’t deny it.
In space, there is no wind. None of the Earthly kind, anyway. To determine the non-fickle truth, need we venture into space?
Maybe scientific methodology is close enough. If the goal is to get outside ourselves and see farther, you can’t go wrong with science. At least not relative to all the other breezy alternatives.
[photo thanks to NASA]
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