August 31, 2007

Katz  permlink

Category: Blog

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Posted by Razib at 2:47 PM • 0 Comments

August 30, 2007

Genetic vs. heritable trait  permlink

Category: Genetics

When someone tells you that height is 80% heritable, does that mean: a) 80% of the reason you are the height you are is due to genes b) 80% of the variation within the population on the trait of height...

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Posted by Razib at 1:23 PM • 23 Comments

Menopause in Matrilineal Whales  permlink

Category: Evolution

I've talked about menopause a fair amount on this blog, usually in relation to the Grandmother Hypothesis. So I thought I'd pass along this article, Eusociality, menopause and information in matrilineal whales, along. I know that many think that menopause...

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Posted by Razib at 1:50 AM • 11 Comments

August 29, 2007

Dirty old men  permlink

Category: Genetics

Update: Comment from Chris Surridge of PLOS One: Just a quick note. The paper is now formally published on PLoS ONE. The citation is: Tuljapurkar SD, Puleston CO, Gurven MD (2007) Why Men Matter: Mating Patterns Drive Evolution of Human...

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Posted by Razib at 11:50 AM • 10 Comments

Twins - Korean that is....  permlink

Category: Genetics

Genetic and environmental contributions to prosocial behaviour in 2- to 9-year-old South Korean twins: ...The best-fitting model indicated that 55%...of the variance in the 2- to 9-year-olds' prosocial behaviour was due to genetic factors and 45%...was due to non-shared environmental...

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Posted by Razib at 3:37 AM • 3 Comments

Tecmo Bo  permlink

Category: Blog

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Posted by Razib at 2:27 AM • 2 Comments

August 28, 2007

Seasonal science  permlink

Category: Science

I was talking with a friend of mine who is an economist about science, and the great productivity in modern societies which allows for the perpetuation of narrow specialties in scholarship. I repeated to him my own hunch that if...

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Posted by Razib at 8:55 PM • 6 Comments

10 questions for Greg Clark  permlink

Category: History

Over at my other blog Herrick posts a response to 10 questions for Gregory Clark. Clark is an economic historian whose most recent book Farwell to Alms is making a splash. I read the book recently, but because I'm not...

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Posted by Razib at 6:02 PM • 3 Comments

August 25, 2007

New Steven Pinker interview  permlink

Category: Psychology

Check out this new interview with Steven Pinker. It ostensibly focuses on his new book, The Stuff of Thought, though it covers a lot of ground. My own feeling is that the interviewer should have let the focus be more...

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Posted by Razib at 10:33 PM • 3 Comments

Update on redhead "hoax"  permlink

Category: Genetics

Yesterday I posted on the resurrection of the "redheads going extinct" meme (as I noted, this story seems to cycle every few years). The current source is National Geographic Magazine, which doesn't have the "article" online. I went to the...

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Posted by Razib at 3:39 PM • 12 Comments

Chris Mooney on bloggingheads.tv  permlink

Category: Blog

Check it, Chris Mooney is on bloggingheads.tv. He's promoting his book Storm World, which is a really good read. I can't speak in detail to the area of science which Chris covers, but the bigger picture issue of the "intersection"...

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Posted by Razib at 1:18 PM • 0 Comments

Primate hybridization  permlink

Category: Genetics

p-ter points me to a new paper which documents interspecies hybridization in monkeys whose lineages putatively diverged about 3 million years ago. Note that the hybridization follows Haldane's rule: the heterogametic sex (in mammals the males) exhibits sterility while the...

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Posted by Razib at 12:38 PM • 1 Comments

Red hair going extinct???  permlink

Category: Genetics

Every few years it seems that a new meme declares that "blondes will go extinct!" or that "red hair will go extinct!" I've only been blogging for 5 years, and this story has already cycled multiple times. A co-blogger of...

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Posted by Razib at 12:29 AM • 10 Comments

August 24, 2007

Katz  permlink

Category: Blog

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Posted by Razib at 9:28 PM • 0 Comments

I am an unbeliever...in overdominance  permlink

Category: Genetics

RPM pointed me to this new paper, Major Histocompatibility Complex Heterozygosity Reduces Fitness in Experimentally Infected Mice: ...Our results show that MHC effects are not masked on an outbred genetic background, and that MHC heterozygosity provides no immunological benefits when...

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Posted by Razib at 4:54 PM • 2 Comments

August 23, 2007

The "proto-Gorilla"  permlink

Category: Evolution

Go read John Hawks....

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Posted by Razib at 3:12 AM • 0 Comments