Science News Tidbits

Posted by Greg Laden on March 25, 2008
(11)
More »

New findings from Tibetan Plateau suggest uplift occurred in stages from PhysOrg.com
The vast Tibetan Plateau–the world’s highest and largest plateau, bordered by the world’s highest mountains–has long challenged geologists trying to understand how and when the region rose to such spectacular heights. New evidence from an eight-year study by U.S. and Chinese researchers indicates that the plateau rose in stages, with uplift occurring first in the central plateau and later in regions to the north and south.

[...]

Baby boys are more likely to die than baby girls from PhysOrg.com
Male infants in developed nations are more likely to die than female infants, a fact that is partially responsible for men’s shorter lifespans, reveals a new study by researchers from University of Pennsylvania and University of Southern California.

[...]

Corn’s roots dig deeper into South America from PhysOrg.com
Corn has long been known as the primary food crop in prehistoric North and Central America. Now it appears it may have been an important part of the South American diet for much longer than previously thought, according to new research by University of Calgary archaeologists who are cobbling together the ancient history of plant domestication in the New World.

[...]

(11)
More »

Comments

  1. #1 the real cmf
    March 25, 2008

    re: baby boy mortality rates:
    The article states that there is a
    “reversal of historical trends indicates…. they are very different in their biological vulnerability, but how different depends on environmental and medical conditions,”

    Curious how the good doctor left out ‘social conditions’ isn’t it?

  2. #2 Stephanie Z
    March 25, 2008

    CMF, just for kicks, you want to explain how social is not part of environmental? Or did you think they meant that global warming is good for boys?

  3. #3 the real cmf
    March 26, 2008

    Stephanie: it is not so much that they are NOT related, but that the word *social implies society* directly, and accountably, whereas environmental is everything from the global warming, to fruits and nuts that grow( or speak) locally, to imported clothing, Liberalzines, Haagen Daas and Birkenstocks, and… oh yeah–the social climate that generally has devalued male life and opportunity.

    Yup, you are right as well: global warming is not only good, but it is GREAT for boys, especially in this era of devalued, throw-away male life;-)

  4. #4 Stephanie Z
    March 26, 2008

    “Yup, you are right as well: global warming is not only good, but it is GREAT for boys”

    See, that’s what I thought. Otherwise, you might have noticed that an article about differential gains for young males over the last thirty years wasn’t the best place to hang your anti-feminist rhetoric. Do you get the irony of saying “the social climate that generally has devalued male life” in this context?

    Or are you anti-baby as well? After all, we know where those have been.

  5. #5 the real cmf
    March 26, 2008

    What’s YOUR deal, Steph? Are you anti-male too? See how man haters always interpret pro-male statements as “anti-feminist”? That’s why boys are not getting to college anymore.

    Of course I get the irony, Steph: I wrote it–where is that famous feminist ‘sense of humor’? (did you get that joke too?)

    And yes, you have a point: I might have to reconfigure my famously flawed chick browser, now that I know where they come from, too…

    Anti baby? EVERYBODY loves babies Steph. I like mine well done, [b]raised in an egalitarian ‘social climate’, with an education, equal opportunities, and last but not least raised by men who are not beholden to the cuckoldry of the faux feminist left.

  6. #6 Stephanie Z
    March 26, 2008

    Man haters? Where? Darn it, CM, I always miss them. I’d give up hope of ever seeing one if Snuffalupagus hadn’t eventually turned out to be real.

    I think you’re fine with chicks, C. They come from hens. Watch the beaks, though. They can get pretty sharp.

    And for the record, c, I’m not terribly fond of babies. My main concern is that they get the chance to survive until they’re interesting.

  7. #7 the real cmf
    March 26, 2008

    Stephanie Z: thank you for that enlightened infotainment.

    But what does that have to do with little boys being essentially neutered to some degree by premature birth(and its mysterious causes–the births, I mean…), or the fact that many men have fertility isues likely due to phthalates, or a host of other unaddressed complications( I do recall in that study above we heard about how the mothers were often ‘low-income, smokers, single,’) etc?

    Makes me feel like organizing a fundraiser for Prostate Cancer….

    It seems we agree, on a few things though,like that babies come from hens, or storks or wutever,and I actually have raised a coop (or two) of actual real live organic chickens–and a host of other real live critters, but steph, I don’t understand the Snuffalupagus reference, and I am unabashedly a believer that ‘there oughta be a license to have a kid.’….

    Are you also suggesting that babies( particularly males raised in female centered households) come from sharp beaked places? You are probably right on that point,stph.

    We do know that rates of young men entering college these days is in the toilet, that we have raised a generation of cannon fodder, within a carefully orchestrated ‘social framework’ of General Apathy as regards male life and that many lower income males–often raised by single mothers, and/or the systemic, endemic belief that male life is worthless( endemic in that the study is of ‘western european’ style society) -end up in the prison system, the military,or in some form of wage slavery, not least of which is the child support system.

    But stp..I still don’t get your snufa-lupe-out analogy: is that the elephant in the back-alley, or a veiled reference to the Women of Juarez project?

    http://womenofjuarez.egenerica.com/

    Please e-labor-ate…

    Thanx for your honesty about your terrible lack of fondness for babies, but you are wrong about hens and beaks: they only peck at the runts in the litter, until the runts are featherless, ignored, and die. It isn’t that the beaks are necessarily sharp, it is that the hens collectively victimize smaller individuals,and then every other bird in the roost does so afterwards– and then they step around the carcass feigning that a weasel must have gotten into the roost;-)

  8. #8 Stephanie Z
    March 26, 2008

    Bored now. Done.

    Enjoy your fundraiser. It sounds like a worthwhile project.

  9. #9 the real cmf
    March 27, 2008

    *snipff* just when I was beginning to appreciate your prose, and sense of humor….;.(

  10. #10 Stephanie Z
    March 27, 2008

    Sorry, CMF. Life is packed right now. Maybe some other time.

  11. #11 the real cmf
    March 28, 2008

    hmmm…let me unpack that last statement….;-)