Iran and US, Together Again

Not since the Shah was deposed has the US and Iran had something to mutually salivate over. Who knew that the hanging of a dictator could bring everyone closer together. And to think...just 20 years ago, we were supporting Saddam in his quest to annihilate Iran.

History is interesting, is it not?

"Institutional Nostalgia"

The University of Texas is reconsidering the presence of statues honoring the Confederacy. It seems that minority students (no shit, Sherlock) are offended by the statues, despite so-called “institutional nostalgia” for the long-time presence of the statues on campus.

Perhaps the supporters of Chief Illiniwek could take a page from the Longhorns and insert this new buzz-phrase in their propaganda.

Of course, the base-level issue that is important to consider is this: if one’s heritage or traditions are offensive to another group of people, should those traditions or heritage be censored or silenced, or should they be maintained in some sense? What place do they have, if any, in the historical record?

Titan-ic Vacations

Feeling like getting away from it all? Try a stroll through Titan's methane rains--they're in Discover magazine's top 13 space stories of the year. Just don't be surprised if your significant other doesn't find it terribly romantic if you smell like you wear cow-fart aftershave after a stroll along the methane lakes.

And...singles, don't despair! You might be able to find some methane-based lifeforms, lurking in Titan's mud. If -300 degree mud wrestling floats your boat, you could be the first to introduce your single-celled lover to your family back home. Hopefully they won't mind the 'primative' table manners.

More info on Titan.

#65: My Older Brothers--No! My Mom--Made Me Gay...Maybe

Scientists have found a correlation between older brothers and men being gay. While this has been in the news before, Discover magazine listed the findings as 65 in a list of 100 most important science stories of the year.

In the study, Anthony Bogaert, a psychologist at Brock University in Ontario, wanted to "clarify the relative importance of biology and environment in determining sexual orientation." He found that boys living with adopted or older biological brothers had no affect on sexual orientation.

However, according to the article, "Bogaert estimates that one in seven gay men can attribute their homosexuality to having older biological brothers. Each increases the odds of being gay by one third. The base rate for homosexuality in men with no older brothers is estimated at about 4 percent, giving a man with one older brother a 5.2 percent chance of being gay." Bogaert postulated that the mother's immune system reacted against the presence of another male fetus, resulting in the child being homosexual.

Of course, I'm curious about all those who don't have any brothers at all or are the older brother themselves. This study seems to support what many of us have suspected all along: there's not one single gay gene or factor that makes a person gay. Rather, there's many influences. Furthermore, there is a whole set of political issues at stake with these studies. They on one hand actually show that homosexuality is 'natural'--the claims that it's not are so damn tiresome--but they also threaten, often unintentionally, to medicalize the discourse about homosexuality once more. We've only had roughly thirty years of gayness not being a disorder to the medical establishment; what if it turns out that parents could choose to ensure that their younger sons or any child wouldn't be gay? Would we not have turned being gay--and the rights that many have worked so hard to attain--into something once more that is a disorder to be 'treated', a condition to be 'fixed', a life to be made (hetero)normal?

PS: Check out the other biology stories on the site. They're fascinating.

Changes in Progress

Hey there cyberfans...I'm updating the look and feel of the site. Notice new blogs appearing in the links nearby, as I add in some great reading that you may or may not be aware of.