the evolving mind

Reconciliations among males are often preceded by a confirmation of formal status. For example, the dominant stands upright with his hair erect and in one mighty gesture passes a raised arm over his ducking partner before they proceed to kissing and grooming.
- Franz de Waal (30)

Rituals grow out of the soil of human nature. In the Abrahamic religions we find a father-god who has been generalized and promoted as the god of all. How do people show they acknowledge and accept “His” position and theirs? They bow, they kneel, they sing praise. Oh you my god are greater, and by logical consequence, I am lesser.

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Technorati Links: evolution, gods, religion, status

In a recent article over at ScienceDaily, I learned that “the dentate gyrus, which is located in the hippocampus in the brain and thought to be responsible for working memory and mood regulation, remained immature in an animal model of schizophrenia.”

In previous centuries, and in some cultural backwoods today, people have resorted to all sorts of non-tested and non-testable explanations for the cause of a group of behaviors we now refer to as symptoms of schizophrenia.  Bad spirits and demons were high on the list.

But what can we expect from people who lack(ed) the tools, material and intellectual, that we now have?

In the present time of a heated-up culture war between science and religion, it seems to me that those in the religion camp are clinging to old tools.  At least when defended what they claim to know (vs. say, the value of participating in a community of like-minded others).  Religion, by and large, provides tools no better than a dowsing rod.  In today’s age of machines that mechanically or electromagnetically penetrate deep below the surface to provide a wealth of new information, it boggles my mind that people still opt for the dowsing rod and other techniques that generate mere hunches at best.

Technorati Links: belief, schizophrenia, science

Simple answers are certainly attractive. If a child asks, “Daddy, where did that plant come from?” saying, “Gawd done it,” is quick and easy, but it does nothing to increase an individual’s understanding of a very complex world.

Many plants begin life as seeds. Well, they begin THEIR life as seeds, for there were “parental” gametes before the seed. In other words, there was life before life. And a seed doesn’t grow in a vacuum, so to fully understand how the present form of a plant came to be, you’ve got to include water, sunlight, nitrogen, carbon dioxide and oxygen into the mix.

In a developmental psychology class I teach, I recently discussed with students how open-ended questions better promote cognitive development in children. Not yes/no, not true/false, not multiple choice, but something more like fill-in-the-blank or even short answer/essay questions.  These questions require more work to answer.  But work can be a good thing.

Simple is attractive. And sometimes simple is good. But many times it is not.

Technorati Links: biology, psychology

If you ask me, astrology is a bunch of bunk, a load of hooey, nothing but pure bologna. I say this because the morning newspaper column informed me that today’s a good day for skepticism.

A number of years ago my wife and I were visiting three friends. Paul, the single male amid two couples, made the observation that all five of us were Pisces. Which is true. Though one is a “cusp” Pisces-and I can definitely see that. Jim, the third male, is definitely cusp-ish.

Pisces, for those of you unfamiliar with us, are sensitive and creative individuals. Is it true that we are sensitive? Yes. None of us like being insulted, and if you put a tack on the chair of any of the five friends, I’m sure each and all would notice it upon sitting down, if not sooner.

Were all five of us creative? Well, I’m a writer, so that makes me creative. My wife played the flute in high school band, so she is creative. Paul had an extensive CD collection, and to appreciate music like he does, you have to be creative. Jim? Hmm . . . Jim played with his dog pretty darn creatively. It wasn’t just fetch and tug-of-war; he could even get his dog to howl along with him. Jim’s wife, Mary Claire, liked to cook, so she was creative, too. It’s amazing how much we had in common.

Hold on. I just had a thought. Must be the skepticism coming through. Astrology proposes that the position of distant stars and planets at the moment of our birth profoundly influences our personality. Why, I wonder, is the moment of birth so sensitive to cosmic influence. At that time we only go from being inside a womb to outside it. It’s not like we were locked in a lead vault.

What about this idea: What if an individual’s personality is fatefully influenced by the television program being broadcast the moment he or she was conceived? Continue Reading »

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I loved living in New Mexico for the ample opportunities for hiking.  And unlike in the Vermont hills and mountains I previously ambled and huffed over, I didn’t have to stay on a trail to make progress.  I could zigzag around the small vegetation. 

One day I was making my way down an arroyo (a stream bed that spends most of its time dry as dust) when I came upon a cattle carcass.  From what I could tell, the animal must have busted its leg and fallen.  As I bent in to get a closer look, flies swarmed out of its nostrils.  Dozens, if not hundreds of them.

No, I didn’t dry heave my way to vegetarianism on the spot.  It seems my love of beef and meat of all types is too strong.

Mind you, I do aspire to limit my meat intake, with good success.  Eating lower on the food chain is a good way to leave a smaller “footprint” on the earth.  There is also another reason for eating lower on the food chain, reflected in a recent scientific finding.

Apparently, there was a mysterious die-off of vultures in Asia.  They first thought it might be a parasite.  Nope.  As reported in Mysterious mass die-off of vultures solved, the culprit has turned out to be a painkiller that veterinarians were giving to sick cattle.  When the cattle later died, the vultures ate the cattle, and the painkiller proved fatal to the birds.

Eating at the top of the food chain exposes you to a lot more potentially bad stuff than eating lower.

What a tangled web is biological life on this planet.

Technorati Links: birds, nature

Our Chihuahua was normally not a yappy dog. No barking at the mailman, at the UPS guy, at stray dogs wandering outside our front window. But once every few months he would let out a call of alarm. On one occasion there was a backhoe and crew of workers in the next yard over, just beyond our backyard fence. The Chihuahua stood twenty feet from the borderline and persisted in a high-pitched racket. Ruff! Ruff-ruff! We tried to verbally assure him that everything was okay, but he seemed to “think” — Like hell. There’s a huge beast on the other side of the fence. And he’s not alone! To put a stop to the noise we picked up the dog and brought him in the house.

On another occasion we found the madly yapping dog sending out an alarm about . . . a plastic bag that had floated into the yard and stuck in the bushes. Why would a dog get all worked up about that? Blame stimulus generalization (or perhaps the tendency to play fast and loose with instinctual inference-making). For any animal with survival at stake, it is much wiser to err on the side of caution, of jumping to conclusions too rapidly rather than too slowly.

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Technorati Links: evolution, psychology, religion

On the nearby stretch of the St. John’s River, boaters must cut their throttle and proceed slowly.  If they don’t, they could get a ticket.  Why the speed limit?

Blue Springs State Park, and its surrounding area, is a popular spot for tourists.  And tourists flock to it because the Florida manatee also like it.  The aquatic mammals particularly like it in the winter, when river waters cool but the spring waters stay a relatively warm 72 degrees.

I’m glad there is a speed limit on that stretch of river for two reasons.  One, it makes the place safer for the protected (formerly endangered) manatee.  Two, it means that boaters with a few beers in their belly and horsepower to spare don’t swamp our small, electric-powered boat when my wife and I go wildlife-watching. 

How’s this for an out-of-left-field tangent: Should certain ideas be protected, as if endangered?  It seems that many people decry the “new atheist’s” outspoken criticism of their dogma.  Is the supposedly new atheist endangering an idea.  Is this a likewise bad thing?  And is my analogy fair?

First off, the “new atheist” seems to me nothing but a regular atheist who has achieved a level of popularity in an age of political correctness.

More importantly, manatees do exist, and might not, if we don’t protect them.  Invisible agents, however, don’t seem to exist by any reasonable measure.  Furthermore, verbal criticism certainly couldn’t harm them if they did exist.

Am I missing something?

Technorati Links: atheism, nature, photography, religion

I am not a shrink, nor do I play one on television, in the classroom, or in the bedroom. (Well, maybe in the bedroom once-in-awhile — my specialty: “libido amplification.”  But that’s none of your business.)

I have, however, “rubbed elbows” with many a psychiatrist in settings from professional to personal. On the whole, my overall impression is not great. Sure, I’ve met some good ones, and I’ve also met a whole bunch who seemed to be on the “wrong end of the couch,” so to speak.

That is why I have been pleasantly surprised by the podcast “My Three Shrinks.” The psychiatrists featured seem to have their heads on their shoulders and, most importantly to this critical thinker, place a suitable dose of emphasis on the science behind their field. It’s not a podcast of Dr. Phil-grade theorizing and proselytizing. I find that refreshing.

When doing mindless desk work (paying the bills, sharpening my pens) I listen. If you have a serious interest in the field of psychiatry, you might want to check it out.

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Does ugly have a purpose?  In the case of the black vulture, and its bald head — probably.  If you dine by sticking your head into or over a carcass that may harbor parasites or bits of flesh and bodily fluids that provide a great medium for “growing” them . . . maybe feathers aren’t such a good idea.  Feathers have a tremendous amount of surface area, at least compared to naked flesh.  And they are much tougher to keep clean.

The species-environment relationship is a telling one.  That is probably part of the rationale behind evolutionary psychology.  If we want to understand human beings, maybe we ought to take a look at the environment (physical, social . . . ) that our kind developed in.

Technorati Links: birds, photography

Here’s a news flash for you: It is important to read past news headlines.  A case in point is this article from ScienceDaily — Dark Matter Disk In Our Galaxy, Supercomputer Simulation Shows.

That there could be dark matter in our galaxy I am willing to accept.  But that it has been shown there is, thanks to a computer simulation . . . huh?!  The lead sentence clarifies and somewhat contradicts the title.

An international team of scientists predict that our Galaxy, the Milky Way, contains a disk of ‘dark matter’.

Okay, so the simulation didn’t definitively show that a dark matter disk exists as much as it predicted that the disk is there.  I’ve got another prediction for you: The Cowboys are going to win the Super Bowl.  My point: Predictions are exciting and can prove true, but they can also be wrong.

Mind you, I think the topic is fascinating and worthy of study.  Yes, run simulations to determine what is more likely and what is less.  But a simulation is a simulation.

I am reminded of the teleological creationist argument that computer/calculator simulations have determined that life on Earth is so unlikely, it just has to be the work of a creator. 

We must remember that sometimes the probable and the actual turn out to be two different things.

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