the evolving mind

“There is very little evidence to show that attempting to treat a person’s homosexual feelings is effective and in fact it can actually be harmful,” says Professor Michael King from UCL. “So it is surprising that a significant minority of practitioners still offer this help to their clients.”

More and more research strongly suggests that sexuality is not a lifestyle choice or even a “preference.” I refer to it as a sexual orientation. Trying to change a man’s sexual orientation from homosexual (attracted to the same sex) to heterosexual seems as implausible to me as would trying to change a heterosexual man’s orientation to homosexual. A square peg is a square peg. Society and individuals would no doubt experience a lot less stress if we could just accept the varied forms of human nature (those that cause no harm, it should go without saying).

Michael King, Lead author of a study reporting in, Therapists Still Offering Treatments For Homosexuality Despite Lack Of Evidence, has come to the same conclusion -

“The best approach is to help people adjust to their situation, to value them as people and show them that there is nothing whatever pathological about their sexual orientation,” he says. “Both mental health practitioners and society at large must help them to confront prejudice in themselves and in others.”

My agreement with King’s conclusions, however, doesn’t mean I have given his “science” a pass. No, I am skeptical. That is my default position. And while he and his colleagues did gather some data — discovering that of over 1,400 British mental health professionals questioned (survey?), one in sex reported having attempted to assist a client change their sexual feelings — many statements were made in the article that were not supported by data. Or at least the data wasn’t referenced.

For instance, in the lead paragraph above, the claim is made that using therapy to change a person’s sexuality can “actually be harmful.” How do they know this?

Our knowledge of ourselves and the universe is expanding every day. Curiosity keeps us vigilant for new developments. And whether you are a square peg or round, that intellectual curiosity is a very good thing.

Technorati Links: humanism, psychotherapy, sexuality

Christians have their cartoons, too. This one is particularly telling -

Silly scientists — just because they can effectively treat, say, pneumonia with antibiotics, vs. ineffective prayer, (and they actively test their knowledge/treatments) they think they should be trusted more than priests and shaman and voodoo doctors and . . . . ?

Silly scientists. We should instead put our faith in a book written 2000+ years ago.

Or should we?

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* Notice that I did not write “The” Christian Perspective.  There are many stripes of Christian, as there are many stripes of atheist/nonbeliever.

Technorati Links: critical thinking, culture, science

While I believe it is important to be tolerant of the expression of a vast array of ideas, I do not believe we need to respect all thoughts. Give people freedom, but have-at-it with ideas. That is one of the reason I so enjoy and admire the comic strip, Jesus and Mo. It’s a breath of fresh intellectual bravery. Here’s the latest -

Technorati Links: cartoon, liberalism, religion

What do you call a collection of skeptics?

I call it a good thing. Over at PodBlack Cat the latest Skeptics’ Circle has been posted. The 108th.

Technorati Links: blog carnival

Is this headline a joke?

When Intestinal Bacteria Go Surfing: Molecular Signal Pathway In Diarrhea Illnesses Identified

Micro-organisms “surfing” on a wave of bodily discharge? Ick!

Oh wait. The research is about how E. coli bacteria avoid being expelled from the intestines by adhering themselves to mucosal cells in a manner that allows them to continue to move around on the surface.

I feel so prudish in my response. But the Wikipedia definition doesn’t fit -

A prude (Old French prude)[1] is a person who is described as being concerned with decorum or propriety. They may be perceived as being uncomfortable with sexuality, nudity, alcohol, drug use or mischief.

Am I instead a microbe-o-phobe? And if so, is it a healthy reaction? It seems my mind wants no part of a “sickening” image. Although my thoughts cannot be infected by E. coli — at least I hope not — those thoughts may keep me an arm’s length and more from possible sources of it.

Keep that headline away from me!

Technorati Links: biology, emotion, semantics

In the ScienceDaily article, Key To Happiness Is Gratitude, And Men May Be Locked Out, we read of research that purports to show that, 1) a feeling of gratitude is important to overall happiness, and 2) there is a gender difference in the tendency to show gratitude. The study author speculates that the cause of the gender difference is, 3) socialization — learning of the cultural sort.

While I’m inclined to accept #2, number 1 I wonder about and number 3 I doubt.

Number 2 was indeed supported by the study results -

[Todd Kashdan] found that women compared with men reported feeling less burden and obligation and greater levels of gratitude when presented with gifts. In addition, older men reported greater negative emotions when the gift giver was another man.

Okay, but is gratitude key to happiness in general, as the article states?

Gratitude, the emotion of thankfulness and joy in response to receiving a gift, is one of the essential ingredients for living a good life, Kashdan says.

What separates an essential ingredient from what otherwise might be mere icing on a cake?

As for number 3 and the gender difference, Kashdan speculates -

The way that we get socialized as children affects what we do with our emotions as adults. . . . Because men are generally taught to control and conceal their softer emotions, this may be limiting their well-being.

Really? Isn’t it possible that men are innately more attuned to interactions that have status implications? Thus they don’t want to be indebted to other men for even such trivial things as the driving directions from a stranger? Cross-culturally men are a more competitive lot. Why is that? I find it unlikely that significant gender differences are wholly learned. But I could be wrong.

Technorati Links: emotion, evolution, gender

Looking past the lunar surface to the Earth. [photo thanks to NASA]

Our planet is likely just one of gazillions in the universe. But is it “just another” planet? I would say no, on two counts, the first firm, the second tentative.

First, is a child just another child? Not if that child is your child. Of course the Earth isn’t just another planet. At least not for its inhabitants.

Second, thus far it seems the protective atmosphere, cloud cover and other bio-friendly attributes of Earth have made it uniquely suitable to the development of life. At least so far it seems that way. None of the planets within probe distance show the same bio-friendly qualities. Beyond our probes . . . who knows?

Technorati Links: cosmos, NASA

How is the higher-IQ brain different from the lower? More richly inter-connected neurons in critical areas? A more robust hippocampus and thus better short-term memory and perhaps working memory? (A larger inner workspace?)

Maybe. Maybe not. The high-IQ brain* might merely be faster. And like potential sprinting speed abilities, largely heritable. In the article, More Evidence That Intelligence Is Largely Inherited: Researchers Find That Genes Determine Brain’s Processing Speed I learned that -

Genes appear to influence intelligence by determining how well nerve axons are encased in myelin — the fatty sheath of “insulation” that coats our axons and allows for fast signaling bursts in our brains. The thicker the myelin, the faster the nerve impulses.

How was this determined? Yikes, you asked that so quickly, you must have a whole lot of fat in your head. The good kind. Here’s how -

Thompson and his colleagues scanned the brains of 23 sets of identical twins and 23 sets of fraternal twins. Since identical twins share the same genes while fraternal twins share about half their genes, the researchers were able to compare each group to show that myelin integrity was determined genetically in many parts of the brain that are key for intelligence. These include the parietal lobes, which are responsible for spatial reasoning, visual processing and logic, and the corpus callosum, which pulls together information from both sides of the body.

Got it? Good. Class dismissed.

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*I prefer to use “high-IQ” vs. “intelligent” because one term is more clearly defined and measurable while the other has more subjective and disputed connotations.

Technorati Links: intelligence, neurology

This paragraph says it all:

Researchers at the University of Washington have discovered an increased pattern of brain activity in the amygdalas of adults with autism that may be linked to the social deficits that typically are associated with the disorder. Previous research at the UW and elsewhere has shown that abnormal growth patterns in the amygdala are commonly found among young children diagnosed with autism. [source]

How does the amygdala influence social life and, in people with autism, cause/contribute-to social deficits? This region of the brain is active in a a wide array of emotional behaviors/processes. Emotion is to social interaction as electromagnetism is to chemical interaction.

The UW researchers hypothesize that autistic individuals experience hyperarousal, due to abnormal amygdalas. When hyperaroused, individuals tend to limit the amount of social (emotional) stimulation they expose themselves to, and will do things like avoid eye contact.

Those individuals with autism who had the most social impairment exhibited the highest levels of amygdala arousal.

Interesting. Very interesting.

Technorati Links: emotion, neurology

The lime tree in our backyard has started to push out new growth. The difference between this year and previous years is that there is no old growth — leaves — on the otherwise bare branches. The multiple, hard freezes we had this winter did them in.

Those new leaves are certainly delicate. Will insects find them and have a feast before they toughen into their more waxy . . . mature(?) form?

I’m almost attempted to taste one. Do lime leaves taste lime-ish?

Technorati Links: florida, nature