the evolving mind

While sipping my morning coffee on the patio this morning I came to an insight about the anti-abortion stance. I think I better understand their perspective now.

As a half-dozen butterflies flitted within view, I marveled at their strange double existence. They have a double life not in a parallel way, but a serial way. First they are caterpillars; then they are butterflies. I got to thinking, probably erroneously, that the caterpillar stage is almost fetal-like: they seem not fully developed, more amorphous in form and incapable of flight.

And here came my insight by analogy, perhaps a faulty one at that. It seems to me a human fetus is a sort of caterpillar, feeding not on leaves but on its mother. So to speak. (In the majority of cases, this is a welcome arrangement.)

In my own mind, abortion does not kill a child or a human being. It kills a fetus, a potential human being. The butterfly that appears later is the human being. And it appears not overnight from a chrysalis, but it fully develops, unfurling its potential and personality, slowly over months and years post-birth.

Here’s the thing: when I view a caterpillar as a potential butterfly of one type or another, I treat it differently. Alright, go ahead, use my backyard foliage as your own personal salad bar. I like your potential.

I have been pro-choice for years and years. But I think I can now better understand the perspective of the other side.

Is a caterpillar a butterfly? No, not really. But it has potential. How much does potential weigh?

—

For a bit of recent science conducted on the subject of fetal abilities, look beneath the fold.

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Technorati Links: belief, perception, politics

Holy smoking creation, preacher-man! The “dry ground” is aflame. From within.

And God said, “Let the water under the sky be gathered to one place, and let dry ground appear.” And it was so. God called the dry ground “land” . . . (Genesis 1:9-10, NIV)

Um, it seems that Gawd didn’t totally finish the job on the third day. Volcanoes, earthquakes . . . . Planet Earth is obviously half-baked.

[photo thanks to NASA]

Technorati Links: belief, bible, cosmos

Parents can be over-protective. But can you blame them? They put all this time and energy and money into their little, precious hell-raisers, so why wouldn’t they go a tad overboard now and again? So, yes, it is not terribly unusual to spy a young one wearing a bicycle helmet while peddling its tricycle in circles in an empty driveway adjacent to a sleepy suburban road.

To me, that’s a bit much. What about putting a helmet on your infant or toddler before bath time? That precaution may actually be more reasonable. At least according to new research.

A new national study finds kids are being hurt in bathtubs and showers at a surprising rate.* You might think scalding or near drownings would be the most common threat in the bathroom, but they’re not.

Experts at Nationwide Children’s Hospital say slips and falls are far more common, sending more than 43,000 kids a year to the emergency department. That’s an average of 120 kids every day who are hurt in the tub or shower.* In most cases, parents are watching their kids, but it doesn’t matter.

A quick search of Google results shows no “toddler bath helmets” for sale. Yet. So this is what I recommend: Parents, keep your hands on your bathing children at all times. And you might want to wear a pair of those sticky gloves NFL receivers use.

Life: so many hazards, so little padding.

Technorati Links: human development

In the above photo you can be found a red-shouldered hawk feasting on a squirrel. In the nearly ten years we’ve lived in our present house we’ve had many generations of squirrel come and go. Sometimes their numbers blossom noticeable. But then they go down again. What makes their numbers dip after a climb? Disease and predation, for two.

Will the same hold true for the human population as it blossoms into the many billions? While predation is unlikely to play a role, warfare might. And what is disease but a form of microscopic predation? That could trim our numbers as well.

Of course, we are not squirrels. At least I hope we aren’t.

Technorati Links: birds, evolution

As a critical thinker, if I were to read or hear the statement, Chinese herbs work, I would be inclined to ask follow up questions.

What herbs? Work on what condition? How well do they work? Etc.

There is an expression “the devil is in the details.” This expression is somewhat fitting for scientific research. Sure, the headlines can be superlative, but what do we find in the details? Sometimes we may indeed find a devil of shoddy research lurking there. Other times we encounter the opposite: near saintly methods, data and reasoning. Most often one will find a mix.

The most slyly devilish science article simply leaves out the important details. And that is at least partly true with this one from ScienceDaily: Chinese Herbs May Relieve Endometriosis Symptoms, Review Finds.

“May”–okay, that’s good. But check out this statement by lead researcher Andrew Flower:

These findings suggest that Chinese herbs may be just as effective as certain conventional drug treatments for women suffering from endometriosis, but at present we don’t have enough evidence to generalize the results.

Follow-up questions anyone? For one I would ask, “how effective is effective?” If you are comparing Chinese herbs to a very effective treatment that is one thing. Comparing the effectiveness of Chinese herbs to a minimally effective conventional treatment is another. And just what herb or herbs were used? Critical thinkers want to know.

Being an informed consumer isn’t easy. And that is true whether we are in the market for a car, an herbal treatment, or for a basic, better understanding of the treatment of illness.

Technorati Links: alternative medicine, research

It is often argued that religion provides people with a comforting mythology. And what distresses people most? Death. While it may be true that belief in an afterlife can blunt fears of death, I am not convinced it is true. I have encountered no good research on the matter. In fact, the one study I’ve read on the topic showed mixed results, with one category of believers actually fearing death more. Nonetheless, in the interim before conclusive data comes in, I view the hypothesis as a reasonable conjecture. But a conjecture it is.

How do atheists perceive death? I imagine there is quite a range. Yesterday I made a post over at Florida Freethinkers that tells of some of my thoughts about that final night. Including this paragraph:

Sometimes, when envisioning my last moments, I think it would be nice to have a little bit o’ religion. On the verge of the big good-bye, while other people can think “Jesus is waiting” (with open arms rather than a dope slap), what will I do? A Porky Pig imitation? Th-th-th-that’s all folks! Will I squeeze my wife’s hand, smile a sad smile, and tell her, again, how much I love her and have loved her and enjoyed our life together?

To read the entire essay, click here.

Technorati Links: atheism, meaning

Any idea what this is? Hints: 1. Not a chocolate chip cookie. 2. The magnification is x200. 3. It is alive and lives very close to rocks.

Answer and another pic below the fold.

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Technorati Links: microscope, puzzle

Roughly twenty years after the birth of the term, I still don’t like homophobia. The word. But before arguing against the use of this term, let me emphasize that by taking a position against the word I am by no means taking a position in support of any or all behavior the term is used to categorize. The issue I address here is solely the perceived misuse of language.

Why quibble over “homophobia”? First, as popularly employed, homophobia implies a diagnosis, and supports a perspective, that rests upon a tenet of pop-psychology. The tenet asserts that behind all aggression, anger, and resistance, exists the true causal emotion — fear. But does fear underlie all aggression, all anger, all opposition?
As Andrew Ortony and Terence J. Turner, researchers specializing in the psychology of emotion, long ago outlined in the pages of Psychological Review, anger is a distinct emotion that has its developmental roots in the infant’s experience of frustration. The infantile experience of frustration, especially that of restraint, develops into the adult emotion of anger. Furthermore, the expression of anger emerges prior to that of fear. Hence anger does not develop out of fear.

What underlies adult anger?

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Technorati Links: politics, semantics, sexuality

Habituation –

is the psychological process in humans and animals in which there is a decrease in psychological response and behavioral response to a stimulus after repeated exposure to that stimulus over a duration of time. [Wikipedia]

Does the familiarity of home breed boredom and a desire to travel? When under-stimulated do we seek out the novel experiences provided by a fresh environment?

Having recently returned from some very stimulating travel — in a fun way — I am thrilled to be home. Perhaps my inner pendulum of emotional homeostasis has swung the other way. Has absence made my mind fonder of home, however temporarily?

Technorati Links: emotion, perception, travel

In the past post, No Solitary Creator, I argued that the Paley’s Watch argument is bogus. In fact, the analogy that biological life is as obviously designed as a watch better supports evolutionary theory.

This paragraph tells it in brief -

No individual stepped into an empty room, drew up a design, and then fashioned my Casio from scratch. Instead, countless people played a role in the design and construction of it: from the plastic wrist strap to the glass face, LCD display, tiny gears and lithium battery.

Similarly,

Is a Mercedez-Benz automobile evidence of “a” creator. Absolutely not. Ask Mercedez. Ask Benz. The truth? Automobiles and watches are the product of many, many individuals working alone and in concert over decades if not centuries.

To read the entire article, click here.

Technorati Links: creation, evolution, Intelligent Design