It's what we always knew, really

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Spotted today in the Daily Express:

Now science proves men are the weaker sex.

I always knew that pesky Y-chromosome had a lot to answer for!

Us poor T-girls get the worst of both worlds :(

Penny

How do you explain me then?

Granted, I have a strong diet of peppers and other sources of direct Vitamin A, C, and D, but my diet is weak in conventional plant matter.

As far as I know, my genetic gender is male.

But I get sick less often than even some of the ladies I know, get better faster, and can usually fight through it without more than missing a beat. I rarely medicate, often an energy shot or two a day is all I need to keep going, and I often use them to keep going even when I'm not sick, thanks to my ADHD/Asperghers!

You know, I said this last night in chat, and now I'm REALLY starting to wonder if I'm not some strange form of intersex that managed to go through puberty as male without intervention, but now is starting to go through some sort of change.

Wish there was a way for me to "shop around" for how much it'd cost to get testing done with a urologist with no insurance, beginning to wonder if it might not become urgent.

Abigail Drew.

Thousands or millions of variations around XX/XY

A couple of years ago, a genetic researcher Doctor that I know told me that it has become very clear that there is much more than the once thought common XX (Female) and XY (Male) and the variations happen much more often than once thought. Hopefully this winter, I will get a Karotype test to see just what I am because a certain group of people I know find that important.

This doctor did tell me that just from looking at gender indicators on my body, I am not pure XY but either Xy or XXy. He says that it is obvious that if I have a Y Chromosome, it is damaged.

So, moving right along, I recently read an article that indicated the X Chromosome has around 1400 genes and the Y Chromosome is only about 47 genes and decreasing, to disappear entirely in a Million years.

Much peace

Gwendolyn

Darn!

a million years too early...
Diana

Bye bye Y

(Go on, groan at that lame joke in the subject, you know you want to!)

Hmm...so if humans are still around in a million years time, will we have evolved the ability to reproduce via parthenogenesis, will science have given us that ability, or will some other means be found to ensure continuity of the species? That is, of course, assuming we're still around in a million years time and haven't managed to cause our own extinction in the meantime...

 

Bike Resources

There are 10 kinds of people in the world - those who understand binary and those who don't...

As the right side of the brain controls the left side of the body, then only left-handers are in their right mind!

Likely humanity as a whole will have completely

Likely humanity as a whole will have completely divorced itself from evolution by natural selection in the next few hundred years. Humanity is very literal at the edge of massive technological breakthrough on many fronts of science and engineering. Genetic engineering in principle can already be done, and we are learning new thing at a break neck speed as sequencing become faster. Also the science is getting much more abstracted as well, there are already software tool kits that allow for what akin to the early 70's computer hacking culture, where people can experiment and tinker as they please.

The stuff though that all of us should be interested in, is that the tissue engineering field is finally beginning to really take off. We already have engineered human bladders, hart valves and just recently a Trachea has been constructed. But what really cool is the mouse models are finally making some big break through i.e. the construction of a semi function mouse lung.

The whole tissue engineering thing mean life expectancy if going to jump through the roof, to the point that anyone who makes it to the beginning stages of life extension therapies will likely be able to ride the technological curve of new therapies to make then pseudo immortal (from aging at least)

Then there the really crazy stuff like IBM blue brain project. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_rPH1Abuu9M

TL:DR
my big point is in that humanity in the next 100 to 200 years is going to change radically. i.e. ghost in the shell type stuff

Post-technologic life

LibraryGeek's picture

This presumes we can sustain a high tech civilization in the post oil era; we're running out of cheap energy.

Yours,

JohnBobMead

Yours,

John Robert Mead

Running out of Cheap Energy... Uh, no.

We're just having some problems convincing companies to switch to things like geothermal, solar, wind, and hydroelectric. These technologies exist and usually pay for their installation in dividends in just a few years.

The problem lies in the "just a few years" - businesses want to run a profit NOW NOW NOW, not three years later.

Eventually they'll be forced to change over, and that'll only prove a minor hiccup in the grand scheme of things.

In a lot of places, Toledo included, the government's begun stepping in and forcing companies to adopt solar panels and wind farms.

We also have, if you're talking about motor transport, electric car technology that's orders of magnitude more efficient than any combustion engine, and capable of running for 2 days or so without a charge if driven responsibly.

We're just having difficulty convincing car manufacturers to actually push that tech out to the common consumer, and convincing the common consumer they actually want it.

Abigail Drew.

and oil by-products...

We already have synthetic lubes on the market that do not come from crude oil and generally actually outperform the oil-based lubes.

There's a replacement for plastics being worked on by various, get this, plastics manufacturers. Who knows when this will hit the market and what price it will start out at, afaik research is still in it's early stages.

Oil as used in combustion engines of varying sorts as an additional additive, either directly to the gas in some engines, or in another receptacle in others, will no longer be necessary as we move away from the combustion engine to more renewable resources.

Abigail Drew.

Slight correction

In economics, there is a term for businesses that don't run a profit now, they are called "closed". Businesses can't go three years without making a profit. A business that has diversified (in other words, those big, evil corporations) can use the profits from one product or division to cover the losses of another one that isn't, but in the end there has to be a profit. Otherwise it's like pumping blood in one arm while it bleeds out from massive cuts in the legs. It's an unstable situation, all it takes is a few more cuts or not enough units of blood and the patient (business) dies.

Electric cars are only "just" possible for metro use, an efficient electric semi is a long way off at this point, primarily due to current battery technology (excuse the pun). It's the old inverse square rule. To make an electric semi that would haul loads over a long distance day in - day out would take so many batteries there would be almost no load-carrying capacity left. The only way currently to haul large loads via an electric-powered vehicle is by train. Those locomotives are actually large electric generators powering large electric motors. And the generators are powered by diesel. Oops!

BTW, don't forget in three to five years you are going to have to replace the electric cars' entire battery package, figure about 3-6,000 dollars. And most of the charging stations will be powered off the grid. And the grid is generated by nuke, hydro, coal, or gas-fired powerplants. So you don't just have to build all the charging stations, you have to build the power plants to supply the charging stations.

Solar and wind power? Solar panels just don't have the efficiency to provide large quantities of power. Wind power requires vast areas to be efficient. And in the last few years wind farm permits are being challenged by environmental groups for altering natural ecosystems, as well as the more common arguments from area residents.

Hydroelectric power faces as many uphill battles as gas and coal-fired plants. It's gotten darn near impossible to get a permit to build a new dam, what with all the environmental requirements and the NIMBY types. And many current dams have reached the end of their design life and need to be replaced or removed. Environmental types would rather restore the environment than see replacement dams built.

Don't get me wrong, I'm all in favor of alternative energy sources. But right now these are technologies that are still in the development stages, some need a major technological breakthrough to become viable. I'm not placing any bets as to when those breakthroughs will occur.

* * *
Karen J.


"Life is not measured by the breaths you take, but by the moments that take your breath away.”
George Carlin

Renewables

The UK is apparently leading the world in offshore farms. They're a little less controversial than on-shore, in that they're not skyscraper-high monoliths sitting on top of hillsides, 'spoiling' the natural environment, and for fairly obvious reasons they're not likely to interrupt TV or radio signals. However, they are considerably more expensive than onshore farms - not just because of their location, but because they're so huge.

Although offshore locations are more likely to be windy, the wind still doesn't blow all the time. One idea that's been proposed, but may take decades to implement, is a single grid across Europe, so the surplus energy produced in places where it is very sunny or windy can be used in the areas where it isn't.

Another idea that's starting to gain credence is to supplement grid power with microgeneration. Solar panels mounted on a south facing roof can generate a couple of hundred watts even on a dull day, and if generation exceeds usage, the excess is sold back to the grid, significantly reducing your net electricity bill. Decent home insulation, double/triple glazed windows and draught excluders around doorways can also reduce energy consumption by reducing winter heating bills (as the home will remain warmer for longer).

 

Bike Resources

There are 10 kinds of people in the world - those who understand binary and those who don't...

As the right side of the brain controls the left side of the body, then only left-handers are in their right mind!

Disagree

This planet is awash in energy. We just haven't figured out the right ways to harness it, but it is happening.

Not really

erin's picture

This is like saying that if you accelerate at 32 feet per second you will eventually be moving faster than light. What you have read is a journalist's idea of what a biologist said, it isn't what any scientist would say. The evidence is that X and Y chromosomes are in a push-pull that neither can win because that would eliminate the species. Rats for instance have undergone a hundred more generations than humans in the last few million years and they have not lost their Y chromosomes or there would be no more rats.

Bad journalism does not make good science.

Hugs,
Erin

= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.

= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.

Nothing new there

When I was studying my GCSEs in the early 1990s, I was told that the probability of humans giving birth to a boy is actually 0.503, as boys are slightly less likely to survive infancy than girls, so nature compensates by ensuring slightly more males are born.

Checking the relevant Wikipedia page reveals there may be other possible causes, both natural (e.g. Y sperm being 3% lighter than X sperm so more likely to reach the egg) and unnatural (e.g. sex-selective abortion). There are also multiple causes for many countries having more females across the entire population than males.


As the right side of the brain controls the left side of the body, then only left-handers are in their right mind!

It's what we always knew, really

Now lets see the ultra macho deal with this,

    Stanman
May Your Light Forever Shine
    Stanman
May Your Light Forever Shine

I wouldn't bet the farm on this one...

Andrea Lena's picture

...women are more likely than men, 75% to 25%, to suffer from autoimmune diseases, despite having 'enhanced' immune systems. ( http://www.aarda.org/women_and_autoimmunity.php ) Hey...I really am a girl!!!

Oddly enough, according to what I've read regarding testosterone, for example, and what my immunologist has explained, my level of testosterone is ironically too LOW to mitigate my fibromyalgia, but is high enough to affect my prostate according to my urologist. Sorta like a hormonal nightmare version of Cool Hand Luke, yes? Oh well!


Dio vi benedica tutti
Con grande amore e di affetto
Andrea Lena

  

To be alive is to be vulnerable. Madeleine L'Engle
Love, Andrea Lena