An interesting article a few days ago called The Genetics of Glee or, what makes us sing in groups?

The punchline was that it appears that people who are members of a choir are more likely to have specific alleles of the serotonin transporter.  “The serotonin transporter has been implicated in many aspects of social behavior, and mutations in the gene have been correlated with autism, obsessive-compulsive disorder, depression, and antidepressant response, as well as cooperation, harm avoidance, and neuroticism.” The question left by the writer was whether this was in fact a gene for social organization rather than simply musical ability and organization.

So a soloist, or a diva in the choir context, theoretically may not have this allele.  Very interesting!

Even more interesting if you consider whether this same type of study could be done on politicians who thrive in a legislative context versus those who seek and succeed in executive roles.  Lyndon Johnson, for example, did both but there is a reason the most famous book about him is called Master of the Senate.  John Quincy Adams would fall in this category as well, though on the House side.  Bill Clinton, on the other hand, is clearly an executive type.

Who out there wants to start pricking the fingers of Congress?

The phrase “no talent assclown” entered our vernacular via Mike Judge’s Office Space more than ten years ago. The only problem with the expression is how badly misused it was in the film. Michael Bolton clearly has some talent. He can sing. He possibly cuts his own hair and makes his own shirts, too.

So while “no talent assclown” may not actually describe Michael Bolton terribly well, it really is a perfect descriptor for Piers Morgan, the latest British television “personality” to “grace” the American airwaves. For the uninitiated, Morgan currently hosts an eponymous nightly talk show on CNN that replaced Larry King Live. Before his conversion to chat-show host extraordinaire, Mr. Morgan played the role of a poor man’s Simon Cowell on “America’s Got Talent” and managed to win The Celebrity Apprentice (approval from Donald Trump, what an endorsement!)

Before his rise to ignominy on NBC and now CNN, Morgan edited two tabloid newspapers in the U.K. First Rupert Murdoch’s News of the World (the one that’s now defunct because it was hacking the cell phones of murdered teenagers, dead soldiers, and victims of the al-Qaeda London bombings), and then The Mirror, where the financial pages of the newspaper recommended buying a shares in a company in which he owned stock. He was eventually fired from The Mirror for approving the publication of fake pictures of British troops abusing Iraqi civilians (the paper’s subsequent “Sorry. We Were Hoaxed” headline just didn’t cut the mustard.) I say again: No. Talent. Assclown.

Given Morgan’s inauspicious background in trashy tabloid journalism, it is unsurprising that his attempts to make his show relevant through outbursts of sensationalism seem to stem from a misguided notion that he can somehow channel the zeitgeist of of the American people. His formula for achieving this (at least for political interviews) is pretty straightforward:

(No Republican Can Say or Do Anything Sensible + (I’ll Sound Intelligent If I Try to Point This Out* British People Are Supposed to Be Rude and Snarky)) / Don’t Get Too Far Into Any One Issue In Case I Get Found Out

This usually translates to the following type of exchange:

MORGAN: A lot of people are saying that you hate women/are racist/aren’t conservative enough to be President/are too conservative to be President etc.

INTERVIEWEE: [Gives reasonable explanation of his or her position]

MORGAN: That’s all very well and good, but [re-states original question but way more provocatively]

INTERVIEW: Well, as I just said, [reiterates previous answer, but is visibly irritated]

MORGAN: Okay, moving on [lest I press you further and you say something I don’t understand]

 
Note to CNN: you want to have a British person host one of your flagship shows so that people think you’re a smart network. I get it. You just shouldn’t have picked someone with this little substance behind them, because no-one will want to watch his tawdry show (in fact, more people read his newspapers than the measly 265,000 who inexplicably tune in to watch him on CNN). And if you simply must have a British host, there are plenty of smart ones to pick from. Try Jeremy Paxman, Jon Snow, or even (if you really want to get people watching) Jeremy Clarkson.

Math Nerds, meet Star Wars Nerds: .  Mother Jones has been on its game lately.  This one discusses the economic viability of the Death Star as a percentage of the world’s GDP.  Fantastic!

Probably Not Helpful in Cocktail Conversation: It turns out there is a competition for the Oddest Book Title of the Year. The full list of finalists with explanation is here.  (via Marginal Revolution.) And for those of you crying out for more detail about this competition:

Philip Stone, the prize administrator, said: “Despite the global economic turmoil, publishers continue to invest in imaginative, diverse and niche publications, and this award wonderfully reflects that.

“Sadly, though, and despite publishers regularly boasting that they are moving with the times, just one of this year’s seven shortlisted titles is currently available to buy in a digital format: Scott Mendelson’s intriguing work, The Great Singapore Penis Panic.”

The Diagram Prize for Oddest Book Title of the Year was first awarded in 1978 to Proceedings of the Second International Workshop on Nude Mice.

A Post Hoc Rationalization for Why I Didn’t Do My Homework: Alan Turing’s grade report here.

Now, for my favorite, drum roll please…

The New York Times Tries Math/Being Smart and Fails: Given how well written this take down is of the New York Times article here, I might suggest there is no need actually to read the New York Times article.  The take down will give you all you need to know. Namely, that reporters are lazy, probably did better in English than math, and are willing to parrot anything said to them without regard to logic. Oh, also, this blogger knows his Bernoullis. [Side note: I lost an office jeopardy game when I answered "What is Bernoulli's Principle" instead of "What is lift."  I'm still bitter, Tom and MC.]

From the folks that brought you the ubiquitous ipod, meet Nest.

Nest is a sleek, self-learning thermostat. And by that, I mean Nest doesn’t do “programming.” There’s a dial and that’s it. You set temperature to where you are comfortable, and after a few days, it starts finding patterns and adjusts accordingly.  The house is empty? It adjusts. You’re heading home early and would like the house to cool down? Grab your iphone and it adjusts. Wondering how to save money and reduce energy usage? It will suggest changes, show you your savings, and adjust. And, its gorgeous on the wall.

USA Today’s review may sum it up best: “Nest smashes any preconceived notions of what a thermostat ought to look like and how it should operate, whether you’re in front of it or accessing it remotely from an iPhone or iPad. It takes advantage of cloud computing, and it learns from your behavior.”

Smashes, eh? But will it save energy? Probably not, say experts.  And as proof, the EPA no longer lists these sorts of thermostats on their Energy Star Program. “Big savings are not achieved by temporary temperature reductions of the home.  In fact, reducing air temperature in the home means high mass items like couches and beds get cold and stay cold.  People bump thermostats to counteract the additional comfort challenge this introduces, so some setback strategies may really cost energy,” according to home energy expert Ted Kidd.

The other problem is more simple. Regardless of how fancy the interface for your thermostat may be, the functionality remains an “on” or “off” choice, meaning that the machinery is either cooling or heating on full blast or not at all. Work is being done in this area, but at the moment, the products cost at least $10,000 as opposed to the $249 price tag for Nest.

So, all in all, Nest is a beautiful piece of technology, but the science behind conservation doesn’t quite line up behind it.

I declare it so.  Thank you, I Love Charts.

Presidential Campaign Costs in 2011 Dollars.

Why you shouldn’t play video games this weekend.

Military support per candidate.

For those who miss Arrested Development on days ending in Y.

Why I’m over the gay marriage debate.

Books v Women. The age old conundrum.

And, lastly, a little fun with my favorite columnist.

I’m all for healthy kids.  And, by healthy, I mean non-obese little humans who play tag more than they play video games. Yep, count me in there.

But what is happening in school cafeterias these day is not the promotion of healthy kids. It is the subversion of parenting and a bizarre subsidy of the dairy industry. [Note: my grandfather came to this country to own a dairy farm, which is still in my family to this day...so let's not start on the American Farmer diatribe...I'm way ahead of you on that count.]

A few days ago, a four-year-old’s lunch was deemed unacceptable because it did not meet USDA guidelines.  She was sent through the cafeteria line where she received chicken nuggets and milk.  What was in her lunch?  A turkey sandwich with a slice of cheese on it, potato chips, a banana and an apple juice.  Aside from the absurdity of the whole thing, it now appears that the inspector’s objection was the lack of milk in the child’s lunch.

North Carolinians aren’t the only parents with a problem. A friend in Georgia has told me that her school mandates milk with lunch as well.  But only one percent. Not skim, not two. They even send a form home with children that the parents must sign indicating that they will send their child to school with one percent milk everyday. My friend, hilariously, has not signed despite being sent six copies of this form.

Where to start? The USDA guidelines are based on a system concocted in 1902 when we believed that bread was great for you and didn’t have a lot of access to fresh vegetables and fruits in the winter time. These guidelines have been updated but are still based on the same principles. Today, these guidelines are a plate that has been split into pie pieces–about 25 percent grains, 25 percent protein, 30 percent vegetables, and 20 percent fruit. Then, oddly, there is also a cup next to the plate that just says dairy.

This means that in states that follow USDA guidelines, of which two thirds do without any changes, your child is encouraged to eat a lot of carbs. Yet, “a growing number of top nutritional scientists blame excessive carbohydrates — not fat — for America’s ills.” In fact, Dr. Frank Hu, professor of nutrition and epidemiology at the Harvard School of Public Health has said that “The overemphasis on reducing fat caused the consumption of carbohydrates and sugar in our diets to soar. That shift may be linked to the biggest health problems in America today.”

This makes sense. Humans wouldn’t have been exposed to many carbs until the advent of true agriculture only a few thousand years ago. Or a few seconds ago in evolutionary time scales. And, yet, they make sandwiches and pizza possible. So here we are.

The same is more or less true for milk.  Most humans can’t digest it past infancy and so it holds no nutritional value.  In the United States, the percentage is lower–about 50 million. But that number includes 75 percent of African Americans and 90 percent of Asian Americans.  So, really, all these USDA requirements are doing for those kids is causing them to have stomach aches in the afternoon.

My point, of course, isn’t that we should ban carbs and milk from schools. Only that the government should have a less intrusive role given their complete inability to keep politics out of our children’s lunches and the hefty price tag these regulations force on budget-strapped school districts.

Politics, you ask? Well, of course. After the new school lunch guidelines went to Congress, Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) “wrote a letter … extolling the nutritional value of tomato paste, [a]nd Senators Susan Collins (R-Maine) and Mark Udall (D-Colo.) from big potato-producing states joined with the National Potato Council to fight the limits on starchy vegetables.” What happened? “In addition to preserving the tomato paste loophole, the bill Obama signed prevents the USDA from limiting servings of starchy vegetables.”

I rest my case.  In the meantime, I hope your child likes milk and state inspectors rifling through her lunch bag.

An interesting, if incomplete, article about infection theory in loosely connected populations.

The point seems to be that if you have two sets of populations–one group of 10 and two groups of 5–a disease will spread faster in the latter population.

Of course, Facebook has known this for a while…

Today would mark DFW’s 50th birthday.  Letters of Note recognized the occasion by posting one from DFW to Don Delillo discussing the conflict he felt between the self indulgent writing he considered fun and the serious, respectful writing that would bring out his feelings of inadequacy.

I’ll save you the comments on any effect his writing may have had on my life and instead encourage you to read the last of his essay collections entitled “Consider the Lobster.” And in case you’re wondering what this has to do with a blog about science and politics, the summaries of some of the essays below should help clear up any confusion (links to original provided where possible).

Authority and Modern American Usage (or, “Politics and the English Language” is Redundant) [Harpers 1999]: The article is a review of sorts of Bryan Garner’s A Dictionary of Modern American Usage.  It begins with a quote from Augustine, has scattered throughout “interpolations,” and is, at its deepest level, dedicated to the political battles raging in the society of SNOOTs (which he uses to create SNOOTitude, ayotolloid SNOOT, SNOOTlet, and contra-SNOOT). Headings include: WHY BRIAN GARNER IS A GENIUS (I)–though you will also find a (II) and (III); DIALECT AS A VECTOR OF SELF-PRESENTATION VIA POLITENESS; and, most importantly, COROLLARY TO THESIS STATEMENT FOR WHOLE ARTICLE, which as you probably can guess, was the first heading. He also quotes extensively Bill Bryson and Steven Pinker–two authors whose books also fill my shelf with linguistic delicacies.

Up, Simba [Rolling Stone 2000]: DFW spends a week on the second press bus, affectionately called Bullshit 2, following John McCain’s Straight Talk Express campaign in South Carolina shortly after his upset victory in New Hampshire over George W. Bush. The article even has its own glossary found on roughly page 12.  Not much else to say about this except that it is the reason I fell in love with politics, the 2000 version of John McCain, DFW, great writing, and zeitgeist-capturing sentences like “the only thing you’re certain to feel about John McCain’s campaign is a very modern and American type of ambivalence, a sort of interior war between your deep need to believe and your deep belief that the need to believe is bullshit, that there’s nothing left anywhere but sales and salesman.”

Consider the Lobster [Gourmet 2004]: DFW covers the Maine Lobster Festival. “One could conclude either that lobsters are maybe even more vulnerable to pain, since they lack mammalian nervous systems’ built-in analgesia, or, instead, that the absence of natural opioids implies an absence of the really intense pain-sensations that natural opioids are designed to mitigate…[making them] more like frontal-lobotomy patients one reads about who report experiencing pain in a totally different way than you and I.”  After a series of question on the connections between aesthetics and morality, he concludes that “there are limits to what even interested person can ask of each other.”

Happy birthday, DFW.  That is all.

I love my 10 month old border collie mix, Tesla. But we’ve had to move her water bowl at least three times just to find a spot where sitting water isn’t a problem. This is because her idea of drinking from a water bowl is about 2/3rds intake and 1/3 collateral damage. This was news to me because I also own two cats who have never let a drop of water spill from their glasses. (Yes, my cats insist on drinking from water glasses as opposed to bowls or any other kind of receptacle.)

Thankfully, engineers from MIT, VPI, and Princeton came to the rescue. As it turns out, my cats’ “lapping method depends on its instinctive ability to calculate the point at which gravitational force would overcome inertia and cause the water to fall.” For those who are wondering, the lapping frequency should be “the weight of the cat species, raised to the power of minus one-sixth and multiplied by 4.6.” And, before you dash off an angry letter about wasted government grants, the cat-tongue-robot was actually built for an experiment on the International Space Station and was only briefly borrowed by our ailurophilic engineers.

Dogs, on the other hand, form a “crude cup” and inefficiently scoop water into their muzzles, creating the mildew farm I am currently overseeing. This means that, in a drought, your money should be on the cat’s perfectly structured water intake machine rather than the dog who will waste a good chunk of whatever is left in the oasis.

This could probably provide a great metaphor for government tax policies and spending. Or perhaps a lesson on fine tuning our environmental policies as we head into a metaphorical drought of energy resources and, given last summer, a literal drought as well.

But, for me, its really just a cool thing about cats. And, given the article I posted on Toxoplasma gondii, I thought they could use a good PR day.

In 1966, Abraham Maslow, the famed professor of psychology that originated the hierarchy of needs, published The Psychology of Science, which included the phrase, “It is tempting, if the only tool you have is a hammer, to treat everything as if it were a nail.”

I think this sums up my opinion of government about as succinctly as anything ever will. The government has a tool shed full of hammers. But the house is made up of more than nails. No where is this problem more clear than in the education realm.

The problem: The kids ain’t learnin’ so good.

I don’t think anyone can dispute that our country has an education problem–although the specifics of the problem may vary depending on who you ask. Is it the percentage of kids that can’t read at grade level? The growing disparity between the performance of kids from different socio-economic groups? The fact that US students rank 25th in math…out of 34 countries?

To the US government, these problems are just a sea of nails. The Constitution gives the government limited powers, most of which involve spending. So, for our government, every problem must be fixed with spending increases. That’s the only hammer they really have. But as we’ve seen time and again, more spending doesn’t equal better results. In the last 30 years, the US has doubled spending on education and things have gotten worse.

Where’s the game changer? Why aren’t we trying new tools? Where is the support for charter schools and vouchers, both of which are cheaper than public schools? [More on charter schools coming soon.]

But, as nobody in particular said, “the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.” So, by all means, keep hammering away.