Category: Commentary

Views about life, politics, science, relationships, and generally anything I want to give my opinion about.

Natural Selection versus Genetic Drift in Single nucleotide polymorphisms, SNPs

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Research published from The University of Queensland indicates that natural selection plays a greater role than genetic drift in SNPs dealing with height, waist-to-hip ratio, BMI, and schizophrenia among European, African, and Asian populations (Does evolution make us or are we just drifting that way?). Led by Professor Jian Yang from UQ’s Institute for Molecular Bioscience and Queensland Brain Institute, the team used more than 400,000 genetic samples from African, East Asian and European populations to determine if the SNPs (pronounced as “snips”) showed a tendency towards randomness, implying genetic drift, or not, and thus natural selection.

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The results showed that for SNPs such as height, waist-to-hip, BMI, and schizophrenia, there was a greater frequency for height among Europeans; a greater BMI number for Africans with Europeans having greater than Asians; both Europeans and Africans falling out of the mean for schizophrenia. None of these traits showed the tendency towards a random distribution which indicates that for these SNPs natural selection plays a greater role than genetic drift. In other words, what this study says that rather than in the colloquial debate of Nature versus Nurture it’s more like Selection over Nature and Nurture not having a factor at all. This is important in that it gives hope for the potential to treat certain ailments, such as schizophrenia through treatments such as CRISPR. 

It has left me to wonder how much of natural selection over genetic drift influenced hominin traits? Eyebrows/brow ridges, robust/gracile, even “having a chin” how were these more a product of selectivity among groups than randomness among Neandertals, Denisovans, and modern humans? More intriguing, could this be applied to culture as well? 

-A. M. Holmes

 

 

Wow, and I thought I was a Progressive Thinker.

Three female scientists discussing their research

This morning I got a Twitter notification from All Revolutions (@RevolutionsCen) about an article from The Atlantic by Ed Young (@edyong209 ) where, as he tells it in I Spent Two Years Trying to Fix the Gender Imbalance in My Stories , “I knew that I care about equality, so I deluded myself into thinking that I wasn’t part of the problem”.  He had seen how a lot of his articles reflected a gender bias he never intended to portray. Reading this opened my eyes to the fact that even though I claim to be “gender-blind” I wasn’t doing any better. Here I’m thinking I’m a progressive thinking person now to find out I’m as dirty as our misogynist President (I wasn’t aware of Emmanuelle Charpentier, Jennifer Doudna, and CRISPR). I was fooling myself completely. Now I begin to wonder where else has my supposed “blindness” toward gender, race, or ethnicity has misled me to promote instead the same prejudices I have always felt unjust?  The article is very enlightening. Also, it has good resource information at the end of it.

-A.M. Holmes

“Populism” is the New “Nationalism”

 

The New York Times op-ed says, “If freedom is to prevail over the many challenges to it, American leadership is urgently required.” Unfortunately, the U.S. has leadership but not in the form it needs to preserve freedom.

In the U.S. “Populism” has become just another word for “Nationalism”. “America Great Again”, “America First” these are fascistic slogans used by a radical movement within the GOP that has Trump as its leader. This is a group that believes in the suppression of the free press, divisiveness along socio-economic and cultural lines, isolationism, and “bread and circuses (tax breaks and parades) for the masses. These people are elitists who have nothing in common with the average American and yet know how to manipulate and lie to achieve power through the ballot box. They are un-American and if we continue to allow them to usurp the government they are a threat not only here but globally as well.

-A. M. Holmes

Scoobynatural!

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 (Image courtesy of Entertainment Weekly and The CW)

 

Tonight on the CW at 8 pm/ 7pm central is the crossover episode I’ve been waiting for since I first there was the possibility it could happen. ‘Scoobynatural’! Yep, that’s right folks. The venerated cartoon classic from the 70’s will be coupled together with the series ‘Supernatural’ in some freakish impossible way that can only happen to the Winchester brothers. Dean (Jenssen Ackles @JensenAckles), Sam (Jared Padalecki @jarpad) and Castiel (Misha Collins @mishacollins) all star in the show along with Scooby, Shaggy, Freddy, Daphne, and Velma. I’m as giddy and excited as a little school girl waiting for her parents to bring home the puppy she saw at the pet store and wanted it so bad. Yeah, like that.

Briefly, because that’s all we have, after Dean purchases a tv for his “Man Cave” at the Men of Letters bunker he, Sam and Castiel are transported into the animated world of ‘Scooby-Doo’. The Winchesters figure that this is a scheme by the Trickster to torment them (if you don’t follow the show just trust me when I say that, yeah, this something he would do) and believe that the only way out is to finish the storyline of the cartoon episode. Dean, the ‘Scooby-Doo’ aficionado takes lead thinking he recognizes the mystery to be solved. So, the three of them meet up with the Scooby Gang (Dean writing off the bucket list by finally meeting his lifelong dream girl, Daphne) and they help along trying to solve the mystery. Except, as if things can’t get any weirder, this is not that Dean, or anyone, remembers and now they are as clueless as the local law enforcer. 

The others starring in the show as voices are Grey (DeLisle) Griffin as Daphne, Kate Micucci as Velma, Frank Welker as Scooby and Freddy, and (drum roll please) Mathew Lillard doing what he has been done very well for years, Shaggy. It is written by ‘Supernatural’ seasoned writers Eric Kripke (creator/producer of the show), James Krieg and Jeremy Adams. It is directed by another ‘Supernatural’ veteran, writer, producer, director Robert Singer.

As of this posting, the show premieres in a little less than two hours. I’m already silencing my phone, getting dinner ready, and making sure, for the fifth time today, that the DVR is set to record so I can see it again. And again, and again. I also warned my friends, children, and ex-wife I’m running in ‘silent mode’ so “no one visits, calls, messaging unless someone is bleeding profusely and at the ER and even then, be near death”.  A little over the top? Well, at least I’m not locking my wife out -she’s a fan.

-A. M. Holmes

“PEACE THROUGH STRENGTH!”

In a Twitter posting the evening of March 21st, President Trump said,

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Here’s my reply.

Since the Russians help you win the Elections2016, I can see why you think this. But, to say you are “smarter”, more “energetic”, or charismatic than the previous POTUS not illustrates your ignorance of history and politics but you naivete in diplomacy. 

Don’t take credit for achievements you have yet to accomplish. So far there’s no non-nuclear proliferation treaty with either North Korea or Iran, no plan with Russia on ISIS or the MiddleEast. And at home, you are claiming economic boon without policy.

You claim victory without achieving anything. “PEACE THROUGH STRENGTH!” you dare to claim Reagan’s words and policy? How dare you. POTUSTrump, you are not and never will be a Great Communicator, you will never be a great anything.

-A. M. Holmes

Why I Remain on Facebook

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I thought about it as well, weighing the security breaches against staying in touch with people, and concluded that whatever I am worried that someone would get has already happened. Therefore, I’ve taken some steps to prevent any further excursions by outfits like Cambridge Analytica into mine and my friend’s lives. I’ve cut down my number of contacts down to a small, manageable number and of people I can control. Removed any pictures of my children and be careful of what I post in the future. I’ve also made access to certain information more restrictive. I won’t participate in surveys, test, and any of the other distractions FB had provided in the past. Note: I never understood why some of these would ask for a login to post on your profile if you were already logged in. Always seemed like a security violation.

Anyway, to keep in touch with family, former classmates, co-workers -friends, I will remain on FB. I will also remain to do so more carefully.

Post #SOTU Commentary

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‘s speech was more of symbolic testaments than of real substance. Other than the brief mention of rebuilding our infrastructure and his most of the speech was about what others, his invited guest in the chamber, had done and empty words of rhetoric. It wouldn’t have been so bad if the speech had not clocked in at a whopping 1 hour and 20 minutes! The first 35 minutes was all about how he had created jobs, increased employee earnings, and help break Wall Street records. The rest of the speech was an artificially overly sweetened piece of fluffy confectionary Americana that leaves nothing but a bitter aftertaste. No real new DACA deal was offered, he wants the building of our defenses by returning to the days of nuclear annihilation, and told Congress he needs trillions of dollars for infrastructure rebuilding without defining what it is exactly and how it’s going to get funded. All I can say about this speech is that that’s 80 minutes I’ll never get back. 

On the Eve of President Trump’s State of the Union Address

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The wife is out doing the thing that she does to uplift and benefit the community, she is seamstress and customer for a local junior high school theater production company, leaving me to my own device. So, enjoying a couple of hours of solitary bliss I do as most in this modern age do and surf the streaming channels looking for entertainment. I finally settled on ‘Ken Burns: American Lives’ and specifically chapters 7 and 8, the life of Mark Twain. Now, as I was watching the program, I began to wonder what this magnificent genius writer of the American culture would have said of our times, and specifically, the 45th President of the United States. Challenging Google to find me an answer I came across the above quote from his “The Character of a Man” that, to me, fits best to what he could have thought. Of course, this could be argued as conjecturable and so I would need to press those who disagree with me to find confirmation as to the meaning of Twain’s quote by going to the source itself. If they chose to do so in order to make their point, who am I to question their absolute dedication to their cause. On the other hand, if some lack conviction in their own assumptions, and thus fail in their pursuit for the truth, they will undoubtedly continue to be the gadflies that they are and some other means will have to be found to deal with their pestering. It’s a shame tar and feathering has gone so out of vogue in our times. Maybe someone can come up with an internet version of it, perhaps?

-A. M. Holmes