Stephan: Science properly done is a self-correcting process, and this story is an example of how it is supposed to work.
Credit: Cedric Kanger/Creative Commons
Newly published research casts doubts on the link between women’s menstrual cycle and their political views, suggesting the association is “weaker or less reliable than previously thought.”
Widely-reported research published 2013 in Psychological Science found that women’s menstrual cycle influenced their religious and political orientation differently depending on their relationship status.
But a new two-part study by Kristina M. Durante of the University of Texas at San Antonio and her colleagues found that single women tended to become more socially liberal, less religious, and more likely to vote for Barack Obama during the ovulatory phase of the menstrual cycle. Women in committed relationships, on the other hand, tended to become more socially conservative, more religious, and more likely to vote for Obama’s opponent Mitt Romney.
But a new study of 750 women, published in the journal PLoS One, found no evidence of link between menstrual cycle phase and political conservatism.
“In summary, our data offer little support for the proposal that there is a substantial, politically significant, effect of […]
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Dana Nuccitelli, - The Guardian (U.K.)
Stephan: This story explains why I believe the Republican Party is a danger to humanity. My view is not based on partisan politics. I don't care much for either party, because I think corruption is so endemic as a result of Citizens United that our democracy itself is in danger.
But the Republican Party, because they recognize that demographics are against them long term, has espoused a strategy that is not designed to provide informed and intelligent guidance to create wellness for its voters, and the country as a whole. Instead its strategy has been to attract a "base" of voters who will reliably vote, and who are defined by their ignorance, adherence to a particular interpretation of Christianity, racism, hate, and fear. The party then panders to this base in return for their vote.
It is essentially a strategy designed and funded by the uber-rich and the corporations they control to game American democracy, and I think it is despicable. It is literally putting the humanity, and the Earth itself at risk.
This report describes how the process works in Congress
The US Congress periodically holds hearings on issues related to climate change. Because the subject has become a partisan one in America, they generally follow a predictable pattern – Democrats invite science and policy expert witnesses who agree with the expert consensus on human-caused global warming and the need to address it, and Republicans invite witnesses who disagree.
John Christy at the University of Alabama at Huntsville is one of the fewer than 3% of climate scientists who publishes research suggesting that humans aren’t the primary cause of the current global warming. He’s thus become one of Republicans’ favorite expert witnesses.
Last week, the Committee on Natural Resources held a hearing to discuss draft guidance by the the President’s Council on Environmental Quality to include carbon pollution and the effects of climate change in the consideration of environmental impacts of federal projects, as part of the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) review process. Needless to say, the Republicans on the committee don’t like the idea.
Christy Manufactures Doubt on Model Accuracy
Given that the hearing was ostensibly about environmental policy, most of the witnesses were policy experts. John Christy was the lone climate scientist invited to testify. His testimony focused on manufacturing doubt about […]
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, - The Raw Story/Reuters
Stephan: Here is another example of the same Republican strategy of creating confusion and doubt about the most important issue we face as a nation, and as a species. Jeb Bush, so far as I can discern is not a stupid, so saying this is not an act of ignorance but a calculated strategy. From my perspective the take away from this public comment is that it reveals Bush to be a man whose ambition is more important to him than his integrity. I would not vote for him on the basis of this statement alone.
Former Florida Governor Jeb Bush speaks during the Wall Street Journal CEO Council in Washington, DC on Dec. 1, 2014.
Credit: Jim Watson/Agence France-Presse.
Republican Jeb Bush said on Wednesday that the Earth’s climate is changing but that scientific research does not clearly show how much of the change is due to humans and how much is from natural causes.
Bush delved into climate politics during a campaign-style house party in New Hampshire at which he took questions from voters on his viewpoints as he considers whether to seek the Republican presidential nomination in 2016.
While President Barack Obama and many scientists believe humans are largely to blame for climate change, Bush said the degree of human responsibility is uncertain.
“Look, first of all, the climate is changing. I don’t think the science is clear what percentage is man-made and what percentage is natural. It’s convoluted. And for the people to say the […]
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Stephan: The decline of religion trend gets very little coverage. It is essentially people stopping a behavior usually quietly over a period of time. Boring compared to the fanaticism and outrageous soundbits of the Theocratic Right. But, in fact, the decline of involvement with religion is a major social trend in the U.S., as this report spells out.
Cardinal Timothy Dolan and Rick Santorum.
Credit: AP/Seth Wenig
The big news out of the new Pew poll on Americans and religion was the precipitous drop in the number of Americans calling themselves “Christian” and its potential impact on the Christian Right and future religion itself in the U.S.
But there’s another number lurking in the poll that may prove just as consequential: there are 3 million fewer people calling themselves Catholic today than in 2007, the last time Pew conducted their extensive poll. As a result, the share of the U.S. population that identifies as Catholic dropped from approximately 24 percent to 21 percent.
Why is this such big news? Because despite unpopular popes and still-simmering pedophilia scandals, the percentage of Catholics in the U.S. has remained remarkably steady for decades. The relative stability of the Catholic population allowed many on the Catholic right to dismiss calls for reform in the church and gave the Catholic bishops political clout when it came to opposing things like no-cost contraception […]
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Tom Philpott, - Mother Jones
Stephan: The die-off of commercially raised chickens hasn't received much attention, even though tens of millions of birds have died, so many that disposing of them has become a logistical nightmare. But media silence does not mean lack of substance. This situation is telling us something very important about the inherent vulnerability of the industrial-pharmaceutical animal husbandry model.
The most interesting part of this story to my mind is the fact that birds that are raised in a wellness as opposed to profit model are NOT succumbing. It took me a while to find a story that described this aspect, since the coverage of this entire event barely rates a yawn in corporate media, but this is a good account. We are being told something very important about our food system; it's a shame we aren't listening.
The Midwest’s ongoing avian flu crisis is wreaking havoc on the region’s large-scale egg and turkey farms. Last week alone, the US Department of Agriculture confirmed that the virus had turned up in more than 20 additional facilities in the region, condemning 4 million birds to euthanasia. Altogether, the H5N2 virus—”highly pathogenic” to birds, so far non-threatening to humans—has affected 168 sites and a jaw-dropping 36 million birds, (emphasis added) the great bulk of them in Iowa and surrounding states. It’s the largest avian flu outbreak in US history—and it has already wiped out 40 percent of the egg-laying flock h Iowa, the number-one egg-producing state in the US, according to The New York Times.
But it’s largely leaving backyard flocks unscathed. Why?
You’d expect backyard flocks to be widely affected too, but they don’t seem to be,” said one virologist.
According to Hon S. Ip, a virologist at the US Geological Survey’s National Wildlife Health Center, it’s a genuine mystery. Backyard flocks typically roam outdoors, in ready contact with wild birds, which are thought to be the origin of the virus. Their commercial counterparts live in tight confinement under strict “biosecurity” protocols: birds are shielded from contact with […]
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