Your article on parthenogenesis is misleading and shows a general lack of scientific understanding. The ability to sexually reproduce was an advancement from single-sex genetics, designed so that successive generations would become increasingly impervious to genetic threats--viruses and deficient mutations--as well as changing environmental factors (i.e, climate, food, predatory) by recombination of genes, allowing for diversity. Diversity and adaptation are crucial in nature--they allow not only survival of the species in the face of new conditions, they allow new species to develop able to migrate and conquer different areas.

Notice that the article states that there are few, if any, genetic differences between mother and daughter, so they lack the ability to change. All it would take to wipe out these geckos is a simple virus calibrated to overcome their immune system, or a change in rainfall over a period of time, or a few degrees average temperature over that same time. Likewise, a single deficient mutant gene would be replicated endlessly and weaken and destroy the species. This is not a long-term solution, as shown by nature's preference to sustain and promote crossbreeding.

Parthenogenesis is nature's last-ditch way of keeping the species going, as shown by the circumstances in which it appears. It is not preferred, and it is not an advancement.

My high school lit teacher, who had us read selections from Bocaccio, told us that nearly every basic sitcom and soap plot in use today was a variation of something found in the Decameron. Nothing new under the sun, I guess...

To me, the author misses ever so slightly as to why the story in "Rome" is so fascinating, yet so timely. The connection to where we are in 2007 could not be more stark.

The Roman Republic, founded in resistance to a king by landowning nobility, eventually grew larger and more powerful, eventually becoming the arbiter of the known world. Her military evolved from a simple levy of peasants in time of emergency to a professional volunteer force constantly fighting overseas to protect economic interests (as in Egypt). Her economic base devolved from landowning citizen farmers to apathetic foreign slaves because bigger profits could be had for a favored few. The leadership increasingly used demagoguery and appeals to the lowest sentiments of the mob to get and stay in power, without regard for the effects on the state. Spectacles and games and public executions were used to keep the plebs distracted from their problems.

Yes, there are good reasons some historians compare the US today with the late Roman Republic.

The history presented in "Rome" is a bit off (Sextus Pompeius outlived Brutus, was not killed by Antony, for example). Yes, Atia and Servillia were probably nothing like what they are presented like. But it is far, far superior, both in the story arc and in the minute details, to anything that came before it. "Gladiator" wasn't even close to history, and while a great popcorn movie, was clearly tailored for modern American mores (the little boy would have been killed by Commodus the moment his mother became a threat, not spared).

lare

How many of you realized, for example, that sessions of the Senate were part of religious ceremonies? That Vorenus, as paterfamilias of the house, had the legal and moral right to kill his wife and children for any or no reason at all?

Perhaps not 21st century Christianity in America, with its centuries-long filtering through Protestant thought in both Europe and America, blended with 20th-21st century concepts of a loving, inclusive God. But practices, shrines and belief in "lares" (in the form of saints) survived ancient Rome, were incorporated into Latin Christendom and still exist in the rural parts of Southern and Eastern Europe, and happily co-exist with the native traditions of indigenous Mexicans, Africans, Filipinos and others. Great Mother (Mary) worship is still very strong, and the Italian belief in Fortuna (seen in the skull and wheel design in the opening credits) has never gone away.

"The history of Rome on the whole is one of continual change and successful adaptation, rather than rigidity leading to crisis leading to annihilation."

It depends on what you consider "successful". If you mean mere survival of the city and people, you may be right, but I'm not sure I'd award it any merit when the Rome of Trajan numbered over a million inhabitants, but the Rome of Justinian four centuries later was a measly 40,000, due to repeated sackings and destruction of water supplies.

If, however, you mean "successful" as in independent, economically vibrant, self-sufficient, forward-thinking or self-governing, you are incorrect. There is a far cry from the Rome of the Gracchi and Marius and the Rome of, say, Elgabalus. After Commodus, Rome was no longer ruled by Romans, the republican fiction was thrown out in favor of the tyrranical Dominate, Rome could not feed itself, class mobility was forbidden by decree and people were tied to the land in perpetuity to generate ever higher taxes. Furthermore, by the fourth century Rome mattered so little in terms of political control that it ceased being the capital and the state religion was abolished in favor of an Eastern cult. It eventually became just a base from where barbarians ruled the countryside. As for the Church's domination, I can't say the medieval mindset promoted from Rome was a positive thing.

Adaptation, yes. Successful? Questionable.