Letters to the Editor
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Anyone who thinks more brain cells = more intelligence has a few misfiring synapses
or is willfully ignorant.
And even if these female mice are getting smarter in response to the presence of dominant males, maybe it's because under stress they're adapting to devise new ways to steer clear of their overly enthusiastic cell mates. I know I would.
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No fair!
Why does my male intelligence always seem to decline when I'm pursuing attractive women?
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I am confused.
Does this mean brain-damaged women in nursing homes should be visited by Favio?
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alpha male choice does not equal smarts
The results of the study, as far as I can see from the Calgary Herald article, suggest no more than that a female rodent becomes better at choosing an alpha male after she has been exposed to his pheromones and that this happens via the mechanism of neuron growth in the female. However, the results suggest nothing about the effects on her global intelligence. There is no reported test of her intelligence post-exposure. Conceivably, her overall intelligence could be even adversely affected as scarce neural resources are expended in shoring up this one isolated skill: picking an alpha male. In other words, the pheromones of the alpha male could be viewed as co-opting the female's brain circuitry to generate more alpha-male-seeking neurons, without any positive effect on the female's global intelligence or survival skills.
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Flory critiquing the scientific merits of a study...
Was that a joke?
Flory isn't even remotely knowledgeable on the subject. And when has she bothered with something vaguely resembling hard science? "Women's studies" is propaganda lacking even the rigor found in real anthropology and history.
Flury is an apparatchik, not a scientist.
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actually
Anyone who thinks more brain cells = more intelligence has a few misfiring synapses
Actually, all else being equal, more brain is better. The point of the study was that the added brain cells increased the intelligence useful for mate finding, which is no small task for social species, even simple mice, and is one of the foundational basis for all higher intelligence. (The evolution of the brain is mostly towards food+mating with things like socialization and tool use means to that end.)
The study didn't mention whether the added intelliegnce was specific to finding the best mate, or whether it was additionally useful for other tasks Flory might find more politically correct. (oddly, the kinds of intelligence she seems to lack.)
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It's not the charms, it's the opposition
You have to learn how to get around their need to dominate. So you have to develop a more complex mind than theirs. A type of arms race, if you will.
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Woman says man dreams of another; hits him with phone
Here's a typical woman abuser that could have used some more brain cells, right Tracy Clark-Flory? Tracy, Tracy, are you aware that woman are responsible for 30-40% of all domestic violence?
A West Monroe woman was arrested, accused of hitting her live-in boyfriend with a telephone because she believed he had been dreaming about another woman.
Ouachita Parish sheriff’s deputies arrested Jackie H. Keith, 47, 486 Lenard Lane, for domestic abuse battery.
Robert Gilley, 40, told deputies that Keith tried to choke him and hit him in the ear with a phone when he tried to dial 9-1-1, arrest reports stated.
Keith told deputies she believed Gilley was dreaming about another woman and it made her mad and that Gilley hit her on the lip.
Deputies saw a small cut inside Keith’s lip, and bruises on Gilley’s neck and a bleeding cut on his ear.
Keith was booked into Ouachita Correctional Center.
Tracy, don't you think an honest discussion of domestic violence would benefit feminism?
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Thanks, Shilla!
I used your response on the receptionist at my eye doctor's office. I have been trying to get her attention for months. I repeated it verbatim and she vaulted over the counter and ravished me on the spot. Who'd of thunk it! You never know, do you.
Whew!
p.s. How many anonymous's are there?
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Deep breaths. Please think outside the uberfeminist box
Rational thinking is more effective than knee jerk reactions, Tracy.
Lets slow down. Okay, so scientists conducted a study. They found that female mice, when in close proximity to dominant males, experienced brain growth. A rational person may see that this is a natural response by the females. It is reasonable that the 'smarter' a female mouse is, the better their chances of being impregnated by a dominant male. Because, as we can surely agree, the offspring of dominant animals tend to outlive the offspring of less dominant animals (I believe a guy named Darwin studied this). Therefore, it is in the best interest of female mice, and their potential offspring, for her to get impregnanted by a dominant male. We are assuming that animals are naturally inclined to reproduce. (something many feminists might not agree with)
Does this correlate to humans?? Probably not as much as it did 10 thousand years ago, but I wouldn't be surprised if women got a little mental boost when they're around George Clooney.
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alpha males
"alpha" male mice in cages are the ones who beat up and hump all the other mice in the cage and get away with it.
the calgary herald's headline makes me worry about the state of "hunks" in canada. in the united states, "hunks" who beat up and rape other males would be in prison.
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That guy Darwin
You should try reading him sometime. Dominant does not always equal fittest. Direct fitness refers to the amount of offspring you produce over your lifetime. In many cases (especially in large mammals) the dominant male does produce more offspring, but that isn't always the case. For instance, prairie voles are monagamous (unlike their close relatives the meadow voles.) They have fewer offspring with a higher chance of survival. The "dominant" males, with fewer vasopressin receptors, are not actually the fittest in this society because fewer of their offspring reach the reproductive age. Indirect fitness refers to the amount of your genes that are passed on. This is why honeybees and ants are mainly female. They're more closely related to their sisters than they would be to their sons. This particular study demonstrates an example of dominant mice increasing their fitness through a previously unknown mechanism. Nothing more.
It's interesting not because of "increased intelligence." To the Anonymous who stated that more neurons equals greater intelligence, you must assume that all women are less intelligent than men. Women have smaller brains with increased connectivity. Since Marylin Vos Savant has a higher IQ but smaller brain than most men, I'd beg to differ with your assertion. It doesn't even necessarily increase reproductive intelligence. Any entry-level evolution or animal behavior class will teach you that every individual attempts to subvert the system to increase their own number of offspring. It doesn't necessarily mean that the female is making better decisions. In fact, this might be an example of run-away selection.
This study is interesting because they've found a mechanism by which new neurons are produced in an adult. This was thought not to happen save for in olfactory neurons. If we can learn the cellular mechanism (ie what neurotransmitters and regulators - not exposure to a Type A guy), then we might be able to help people with neurological disorders actually regrow damaged brain cells. That's pretty far off in the future, though.
Tracy wasn't criticizing the study. She was criticizing a stupid article based on its equation of mice pheromones with muscle men. We haven't found any pheromones in humans so far, so I'm not sure how this could even translate. I imagine the scientists are more annoyed about this stupid article than Tracy is. Their hard work and fascinating findings have been turned into a kitchy bit of fluff that bears absolutely zero relationship to the work in question.