text:
The Clapham Interpretation
Just common sense, really
Life & Consciousness
Posted on July 3rd, 2019 August 1st, 2019 by Author
Life and Consciousness – Chapter 3
The Hawking of Dawkins
By any criteria, especially Dawkins's own concept of meme propagation, his theory of gene-centric evolution has been one of the most successful scientific theories of all time, dominating the field of genetics since he introduced it, with just one teeny drawback. To use his own words, Dawkins "got it totally and utterly wrong".1 The Selfish Gene, Chapter 1. To be fair, he was talking about other people, but what the hey? Hoist with his own petard, I think the phrase is For a start, the title "The Selfish Gene" is just a bit of anthropomorphic teleological silliness. Even if a gene is positively throbbing with lust to rule the world, there is no known mechanism by which it can realise its ambitions, largely because it is dead; or, if you prefer, inanimate. More to the point, it is redundant verging on tautological to say that for a species to survive its genes must survive. There's no alternative; that's how it has to be done. And no, it is not a metaphor. 2 A metaphor uses elements of a known concept that directly correspond to the elements of the concept to be explained. For example, a water-mill provides a good metaphor for the role of money in an economy since it shows how, for the work to be done, it is not enough to have a sufficient quantity of water; it has to flow. And you can take that to the bank, for all the good it'll do you There is absolutely nothing in a gene's makeup or behaviour that in any way corresponds to the human emotion of selfishness. Nonetheless, the underlying idea is not necessarily as trivial as it might at first appear.
First, however, a little background: evolution is not a theory, it's a fact. The word comes from the Latin 'volvere', 'to turn', with the prefix 'e-', meaning 'out'. 'Evolvere' means 'to turn out', and since things are bound to turn out one way or another, evolution can be considered a fact. There are, of course, theories about evolution. "Shit happens" is one of them. "Things are the way they are because they got that way"3Gerald Weinberg quoting Kenneth Boulding is another, very succinct, expression of the official scientific view. Charles Darwin had one which has since itself evolved into the modern synthesis. Most religions, large and small, have their own, the major exception being Buddhism4 Which the Dalai Lama doesn't really consider to be a religion, and he should know which, having neither gods nor creation, focuses entirely on evolution, although in their version, if at first you don't succeed . . .
However, as far as we know, evolution selects for survival, and that's all.5You epigeneticists and your funny ideas. You'll be resurrecting Lamarck next :o) What? Oh, I see. Carry on, then There are no rules, so you can't cheat. If you happen to make it through, no matter how you do it, you win and you go on to the next round. If not, not. And that is the whole of the law. In the words of the song: "If a tree don't fall on you, you'll live till you die." It can be gross. The female Stegodyphus lineatus spider feeds her brood by the simple device of taunting and cajoling them until they kill and eat her, having first drained her of all her blood; a sort of combination suicide/matricide that guarantees them at least one good meal before they set out on their own. And you thought your mother was bad. Stegodyphus is not the only one, either. Other species of spider do the same thing, indicating some distant common ancestor who came up with this plan in the first place, so it's obviously been going on for some while. It should also be pointed out that this is not Plan B, for use in emergencies only; no, this is just the way things are done in those circles. But you can see how it would work. Most mothers indulge in a little self-sacrifice to give the kids a good start in life. That's the trouble with FAPs; if they work, they're very hard to cancel once they've begun.
Animals' behaviour for the most part is genetically determined, so selection occurring at the level of the gene should be able to affect the behaviour of the phenotype, the individual organism that is carrying the gene. If it does, we should find that the resulting phenotypical behaviour supports the gene's need to reproduce and spread itself, and if not, not. The problem is that this is a circular argument, since you can't get to be a species unless you can reproduce yourself, and you have to use your genes to do it, so successfully behaving species are bound to have successful genes. The question is: is the converse necessarily true? Do successfully reproducing genes produce successful species?
Turns out, not so much. The obvious and best way for a gene to reproduce itself is just to make a copy and send it out into the world. This is definitely an option; it is called asexual reproduction, but almost nothing uses it. Or to put it another way, the organisms that use it aren't very successful. This is almost certainly due to the fact that asexually reproducing species are highly vulnerable to environmental change because they lack the genetic diversity that gives sexually reproducing species at least a chance of coming up with something useful to cope with the new conditions. So the primary mechanism for species' evolutionary success depends on the failure of genes to reproduce themselves accurately. Hmmm.
Perhaps we're going about this the wrong way. Let's get back to phenotypical behaviour supporting the gene. The vast majority of species are born into a family, even if it's just the kids and their mother. Families come in all shapes and sizes, and they radically affect the offspring's chances of survival. The environment exerts evolutionary pressure, but it has to be local to do it. It's not the butterfly in the Himalayas; it's the storm over your head. Families, and social structures generally, provide a mini-environment that modifies the ecosystem outside it to create different, more benign internal pressures. It allows pups to move further up the food chain from prey to predator, where left to their own devices they would simply die, taking their species with them.
Not all animals love their families. When they do, it gives them an enormous evolutionary edge. It protects the young at their most vulnerable, and the family as a whole by uniting it against external threat. Them against us. But it doesn't have to be so. Families are not vital for producing offspring. Sea turtles have survived for millennia largely providing crunchy snacks for other sea creatures, but with enough leftover progeny to keep their own population going. Works fine as a strategy, but there's no moral to this story, I wouldn't have thought. No tales of maternal self-sacrifice here, and no family as such.
We, on the other hand, do love our families. Not all of them, and not all the time, especially in large gatherings, but we do. And a good thing, too. Imagine when the first generation of our race was being born. No genetic memory, no FAPs, no understanding of the world; completely helpless infants, not just for a few weeks but for years, slowing the tribe down more and more as the mutation took hold. It's a wonder they let us live. Perhaps if the tribe had been larger, and life less precious, they wouldn't have, but they did, fortunately. Parents love their babies and will fight to protect them. Siblings bond together. Families are at the heart of the tribe and, if pushed, will unite against it,6 There's an old Arab saying: my nation against the world, my tribe against the nation, my family against the tribe, my brothers against the family, I against my brothers, and I am schizophrenic. Perhaps it's not that old so ultimately it was probably wise just to accept us. Or perhaps in the end they didn't, and it was Adam alone who pushed on, recruiting more or less willing females to provide future generations. One way or another we got our start.
The difference between creatures that love their families and those that don't forms the basis for what's called r/K Selection Theory. I now have a confession to make. Unfortunately for me, but perhaps fortunately for you, I am one of those people for whom number is just the stage between numb and numbest; useful on a Polar expedition when people ask, "How's it going?" but not otherwise, really. So I promised myself and thus, unwittingly, you, that I would try to eliminate all formulae from this book. I have just failed.
This is the Verhulst equation for population growth. Read it and weep, as I do.
Actually it's not that bad. N is the size of a population, r is the rate at which it grows, and K presumably stands for the Karrying Kapacity of the environment, otherwise known as the population's upper sustainable limit. Any species that relies for success on producing large numbers of offspring, but with a low probability of individual survival, are called r-strategists, and those that produce only a few progeny, but ensure a high probability of survival by looking after them until they grow up, are called K-strategists. r-strategists are supposed to be small and short-lived but fertile, while Kstrategists, like us, for instance, should be big and long-lived, at least long enough to raise their offspring. In practice, however, even though they do include bacteria and small rodents, r-strategists can also be sea turtles, while ants make really good parents, so not so accurate. Still, the basic idea, regardless of size, is that in an unstable environment where you don't know what is going to happen, there's no point in putting a lot of effort into the kids' upbringing; if they're not going to live long enough to see the benefit, the numbers will just have to do it for you. At the same time, in a stable environment, where the formula has had time to work its magic and population numbers are at or close to optimum, then you need to give children a proper education if they're to compete. If either of these families sounds familiar, welcome to the club. However, the main point for me is that for the r-strategy to work you just need to be fertile, but for the K-strategy to work you need, guess what? A mother's love.
Scientists just seem to hate love; not only altruism, but love generally. I think, like little boys, they find it all too soft and sissy to suit them. This distaste is a shame, because love in its various forms is probably the most powerful evolutionary force among species that reproduce sexually. How animals love is built into their genes, and it engages the entire limbic system, all four Fs that form the most basic survival responses. Its effects range from autonomic releases of hormones to complex FAPs involving concealment strategies, all to produce and rear offspring. Yet most scientists would much prefer to be able to pass the whole thing off as the work of obscure forces in the sperm, or even at the phenotype level that, like the gene, is supposed to be driven by the urge to reproduce itself through the act of procreation.
Alas, I have to break it to you that there is no such urge, either at the level of the gene or the individual, not counting us, of course. We know the sea turtle, for instance, does not give a two-way flying 'act of procreation' about her offspring; a couple of scoops of sand and that's it, maternal duties done, so it's unlikely they were on her mind when she was happily copulating with their father(s) a few weeks earlier. No, it's love that makes the world go round,7Actually, of course, it's gravity that makes the world round; otherwise it could be any shape. Given gravity, inertia and a good spin, any orbiting body will end up spherical, and that's why worlds and moons are round, and asteroids aren't. Could help you in a pub quiz, you never know its two great drives being the sex drive, which the sea turtle does have, that makes unrelated members of the species seem so attractive, and the family bonds that unite closely related members of a species.
Let's talk about sex for a moment. For the vast majority of species sex has nothing to do with procreation. Don't get me wrong. I love the idea of ducks sitting around worrying about family planning, finally opting for the rhythm method, but I have to tell you that that's not what they do. Basically what ducks want to do is find another duck and do stuff that rhymes. There's a bizarre notion going the rounds that humans and Bonobo chimps are the only species that have sex for fun. In fact we're probably the only ones who do it for any other reason. Humans actually know it makes babies, so we have a choice, but it's still fairly basic: family versus fun. Bonobos are infinitely more imaginative. They think sex is the answer to everything. Life is just one long orifice party. They even use it to apologise. If they think they have offended someone, in a row over food, say, immediately afterwards they'll rush over and offer to stroke his willy, which as apologies go seems pretty sincere to me. I wouldn't do it. You'll not be surprised to learn that there is relatively little lasting aggression within Bonobo bands.8 Some scientists claim not to know/believe animals have sex for fun, claiming it is just a biological urge to spread their genes. To refute this, I need go no further than masturbation. Pretty near all species masturbate, a practice that can only possibly be undertaken for fun. Even as I write this, Freya is eyeing my left leg with a speculative gleam in her eye
Clearly, it's better to be a Bonobo9 T-shirt, anyone? but, for all their sexual inventiveness, even Bonobos resist incest,10 Not entirely, however. There's a whole Œdipal thing that we don't have time to go into here which is the next topic. If genes are supposed to be driving this whole process, why the whole incest taboo? From a gene's point of view incest vastly improves the quality of its copies, while standard sexual reproduction reduces it. A father/daughter pairing will give you a good 75% matching copy instead of just 50% with her mother. In theory this might damage the delivery system somewhat, but for the gene to care would be uncharacteristic (see sea turtles above), and anyway, the famous Cleopatra was the product of half a dozen generations of brother/sister marriages and she was sharp as a whip and beautiful to boot. So why don't we roll our own? After all, if Flegr is right, most species must have got their start through some level of incest.11 Technically it has to be illegal to qualify as incest; otherwise it's just inbreeding. However, inbreeding is too broad a term, and nothing's illegal for animals, so I'm using incest to mean pairings between very close relatives, even though it's incorrect to do so, because it's useful shorthand. Sorry about that They certainly do if we need them to. Humans have been breeding animals for centuries, and inbreeding is an essential part of the process. So too, unfortunately, is culling, either by the breeder or evolutionary pressure, but again, why would a gene care about the fate of poor copies so long as the good copies make it through?
Nonetheless, most species, ourselves included, are against the idea, and that is in our collective genetic codes, together with quite elaborate FAPs to make sure it doesn't happen, regardless of the obvious advantages of incest for our genes. It is true that many top predators, lions for instance, are finding it necessary to mate with close relatives, but it is unlikely that it is out of choice. It's just that the food web12 This is the web formed by all the food chains a particular animal finds itself on when it's eating or being eaten that supports a predator demands a lot of acreage at the lowest, grass-producing level, and that acreage isn't available even in the conservation areas. Also, lions cannot get from one area to another, so they can find themselves fighting one set of cousins for the right to mate with another set. It can't be much fun, but it is the only game in town.
This is the point at which it all gets a tad unlikely. Geneticists talk and teach about 'fitness', as if evolution actually had something to do with the survival of the fittest, and it's not just scientists who need to know about it.13 I am not suggesting that there are no qualities that favour survival, only that 'fitness' is a bizarrely inappropriate inclusive term for them. We'll talk about geneticists and their strange uses of language in more detail later The females of all species, no matter how small and dim, are supposed to ponder the qualities of potential mates in terms of their long-term suitability as parents of the offspring they somehow know will result from the proposed mating, prompted all the way by their genes' private agenda. Doubtless they discuss all their suitors with their girlfriends during the usually brief interval between flirtation and copulation. There is even a theory called the Sexy Son Hypothesis which says that the reason females like to mate with attractive males (think peahen and peacock) is that that way their joint offspring will be more attractive and thus pass on the parents' genes to the next lot who will also bonk the ones they fancy, but just for the good of the species, mind, just doing their duty.
One extraordinary example of this kind of rationalisation is known as Handicap Theory. A great many species are dimorphic, which basically means "two-shaped", i.e. the males and females are physically different to a greater or lesser extent (think peahen and peacock again). Obviously males and females differ in their primary sexual characteristics, their sex organs, so those don't count in dimorphism. Any differences between the sexes that are not directly involved in reproduction are called secondary sexual characteristics, and that covers everything from size and horns to manes and plumage. Horns, antlers and so on are called, not surprisingly, weapons, and the rest are referred to as ornaments. The weapons, of course, are used as weapons and they a) keep their owner alive to mate, and b) drive off alternative suitors. In species where that works, that's usually pretty much it for sexual selection; the females get to select the big male who just won, whatever they look like. Where the ornaments kick in is when the female has a choice of mate, and that's basically birds. Birds are the worst.14Whence 'birdbrain'? They really are suckers for a pretty face or nice outfit. Birds of paradise and peacocks are obvious examples, but even the Bowerbird qualifies. Come the season, the male builds an elaborate bower and then carefully decorates it using bits and pieces it finds around the forest. It spends hours doing this, occasionally stealing the good stuff from other birds' bowers, because it's really competitive out there. The females go around like shoppers in a mall, often returning to see the short-listed bowers several times. It seems so sensible at first, choosing a mate that way, handy at DIY and so on, but does he build a nest like that? Does he heck. He bonks her and buggers off, leaving her to put together her own rather dull nest, and raise the kids on her own. In fact, they all do, because she'll mate with all the males whose bowers pass scrutiny. Not much thought for the next generation there, I would suggest. On the other hand, they seem to be good mothers, despite not having much of a clue who the actual father is, nor where the kids' genes came from, as if that mattered.
The problem for geneticists is that birds make really bad choices. They'll invariably go for the Pretty Prat who'd be useless in a fight and may well leave them flat when it comes to raising the little ones. Even if they do find a good partner who'll stick by them for the long haul, the females themselves, chickadees and barn swallows for instance, are perfectly capable of sneaking15Again, this is the technical term; ornithologists call them "sneakers" off for a quickie with his boss. Overall, biologists are finding that "…between 10 per cent and 70 per cent of the offspring in a nest [do] not belong to the male caring for them."16 Angier, Natalie (21/08/1990). "Mating for Life? It's Not for the Birds of the Bees". The New York Times. Retrieved 15/4/2011 So where is the gene-centric 'fitness' in all this? The argument goes like this: "You think that a sensible female would try to mate with a male who was healthy, thus likely to live longer, and faithful, taking his share of the chick-raising burden, so that her offspring, the bearer of the couple's genes, would be equally likely to live long and prosper. But that's what they're expecting her to do, so the male's cunning plan is to look and behave as though he couldn't outrun a three-toed sloth, thus proving that he can afford to mock the obvious handicap of that useless tail, and by a tortuous chain of reasoning is therefore fitter than a bird that doesn't have the tail in the first place. And to Hell with whose genes they are." The idea behind this is similar to the idea that the only way you can tell someone is really rich is if he or she squanders their money. It's a thought, but unlikely. My own experience of the very rich is that they are the first to query a bill, while those who airily pick up the tab are on an expense account and it's not really their money.17 None of this is to be confused with valid sex/power displays, like driving a Mercedes, but again, it's worth checking to see if it's leased Personally I don't think the females get much beyond the plumage. Birds are probably not very deep, and it doesn't matter because the plumage is self-perpetuating on its own merits. In life generally, if females really fancy you, you get to bonk them. It doesn't matter if that's a sensible thing to do. Ask any rock band.
The two major problems with this idea that females see themselves as guardians of the species's evolutionary heritage are a) at the phenotypic, and b) at the genetic level. At the level of the individual, even human beings, who do actually know that sex can result in pregnancy, have a hard time remembering that when it comes time to have sex. Even today, a hundred and thirty years after the presumably welcome birth of Marie Stopes, we still have a huge number of unwanted births that could not occur if we had an innate drive to think it through on the night. More to the point, beautiful people get laid a lot, usually by other equally beautiful people, and there is no established correlation between beauty and parental qualities. If 'fitness' as defined above genuinely meant anything, nice, dependable people would get laid more than pretty ones, and would be more successful at getting successful mates. You wish! If we humans don't choose our mates that way, it seems to me unlikely that all of Rabbit's friends and relations would.
The other problem is at the genetic level. If what genes want out of life counted for anything we'd never have got as far as sex; we'd have stuck with asexual reproduction and be done with it. That, of course, didn't happen, and why not? Because what genes want, even assuming they were capable of wanting, is of no account when it comes to survival. Nor is what species want. The only thing that counts at all when it comes to wanting stuff is what the individual organism wants, because that is what drives its behaviour, and it is its behaviour in any given situation that determines its survival or otherwise. And even that doesn't matter so long as its behaviour helps the group to survive, because evolution will select for that by definition, and we're back to altruism.
In fact, this might be a good time to give up on the whole gene-centric thing. Gene-centric evolution in many ways resembles the geocentric model of the cosmos. It is the current orthodoxy, and mathematical models support it, but you end up with the biological equivalent of planets going backwards, giving rise to the kind of elaborate and implausible rationalisations that would stop the entire village of Ockham in its tracks, never mind Oor Wullie. At the heart of them all is the concept of the future.
Dr. Endel Tulving of the University of Toronto has called consciousness of the future "one of the most powerful ideas ever to emerge from the human brain/mind". Certainly, the need to invent the future may well be the single most significant consequence of being set adrift in a world without genetic memories. Tulving calls this human sense of time, the ability to imagine oneself in past and future situations, chronesthesia. He also divides our knowledge of the past into what he calls episodic and semantic memory, 'episodic' signifying the memory of, and mental ability to replay, past episodes in their full context, and 'semantic' signifying the kind of memory that consists in an updated model of the world, the ability to remember what experience or others teach you.
We know that animals can learn things, which means they must have semantic memory; their OMs are constantly updated. The question is, can they remember learning them? More to the point, why do we care? Well, we care because of W.D. Hamilton,18William Donald "Bill" Hamilton, FRS (Fellow of the Royal Society) (1 August 1936 – 7 March 2000), not W.R., he of the Hamiltonian, of whom more later who was hugely influential in achieving acceptance of gene-centric evolution because he solved the problem of altruism. He proposed that, even though an individual who sacrifices him or herself for others might appear to be acting counter to the interests of their genes, that wouldn't be the case if the others in question were close enough relatives, and therefore carried copies of the same genes. His formula, known as Hamilton's Rule, was
19 I'm sorry, I've failed again :o(
where r is the degree to which the beneficiary is related to the altruist, B is the benefit they get, and C is the reproductive cost to the altruist him or herself. Much rejoicing ensued in the world of genetics, and gene-centric evolution came to rule the roost, along with its companion theory of Kin Selection.
There are, however, a couple of interesting things about this theory that should give us pause. One is that it fails to take into account altruistic behaviour between non-incestuous pair bonds, otherwise known as the mummies and daddies, where r=0; and the other, far more important, is that in more than half a century since Hamilton came up with this formula, no one has bothered to check whether anything like it actually happens. Like Aristotle and women's teeth,20 As Bertrand Russell pointed out in Impact of Science on Society (1952): "Aristotle maintained that women have fewer teeth than men; although he was twice married, it never occurred to him to verify this statement by examining his wives' mouths." After all, all he had to say was, "Roll over this way, dear, and open your mouth. This won't take long." And who hasn't done that? the Rule was immediately accepted as gospel without anyone thinking to verify that it accurately describes behaviour in the wild.21 We will return to the issue of the sacrosanct in science later To be fair, you wouldn't expect it to apply down at the 'r' end of the r/K spectrum, but that's largely by definition. Stegodyphus may be small and have a large brood, but her single act of self-sacrifice must surely move her up the scale; she must get points for that. And what about the ants and the bees? The entire hive or hill consists of brothers or sisters, and their whole life is based solely on self-sacrifice and tending to the young, so they qualify to be at both ends of the spectrum. At the same time, the Rule seems inadequate to explain some of the more complex social structures that are just up at the 'K' end.
Returning to the parents, they are the genes' primary mode of reproduction, but they don't obey the Rule at all. Thirty years before Hamilton, J.B.S. Haldane said he would only lay down his life to save two brothers or eight cousins, which is essentially the Hamilton Rule, but no one asked him about either of his wives. And why is the lion we mentioned earlier so reluctant to lay down his wife for his sons, when that would be a much better solution from the genes' perspective? Think of the points they'd get: r would be at least 50% for the son, plus whatever we count for the mother being involved twice; for B you have to add together the son's opportunity to breed this time and the father's continued availability for subsequent times, and then there's the whole 'not dying' component which is definitely a reproductive benefit from everybody's point of view; and C is basically just a bit of embarrassment.22 No one has actually worked out how to calculate values for r, B and C, which is all part of the overall lack of scientific curiosity about whether the Rule is valid or not It's a great score. Still, that's not how it goes in practice. They just get all possessive and kill each other.23Members of a coalition, however, all have equal access to all the females, and vice versa
The big problem is that the mechanism needed for Hamilton's Rule to work requires a built-in Mendelian value kin assessment function to determine the value for r, and then a projective modelling function that would enable the would-be altruist to envision competing scenarios of the consequences of his actions or lack thereof, yielding all possible values for B and C, and only then make the appropriate judgement. All in the heat of battle, of course. I don't know. It just seems unlikely to me. Bear in mind that even Darwin had no idea what genes were, so the idea that beetles are factoring them into their sex life seems farfetched. Fond though I am, I'd be surprised if any animals possessed this level of chronesthesia, largely because the ability to invent the future pretty much includes the ability to invent anything, and we're the only species that does that.24 The major, if infrequent, exception to this is FAP innovation, like washing potatoes
"Wait a minute," you say. "I'm sure there's a gene for altruism modified by kin selection, because we know ground squirrels have it."25 You can supply your own "So there!" Well, we know that ground squirrels and prairie dogs, among others, will warn the group generally of danger, thereby attracting any predator's attention, so very brave stuff, and they do do it more enthusiastically if they have close family nearby,26 Care to anthropomorphise, anyone? so perhaps there could be a gene for that kind of inadvertently inclusive altruism. An even better candidate for selection, of course, would be the gene for hanging out with relatives of the squirrel on watch but never actually warning anybody yourself, thus avoiding all risk of predation, but still getting the head start you need. What game theorists would call a 'defector' gene. Hang on! I've got an even better one. What if there were a gene for oxytocin? Wait another minute! We already have oxytocin! And dopamine!27 Dopamine is often called the pleasure hormone, and is associated with nearly all forms of addiction; and chocolate, but that's different Well, that's a stroke of luck, because if we have those two, then all these kin selection issues just go away.
Actually, we've had oxytocin or a reasonable facsimile thereof for an awfully long time, about half a billion years or so, so when I say "we" in this case I'm including quite a variety of predecessors, not to mention every other vertebrate on the planet, so it's not rare. Also we've known about it for over a hundred years, so it's not new either. In 1909 Sir Henry Drake found that it made a pregnant cat's uterus contract, and to this day it's used to stimulate contractions during childbirth. Then it was found, along with dopamine, doing its stuff earlier in the process during conception, providing the contractions that make orgasms such fun for both parties. Not content with all this, it is also needed to release breast milk to the nipples so that the newborn can suckle. Literally vital stuff, but slightly off the point for this stage in the argument, you might legitimately be thinking. Quite right. The important thing about oxytocin is that, along with its plumbing functions, it also provides the sensations of love and affection that help form pair bonds in the first stage,28 Oxytocin is the reason that the phrase "making love" is not a euphemism and bind mother and baby after its birth. If a man still basking in the oxytocin-induced post-coital afterglow tells his partner he loves her, he is almost certainly not lying, but she'd better be quick to respond; oxytocin wears off within minutes, along with the dopamine that has been providing all the excitement. It also wears off after childbirth, but so long as the bonds it induces have time to form, they can last forever.29 The physical sensations that accompany our emotional states are just that: physical. They are caused by the hormones running through our body. They are not the actual emotions, though. One just entails the other, although which does which we'll have to leave till later
Now, we know that mothers love their babies, so no change there, then; the question is, though, do the babies have to be theirs? Do they have to be genetically related? Can we test this? Well, I can think of one way, with humans at least. This will sound a bit cruel, but what if we give a brand new mother the wrong baby, and see what happens? Not on purpose, of course. What kind of person do you think I am?30Answers on a postcard, please, to … Nonetheless, it has happened, and each time the mothers at least want to keep the baby they've bonded with, although they usually want to keep their own genetic child as well. The children, too, if they are old enough to choose, want to stay with the mother they've always loved, although they have been known to change their minds later, several times in some cases, but that may just be a rehearsal for finally leaving home.
Still on humans, Edvard Westermarck, a Finnish anthropologist writing at the end of the 19th century, noted that unrelated people who are raised together and have thus bonded as small children are not sexually attracted to each other when they grow up. This is now rather unimaginatively called the Westermarck Effect, and it has been seen in children of the kibbutzim in Israel who never marry others raised in the same kibbutz. They behave towards each other like brothers and sisters even though they are not related. Brothers and sisters, on the other hand, if they are not raised together but meet later in life, can find each other hugely sexually attractive, even more so than unrelated people. At first blush, and I use the word advisedly, this might seem to indicate that some level of kin recognition is at work, and indeed the effect has been called genetic sexual attraction (GSA for short). In fact the reverse is true; it's just assortative mating without the kin recognition that is supposed to prevent incestuous pairing. So no genetic component.
Now that I come to think about it, it looks as though all supposed kin selection is just a combination of assortative cue recognition and bonding, with the bonding being the dominant component. As in the kibbutzim, if the bonding takes place, the individuals involved don't have to be at all related. Or even alive. Duck and goose hatchlings, among others, imprint on the first moving thing they see, which statistically is probably going to be their mother, but as has happened on at least one famous occasion, turned out to be someone's Wellington boot. In that particular case it all worked out well because the welly in question was being worn by Konrad Lorenz, the co-founder of ethology, and he took good care of them.31 And they of him; he got two great books out of his time with them If, on the other hand, neither family nor pair bonding occurs, then preferences will be based on assortative cues.
Just to give the gene-centric theory one last kick at the cat, so to speak, W.D. Hamilton came up with a thought-experiment32 A thought-experiment is generally an experiment you can't actually be bothered to do, and never more so than in this case known as the Green Beard Effect. To quote from Wikipedia:
A green-beard effect occurs when a gene, or linked genes, produce three phenotypic effects:
a perceptible trait — the hypothetical "green beard";
recognition of this trait in others; and
preferential treatment to those recognized.
The idea is that such a gene or genes would proliferate so long as the phenotypic effects were there, even if that means promoting other sets of genes that are not exact copies of themselves and so, according to the gene-centric view, should not prosper. The green-beard gene was proposed purely hypothetically, largely because no single allele could possibly produce all these effects, so you can imagine the excitement when it was discovered that red fire ant queens with a particular gene configuration are killed as they hatch by the workers in one type of colony, and are the only queens allowed to live in the other type. Not quite the cooperative, altruistic version that Hamilton and Dawkins had in mind, but it seems to show that some sort of green-beard gene could exist.
All very interesting, but if I were to say to you that any species you care to name has perceptible traits, can recognise its own kind and gives them preferential treatment, that wouldn't exactly make it stand out from the crowd. It, too, would prosper precisely to the extent that it could maintain those characteristics. This is the problem, or at least my problem, with gene-centric evolution. It takes the perfectly obvious and straightforward functioning of evolutionary processes and makes them highly improbable and mysterious. Back in the old days in Ockham, you'd never have gotten away with it. But then, back then, the driving creative force behind the universe was presumed to be love.
Not that it's all romantic and happy families out in the wild. At the r end of the r/K spectrum there's just lust,33 This is the technical term as defined by Helen Fisher, an anthropologist at Rutgers University who has devoted much of her adult life to the study of love, at least in humans as I've said. The next stage, according to Professor Fisher, is supposed to be 'attraction', intense feelings of romantic love that cause pair bonds to form, followed by 'attachment', the mature love for a long-term partner that is needed at the K end. This, of course, is the ideal, but in practice in the wild, and with that I include much of South London, the next stage after lust is motherly love, which usually kicks in, if at all, round about parturition, leaving a lot of single mothers raising their kids. Cheetahs, for instance. The cheetah population is dangerously small and not genetically very diverse, but they don't pair bond, which is unusual for that size of animal. At the same time, cheetahs may be single parents, but family is still crucial to their survival. The mother has to teach her cubs to hunt. It's not a FAP, which is surprising because you'd think it would be basic to a cheetah's existence; just the sort of thing you'd expect the genes to look after if they could.
Lionesses, too, have to teach their cubs to hunt, but in their case the fathers stay with the pride for as long as they can before being ousted by a different set of males. In a pride, all the lionesses are related more or less directly, and stay with the pride in the same territory for generations. At about 3 or 4 years old, if they live that long, the young adult males are kicked out to fend for themselves. There are usually about three or four of them in the gang, known as a coalition, and they go off to find a different pride and take it over from the resident coalition. If they succeed, they promptly kill all the existing cubs which has the effect of making the lionesses go into oestrus, and thus be available for mating. Lions are not sexually jealous. All the new males get to mate with all the existing females. Now, it could be argued that, since all the males are brothers and all the females are related, this is a good strategy for gene replication, and thus there is no reason for sexual jealousy. However, successfully reproducing prides require up to four males just for their defence, so the next coalition to leave any pride and take over any other may well have different fathers, and their mothers may be no closer than cousins. Given the shallowness of the gene puddle top predators tend to find themselves in nowadays, they are probably not much more related than any random group of lions in the neighbourhood. They will, however, have grown up together, so will have bonded as cubs, and may thus be more willing to share.
From the gene's point of view, lion copulation is famously ineffective. Like the woman with the six sets of twins, hundreds of times they get nothing at all.34Just while we're on the subject, lionesses, like many cats, practice a form of contraception, in that they can decide when to ovulate. Lionesses in a pride synchronise their ovulation so that all the cubs are born at the same time, which helps a lot with the baby-sitting, feeding, etc. It's called a crèche. Sweet, no? They allow themselves to get pregnant twice a year on average, and the gestation period is just short of four months. At the same time, for the other four months their oestrus cycle comes around monthly, and lasts for several days. While the lionesses are in oestrus, the males will mate with them three to four times an hour, every waking hour. Each bout only lasts about a minute, but you do the maths. Who says animals don't think sex is fun? Out in the wild, there is no selective pressure for gene friendly versions of the family unit. Packs, herds, flocks and broods run the gamut from committed and nuclear to diffuse and unclear. It's hard to find a representative example, but wolf packs are fairly typical of the nuclear family. They consist of the parents, otherwise known as the alpha pair, their offspring, and the occasional friends who come to stay. The parents get all the sex, at least officially, and they enforce the rules very strictly. Amazingly, the rules don't always apply to them, and both mother and father are up for the occasional bit on the side. The kids also do their best to get some, but the penalties for discovery are severe, including banishment at the very least. As for the friends, some are welcomed and others are instantly driven away, although the criteria for that decision are obscure. Just like in your house.
Packs are generally single families, but two or three families may get together. The rules are still strictly applied within the family units, but conflict between the alphas is rare so long as they don't themselves break the rules. Overall it's a really good system, especially for the cubs. It's certainly one of our two favourite schemes, this and polygamy.35 Technically this should be polygyny, the practice of having several wives. However, given that out of some 1,200 human societies on this planet, at the last count only four practise polyandry (having several husbands), polygamy is close enough The multi-pack structure is at the base of all our societies and communities, essentially with the care of the kids in mind, as we'll explore later. Its only possible drawback is that it's just not great from the genes' point of view. There are just too many missed opportunities, as I've said, with all that enforced virginity. Polygamy is better, and there are many examples of harems in the wild, but they come down towards the r end of the r/K spectrum.
Up at the K end, especially in herds, individual family relationships become less and less important. Migrating herds of wildebeest, for instance, are made up of hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of small families, and all the calves are kept in the middle of the herd, surrounded by all the adults. Each calf's own parents are there somewhere close by, of course, but its safety is the responsibility of the herd as a whole. Millions of people have seen the clip on YouTube of the calf crossing a river and being attacked by a crocodile and then lions. After a peculiarly touching moment of hesitation that emphasises the courage of their decision, the herd turns and returns to attack and drive off both the crocodile and the lions, one of whom can be seen performing a graceful backward arc after being tossed by a furious wildebeest. This little scene of courage and devotion presents an insoluble puzzle to geneticists and ethologists, but is completely transparent to the tourists watching and filming. As often happens in science, it takes years of postdoc slog just to be unable to understand the obvious, all of which will be discussed later.
But wait! There's more! On the great transmigration across the Serengeti, the wildebeest are accompanied by hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of zebra. They are not the only ones; elephants, buffalo, antelope and ostriches also tag along, but the zebra are interesting. The obvious advantage of joining forces is that zebra eat the long grass – they have the teeth for it – and the wildebeest prefer the short grass that's left once the zebra have finished the major mowing. So it's sensible to pair up; it's a long trip. At the same time, wildebeest are really good at finding water, which is equally crucial. So far, so good, but it turns out that zebra are also better migrators. They remember the good routes and, most importantly, the better river crossings. Where the wildebeest have a tendency to blunder across wherever they hit the river, zebra are more selective. Furthermore, when they think they've found a good spot, one of them volunteers literally to test the waters, and swims across alone while all the others – wildebeest, elephants, ostriches – stand and watch. If he makes it safely, only then do the rest follow.
This level of altruism, by which I mean bravery and potential self-sacrifice, refutes all the theories. This is just one zebra. He is not even related to all the other zebras, let alone the ostriches. Of course, as I say, we can understand what is going on because it follows the first rule of observation, the wysiwytys rule: What You See Is What You Think You See. Now, I'm not suggesting for one minute that the wildebeest held a meeting: "Hey, these guys are really good at this. I vote we follow them." "Yeah, except when we're thirsty." "OK then, except when we're thirsty. All in favour?" But it's not hard to imagine that wildebeest would follow anyone who is clearing the brush for them, or that zebra will follow wildebeest when they themselves are thirsty and the waterhole they remember from last year is no longer there. Nor is it difficult to see that the collective behaviour of the migrating herds, including the selfless act of the zebra volunteer at each crossing, is going to promote the survival of the group as a whole, and the rule is that behaviour determines survival, and survival is the only criterion for membership of the evolutionary winners' circle. Remember, we're talking about millions of family units spread across dozens of species, all getting that extra edge from each other's behaviour, whatever its motivation.
There is one final point to be made, and who better to make it than the bonobos who started this whole section? As you may know, bonobo society is a lesbian gynarchy,36 It's pronounced with a hard 'g' and a long 'y' to rhyme with wine, while polygyny above is pronounced with a soft 'g' and a short 'y' to rhyme with, well, gin. Why this should be, I have no idea, although next time you are dreading a visit to your gynaecologist, it might help to think of him or her as a gin ecologist and take your own tonic not exclusively or there'd be no little bonobos, but in general. It's not a matriarchy, as that would imply a fairly conventional nuclear family structure, just with the mother in charge. Bonobos are ruled by females who are not related and whose primary sexual and pairing relationships are with other females. The males' position within the group's overall hierarchy is determined by their mother's position in the female hierarchy. And very successful it all is, too. Remember, they, not the Neanderthals or any humans but us, are still here, which is the definition of evolutionary success. Now, I don't know how you personally feel about homosexuality, but you have to admit, from a procreative point of view, it ought to come a very poor second to heterosexuality, and when I say "poor second", I mean it ought to have been eliminated from the genes' playbook of survival techniques very early on. However, no one has told the bonobos nor, for that matter, the giraffes, who regularly practise homosexual mating.37 When I say "practise" I mean it in both senses. It can't be easy at that height In fact, according to recent research which, it has to be said, consists largely of reclassifying old research, around 20% of sexual contacts in most species are homosexual. By this measure, humans with their globally estimated 3-4% of homosexuals are relative pikers, but then we are the only species that thinks there is anything wrong with it, so there may be a certain amount of under-reporting.
The point is that, while it is obviously impossible to reconcile this behaviour, involving as it now appears a fifth of all sexual activity, with any form of gene-centric view, it is quite easy to see how a slight shift in focus on the part of oxytocin38 Female rats that receive an injection of oxytocin begin to display maternal behaviour toward nearby rat pups whether the females have had offspring or not and whether the pups are theirs or not could cause attraction between same-sex couples. It is the ultimate form of assortative mating, after all. The whole imprinting process is far less reliable than people think.39 There may also be a form of Westermarck Effect. People are always telling me how their children are their best friends,suggesting they have a sibling, rather than parental, relationship with them. Research project, anyone? Let me know how you get on Zebra mares, for example, go to great lengths in the first few days after giving birth to make sure their foal imprints only on them. They don't want it wandering off with some passing stranger just because it sees them first. And let's face it, Manolo Blahnik has made a good living out of humans' tendency to fixate on footwear,40 A lot of people seem to think that the term 'sex object' refers to this kind of fetishism. You and I, of course, are fully aware that the word 'object' in 'sex object' does not mean 'thing' but 'objective' as in "the object of my affections". So when people say they don't want to be treated as a sex object, what they are actually saying is that they don't want anyone ever to find them sexually attractive. I'm sure they don't mean it, but if they really do, of course, then I recommend the burqa. That is what they are for, and I understand the big, black ones are best although why we can't keep things straight, I've no idea. No pun intended.
To sum up, different social structures alter the odds of survival in different ways, and succeed or fail depending on the environment they find themselves in. Furthermore, successful strategies tend to last, while failure is rapid. As a result, at any given moment what you are looking at are the successful solutions to the great evolutionary problem of survival, and they will last, to the exclusion of other possible solutions, until the problem changes, and their solution is no longer valid. Then they die out. We are the only species with the power to adjust the solution to match the problem, the one major drawback being that we have no idea whether we are getting it right or not.
TagsLife & Consciousness
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Breakfast on the house free Wi-Fi and a location near scenic attractions make the Executive Inn a wallet friendly option in the Ozarks.
Each of the property's 32 rooms offers free Wi-Fi a cable TV microwave mini-fridge and desk. Belly up to the free continental breakfast bar before you hit the road. Pets are welcome and parking is free.Located on Highway 62 one block from the Village Mall the Executive Inn is four miles from the links at Big Creek Golf and Country Club. Drive 15 minutes to Norfork Lake and the Miniature Museum of Merritt. Buffalo Point in Buffalo River National Park is 50 minutes south and Bull Shoals Dam is 25 minutes west. Tecumseh Missouri is a half-hour north and the folk music venues in Mountain View are 50 miles south. Boone County Airport is 55 miles west and Branson Airport is 85 miles northwest in Missouri.


At first glance, it might seem incongruous that a company at the forefront of space and aviation technology would also be a leader in the field of air-conditioning.
But it makes sense when you consider all three involve a degree of mastery over the atmosphere.
It takes precision, engineering excellence and innovation to carve out a place in the frontier of space technology. If you're making rockets and launching valuable payloads into orbit, you need to know that what you build will operate at maximum efficiency under extreme pressure.
Innovation and pursuit of excellence is part of the DNA of Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Air-Conditioners Australia (MHIAA), which is part of Mitsubishi Heavy Industries. Consumer advocacy group CHOICE agrees, awarding MHIAA's air-conditioners Australia's best in 2018.
Mitsubishi Heavy Industries has been a symbol of Japan's rise as a world leader in technological and manufacturing precision for over 130 years and has been involved in a huge range of industries including power systems, shipping, industry and infrastructure, aircraft, defence and space exploration.
Leveraging 130 years of engineering excellence and keeping with the groups drive for innovation, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Air-Conditioners is focused on delivering world-class, highly efficient and energy-saving air-conditioning systems for the Australian Market.
The CHOICE award indicates this has been achieved.
Adrian Brown, MHIAA's national sales and planning manager, said receiving the Best Brand recognition by CHOICE is reward for his company's commitment to quality, technology and customer service.
"We would like to thank CHOICE and Australian consumers for this recognition," he said. "It is an honour and it further validates our commitment to our customers.
"Against tough competition, we scored a Best Brand score of 79 per cent and a satisfaction rating of 91 per cent, with a high-reliability rating of 88 per cent.
CHOICE based its assessment on test reviews of 140 split-system air-conditioners made by 7738 respondents in its annual reliability and satisfaction survey.
The reviews are weighted on brand reliability, overall average test score, recommendation ratios and overall customer satisfaction.
Air-conditioners are reviewed twice a year – in May and October – to ensure accurate results for both the winter and summer seasons.
"At MHIAA we pride ourselves on global research and development. Our products are designed and engineered in line with local and international standards while keeping the Australian consumer needs top-of-mind," said Mr Brown.
The Mitsubishi Heavy Industries brand of air-conditioners first became available in Australia through a local distributor during the 1970s.
Sustained growth forced the parent company in Japan to redefine its operations in Australia, and so in 1999, the subsidiary Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Australia was born.
Ten years later came the spin-off company MHIAA, devoted specifically to making and marketing high-quality air-conditioners.
And as the CHOICE award indicates, that commitment has paid off, for both the company and its customers.
Today, MHI air-conditioning units can be found in large-scale commercial enterprises including warehouses, manufacturing plants, retail centres, office and apartment units, and in individual homes in Australia and New Zealand.
With offices in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Townsville, Perth and Auckland, including representative offices in Adelaide and Darwin – MHIAA is set to expand its presence in all major and regional areas.
MHIAA air-conditioners lead the way in innovations such as silent operation, longest-reach air flow, energy conservation and durability through to digital advancements with Wi-Fi connectivity.
But there would be no company if there weren't customers, and MHIAA regularly gives back to the community that has supported it for the past two decades.
To mark the occasion of MHI setting up its Australian operations 20 years ago, the company is donating $20 to the Red Cross Natural Disaster Relief Fund from the sale of every air-conditioner this summer.
Mr Brown said this cause resonated in the hearts and minds of Aussies, particularly over the holiday season.
"While most of us enjoy a comfortable home environment throughout the year, many Australians face the reality of natural disasters each day," he said.
For more information about MHIAA, its air-conditioners or the Red Cross donation scheme, go to mhiaa.com.au.


text:
This title covers these subjects: United States -- History -- 1600-1775, Colonial pe, United States -- History -- 1775-1783, Revolution., North Carolina -- History.
Step back in time and visit North Carolina during the Colonial period. After the mysterious disappearance of settlers at Roanoke Island, colonists from Virginia established the first permanent settlement in North Carolina. Find out what makes North Carolina unique, what role it played during the Revolutionary War, and what daily life was like in Colonial times and the early days of statehood.
Jessica Gunderson
Jessica Gunderson grew up in the small town of Washburn, North Dakota. She has a bachelor's degree from the University of North Dakota and an MFA in Creative Writing from Minnesota State University, Mankato. She has written more than fifty books for young readers. Her book Ropes of Revolution won the 2008 Moonbeam Award for best graphic novel. She currently lives in Madison, Wisconsin, with her husband and cat.
Sacagawea: Journey into the West
The Elephant Dancer: A Story...
The Horse on the Hill: A...
The Servant and the Water...
The King's Warrior: A Story...
The Pilgrims' First Thanksgiving
Thanksgiving Then and Now
X: A Biography of Malcolm X
Full Court Pressure

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


text:
Farmer guilty of the manslaughter of Lauren Scott, 20, killed by machinery
The defendant had denied manslaughter by gross negligence. Lauren Scott, 20, died after becoming entangled in machinery
Paul Greaves
A farmer has been found guilty of the manslaughter by gross negligence of a 20-year-old woman who was killed by machinery while while working in his field.
Lauren Scott, from Kenton, was helping Neil Carpenter, 45, at Springfield Farm in Dawlish when she suffered a 'catastrophic entanglement' with a spinning power shaft at the back of a tractor.
Carpenter stood trial at Exeter Crown Court accused of causing Lauren's death by his 'cavalier' approach to safety.
Lauren Scott trial
Jury watches crucial phone footage
Tearful father recalls day she died
Farm volunteer was killed by machinery
Farmer denies causing death
He admitted serious health and safety failings but denied unlawfully killing the volunteer.
On Monday the jury returned a unanimous guilty verdict.
Lauren died from multiple injuries on March 4.
She was described as a bright and sensible young woman who loved animals. She worked at Pets Corner in Powderham Castle and sometimes at Newton Abbot racecourse with the horses.
Lauren Scott, 20, died after becoming entangled in machinery
Lauren would regularly travel from her home to help Carpenter with his pigs, cows and chickens. She died when she was caught by her hair and clothes in a power take off (PTO) shaft.
A plastic sleeve, which should have covered the PTO, was broken and not working properly.
The issue at the trial was whether Lauren had used the PTO, which connected the tractor to the milling machine, with Carpenter's knowledge.
The defendant, of Firbank Road, said he was in a stable at the time and was not aware of what Lauren was doing.
He knew the machinery was a danger to life but had not given Lauren permission to use it.
Carpenter, who was alone with Lauren on the farm, told police he heard a bang and found Lauren on the ground. The milling machine, which was made before World War One, was on its side close by.
Latest from Exeter Crown Court
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The prosecution said Carpenter lied to police about the sequence of events on the day Lauren died and safety standards at his farm were 'lamentable'.
It was claimed he knew the tractor and milling machine were being used that day to prepare animal feed.
A video taken by Lauren on her phone half an hour before she died showed Carpenter in the background using the tractor - something he had no memory off.
Lauren, 20, died after suffering multiple injuries from a farm machinery accident in Dawlish earlier this year
At 1.17pm Carpenter called 999 to report an accident. An air ambulance arrived at the 10-acre farm but could not save Lauren's life.
The sleeve covering the PTO was dented and did not cover all the of the high-speed shaft.
The jury was told a properly fitted plastic sleeve costing just £75 would have saved Lauren's life.
"That isn't the only failing in respect of the set-up but the inadequacy in the PTO cover would and should have been obvious to the defendant even with the most scant of glances," said prosecutor Mr David Sapiecha.
All these people appeared in Devon magistrates' courts last week
The defendant, who bought the farm in 2002 and also worked as a civil enforcement officer, rarely turned a profit on the land.
He was described by his own counsel as a 'plodder' and a 'weak' personality. But he was also somebody who was willing to help and put others before himself.
Mr Sapiecha said Carpenter's lack of money led to poor investment in proper safety standards, underpinned by a 'cavalier attitude' to safety. After Lauren was killed a health and safety officer put prohibition notices on 11 pieces of equipment at the farm.
"We do not allege he intended to cause the death of Lauren Scott," added Mr Sapiecha. "But he had a duty to ensure her safety."
NEIL CARPENTER ON MANSLAUGHTER CHARGE
"He failed to provide adequate PTO shaft cover and the prosecution say that breach caused Lauren's death."
Carpenter pleaded guilty to two breaches of the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974 by exposing Lauren and other workers to a risk.
Ben Compton QC, defending, said: "How can it possibly be said that such mistakes can possibly be characterised as gross negligence for manslaughter?" he asked the jury.
"This is a case where no one attempted any harm to the victim. Lauren Scott died in truly terrible circumsatnces.
"No one involved in this case cannot be moved by this immense tragedy. One cannot imagine the extent of the family's grief. But you have to put emotion either for the defendant or family to one side.
Carpenter will be sentenced on Tuesday.


text:
Emilio José Zelaya (born 30 July 1987 in San Miguel de Tucumán) is an Argentine with Italian passport football forward, who plays for Ohod.

Zelaya made his first team debut in 2006, but he came to prominence in 2008 after scoring two goals in a 3–1 away win against Olimpo de Bahía Blanca on 14 March 2008.

Career

O'Higgins

In July 2015, he joined O'Higgins for one season, starting for the 2015–16 season.

Career statistics

Honours
Arsenal
Argentine Primera División (1): 2012 Clausura
Supercopa Argentina (1): 2012
Copa Argentina (1): 2013

References

External links
 Argentine Primera statistics
 Football-Lineups player profile

1987 births
Living people
Sportspeople from San Miguel de Tucumán
Argentine footballers
Argentine expatriate footballers
Association football forwards
Rosario Central footballers
Club Atlético Banfield footballers
Arsenal de Sarandí footballers
O'Higgins F.C. footballers
Argentinos Juniors footballers
Ethnikos Achna FC players
Apollon Limassol FC players
Damac FC players
Ohod Club players
Chilean Primera División players
Argentine Primera División players
Cypriot First Division players
Saudi Professional League players
Saudi First Division League players
Expatriate footballers in Chile
Expatriate footballers in Cyprus
Expatriate footballers in Saudi Arabia
Argentine expatriate sportspeople in Chile
Argentine expatriate sportspeople in Cyprus
Argentine expatriate sportspeople in Saudi Arabia

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


HemataStat II™ is a hematocrit centrifuge delivering quantitative readings for up to six blood samples from a single 60 second spin.
EKF Diagnostics' HemataStat II™ is a micro hematocrit centrifuge that provides a quantitative hematocrit reading for up to six blood samples from one 60 second spin.
HemataStat II™ is an ideal hematocrit centrifuge for point-of care and laboratory use in clinics and hospitals. Its compact size and the optional battery pack make it well suited for outreach programs and also for veterinary settings.
2. Place the sealed tube into the centrifuge and spin for 60 sec.
3. Results are displayed on screen.
The multi-lingual display provides easy to follow instructions to ensure accurate results every time.
The HemataStat II™ Hematocrit Centrifuge combines easy maintenance with a high degree of user safety, for example, heparinized ClearCrit™ tubes are used to collect the blood sample and are available in plastic, glass or Mylar® coated glass, designed for maximum user safety.
Centrifuge, power supply, 10 disposable transparent tube holders, user guide and quick reference guide.
The HemataStat II™ Hematocrit Centrifuge is accurate +/- 1% if the hematocrit is displayed in whole numbers, +/- 0.5% if the hematocrit is displayed with the decimal. When compared to the NCCLS method, the correlation coefficient is 0.9978.
Can samples from an EDTA tube be used?
Yes. Ensure that the sample is well mixed first.
Is the result affected by air bubbles?
No. The HemataStat II™ Hematocrit Centrifuge results are not affected by air bubbles in the sample.
What size I.D. (inside diameter) capillary tubes should I use?
Most facilities use 1.1mm I.D. tubes. 0.5mm I.D. are generally used for pediatrics because of the smaller sample required.
How many spins can be completed on a single battery charge?
A fully charged nickel metal hydride battery pack should provide greater than 75 spin cycles assuming that the time to read the tube is less than one minute and that the centrifuge is turned off when not in use.


Ketron ran unsuccessfully in 1990 and 1998 for the job, which was then known as County Executive.
Ketron will return to Nashville for one more session in January as he seeks the county mayor's position.
News that Ketron would seek the County Mayor's office created a domino effect. After his announcement, State Representative Dawn White threw her hat in the ring for his senate seat. So did County Mayor Ernest Burgess. And another name has emerged as former Congressional candidate Grant Starrett is speculated to be interested.
Voters will head to the polls for the county primary May 1st of 2018 with the County General Election August 2nd of 2018.


text:
The New European > News
Labour are letting the Tories off the hook on Brexit
Published: 11:00 AM December 3, 2020 Updated: 4:01 PM December 6, 2020
Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer during a visit to the University of Edinburgh School of Medicine. - Credit: PA
Weak Labour is letting itself be led by the Conservatives on Brexit.
It's the hope that kills you. Every football fan knows the feeling. But it's the same in politics too. Despite being kicked out of the party a while back I so hope Labour win the next election. I so hope the venality and incompetence of this awful, dreadful, wretched government gets punished. I so hope that just as the Americans have corrected their error of 2016 we can begin to clean up the mess of our 2016 and 2019 errors - Brexit and Boris Johnson.
But I worry. I worry because whereas Trump is a one-term nightmare, Brexit is likely to be around a lot longer. I worry too that whereas there was always a sizeable proportion of the US public revolted by Trump's lies, his lack of basic human decency and the placing of self before country, Britain seems more becalmed faced with the UK variety of the same disease. And I worry that the opposition has yet fully to grasp just how venal and ruthless these Tories really are.
I do not recommend playing them at their own game. Because that way lies a dive to the bottom and the vacation of any sense of morality in politics whatsoever. I do recommend studying the tone and nature of the Joe Biden handling of Donald Trump.
One of Biden's best qualities was that Trump did not get inside his head. That was important. Because the truth is he was inside a lot of people's heads all the time. The noise he created. The nonsense. The tweets. The false narratives. The whole 'oh my God what has he gone and done now?' of it all. Johnson is more subtle than Trump. But he is smashing norms and values with every bit as much cavalier disregard for truth, decency or a genuine belief in public service. And I worry that Johnson and his right wing populist Tories get inside Labour heads in a way that Trump failed to get inside Biden's. "Aw shut up man," was for me the highlight of the low level debates that Trump sought to drag into the gutter. "You're the worst president we've ever had"' was runner-up. His candid assessment that Trump's character had created the failed response to Covid took bronze.
He was not getting down in the gutter with him. But he was calling him out for who and what he was. I don't feel Labour are calling out Johnson for who and what he is. Now I get it - we are in the middle of a pandemic and the last thing the country wants is endless name calling and politicians failing to act in the national interest and for the national good.
But as Labour ponder what to do about a possible vote on Brexit they should look back at their Covid strategy. Support the government in its basic aims, criticise where they get things wrong. The government has got so many things wrong. Big things. Yet when Labour raise any of these, it becomes clear that these ruthless Tories only heard the part of the strategy they wanted to hear - support the government in its basic aims.
10 The polling that signals the plight of the Union
There was even a moment in a recent PMQs exchange when Keir Starmer felt moved to remind Johnson that Labour had supported him on the lockdown measures when Tory MPs were starting to rebel. Mmmm. What does that say about how the Tories view opposition? It says they will pocket support and turn with venom when the opposition does what it says on the tin, and opposes, or exposes the lies and the sheer failure to do pretty much anything without cocking it up. We are seeing the same now in their response to Labour's abstention on Covid tiering.
These are populists. Opportunists for whom politics is a game in which you get power by exploiting genuine concerns about change in the world, and you keep power by finding ever new and more imaginative targets to blame for your own failings. So Andy Burnham is to blame for Covid in the north, and people not listening to the advice are to blame for Covid in the south. The people who are never to blame are the people who keep telling us we have turned the corner, squashed the sombrero and keep shifting the deadlines by which we will reach the sunlit uplands and all manner of other failure-camouflaging clichés.
Covid is developing according to the same pattern as Brexit. Tell people what you think they want to hear, regardless of the facts. Make false promises about the future. Blame everyone else when that future fails to materialise. The next target will be the EU, to be presented as the sole reason why Brexit has gone wrong.
At least with Covid the rest of the world is engaged in the same struggle and will help find solutions, be that vaccines or economic support through crisis. But when it comes to Brexit the rest of the world long ago stopped seeing this as a shared endeavour. Brexit is made in Britain, or more accurately in England, and Britain and the UK will have to clear up its own mess.
And I really worry, Labour having been shown already on Covid what this government does when you are nice enough and reasonable enough to help them out, that if they support Boris Johnson's Brexit deal it risks being an error of catastrophic proportions. When I said this to a member of the shadow cabinet this week he said I sounded like one of those Japanese soldiers who thought years after the war had ended that it was still going on. However there is a difference. The Japanese who had been hiding, when told what had happened in their absence, were able to compute a new reality and in the main get on with their lives. With Brexit it is happening - even I accept that, crazy though I think it is and angry through it still makes me - but the new reality has tended to confirm what people like me said and thought rather than deny it.
So the real madness in our politics is that despite this new reality confirming they lied, confirming there was no oven-ready deal, confirming the economic damage will be real and substantial, not only are those who believed in Brexit being asked to support it… but Labour are urging those who didn't support it to do so too! To support a deal when it fails to meet any of the major conditions set for it by either of the main parties. I mean I know manifesto commitments have gone out the window with the Tories simply deciding to dump their categoric pledge on overseas aid. But once both sides are no longer worried about what they have promised in the past then how do we even begin to conduct a democratic debate?
Sometimes in politics you have to trade off principles and pragmatism. The proposed approach strikes me as being neither principled - in that Labour knows the deal will damage their constituents - nor pragmatic. It won't bring closure. It won't persuade hardened Brexiters that Labour really supports it. Far from people thinking it shows Labour strength many will think it shows weakness. And it won't clear the way for Labour to make a more constructive argument about future relations with the EU.
The dynamic in this debate will quickly shift back to cries of betrayal from the Brextremists. The pressure on the government will be to seek ways of diverging from it and picking a populist fight against those nasty Europeans. Labour will be marooned in a place where they have to defend an unpopular deal which they backed.
I have heard all the arguments why Labour are minded to support a deal. And I fear that every single one of them comes primarily from the fact that the Tories and the Tory media are more inside Labour's heads than vice versa. They have bought the line that the Tories took northern seats because of Brexit. No, Jeremy Corbyn was a way bigger factor and they all know it. They have bought the line that Labour won't be heard on anything else until it has fallen into line on Brexit. No, Labour needs to have an agenda on everything else that is better than the right-wing populist rubbish served up by these clowns. They have bought the line that people around the country sit telling each other that Keir Starmer is a massive London metropolitan elite Remainer when in truth they are just relieved he is not Corbyn, quite like the cut of his jib, and would like to see and hear a bit more of what he has to say.
In buying those lines they are, if they do support the deal, putting themselves in a position where any time they criticise the government as Brexit destroys jobs, harms business, creates decline, chaos and red tape galore, Johnson will fire up his panto MPs to shout and screech so that come an election everyone remembers the line: "BUT YOU VOTED FOR IT.".
I just cannot for the life of me fathom why anyone would want to co-own this enterprise. If they get a deal it doesn't even need a vote as they have the mandate already and there will only be one so Johnson can do what he likes to do - theatre and game-playing politics. If he gets a deal it is almost certain to get through without Labour votes. So let them have it on those terms. Their Brexit. Their deal. Their Covid. And they have ballsed up the lot of it. Then get on with preparing a modern agenda for a better future and do not let them put an albatross that they killed around your neck.


Today is technically the last day to celebrate Women's History Month, but there's always an occasion to celebrate women who make a difference — especially those whose work is fueled by a passion for supporting and mentoring other women and girls.
Congratulations to the mothers of every child who took part in the March for Our Lives. They encouraged and empowered their children to change the future of the nation — one free of gun violence.
A special shout-out to inner-city moms, whose children face the double scourge of gun violence, both in school and on the street — for seizing the opportunity for their voices to be heard.
The impact of mentorship and its generational importance was on full display last week when the esteemed UMass Center for Women in Politics and Public Policy, under the inspired direction of Ann Bookman, highlighted the accomplishments of former Wheelock College president Jackie Jenkins-Scott as a blueprint for future leadership. On the panel were Planned Parenthood's legendary Dianne Luby and two of Jenkins-Scott's mentees: the phenomenal Denella Clark, head of the Boston Arts Academy, and marvelous Marta Rosa, one of the state's first Hispanic female elected officials.
Their message: Strong mentorship is a formidable tool for enhancing women's empowerment.
Through the quality of their work, three generations of Asian-American women leaders — Helen Chin Schlichte, Suzanne Lee, former Fitchburg Mayor Lisa Wong, (the state's first Asian and minority mayor), Diana Huang and activist Lydia Lowe — have successfully dispelled preconceived notions of Asian women as docile and compliant. All are mentors who continue the work of cultivating young women's leadership.
In a recent visit to Cambridge, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi paid homage to the many black women who made strides this year in elected office and who parlayed their strength into helping elect Democrats across the country. Here in Massachusetts, we saw elections that led to a near majority of minority women on the Boston City Council, ground broken less than 10 years ago by Councilor Ayanna Pressley, a mentor to many and a candidate for Congress. We also applauded the election of Framingham's Yvonne Spicer, the state's first female African-American mayor.
And it was less than five years ago that Latinas broke barriers to double and triple their numbers in elective offices throughout the state, Haitian-American women Natacha Clerger and Eunice Delice Zeigler were elected to office in Randolph and Methuen, respectively, following the paths of two Haitian-American trailblazers before them: former State Rep. Marie St. Fleur and former Sen. Linda Dorcena Forry.
Legions of women here and across the nation have benefited from the mentorship and generosity of Barbara Lee, whose foundation created Emerge, the campaign skills organization for women Democrats. Kudos also to Maria Jobin-Leeds, Georgia Murray and attorney Beth Boland, Roz Watson and Bennie Wiley.
The almost 50-year-old bipartisan Massachusetts Women's Political Caucus, currently under the direction of Gail Jackson-Blount, also offers a range of support to help women win elective office.
As for the next generation, kudos to Bridgette Wallace and Carolle Nau, who are building a house for homeless girls, teaching them life skills that will include teaching very marketable coding skills. And Wellesley grad Liz Miranda, who heads Roxbury's Hawthorne Youth and Community Center, is a community treasure and spectacular mentor to the many young people she mentors.
At one time, it was difficult to find women mentors. As a serial mentor for many years, I'd say the future for more mentorship for women and girls looks brighter than ever.
Joyce Ferriabough Bolling is a political strategist and a communications specialist.


16 Examples Of Creative Car Signage : MySpin.com.au - social media for cars.
1) This creative plumbing and electrical service utilised a rather eye catching motif for their vehicle. The funny use of someone sitting on the toilet, with the lower half of it printed as a graphic on the door, while the top half is taken up by whoever is sitting in the drivers and passenger seat!
2) This van was used to advertise a kitchen refurbishing and renovation company in London, and while it's not the funniest, it is one of the creative ones we have seen driving around.
3) Check out this taxi back signage for IAMS Pet Food, with a graphic of a dog, and a dog's tail being superimposed over the rear windscreen wiper. Definitely a cute and creative design in our books!
4) Another, much more interesting graphic design! An advertisement for a zoo in The Netherlands, where the graphic shows a snake wrapping itself around a public bus, crushing it. Definitely an eye catching design by any means.
5) A great design for an air conditioning company, specialising in cold storage, air conditioning, and air conditioning servicing. This company, based out of Rendsburg, Germany, use an old school pick up truck graphic delivering ice cubes.
6) Another design with the same influence from the first photo. This car review website uses a girl in fishnet stockings printed on graphic, sitting in a car. Another comical graphic design!
7) This clever graphic design for a french car repair company shows a van split in half, with a clever message saying "Vehicles Break!... Bodywork Storeroom". Mind you that this is a rough translation, but the message would probably invoke a chuckle from anyone who understnads french!
8) Now for something a little more familiar, here's some friendly competition graphic between FedEx and a DHL Van. Notice how the yellow van printed on the FedEx van doesn't explicity say DHL, but the colours imply who the comapny is. We often see many of these competitve advertisements between leading brands in various industries. This is just one of the many hilarious ones designed and printed.
9) Whilst this design was exclusively created as part of a graphic design competition, this creative ad for a beer company in Germany with the message, roughly saying "Tastes Delicious". It would definitely make us do a double take and check it out. It's quite the creative design!
10) Another nature inspired graphic wrap. This time, an advertisement for Shark Week on National Geographic. The jaws of the great white shark are used as part of the doors that slide open and close. This is another creative example of the possibilites of car vinyl graphics.
11) Here we have a collection of Europcar Vans with custom, comical vinyl graphic designs on their cargo sections. This one shows a lady in a bathtub, relaxing in the back of the truck.
12) Another Europcar graphic design, with three cyclists powering the truck in the back.
13) Here is a special Europcar truck, which was designed in conjunction with Fiat, who were running a promotional campaign for their new 500 two door hatchback.
14) Another clever graphic design! This time it's a stack of gold bars, with a sleeping guard next to it, inside the van. Of course, there isn't actually a stack of gold in the van, or maybe there is?
15) This is probably the funniest in our opinion. A graphic design of an alien, with a UFO being transported in the back of a Europcar van, with the message "Impossible Transportation" printed up the top. We're sure anybody would have a good laugh at this!
16) Our lucky last graphic design, this other Europcar van in Sweden, with a bedroom layout graphic design on the back. Definetely something that, no doubt, took a while to design.


text:
What We Lost when Ashland was Saved
In Reminiscing, on May 27, 2021 - 14:38
By Cameron Sumner Walpole
After a monumental career as a senator, Secretary of State, and Speaker of the House of Representatives, Henry Clay, the "Great Compromiser," died in 1852 at the age of 75 in Washington, D.C. His family quickly got to work ensuring the survival of Clay's beloved Ashland estate. Clay's son James Brown Clay purchased the home, razed the structure and rebuilt the home on its original foundation. As the original mansion was in such poor structural condition, this drastic step was rather forward-thinking.
In 1948, Nannette McDowell Bullock, the great-granddaughter of Henry Clay, died at the age of 88 and secured her place among so many American women who helped preserve the homes of our nation's first leaders. With help from Ashland preservation proponent Judge Samuel M. Wilson, Nannette's will funded the Henry Clay Memorial Foundation, established in 1926 to ensure that the public would have access to Clay's home and his legacy indefinitely — "I make this gift to said Memorial Foundation in the hope that…said foundation may be enabled to acquire, preserve and maintain Ashland and the grounds immediately surrounding it as a public park and perpetual memorial; and the gift is made in trust for that purpose…"
Nannette McDowell Bullock
Nearly 100 years earlier in 1853, Ann Pamela Cunningham's efforts to save George Washington's Mount Vernon would serve as a framework for the early historic preservation movement. Cunningham's mother had seen the mansion in a state of bad decline and asked her daughter that if the men of this country were not going to save these places, shouldn't the women? This galvanized Cunningham. She enlisted the help of southern women and formed the Mount Vernon Ladies Association, which raised $200,000 – enough to purchase the mansion and 200 acres. The association's subsequent fundraising allowed for the conservation work the estate so desperately needed.
Finding their Calling
Inspired by the work of the MVLA, other women's associations like the Daughters of the American Revolution, the Colonial Dames of America, and the Ladies Hermitage Association, formed around the country, establishing historic house museums at an incredible rate. Members of these associations had a few things in common – they were white; they were wealthy; they were women. Nineteenth century American men and women operated in separate spheres. Bound by what Barbara Welter called the "Cult of True Womanhood" or the cult of domesticity, women were seen as morally superior to men. They were to reflect the virtues of piety, purity, submissiveness, and domesticity. And while they were unable to participate in the public sphere, women found agency in social reform that affected the family – causes like temperance and poverty. The work of historic preservation provided an outlet for women to contribute outside of the home while maintaining the established social order.
Nannette McDowell Bullock exemplified the qualities of early 20th century women of her class. Their contributions might have been limited to matters of the family, but they were beginning to push the boundaries of their influence. While Nannette established HCMF as a shrine honoring her great-grandfather and her sister, suffragist Madeline (Madge) McDowell Breckinridge, she did it during a time when women's stories were rarely preserved in this way. Perhaps she hoped, though it is unlikely that she assumed, that Madge's efforts would be celebrated at Ashland. Today, visitors engage with both Nannette and Madge's inspiring stories, and celebrate their accomplishments on the "Signature Henry Clay" tour and think critically about the politics of the suffrage movement on the "Women's Voices" tour. While she was a member of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, Madge left Black women out of her call for women's suffrage. In the same way the women's suffrage movement left little or no room for Black women, early historic preservation prioritized white spaces and narratives – resulting in national a preservation landscape where organizations like Ashland are challenged to interpret the totality of a historic site despite the erasure of spaces like slave quarters.
Saving Ashland, Losing History
About 17 of the original 600 acres remain at Ashland today, nestled within the residential neighborhood of Ashland Park which was created when the remaining great-grandchildren of Henry Clay enlisted the help of the Olmsted Brothers firm to sub-divide the farm to meet the housing demands of a growing city. Fortunately, they had the foresight to retain the acreage immediately around the mansion. Today, visitors can explore the rebuilt mansion, keeper's cottage, privy, ice house, dairy cellar, and smokehouse. They can stroll along Clay's famed walks and enjoy a picnic on the "pleasure grounds," an area behind the mansion where parties and tennis matches were once held. But tourists would have to look hard for any impression on the physical landscape left by those enslaved here. Though enslaved people likely built and certainly labored in the remaining structures, the vernacular buildings like barns, stables, and fowl coops no longer stand. New research by Ashland curator Eric Brooks indicates that the multi-family structures where people enslaved at Ashland lived were removed sometime between 1938 and 1951 and have been largely forgotten.
Grove by Garden and Old Farm Road by Bob Wilcutt
It is likely that two sets of brick structures once housed people enslaved on the property – one set for those enslaved to work on the farm and another, close to the mansion near the kitchen garden, for those enslaved to perform domestic labor in the mansion and domestic area of the estate. The earliest reference to the slave quarters is found in a letter to John Mason from Henry Clay dated March 9th, 1826 in which he discusses rental of the Ashland property. He says, "I reserve the negro houses near the dwelling house and also the house in the garden, or such of them as are wanted for my own negroes." Archaeological excavation along the old farm road revealed pit cellars and evidence of whitewashed brick. Beyond that, however, the archaeological evidence is so fragmentary it reveals nothing about size of the quarters, their arrangement, or even the exact number of slave quarters present during Henry Clay's time.
The Clay great-grandchildren likely razed buildings like the slave quarters because they had fallen out of use, were in need of repair, and were standing on land that could be sold. These structures were torn down, the land was developed, and beautiful homes were built over top. Trees were planted. Roads were paved. Those structures and the people who inhabited them have largely been forgotten. While the intentions of the great-grandchildren were likely not malicious, their actions proved insidious. Their disregard of slave quarters and vernacular buildings for preservation was not uncommon. This process of historical erasure is systematic – affecting not only the historical landscape, but also the sanitizing of the written historical record.
With so much erasure and obfuscation of the built environment and written record of slavery, how do we rebuild, reconstruct, and remember? In 2020, "Traces: Slavery at Ashland," a guided tour experience, was launched. Docents encourage visitors to walk in the footsteps of those enslaved at Ashland. Along the "farm road," a well-tread path behind which a row of slave quarters once stood can still be seen. On the tour, visitors mentally reconstruct the built environment and do the work of remembering. This step is the first of many to more accurately and honestly interpret this history.
From Veneration to Education
Today, women in historic preservation ensure more inclusive and accurate preservation practices. During Nannette McDowell Bullock's era, homes like Ashland were preserved as "shrines," places to venerate individuals. Historic houses today, however, aim to educate and help the public find relevance in the past. Ashland staff continue to research the lives of all who lived and worked on the estate – to reinterpret the spaces saved by Nannette, but also to reconstruct the narratives that were erased.
About the author: adminHC
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Reminiscences: The Ice Storm of 2003
Henry Clay's Run for the White House: Teacher Resource
Creating a Place of Shared Identity
Family Bible


There are more women than men in Wilcox County, Alabama. Total population of Wilcox County, Alabama is estimated at 11,098 people with 5,281 male and 5,817 female. There are 536 more women than men in the county, which is 4.83% of the total population.
The Wilcox County, Alabama Gender Ratio is 91 men to 100 women (91:100) or 0.91. Wilcox County, Alabama's gender ratio is lower than the Alabama State average of 94 men to 100 women (94:100) or 0.94. The gender ratio is also lower than the national average of 97 men to 100 women (97:100) or 0.97.
Gender Ratios vary by age group as well as location. The table below shows the gender ratios breakdown in Wilcox County, Alabama by age.
Alberta, Annemanie, Arlington, Boykin, Camden, Catherine, Coy, Furman, Lower Peach Tree, Mc Williams, Oak Hill, Pine Apple, and Pine Hill.
Prairie, Low Peach Tre, Lwr Pch Tree, Snow Hill, and Yellow Bluff.


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The àmì on the author's name made me translate the title into Yoruba subconsciously and there! I got a loose idea of what the book was centred on – Àbíkú.
However , nothing prepares you for the twists and turns, the suspense and carefully woven tapestry of this work, the ending that is as unexpected as it is beautiful. All of this makes Stay With Me such a fantastic piece.
The plot mirrors common but rarely discussed experiences. In it, you are made to feel the pressure, frustration and all other emotions of a childless couple in 80's South West Nigeria.
You feel the pain of betrayal, the rawness of deception, the calculation and misguided love in the ties connecting Akin and Yejide to Funmi, Dotun, Moomi and other characters. Witnessing the darkest side of each's persona still does not make you judge them. Such is the candour of Ayòbámi's presentation.
Perhaps what made this book so striking is the familiarity of the setting.
It is amazing how the author manages to incorporate so many themes in a concise and enjoyable read. Among them are life in Nigeria's military era; escaping poverty to middle class through education; retaining core aspects of cultural heritage nonetheless; dedication and sacrifice of mothers; sickle cell disease and mental health.
It provides insight into the overwhelming importance placed on having biological children, how this leads to desperation, unforseen circumstances and uncontrollable consequences that defy best laid plans. Societal expectations are seen to be more stringent on women. Even self-proclaimed feminists are not spared.
P.S I would love to know more about Akin. For me, he was the most layered and interesting character.