Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Science/2017 January 8

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January 8

Euginic is base from correct evoltion science?

If no, can explain why is wrong science? If yes, what evoltion scientist think about discrimation base from euginic? Sorry for bad English. --Curious Cat On Her Last Life (talk) 08:50, 8 January 2017 (UTC)

No, because it entirely overlooks the effects of genetic defects arising from spontaneous mutation -- effects which are amplified by inbreeding. (Also the reduced resistance of an inbred population to infectious disease, kind of like what we're seeing right now with bananas.) To be honest, though, these effects were not fully understood when eugenics started out -- so it's more precise to say that eugenics are not so much "flat-out wrong" science as they are outdated science. 2601:646:8E01:7E0B:F88D:DE34:7772:8E5B (talk) 09:36, 8 January 2017 (UTC)

We have an article on eugenics. Historically, the problems with eugenics were that A) People assigned to genetics traits that are not genetic in origin, such as criminality or poverty, and B) People who have promoted eugenics are frequently mind-bogglingly racist or otherwise so bigoted their decisions have nothing to do with actual science. I'm sure there are scientists (of evolution and otherwise) who would support the elimination of clearly deleterious genes through either genetic engineering, selective abortion, selective fertilization, or voluntary non-reproduction. Genes for diseases like tay sachs or Huntington's, which are not believed to confer any advantage to the carrier. But given that research ethics is such an integral part of modern science education, I doubt many would support involuntary means of getting rid of these genes. You can read about some of this at History of eugenics#Modern eugenics, genetic engineering, and ethical re-evaluation. Now, this is very different from the original idea of Eugenics. Back in the early 20th century, there was some Nietzshean fantasy of creating more perfect humans through eugenics, rather than simply eliminating a handful of rare deleterious mutations. And as I said before, back when these ideas were young, this lead to totally unscientific things like the Holocaust, or limited American attempts to get rid of poverty through forced sterilization, which suspiciously looked like attempts to get rid of black people (see: Eugenics in the United States). Someguy1221 (talk) 09:29, 8 January 2017 (UTC)

Well, how do we actually know that there is no genetic component whatsoever to criminality??? 2601:646:8E01:7E0B:F88D:DE34:7772:8E5B (talk) 09:36, 8 January 2017 (UTC)

We don't know even now. The problem is, that didn't stop people from trying to get rid of it. Someguy1221 (talk) 09:47, 8 January 2017 (UTC)

We don't. But we know that environmental factors are more significant hence the U.S. violent crime rate is 5 times higher than other developed nations. TFD (talk) 11:08, 8 January 2017 (UTC)

Additionally, "crime" refers to a whole host of activities, the only completely unifying factor being that the authorities have forbidden them and set specific types of punishment for those who commit them. I think its extremely unlikely that murder, trespass (which isn't a crime where I live, but is in some countries), libel, and watching videos in places the copyright notice says you shouldn't could all have the same genetic cause. (Unless it is simply a genetic propensity to not always obey rules). Besides, even if there was a genetic propensity to any of these activities, it would probably be linked to things that you wouldn't want to breed out of the population. Iapetus (talk) 14:11, 9 January 2017 (UTC)

^{[Citation Needed]}. Our article on List of countries by intentional homicide rate says that you are wrong. It is higher than most, but not five times higher. According to our article on Sex differences in crime, men account for 80.4 percent of persons arrested for violent crime, so we know that genetics plays a very large role. --Guy Macon (talk) 15:10, 8 January 2017 (UTC)

Correlation does not imply causation. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 21:41, 8 January 2017 (UTC)

That is by far the worst application of the "correlation does not imply causation" argument I have ever seen. Do you think that perhaps committing violent crimes reaches back into the past and causes you to be born male? Or perhaps some third factor causes you to be born male and then 20 years later causes you to commit violent crimes? --Guy Macon (talk) 01:50, 9 January 2017 (UTC)

Neither. But I believe that it is well possible that a third factor (our historically evolved society with its gender-stereotyped roles and education) causes males to commit more violent crime, without this necessarily having anything to do with XY vs XX chromosomes. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 02:02, 9 January 2017 (UTC)

Eugenics in all its misanthropic interpretations depends on belief that human character determinism by the genetics of sexual reproduction should be directed by intervention. However when Androcide i.e. systematic male Gendercide occurs, as in July 1995 in the Srebrenica massacre, the misandronist perpetrators are disputing some Casus belli but their act carries no eugenic rationale; their aim is to vanquish the victim group, not to change it genetically. I take this opportunity to commend the above reply by Someguy1221 for his well-thought reponse that concisely gives both historical and ethical perspectives to the OP's questions. Blooteuth (talk) 15:34, 9 January 2017 (UTC)

Well, cultural factors is probably the explanation, but you might argue physiological characteristics (e.g., testosterone makes you prone to confrontation). I guess you could do some comparison with the ratio of male/female propensity to violence in (say) Sweden (where traditional gender roles have almost disappeared) vs. Spain (ok, that choice comes from a stereotype, but still). Tigraan^{Click here to contact me} 16:05, 9 January 2017 (UTC)

Comparing countries with reduced gender roles vs where they are still more closely ingrained may be a useful exercise but I think it's quite qustionable to claim they have "almost disappeared". Sure they may be significantly less than in many other countries but see e.g. [1]. Consider also that it's only recently that some toy stores have tried to avoid presenting toys as being for girls or for boys [2] [3], way too recent to be relevant to the crime rate. Likewise these sort of things [4] are still an oddity. This may seem a minor thing, but on the other hand, it may also be an indication of how early gender roles are part of the social fabric.

And I've chosen my words carefully here, whether you believe there is a very strong genetic component to some of these differences so they aren't likely to disappear, or it's mostly cultural/learnt but such a fundamental part that it's very hard to remove especially in an internationalised world is beside the point namely that for whatever reason these are still there even in places like Sweden. As mentioned, this doesn't preclude some analysis from the differences but still care needs to be taken into reading too much into the results considering that we know such roles still exist to some extent. Especially since violent criminals tend to be outliers, even more so in a place like Sweden.

And once you start to look at the details, there are obvious complications. Switzerland was mentioned below, an obvious thought is that as as established below, there is a difference between conscription etc between males and females. (Even considering the average physiological differences which I think many would accept are significantly of genetic origin, is the lowest standard needed for males higher than the highest standard some females can achieve? Even if this is the case, males who can't achieve the standard often aren't exempted but made to do something else.) And Switzerland is also the place where one canton didn't allow women to vote on certain issues until 1991. Yet despite that, in many ways the situation for women was likely generally perceived as better than, giving a random example, in Pakistan where women have been able to vote since 1947. But how do you decide what cultural differences in the roles and rights of men and women could be affecting violent crime rates?

Nil Einne (talk) 05:05, 10 January 2017 (UTC)

User:The Four Deuces may have been thinking of gun-related homicides: "According to United Nations data, a person is 4.5 times more likely to die from gun violence in the United States than Italy [the next highest G8 nation]. [5] Alansplodge (talk) 20:28, 8 January 2017 (UTC)

Guy Macon, it is true that the U.S. homicide rate declined from 5 to 3.9, while some developed countries have seen an increase. So the list shows Canada at 1.5, France at 1.2, UK, Germany and NZ at 0.9, Switzerland at 0.5 ans Japan at 0.3. 5X is historically accurate and usually quoted. But lets not miss the issue: the differences can be primarily explained by environment rather than genetics. The Swiss, who are mostly French and German, have a 50% lower homicide rate than France or Germany. Alansplodge, gun-related homicides are only one of the factors in making U.S. violent crime rates higher. TFD (talk) 22:29, 8 January 2017 (UTC)

That would be the same Swiss that by law require every home to contain a loaded machine gun, right? Yet somehow they have a lower rate of gun-related homicide that genetically-identical neighbors. So that argues environment/culture. On the other hand, of the homicides and other violent crimes committed in Switzerland, the vast majority are committed by males, just as is the case in all other nations. So that argues genetics. The thing is, there doesn't appear to be any genetic difference in violence between races or ethnic groups. Those differences are primarily cultural. --Guy Macon (talk) 02:00, 9 January 2017 (UTC)

Contrary to NRA propaganda, Switzerland very much does not require every home to contain a loaded machine gun. It requires reserve soldiers in a certain age range to have their service gun (which is usually an assault rifle, which is not, by most definitions, a machine gun) stored securely at home. In particular, it is stored unloaded, and the very limited ammunition supply is stored separately in a sealed (as in tamper-proof seal) container. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 02:09, 9 January 2017 (UTC)

You are somewhat out-of-date. Several years ago, the Swiss changed the law to allow reservists who live no more than X km from an approved armory to store their weapons at an armory outside their home. Such armories are available in most cities. I don't know how many people have taken them up this new option (it is probably still true that most weapons are stored at home). Also, the official guidance is that service weapons should not just be locked but disassembled in the home with the barrel stored in a separate part of the home from the other components to make theft and misuse more difficult. Both the armory option and recommendation that weapons be disassembled speak to the fact that service weapons are intended for national defense, but are not generally anticipated to be used in personal self-defense. Dragons flight (talk) 08:12, 9 January 2017 (UTC)

Thanks for the update. I primarily remembered my brother in law's joy at finally being able to return the rifle when he passed some age mark a few years back. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 09:57, 9 January 2017 (UTC)

Indeed. Alansplodge (talk) 22:35, 8 January 2017 (UTC)

Eugenics is not really as dead as people like to say - after all, cousin marriage is still prohibited, on rather scant evidence, in many areas. More dramatically, abortion law often carries an exception for rape or incest, which seems like quite a crude way to estimate the psychological burden for the woman but would appear to have a eugenic motivation also. There are also eugenic aspects to the sperm donor industry, and I'd hazard a guess that the eugenic potential of computer dating sites, and their proprietary algorithms, is likely unrivalled in history.

That said, the idea of eugenics is still not merely stupid but palpably counterproductive. A monoculture can work well in the short term, but a changing environment requires access to a broad gene pool. With the present level of ecological disruption, we see hybrid species forming all over the world - killer bees, hybrid West Nile carrying mosquitoes that bite humans and birds alike, and many other invasive species with hybrid roots. This should be a tip-off that organisms are casting about far and wide for new genes to deal with new environments. In the case of humans, of course, there are no other species to work with, but there is a broad gene pool in Africa. As a result we see "Recent African origin of modern humans" migrations of Homo erectus, then Homo heidelbergensis, then Homo sapiens. In each case, evolution has gone back to the deep end of the gene pool to pull out a new species. One of my many crazy ideas is that evolution could do this again relatively soon; that "Pygmies" such as the Twa have superior thought-to-mass ratios and would inevitably be selected for in any sort of interstellar dispersal. In any case, it should be clear that a program of rigorous eugenic purification is only a road toward irrelevance and perhaps even extinction. Wnt (talk) 16:00, 8 January 2017 (UTC)

"This should be a tip-off that organisms are casting about far and wide for new genes to deal with new environments"? That would suggest that evolution is driven by some sort of intelligent plan - which, I'm sure you know, is not how it works at all. Richerman (talk) 16:58, 8 January 2017 (UTC)

It's difficult to talk about evolution without it sounding that way, similar to how we say "the Sun rises" versus "the Earth rotates so that the Sun becomes visible at our location". It can be done, but it's painful and time consuming. StuRat (talk) 17:04, 8 January 2017 (UTC)

Well that may be so, but I think the statement above is a step too far for a science reference desk. Richerman (talk) 17:17, 8 January 2017 (UTC)

@Richerman: Oh, to be sure, I was speaking in a colloquial and, in my opinion alone I suppose, colorful style. Nonetheless, the "breadth of the net" so to speak with which organisms "cast about" is indeed potentially modifiable by selective mechanisms. For example, the SOS response in bacteria allows individuals to decide on a higher mutation rate in the hope (speaking only poetically, sure, bacteria don't hope) that the potential adaptive benefit outweighs the clear and present danger. There are other claims of adaptive mutation... these are generally seen as dubious, yet I continue to suspect that the phenomenon of DNA methylation is not merely a short term or even short term transgenerational form of epigenetic inheritance, but also maybe a method of designating genes for preferential mutation, even preferential types of mutation. But in the present situation, behavior might be more amenable to modification: organisms exposed to an unusually broad range of landraces in a disrupted environment might choose to discriminate less in seeking a visibly similar mate, for example, causing the degree of genetic diversity within each local population to increase, and permitting a more rapid reassortment of available genetic material. Assortative mating and disassortative mating are only extreme approximations, after all, and that behavior is as much the decision of the individual as anything can be. Wnt (talk) 18:54, 8 January 2017 (UTC)

One problem with eugenics, or any system where people "pick winners", really, is that people are prone to make bad selections. In the case of sex selection, many places may pick disproportionate numbers of males, messing up the fabric of society. Or we may choose the tall, until people become so tall that it causes medical problems. Or we may choose the thin, resulting in people with inefficient digestive systems, and mass starvation when food supplies are low, and overuse of land for farming at normal times. Even supposed defects, like autism or bipolar disorder seem to produce individuals with extraordinary abilities. StuRat (talk) 16:47, 8 January 2017 (UTC)

You may enjoy reading about plant breeding and animal husbandry and artificial selection. Maybe inbreeding depression or a hybrid vigor. Also related are genetic diversity, founder effect, and sexual selection. SemanticMantis (talk) 17:49, 8 January 2017 (UTC)

So eugenics do not work cause inbreeding make more problems? Some answers (example Swiss gun laws) confuse me, what is the link to eugenics? Also what do evoltion scientist say about eugenics and discrimation? --Curious Cat On Her Last Life (talk) 13:14, 11 January 2017 (UTC)

Yes, inbreeding is THE big problem associated with eugenics of any sort. (Also the fact that many traits which people thought were genetic actually turned out to be mostly cultural, and thus attempts to change them by means of eugenics proved ineffective.) 2601:646:8E01:7E0B:6CD5:FDD3:C2B8:18E8 (talk) 14:03, 11 January 2017 (UTC)

Vancouver cold this winter

Why has Vancouver in Canada been cold so far this winter? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Uncle dan is home (talk • contribs) 18:08, 8 January 2017 (UTC)

'Cause of the Jet Stream. Latest jet stream weather chart for Vancouver Island. Oh, and before any one says that ain’t cold. It is in comparison that Vancouver normally benefits from the Pacific winds that bring both warmth and a hell of lot of winter rain. Don't understand why Bigfoot bothers to live there in such a terrible climate. --Aspro (talk) 18:27, 8 January 2017 (UTC)

To amplify a bit, the jet stream tends to divide warm and cold air masses, as a result of the thermal wind relation. Unfortunately our thermal wind article isn't very good.

Cliff Mass discusses the recent situation for your area in a blog post here although it focuses more on the "what" than the "why." You could try following up with Cliff in a blog comment or by email. Shock Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 18:41, 8 January 2017 (UTC)

There is an idea of "warm oceans, cold continents" that has been floating around a few years [6]; I remember seeing it had been gaining a bit more traction lately but it is still by no means widely accepted. Wnt (talk) 19:08, 8 January 2017 (UTC)

Don't know if this is an over simplification but when the jet stream is overhead, it drags bad (or severe changes of) weather along with it. Of-cause, we all know that there is no such thing really as 'bad weather' just the wrong clothing. Suitably fitted, the OP will be as snug as a bug in a rug. --Aspro (talk) 19:22, 8 January 2017 (UTC)

Or, a better way of putting it is, what's bad weather for the trucker can be good weather for the farmer. 2601:646:8E01:7E0B:F88D:DE34:7772:8E5B (talk) 03:44, 9 January 2017 (UTC)

Maybe it's not related, but New Zealand has been experiencing an unusually cold and windy summer since mid-December. Swimming pools are noticing a reduction in attendance. Akld guy (talk) 21:11, 8 January 2017 (UTC)

What are these little spikes on the beach?

I was at a beach recently (on the Atlantic Ocean) and saw these little spikes all over the edge of the water. This one is probably just under 1" but most are a bit smaller. What is it? — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 21:05, 8 January 2017 (UTC)

We have an article on Lanice conchilega or the Mason Worm that cements sand grains together like this. What part of the world do you live in and maybe we can home in to the actual critter. Also, as you have a camera maybe you can dig one up a photo it.--Aspro (talk) 21:20, 8 January 2017 (UTC)

Umm....======> ? --Stephan Schulz (talk) 21:28, 8 January 2017 (UTC)

I assume he means to photograph the part currently below the surface. StuRat (talk) 21:36, 8 January 2017 (UTC)

I parsed "one" as referring to the camera. Damn grammatical ambiguity! --Stephan Schulz (talk) 21:47, 8 January 2017 (UTC)

The picture was taken in Rhode Island, USA (geotagged if a map is helpful), but I don't live near there so can't go back to dig. :/ — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 21:39, 8 January 2017 (UTC)

Hmmmm. That mason worm might just be it! this picture I found when googling looks awfully similar -- just without the top part. That's pretty far from my theory -- that some kind of organic material in the ocean froze and accumulated with the outgoing tide... or something. :) — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 21:59, 8 January 2017 (UTC)

Had a similar question about things found on the beach a short while ago. Mysterious beach blobs and the OP got confirmation from emailing the images to Scripps Institution of Oceanography. Don't be shy! Email them today. At low tide there is little point in keeping their tentacles out and displayed. P.S. That is a high quality image. Without it being so crisp and sharp I wouldn't have had a clue as to identification for something so very small. It is clear enough to discount File:Type I fulgurites Florida 1.jpg etc. --Aspro (talk) 22:20, 8 January 2017 (UTC)