Under The Sun

Cold was killing dinosaurs long before the asteroid commonly thought to have been their downfall hit, according to scientists.

A baby’s babble leads to language Research uses mouth asymmetry to investigate the link between baby babbling and language.

The different views on babbling reflect a larger divide over why humans communicate using words, while other species don’t. Some experts believe that we began speaking essentially by accident, perhaps after our ancestors noticed they could make different sounds while moving their jaws. Others believe that language is one of the key things that define us as human, and that our brains have been “hard-wired” for language all along.

The technique may also provide early diagnosis of speech disorders.

‘Meteorite’ hits girl A teenager in North Yorkshire, UK, was apparently hit on the foot by a meteorite. “This does not happen very often in Northallerton” she told reporters.

Cloning pigs for animal-to-human transplantation

Four cloned double “knockout” pigs were born at PPL Therapeutics, Inc., in Blacksburg, Va., on July 25. Each lacked both copies of the gene responsible for making the enzyme alpha1, 3 galactosyl transferase, a feat that could bring in the next generation of organ donors, making animal-to-human transplantation feasible. Without the enzyme, which adds a sugar to the surface of cells that the human immune system immediately recognizes as being foreign, hyper-acute rejection is unlikely.

No doubt this triggers the “yuk factor” in some people. I can’t see that it’s much different to eating a ham sandwich.

I’ve added comments to the blog. YACCS seems to be the most popular system, but it’s not accepting new subsriptions so I went for Enetation as a) it’s free and b) it’s British! I will tweak the template when I get time.

No one has a human right not to be unhappy

there can be no human right to have a baby, any more than there should be a human right to have a pint. Nobody can really be guaranteed the right not to be unhappy

The American revolutionaries, founding fathers of the fight for individual freedom, promised their people only the right to “life, liberty and THE PURSUIT of happiness”. The success or otherwise of that pursuit is a matter of human endeavour. It cannot be assured by calling on God, or His modern substitute, the Human Rights Act.

There’s too much italic on this page- in future I’ll use blockquote.

Eminem lyrics are blamed for sex attack

A sex attack on a nine-year-old boy may have been inspired by the sordid lyrics of a song by the rap star Eminem, a court was told.

The attacker was 12 years old.

Michele Elliott, director of Kidscape, the child protection charity, criticised the music industry for giving such records “a platform.” She said: “There is something disturbing about a record or video egging people on to behave outside social parameters. I personally find them disgusting and don’t think we should give them a platform. If you are already disturbed, listening to something particularly unpleasant could give you the rationale that it is okay.”

The article has a link to the lyrics in question, if you have the stomach for it.