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A plan to make the physical requirements more difficult for aspiring female US Marines by requiring full pull-ups has been postponed indefinitely. And as it stands now, women interested in becoming lady Leathernecks must meet lower physical standards than their male counterparts. But for jobs that require brute physical strength, is it fair to give women a break? Yes, and no. More »
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If you're tying to figure out how cute a baby is, you had better ask a premenopausal woman: they're scientifically proven to have the highest cuteness sensitivity. Yes, this experiment involved coming up with an objective scale of baby cuteness. More »
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Today the National Geographic Society announced the recipient of the 10,000th grant it's given in its 123-year history: 32-year-old conservation biologist Krithi Karanth. We spoke with Dr. Karanth about her work, and about what it's like to be a female scientist both in the US and her native India. More »
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Remember this summer, when Miss America contestants were asked if evolution should be taught in our schools, and everyone except for the pinko commie blue state beauty queens responded as though they were being interviewed for the position of news anchor on Fox & Friends, hemming and hawing as though they'd been asked to describe their most recent sexual experience to their parents. (If you can get through the entire video without rolling your eyes once, you're made of stronger stuff than I). More »
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What's wily like a coyote, but hungry like a wolf? A coyote-wolf hybrid! Scientists have confirmed that these modern-day dire wolves are now sweeping the country, appearing as far east as New York. Biologist Christine Bozarth says the hybrids "should be able to do things like take down deer, which a little, scrappy Great Plains wily coyote would not be able to do on its own." Also, the coyote is "one of the animals that will be left at the end, like the cockroaches, raccoons, and rabbits," and coyote-wolves are "absolutely established — they're here to stay." Give up, humanity. More »
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"The vagina is becoming big business." This is not a story about sex work — it's about marketers talking honestly about female genitalia, and the fact that the AP is getting away with using it high up in their stories is basically case in point. More »
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Another blow to the idea that homosexuality is unnatural- researchers have found a surprising frequency of homosexual behavior among insects. More »
]]> http://jezebel.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=5833024&view=rss&microfeed=true While it sounds like the plot of something Kurt Vonnegut might write after reading Upton Sinclair and then dropping acid, biologists claim that it's not far fetched to assume that in the future, our meat won't come from animals that we kill; it will be grown in petri dishes in giant labs by mad scientists who drive flying cars. More »
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A woman, whom the medical journal Current Biology simply calls SM, has a rare from of brain damage, and literally can not feel fear. But researchers sure had a good time trying to scare her! More »
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At any rate, they've discovered how to "reverse the aging process...dramatically." Human organs are in their sights. More »
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Says Holly Hill of infidelity: "This is what every man already knows and I think what every woman deep down already knows." More »
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According to today's "Science Times," it's not that we shrink with age: it's that we lose our ability to regain height. Adults actually "shrink and regain height on a daily basis, as much as three-quarters of an inch." [NYT] More »
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Marjorie Grene, a scientist instrumental in creating the study of Philosophy of Biology, has died at 98. Dr. Grene was the first woman to get a volume in the "Library of Living Philosophers" series. [NYT] More »
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According to a (gross) new study, female body odor smells like a variety of savory foods! Read on! More »
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Hot on the heels of the revelation that gentlemen do, indeed, prefer blondes comes the latest from the Cosmo Institute of Science (okay, it's actually the University of Rochester in this case): men are attracted to the color red! The men who participated in a study overwhelmingly found they were more attracted to a woman sporting a red shirt than a blue — although they denied that color had an impact on their choices. It's subliminal, you see, having to do with ovulation and baboons. It might also interest you to know that, according to the BBC, red "has traditionally been linked with romantic and sexual matters, from red hearts on Valentine's Day, to red-light districts." So, what have we learned lately? To get a man, we need to dye our hair blonde, don a red dress, go off the pill, and stop wearing deodorant. I'm feeling think-y and here's a study I want to see: how much of an impact do these studies have on our behavior? More »
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New book out: Jena Pincott's Do Gentlemen Really Prefer Blondes? It's a pop-science read on the natural laws of attraction: pheromones, smells, evolutionary psychology —you know the drill. And in answer to the Big Question? (Well, the Other Big Question, along with whether or not Blondes Have More Fun.) Yes. Yes, they do — at least Stateside. It has to do with scarcity, apparently, and perceptions of femininity. (Of course, we already knew that men act stupider around blondes, but marry brunettes, so make of this further "confirmation" of our societal proclivities what you will.) Having barely passed Chemistry, I probably shouldn't be arguing with scientists. Not to get all "Hair Diaries" on you, but all I can say is, in my personal experience going blonde sucked. More »
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On the heels of The Re-education of the Female, which suggests that women keep their men by doing chores in sexy outfits, comes a study implying that male fidelity may have more to do with genetics than wifely subservience. According to scientists at the Karolinska Institute (sounds like a ballet studio, actually a Swedish medical school), two in five men carry a gene variant that makes them less likely to commit to women. The Daily Mail calls it "the love-rat gene" — presumably in reference to Rod Stewart's appearance in the accompanying photo — and it apparently has a surprising number of social and sexual effects. More »
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"Menopause is evolution's way of solving the age-old tensions between wives and their mothers-in-law," reads a headline in the Daily Mail. Michael Cant, a biologist at Exeter University, says: "When more than one female breeds, every mouth you feed is one less for your own." Apparently older women stop being fertile so they can help raise the grandchildren, which is an advantage. It may be biologically sound, but why does the paper make this theory seem like women are all about conflict and rivalry? In any case, good news: Another report claims that even though erectile dysfunction in males is clearly linked to the development of cardiovascular disease, the same is not true for females. Decreased sexual satisfaction in postmenopausal women is not predictive of cardiovascular disease, say researchers at Boston University School of Medicine. [Daily Mail, UPI] More »
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Check out this excellent blurb from 1936, depicting women winning honors in science. These cancer researchers, vinegar fly dissectors, and solar eclipse peepers were truly revolutionary. [Modern Mechanix] More »
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