"Compromised science" news/opines (includes retractions, declining academic standards, pred-J, etc)

[C C]

The most extreme incursion of ideology into ecology and evolution I've ever seen
https://whyevolutionistrue.com/2023...ogy-into-ecology-and-evolution-ive-ever-seen/

INTRO (Jerry Coyne): The paper below, which is likely paywalled if you click on the screenshot (but a pdf is still accessible here) shows how deeply my own field, organismal biology, has been infected by ideologues—deeply authoritarian ones. It’s from a once-respectable journal (Trends in Ecology & Evolution), which apparently has now drunk the Kool-Aid of “political correctness” (“wokeness,” if you will), producing an article that is so bizarre and so off-putting, that none of the several colleagues I sent it to could finish it.

But I did, saving you the trouble. (It’s short, though, so you should read it from the pdf link if you’re an ecologist or evolutionist.) If Ibram Kendi were a biologist of this type, this is the paper he would have written, for, as you’ll see, it’s right out of the CRT playbook. It is full of distorted, overblown, or purely speculative assertions, and here are its major points:

a.) Ecology and evolution are thoroughly permeated by racism—structural racism that is deeply embedded in the way we still do science.

b.) We (here I mean “people not of color”) are all complicit in this racism, and we must constantly ponder our bigotry and persistently try to rid ourselves of it.

c.) Our curriculum is thoroughly “Eurocentric” and has to be “decolonized” for the good of all.

d.) Ecology and evolution cannot be taught properly without continually emphasizing the racism of the fields, racism said to be a big source of inequity in STEM. We must infuse all of our courses with a strong emphasis on the history and reality of racism, showing our students how the field was and is complicit in the creation of present inequities.

I don’t know whether to critique the whole thing point by point, or let you see the problems yourself. I think I’ll try a hybrid approach...

The abstract:

Racism permeates ecology, evolution, and conservation biology (EECB). Meaningfully advancing equity, inclusion, and belonging requires an interdisciplinary antiracist pedagogical approach to educate our community in how racism shaped our field. Here, we apply this framework, highlight disparities and interdisciplinary practices across institutions globally, and emphasize that self-reflection is paramount before implementing anti-racist interventions.​

The short answer to the first sentence is, “No it doesn’t.” Yes, you can find instances of bigotry in the field, as you can everywhere, but no rational biologist I know would make such an extreme and unsupported statement unless they have an ideological agenda that requires this claim.

The article starts, as do all of its ilk in science journals, by invoking George Floyd and Black Lives Matter. It then proceeds onto boilerplate Critical Race Theory... (MORE - details)
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[C C]

In bed with the enemy: how to fix science
https://iai.tv/articles/auid-2489-auid-2489?_auid=2020

EXCERPTS: If we were naïve observers, we might think of scientists as earnest detectives—carefully sifting through the evidence, pursuing all reasonable leads, and updating their beliefs as needed. [...] These ideas usually would be true and thus form a reliable basis for designing effective interventions and policies.

To be sure, science has accomplished remarkable feats, from vaccines to spacecrafts. But science is far from the idealistic version portrayed above. Science is the single most effective mode of knowledge formation to date. But, it can also be inefficient, hostile, petty, unreliable, and invalid...

[...] Over the past decade or so, many scholars have accepted that much of science suffers a “replication crisis”. When a group of scholars tries to conduct the exact same methodological procedures as an earlier set of scholars, they often find different (and usually much less impressive) results. This means that a great deal of science is unreliable—very similar studies do not consistently produce very similar results.

But things are a bit worse than that. A great deal of science is also invalid [...] Even highly replicable findings can be wildly misleading, such as when a highly replicable association between two variables (say, ice cream sales and shark attacks) is accompanied by a highly inaccurate causal story (purchasing ice cream causes sharks to attack). Scholars had to work very hard to detect and demonstrate the replication crisis. The validity crisis is much simpler to detect: There are countless contradictory claims in the published literature.

Such claims, at least taken at face value, cannot all be true. Either someone is horrifically wrong, or at least someone is exaggerating. Although science purports to pursue truth, science actually incentivizes such contradictions...(MORE - missing details)

COVERED: Be New ..... Be Big ..... Be Right ..... A Better Way ..... Calling All One-Issue Renegades

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[C C]

What Carl Sagan got very wrong about the human brain
https://bigthink.com/neuropsych/carl-sagan-reptile-brain/

KEY POINTS: Science communicator and astrophysicist Carl Sagan was, and to this day is, generally regarded as an honest and skeptical broker of scientific information. However, in his Pulitzer Prize-winning book, The Dragons of Eden, Sagan endorsed a disputed theory of human brain evolution, suggesting that humans have a "reptilian" brain deep within our minds. The idea has since been roundly disproved, but the myth that humans have a reptile brain persists almost certainly thanks to Sagan's problematic popularizing... (MORE - details)
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Academia's postdoc system is teetering, imperiling efforts to diversify life sciences
https://www.statnews.com/2023/06/06/postdoc-system-teetering-imperiling-life-sciences-diversity/

INTRO (excerpts): For young life scientists hoping to land a prestigious faculty job in academia, postdoctoral research is practically a requirement. But it’s not a path equally open to everyone.

Freshly minted life science Ph.D. graduates who have started families or have big loans, or are Black or female, say they plan to pursue postdoc positions at lower rates than their peers, according to a STAT analysis ...

Prospective postdocs also tend to be younger and are less likely to be Black or female...

[...] These findings, which come from an in-depth look at an annual survey of new Ph.D. grads, were consistent between 2017 and 2021, the years for which data were available...

[...] “I’m deeply concerned that academia is dying,” said Sofie Kleppner, associate dean of postdoctoral affairs at Stanford University. “If the academic world is not warm and welcoming and diverse, it is going to die.”

For decades, postdoc positions were seen as a way to get additional scientific training and as a reliable route into a faculty job, akin to a residency for a medical school graduate. The low pay and demanding hours were rewarded in the end. But for many, a postdoc is now a dead end.

There are increasing signs that academic science has lost its allure for many talented researchers. More life scientists than ever are leaving academia, with Ph.D. graduates skipping postdocs to jump into lucrative positions in private industry...

[...] Those concerns led the National Institutes of Health to launch a working group focused on re-envisioning postdoctoral training, which is scheduled to share updates Friday and release a final report at the end of this year. The NIH is facing its own internal pressures from thousands of postdocs, graduate students, and other temporary researchers who just last week filed a petition to unionize, citing inadequate pay and benefits and excessive workloads... (MORE - missing details)
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[C C]

How a now-retracted study got published in the first place, leading to a $3.8 million NIH grant
https://retractionwatch.com/2023/06...rst-place-leading-to-a-3-8-million-nih-grant/

he 2017 paper attracted immediate and sustained scrutiny from other experts, one of whom attempted to replicate it and found a key problem. Nothing happened until this April, when the authors admitted the work was flawed and retracted their article. By then, it had been cited 134 times in the scientific literature...

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Did a ‘nasty’ publishing scheme help an Indian dental school win high rankings?
https://retractionwatch.com/2023/06...lp-an-indian-dental-school-win-high-rankings/

By systematically citing other papers published by Saveetha faculty—including papers on completely unrelated topics—the undergraduate publications have helped dramatically inflate the number of citations, a key measure of academic merit, linked to Saveetha.

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Journal pulls paper from Ethiopia for unlicensed use of questionnaire
https://retractionwatch.com/2023/06...-unlicensed-use-of-questionnaire/#more-127251

A public-health journal has retracted a study from Ethiopia that made unlicensed use of a questionnaire developed by a U.S. researcher known to aggressively protect his intellectual property.

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“Flagrant and frankly, inexcusable” data duplication leads to retraction
https://retractionwatch.com/2023/06...cusable-data-duplication-leads-to-retraction/

A biochemistry study has been retracted nearly a year after a whistleblower found significant overlap between the article and one published in a different journal by the same research group.
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[C C]

A researcher who publishes a study every two days reveals the darker side of science
https://english.elpais.com/science-...-days-reveals-the-darker-side-of-science.html

EXCERPTS: Meat expert José Manuel Lorenzo, 46, is the researcher who [...] publishes a study every other day (if you include weekends). It’s an astonishing figure, far above the second-highest ranked scientist: the prestigious ecologist Josep Peñuelas, 65, who published 112 studies in 2022.

[...] Researchers are under brutal pressure to publish studies. Their salary increases, promotions, project funding and social prestige depend on evaluations in which their performance is measured practically by weight. This system — known as “publish or perish” — has created monsters. Thousands of scientists around the world publish at least one study every five days, according to Ioannidis’s calculations. They are the so-called “hyperprolific” researchers, who have an amazing production rate, which is sometimes suspicious.

[...] At one point, Lorenzo began collaborating with exotic researchers — who nobody knew about — on topics that have nothing to do with meat. ... In a telephone conversation with EL PAÍS, Lorenzo admits that he doesn’t know any of these co-authors in person, nor is he an expert on any of these issues.

[...] India is one of the countries where so-called “paper mills” are concentrated — factories that churn out scientific studies which are already written and ready to be published in specialized journals. Co-authorship is offered in exchange for money.

[...] Lorenzo categorically denies having resorted to these services, but he is aware of the existence of a market for the sale of authorship.

[...] Scientific journals have a perverse incentive to publish studies of dubious quality. In the past, it was readers who paid to read the articles, which were inaccessible without a subscription. But in recent years, another model has been imposed, in which the authors themselves are the ones who pay up to $6,500 to private publishers so that their studies can be published with open access to any reader. The change in this model has caused an earthquake in the world of science. In 2015, there were barely a dozen biomedical journals that each published more than 2,000 studies per year, representing 6% of total production between them. There are now 55 of these so-called “mega-journals” — together, they publish almost a quarter of all specialized literature, according to recent research by John Ioannidis.

[...] “We’re losing millions of euros of public money paying for the publication of studies that usually don’t contribute anything — like parrots, they only repeat what everyone already knew about,” laments Delgado Vázquez, from the Pablo de Olavide University, in Seville.... (MORE - missing details)

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Scientists Beware! Your University Could Revoke Your Ph.D.
https://www.jdsupra.com/legalnews/scientists-beware-your-university-could-3920477/

EXCERPT: In an opinion from March 2023, the Texas Supreme Court held that public universities in Texas can revoke former students’ degrees who were found responsible for research misconduct that was committed while they were students and is related to obtaining their degree. In reaching this decision, the Texas Supreme Court noted that the two institutions at issue had adopted rules that contemplate degree revocation in instances of “academic dishonesty.” The Texas Supreme Court observed that courts applying other states’ laws, such as Ohio, Virginia, North Dakota, New Mexico, Maryland, Michigan, and Tennessee, have also held that universities have degree revocation authority. In fact, a recent ruling from the Court of Gelderland in the Netherlands demonstrates that some universities outside the United States may also revoke degrees based on research misconduct findings. Scientists should be aware of the possibility of this extreme sanction if their work toward fulfilling degree requirements comes into question... (MORE - missing details)
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[C C]

The shaky evidence for medical cannabis
https://www.skeptic.org.uk/2023/06/the-shaky-evidence-for-medical-cannabis/

EXCERPTS: . . . There are two disclaimers I have to put forth: the first is that in the US and the UK; legal restrictions on the substance have made it difficult to even research it for medical reasons. In the UK this restriction was repealed in 2018, while in the US the problem varies between jurisdictions but as a drug, it remains a schedule 1 — the most serious of classifications, which renders research into it very legally odious to conduct.

The second is that I am not anti-marijuana. I personally don’t care for it, and as someone with a PhD in Philosophy I know that I’m in the minority of non-pot smokers in my discipline. My position is similar to Mill’s: do what you want, as long as everyone consents, and no one is being harmed.

The concept of medical marijuana seemed to be nothing more than a gateway argument. It was a way to open the door to full legalisation. I thought it was similar to the way that people, during the American experiment with alcohol prohibition, could get medical whiskey prescriptions (including a certain UK Prime Minister). Yet smokers assured me that it had benefits that were as good, if not better, than their pharmaceutical counterparts. Given the fervour by which they advocate for its effectiveness, it felt like the evidence must exist.

[...] To conclude, more research is certainly needed. The restrictions on running studies on the substance are being slowly chipped away and its placement as a schedule 1 drug in the US is an absurdity. However, as Science Based Medicine has written, the current state of the science does not provide the conclusions that advocates have claimed... (MORE - missing details)

COVERED: Glaucoma .... Cancer .... Pain

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The scientific fraud behind the “discovery” of element 118
https://www.quantamagazine.org/a-ne...n-the-leading-theory-of-the-nucleus-20230612/

During the Cold War, the United States and the Soviet Union raced to discover superheavy elements. For years, UC Berkeley was the undisputed leader in this race — until they weren’t. Eager to reclaim its lost prestige, the university launched rigorous investigations to discover how the scientific fraud was carried out.
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[Write4U]

Yet smokers assured me that it had benefits that were as good, if not better, than their pharmaceutical counterparts

I don't believe there is a counterpart to marijuana.

There is now a substantial body of knowledge developing on the benefits and dangers of medical (controlled growth) marijuana.

I believe this more or less describes the current knowledge.

MEDICAL MARIJUANA VS. PRESCRIPTION DRUGS

Medical marijuana undeniably provides many health benefits to patients both young and old. As conventional methods and prescription drugs have failed to treat or alleviate debilitating medical conditions, low-THC cannabis and medical marijuana has proved an effective option to provide patients with a naturally therapeutic alternative.

As we get older, our years contain many wonderful memories and experiences, but unfortunately aging also comes with the need to take various amount of pills to take for many situations, which often bring a series of unpleasant side effects. So, it’s obvious why more and more people are looking into medical marijuana as a replacement for prescription drugs. Here are the top seven reasons why cannabis is healthier to use than prescription drugs:

1. REPLACES HARMFUL OPIOIDS
Did you know that opioids have the potential to severely damage your essential organs over prolonged use? Additionally, it can contribute to addiction as the body becomes more and more tolerant of the drug or even result in overdose. Patients with severe pain don’t have many options. With stronger painkilling capabilities comes possible organ damage, tolerance and addiction. Cannabis medicine works as a safe replacement for opioids without the risk of overdosing. It is extremely unlikely that you would ever ingest or smoke enough marijuana in a short period to actually overdose (you would need to consume about 1,500 pounds in 15 minutes.)

2. LESS DANGEROUS SIDE EFFECTS
While all medications have side effects, some can cause more harm than others. Certain prescription drugs can cause effects like organ damage or addiction. Medical marijuana has side effects, too, but they don’t result in long-term damage and can often go away when dosage is adjusted.

3. ADDRESSES SPECIFIC CONDITIONS FOR SENIORS
Even some of the healthiest people begin to deal with chronic conditions as they age. As we get older, we become more susceptible to health problems that have symptoms that are difficult to manage. Fortunately, medical marijuana can assist with alzheimer’s, dementia, osteoporosis, chronic pain, arthritis, glaucoma and other ailments that many elderly people suffer from.

4. EASY-TO-ADJUST DOSES AND MEDICATION
Oftentimes the medicine available to you is dictated by your insurance, your doctor and your tolerance to certain side effects. There may be times when none of the medicines are working for you and there are no other options. Also, when you change or stop taking a medicine, you have to ween yourself off or on your dosage before making the switch. However, cannabis comes in a variety of dosages and formulations that patients can easily try out without worrying about withdrawal effects. If a medical marijuana patient experiences side effects such as paranoia or increased fatigue, their doctor can easily reduce the dosage level to the right fit for the patient.

5. MULTI-SYMPTOM RELIEF ALL-IN-ONE
It doesn’t matter if you have one medical condition/ailment or multiple, it can take multiple prescription medications to fully address all of your symptoms. Managing multiple medications can easily become expensive and will have you running to the pharmacy frequently. With medical marijuana, you can easily address many ailments, from cancer to epilepsy. One stop at the dispensary lets you get an all-in-one solution for many of your health problems.

6. INCLUDES A MULTITUDE OF OPTIONS FOR INTAKE
Prescription drugs typically only come in a few forms and don’t always have alternative options available. However, while cannabis effectively treats many ailments, it can also be consumed in many different ways. If a patient prefers not to smoke, there are capsules, oils and even edibles available as well as many other alternatives.

7. A TREATMENT EXPERIENCE WHERE YOU’RE A PERSON AND NOT JUST A PATIENT
Medicinal cannabis doesn’t just offer an alternative medicine — it also involves a compassionate healthcare experience. Since medical marijuana is so versatile and each individual is unique, physicians work one-on-one with you. They look at your specific ailments and determine what would serve as the best way to intake cannabis, especially if your ability to consume medicine in certain ways is limited.

Patients can use cannabis as a supplement to their prescription drugs or as a total replacement. Of course, before you make a decision regarding any kind of medicine, consult your doctor first. Do you think you or your loved one might qualify for medical marijuana? If so, you can learn more about what health conditions are eligible under Florida law, see our office policies and fees, find dispensaries or request an appointment at Pensacola Wellness Solutions here.

http://pensacolawellness.com/medical-marijuana-vs-prescription-drugs/#

This Class 1 label is a farce. MJ is not an opioid (addictive), it is a cannabinoid and does not affect autonomous parts of the brain that are instrumental in addiction.

WHY CHOOSE CANNABIS OVER OPIOIDS FOR PAIN TREATMENT?

While both cannabis and opioids are effective in pain management, cannabis has never been linked to death by lethal dosage, while the CDC reports that more than three out of five drug overdose deaths involve an opioid. So why use opioids to treat pain? The legal availability and the widespread cultural acceptance make opioids easier to obtain and use. With most opioids listed as a schedule II drugs by the DEA, a slew of these can be marketed to you and prescribed by healthcare professionals at their discretion. Cannabis and cannabinoids are listed as a schedule I drugs, making all cannabis or cannabis derived medications illegal federally, even medications that don’t cause a “high” like CBD. This of course means that, regardless of local or state law, the federal government sees cannabis as having no medicinal value.

https://arborswellness.com/blog/what-is-the-difference-between-opioids-and-cannabis/#

This fact alone should exempt marijuana from any list of "dangerous" drugs and any criminality in its use.
In fact, marijuana has proven effective in combating opioid addiction as well as treating brain disorders.

Medical Marijuana for Neurological Conditions

One relatively new treatment for neurological conditions is medical marijuana. Although medical marijuana may not be ideal for treating every neurological condition, it has proven to be especially effective in managing seizures, multiple sclerosis, and muscular dystrophy.

more .....
https://premierneurologycenter.com/blog/medical-marijuana-for-neurological-conditions/#

 

[Write4U]

What Carl Sagan got very wrong about the human brain
https://bigthink.com/neuropsych/carl-sagan-reptile-brain/

KEY POINTS: Science communicator and astrophysicist Carl Sagan was, and to this day is, generally regarded as an honest and skeptical broker of scientific information. However, in his Pulitzer Prize-winning book, The Dragons of Eden, Sagan endorsed a disputed theory of human brain evolution, suggesting that humans have a "reptilian" brain deep within our minds. The idea has since been roundly disproved, but the myth that humans have a reptile brain persists almost certainly thanks to Sagan's problematic popularizing... (MORE - details)
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Question: If there is no remarkable difference between the reptilian brain and the mammalian brain, why does that prove that mammalian brains are not evolved from the much older reptilian brain and retain vestiges of that early genetic model?
Does anybody actually claim that humans have reptilian brains, or just that brains that have evolved from reptilian brains?

Understanding reptile intelligence can aid conservation and safeguard ecosystems.
Commentary by Deyatima Ghosh on 19 January 2023
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Charles Darwin, in his second book “The Descent of Man and Selection in Relation to Sex,” mentions that other animals differ cognitively from humans only in degree but not in kind. In the reptilian brain, being of primitive, ancestral form, the structural and functional complexity may not be as sophisticated as those of birds or mammals. Hence the cognitive processes are fairly simple compared to the higher taxa.

https://news.mongabay.com/2023/01/r...rvation-and-safeguard-ecosystems-commentary/#

 

[C C]

Question: If there is no remarkable difference between the reptilian brain and the mammalian brain, why does that prove that mammalian brains are not evolved from the much older reptilian brain and retain vestiges of that early genetic model?
Does anybody actually claim that humans have reptilian brains, or just that brains that have evolved from reptilian brains?

The "Triune brain" model supposedly isn't about already existing structures being modified over time, but a claim that the human brain evolved by adding on new layers. Plus, the view that distinct brain regions are rigidly devoted to specific functions.

The myth of the reptilian brain is tenacious – but wrong.
https://sciencenorway.no/brain/no-you-dont-have-a-reptilian-brain-inside-your-brain/2201926

[...] instincts, emotions and reason don’t exist in separate parts of the brain, he says. ... “To say that one part of the brain has this function and another part has that function is a gross oversimplification and is at best only true for simple and specific functions,” says Tamnes.

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You don't have a lizard brain
https://thebrainscientist.com/2018/04/11/you-dont-have-a-lizard-brain/

. . . the very idea that new brain structures emerge on top of old ones is fundamentally at odds with how evolution usually works: biological structures are typically just modified versions of older structures. For example, the mammalian neocortex isn’t a completely new structure like MacLean thought it was, but instead is a modification of the repitilian cortex. As the evolutionary neuroscientist Terrence Deacon explains: “Adding on is almost certainly not the way the brain has evolved. Instead, the same structures have become modified in different ways in different lineages.”

Notice that the cortex and its analogues (colored here in blue) are found in all vertebrates, and isn’t unique to mammals. What’s more, all the major structures of the mammal brain can also be found in the reptile brain, and even in the fish brain.

So what’s gone wrong here? Why is the triune brain theory widely believed, even among psychologists, while evolutionary neuroscience abandoned the theory decades ago (and never took it very seriously in the first place)?

The problem starts, of course, with MacLean. I think it’s fairly clear that MacLean wanted to find what makes humans (and mammals more broadly) unique. And that desire to identify our uniqueness led him to judge his available evidence poorly. MacLean should have considered alternative hypotheses, such as the possibility that differences between our brains and those of other vertebrates are a matter of degree, rather than kind.

And he should have asked whether those alternative hypotheses could explain his evidence as well as his own theory could. This sort of self-questioning is key to doing good science: we need to work especially hard to try to prove ourselves wrong. Fortunately, science is structured such that if we can’t (or won’t) prove ourselves wrong, our colleagues most certainly will. And other scientists did prove MacLean wrong, as detailed thoroughly in Terrence Deacon’s paper on what’s known about mammalian brain evolution.​

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[C C]

What Bigfoot Teaches Us About Public Mistrust of Science
https://www.sapiens.org/biology/bigfoot-hoax-public-science/

In the 1960s, credentialed scientists, including physical anthropologists, hunted for the legendary Sasquatch. How did they fall for the hoax?

EXCERPT: . . . The Bossburg incident serves as a warning against hubris among scientists. When the scientist becomes more important than the subject being studied or the evidence being gathered, they are no longer practicing science or producing reliable and useful knowledge.

And scientific or academic hubris is not limited to claiming genius-level intelligence. It can also manifest in opaque language. In later years, Krantz would say that he had two secret tests that could determine whether a footprint was real. He never revealed them. Ultimately, not even the other monster hunters trusted him... (MORE - missing details)
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[Write4U]

The "Triune brain" model supposedly isn't about already existing structures being modified over time, but a claim that the human brain evolved by adding on new layers. Plus, the view that distinct brain regions are rigidly devoted to specific functions.

Ahhh, yes. The reptilian brain remained unaltered, exempt from evolutionary modification, for hundreds of millions of years. The modern brain just built on top of that old brain in layers as if a multilayered cake...lol.

On a more intriguing note, I have posted this before but received little response.

Human Chromosome 2 is a fusion of two ancestral chromosomes
Alec MacAndrew

Introduction

All great apes apart from man have 24 pairs of chromosomes. There is therefore a hypothesis that the common ancestor of all great apes had 24 pairs of chromosomes and that the fusion of two of the ancestor's chromosomes created chromosome 2 in humans. The evidence for this hypothesis is very strong.

The Evidence

Evidence for fusing of two ancestral chromosomes to create human chromosome 2 and where there has been no fusion in other Great Apes is:
1) The analogous chromosomes (2p and 2q) in the non-human great apes can be shown, when laid end to end, to create an identical banding structure to the human chromosome 2.
2) The remains of the sequence that the chromosome has on its ends (the telomere) is found in the middle of human chromosome 2 where the ancestral chromosomes fused.
3) the detail of this region (pre-telomeric sequence, telomeric sequence, reversed telomeric sequence, pre-telomeric sequence) is exactly what we would expect from a fusion.
4) this telomeric region is exactly where one would expect to find it if a fusion had occurred in the middle of human chromosome 2.
5) the centromere of human chromosome 2 lines up with the chimp chromosome 2p chromosomal centromere.
6) At the place where we would expect it on the human chromosome we find the remnants of the chimp 2q centromere (4).

Not only is this strong evidence for a fusion event, but it is also strong evidence for common ancestry; in fact, it is hard to explain by any other mechanism.

more....

Let us re-iterate what we find on human chromosome 2. Its centromere is at the same place as the chimpanzee chromosome 2p as determined by sequence similarity. Even more telling is the fact that on the 2q arm of the human chromosome 2 is the unmistakable remains of the original chromosome centromere of the common ancestor of human and chimp 2q chromosome, at the same position as the chimp 2q centromere (this structure in humans no longer acts as a centromere for chromosome 2.

Conclusion

The evidence that human chromosome 2 is a fusion of two of the common ancestor's chromosomes is overwhelming.

http://www.evolutionpages.com/chromosome_2.htm

IMO, there exists no compelling natural adaptive reason for our extraordinary brain. All other mammals seem to do just fine with a considerably lower evolutionary development.
Even our closest related members of the great apes seem to have done quite well without Shakespeare.

It would suggest that instead of a gradual modification, a significant beneficial mutative event might have caused such an evolutionary leap and that concept is supported by the fusion of chromosome 2 at which point humans actually split from our common ancestor. Did the fusion create a greater, more complex brain growth instruction?

 

[C C]

IMO, there exists no compelling natural adaptive reason for our extraordinary brain. All other mammals seem to do just fine with a considerably lower evolutionary development.
Even our closest related members of the great apes seem to have done quite well without Shakespeare.

It would suggest that instead of a gradual modification, a significant beneficial mutative event might have caused such an evolutionary leap and that concept is supported by the fusion of chromosome 2 at which point humans actually split from our common ancestor. Did the fusion create a greater, more complex brain growth instruction?

The fusing event causing the origin of chromosome 2 may date back to as much as 4.5 million years ago.

3 million years ago human ancestors still had chimpanzee-sized brains. Around that time or later, however, the offspring of Australopithecus afarensis (a relative, at least) may have experienced an extended childhood.

Ancient hominins had small brains like apes, but longer childhoods like humans
https://www.uchicagomedicine.org/fo...s-like-apes-but-longer-childhoods-like-humans

“As early as 3 million years ago, children had a long dependence on caregivers,” said Zeresenay (Zeray) Alemseged, PhD, Donald N. Pritzker Professor of Organismal Biology and Anatomy [...] “That gave children more time to acquire cognitive and social skills. By understanding that childhood emerged 3.5 million years ago, we are establishing the timing for the advent of this milestone event in human evolution.”​

By two million years ago, Homo habilis and others had developed increased skull tissue: larger brains.

Zeb2 gene (below) is located on chromosome 2.

Scientists discover how humans develop larger brains than other apes
https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/828374
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2021/mar/24/scientists-discover-why-the-human-brain-is-so-big

EXCERPT: Lancaster and her colleagues collected cells, often left over from medical tests or operations, from humans, gorillas and chimps, and reprogrammed them into stem cells. They then grew these cells in such a way that encouraged them to turn into brain organoids – little lumps of brain tissue a few millimetres wide.

After several weeks, the human brain organoids were by far the largest of the lot, and close examination revealed why. In human brain tissue, so-called neural progenitor cells – which go on to make all of the cells in the brain – divided more than those in great ape brain tissue.

Lancaster, whose study is published in Cell, added: “You have an increase in the number of those cells, so once they switch to making the different brain cells, including neurons, you have more to start with, so you get an increase in the whole population of brain cells across the entire cortex.”

Mathematical modelling of the process showed that the difference in cell proliferation happens so early in brain development, that it ultimately leads to a near doubling in the number of neurons in the adult human cerebral cortex compared with that in the great apes.

The researchers went on to identify a gene that is crucial to the process. Known as Zeb2, it switches on later in human tissue, allowing the cells to divide more before they mature. Tests showed that delaying the effects of Zeb2 made gorilla brain tissue grow larger, while turning it on sooner in human brain organoids made them grow more like the ape ones.​

Traditional ideas:

Why do humans have such huge brains? Scientists have a few hypotheses.
https://www.vox.com/science-and-health/2018/5/23/17377200/human-brain-size-evolution-nature

EXCERPT: So far, evolutionary anthropologists have laid out three broad categories of explanations for why the human mind grew so large (there are many other, more specific sub-theories). They are:

• Environmental: Physical challenges — like finding, hunting, or remembering sources of food — provided selection pressure for bigger brains.
• Social: Interacting with others — either cooperatively or competitively — favored people with brains large enough to anticipate the actions of others.
• Cultural: People who were able to hold on to accumulated knowledge and teach it to others were most likely to reproduce. (One of these cultural factors could have been cooking. As biological anthropologist Richard Wrangham famously argued in his 2009 book Catching Fire, when we learned to cook food, we got access to more easily digestible calories, which freed up energy and time develop bigger brains.)

It’s likely all three factors played a role and influenced one another. But the mix has to be precisely right to create the human brain in its current form. For example, if natural selection pressures favored a high degree of cooperation, that would actually favor a smaller brain. Think about it: If you rely on others to a high degree, you don’t need to use your own brain as much. Ants, an incredibly cooperative species, don’t have much when it comes to brains. Same goes for bees. ​

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[Write4U]

Thanks for that comprehensive summation.

What intrigued me most is the fact that only humans have 23 pairs of chromosomes. All other great apes have 24 pair, just like our common ancestor.

This seems significant to me because this is the single greatest difference between our species and apparently was the causal mutation for the emergence of the human strain. There can be no other conclusion.

Given that the human brain far exceeds the necessary sophistication, such as it evolved in other great apes, it seemed to me that these two events must have some common denominator. Change in chromosome pairs, change in species?

 

[Write4U]

After several weeks, the human brain organoids were by far the largest of the lot, and close examination revealed why. In human brain tissue, so-called neural progenitor cells – which go on to make all of the cells in the brain – divided more than those in great ape brain tissue.

A possible result of a larger set of growth instructions contained in the fused chromosome?
Note that the human fused chromosome is twice as large as each individual ape chromosome.

What emergent growth potentials resulted from the formation of that much larger bio-chemical polymer?

 

[exchemist]

A possible result of a larger set of growth instructions contained in the fused chromosome?
Note that the human fused chromosome is twice as large as each individual ape chromosome.

What emergent growth potentials resulted from the formation of that much larger bio-chemical polymer?

There is no larger bio-chemical[sic] polymer mentioned.

And "emergent growth potential' is meaningless.

 

[C C]

[...] What intrigued me most is the fact that only humans have 23 pairs of chromosomes. All other great apes have 24 pair, just like our common ancestor.

This seems significant to me because this is the single greatest difference between our species and apparently was the causal mutation for the emergence of the human strain. There can be no other conclusion. [...]

Maybe. Need to actually trace certain human attributes to smoking guns in the alterations that fell out of chromosome 2's origins. Fully rule out a coincidence or spurious correlation. Somebody should actually propose the idea in a paper, first, so that it can be critically assessed and researched. Not sure anyone even has.

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[Write4U]

There is no larger bio-chemical[sic] polymer mentioned.

Did you look at the mutated chromosome? It is almost a total straight fusion of 2 individual chromosomes,resulting in a twice as large chromosome.

Chromosome 2

Humans normally have 46 chromosomes in each cell, divided into 23 pairs. Two copies of chromosome 2, one copy inherited from each parent, form one of the pairs. Chromosome 2 is the second largest human chromosome, spanning about 243 million building blocks of DNA (base pairs) and representing almost 8 percent of the total DNA in cells.

https://medlineplus.gov/genetics/chromosome/2/

And "emergent growth potential' is meaningless

No, it isn't. Greater biochemical complexity almost always results in greater sophistication of emergent properties. (integrative levels of organization.)

Because it doesn't always result in greater emergent properties does not negate the fact that it usually does. The human brain is a perfect example. Greater complexity, greater sophistication in general, even if some simpler brains may have extraordinary emergent qualities that are lacking in more complex organisms.

Biological Complexity and Integrative Levels of Organization

Emergent Properties

When units of biological material are put together, the properties of the new material are not always additive, or equal to the sum of the properties of the components. Instead, at each level, new properties and rules emerge that cannot be predicted by observations and full knowledge of the lower levels. Such properties are called emergent properties (Novikoff, 1945).

Life itself is an example of an emergent property. For instance, a single-celled bacterium is alive, but if you separate the macromolecules that combined to create the bacterium, these units are not alive. Based on our knowledge of macromolecules, we would not have been able to predict that they could combine to form a living organism, nor could we have predicted all of the characteristics of the resulting bacterium.

Thus, our understanding of physical and chemical properties in lower levels of organization helps us understand only some of the properties of living organisms, which prevents use of a reductionist approach. No matter how well we understand the physics and chemistry of living systems, we must recognize that living systems, and other high integrative levels, have new and unique properties that emerge through the combination of the lower-level units of matter (Novikoff, 1945). Likewise, our understanding of the new emergent properties at a higher level does not help us understand the properties of the lower levels, because each integrative level of organization has its own particular structure and emergent properties.

more ...... https://www.nature.com/scitable/top...y-and-integrative-levels-of-organization-468/[/quote]

 

[C C]

Do Women Really Make Up 80 Percent of All Climate Migrants?
https://undark.org/2023/06/14/do-women-really-make-up-80-percent-of-all-climate-migrants/

INTRO (Disha Shetty): It is an alarming and evocative statistic: An estimated 80 percent of climate migrants are women. The figure has been used by the United Nations in its official communication. It has been repeated in the media and by human rights groups. But it stands on shaky scientific ground — and most likely is wildly off the mark.

To begin with, the 80 percent figure fails the basic smell test. As someone who has reported on climate change and migration across India, it is clear to me that men are typically the first to move in the face of environmental pressures, often in search of seasonal income or jobs in cities. Women and children tend to be the last to go, if they leave at all.

Perhaps more importantly, there are currently no comprehensive datasets that can tell us how climate migrant populations break down along gender lines. In fact, experts say there isn’t even a consensus on the definition of who counts as a climate migrant. When people migrate, it is often due to a combination of factors. Environment, when it comes into play, is just one of them.

Where, then, does the 80 percent figure come from? (MORE - details)
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[C C]

Gender activists get a paper retracted for unjustified technical reasons—just to discredit its results
https://whyevolutionistrue.com/2023...hnical-reasons-just-to-discredit-its-results/

INTRO EXCERPTS (Jerry Coyne): Colin Wright, who’s turned out a number of clear and well written pieces on gender issues, has by so doing inserted himself into a maelstrom, for there are no activists so authoritarian and unforgiving as gender activists. In fact, their actions in getting a paper retracted is the subject of Wright’s latest piece in City Journal (click on first screenshot below) which recounts a fracas that I think we should know about.

Why? Because it shows very clearly how ideology can distort science, and how activists can get a paper retracted for no good reasons, just to discredit the contents of that paper. Much of the science around gender issues is currently unsettled, including the notion of a syndrome called Rapid Onset Gender Dysphoria (ROGD), its possible influence by social pressure, and, of course, whether puberty blockers can cause permanent damage or are completely reversible.

Instead of allowing open discourse on these issues, activists try to shut down all discourse, including scientific publication, in favor of their own views: that ROGD doesn’t exist, that children “know” instinctively if they’re in the wrong body, and that any child or adolescent who’s confused about their gender must immediately receive “affirmative therapy”, which appears to involve enthusiastic rather than objective support by therapists coupled with a nearly instantaneous prescription for puberty blockers.

Any deviation from this scenario produces a storm of opprobrium [...] Now there’s a new paper by two authors on ROGD, and that one (click on second screenshot below) has generated all the scandal. I’ll try to be brief and give a numbered sequence of events... (MORE - missing details)
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