Mokele

That the banana thing is irrelevant to genetic engineering in crops for the reasons I mentioned above, for one.

Parasites are to the detriment of the host, symbiotes are to the host's advantage. Mokele

I dunno, I see a lot of similarities between the book and the movie, and those differences are probably a result of the book being written before we really knew much about heredity and DNA. However, I could also see that I may simply be linking them because of the similarity of subject matter and theme. Mokele

You are aware that 35 is less than 42.4, right?

Well, I'm a white male from an affluent family, so that's most of the election won. On the other hand, I'm also bi and an immigrant. But if I go into the closet and it's for anything other than president, well, rich white male = win. Oh, wait, except I'm an atheist and actually have moral scruples. But seriously... No, yes, yes, yes, and only if unleashing 500-foot atomic monsters counts as "policy" I've been told so. Yes and no. I'm like a scaled-up Gimli with collosal sideburns (complete with the love of battle-axes and fighting), but kids also seem to inherently know that I have knowledge of weird and cool animals. Not without mind control technology. I'm not exactly Mr. Popular unless we narrow the competion to a severely bias sample in terms of charisma (like, say, the population of a sci-fi convention). No, hence making me even more un-electable. Smear? No. Would I be scathing, cynical, sarcastic, critical and just plain mean? I can't give up my hobbies, now can I? Oh hell no. Does being a former polygamist count? No, I'm not making that part up. Looks like I'll just have to resort to conquest via robot armies. Mokele

Given that Skye is in australia, I suspect they're some form of Pleurodire turtle (commonly called side-necked, though many don't have very long necks). As such, you're not likely to find them in the US pet trade for less than several hundred. Given that AU has a total import/export ban on live animals, I suspect you won't find that particular species at all. Yep, most feed just fine on frozen mice. I get mine here. Adults are pretty nice, but babies are very nippy. They're also nearly $100 each outside of AU. Plus, given the size and strength of most of genus Morelia, I wouldn't recommend them as first time pets. Mokele

Why don't you try just not killing it? They're not hurting anyone, even the venomous species. Over 70% of venomous snakebites are caused by people attempting to catch or kill the animal. Just leave it alone and let it do what it evolved to do. Mokele

The Abyss was very good, too.

Pigs have 30-minute orgasms.

Well, on one hand, the information *does* seem plausible, but the pertinence to genetic engineering is nearly zero. Selective breeding is basically original and crappy genetic engineering. It takes a hell of a long time, and produces collosal problems like these banana issues and the famous health troubles of purebred dogs. In each case, the problem is the gene pool. In plants, the ability to clonally reproduce has allowed us to create entire crops with an original gene pool of 1 and no diversity, leading to these problems. In dogs, while the lack of natural (or low tech artificial) clonal reproduction has necessitated an expanded gene pool, the selective breeding process as still relied on very small gene pools which are very prone to manifesting negative recessive traits; it's basically inbreeding, but not quite. However, genetic engineering is not so restricted. If we want a plant with, say, fungus resistance, we can add the resistance genes to thousands or millions of different individual plants, resulting in a huge gene pool for the future and much-improved genetic diversity. Furthermore, because of genetic techniques we can actually monitor the diversity directly and, if it gets too low, just alter some more plants from the non-altered population, giving the gene pool a fresh infusion. While the article is right about the dangers of poorly-planned selective breeding, those same dangers do not directly translate to GM crops. Mokele

Looks like around about $150, from what I can see on this site. A quick google yeilded an abundance of care sheets, with this one and this one seeming to be the best. Mokele

They're very cool animals, no doubt about it. My GF wants one, and my sole condition was that she deals with the veggies. As for cooler than a beardie, the commonly availible ones would be: Crested geckos (a bit delicate the handle, but still handlable), dwarf spiny-tailed monitors (large-ish at 2 feet with more space requirements), frilled dragons (the australian ones with the huge neck frill that pops out), basilisks and water dragons. Some of the smaller species, such a diamond terrapins or map turtles, maybe. The problem is that red-ears and other sliders grow to larger than a dinner plate and need very large tanks. Mokele

By this logic, we should kill all the animals, since they also contribute to greenhouse effect by inconsiderately continuing to breathe. Mokele

Yes, but heterozygote advantage only works when there actually is a fitness advantage to heterozygotes. In the modern US, without malaria, there is no such advantage, and a penalty for homozygotes, so the gene frequency will no longer be maintained as it was in Africa. Also, heterozygotes for sickle-cell can and do develop full on sickle-cell (if only temporarily) at high altitudes. Sickle-cell allele beta hemoglobin causes unusual hemoglobin agregations when the blood loses oxygen. In homozygotes this happens just in normal metabolic processes, but in heterozygotes, situations which deplete the oxygen of individual RBCs can cause it too (such as malarial infestation or moving to high-altitude). So, for a heterozygote in Denver, there are actually more fitness penalties than advantages. Mokele

Oh, almost forgot, expense: Torts aren't very expensive, except for caging, animal purchase, and veggies. Turtles are a bit more expensive, because you have to add a filter to their tank. Large anything, be it snakes or lizards, are very expensive on account of the large cage (my tegu's enclosure cost me $200, and I built it myself, for 1/2 the price of commercially availible cages of that size). Lizards are also more expensive than snakes for 2 reasons: 1) they need proportionally more room, therefore a bigger cage 2) they require UVB light, and thus expensive lighting setups Veggies are more expensive than rodents if you buy frozen rodents and have them shipped in large numbers, thus saving on the shipping, but shipping along is over $26 or so, and therefore only balances out for orders of hundreds of mice. But the mice don't ever go bad. Once you've picked a species, I'll be more than happy to help explain the required set-up (or even tell you the required setup for a handful of species once you've narrowed it down, if it'll be a deciding factor). Mokele

Personally, I'd strongly recommend *against* Iguanas. They've wonderful animals, but are definitely *not* a first-time pet lizard. The reasons for this are twofold: 1) Iguanas are friggin huge, and require *very* large cages. Because they're arboreal, the cages have to be quite tall. For an adult ig, I'd go with nothing short of a 4 foot by 8 foot by 6 foot tall cage. 2) They have extremely complex diets. As pure veggie-eaters, they need to have a wide range of fruits and veggies availible, in precisely the right proportions with certain specific foods. You could write novel-length books about feeding themn properly, and spend over $20/week. Everythinhg has to be fresh, and you need to obsessively check calcium-phosphorous ratios and the presence of oxalates (which interfere with calcium absorption). Other reptiles eat veggies too (bearded dragons and blue-tongue skinks, for example), but will also eat meat/insects, which *drasticly* reduces the chances that you'll make an error in nutrition that could cripple or kill your pet. Another way of putting it: I've been keeping reptiles for over 12 years and I don't feel up to owning an Ig. Their diet is just a *huge* pain in the ass. ---------------- Ok, as for the rest: turtles/tortoises: I do know wood turtles are availible, but I'm also pretty sure they're not as cheap as other species. In general, most chelonians aren't "pick up and play with" animals, thought they can be interesting to observe and interact with (like letting them roam your room for a few hours every so often). The main caveat is do not buy a snapper or alligator snapper. With the former, you'll be missing fingers, with the latter, your whole hand. lizards: I'll break them down into three keeping-categories (without regard for phylogeny, but with regard to care and disposition). Small lizards: these are things like small geckos, anoles, etc. They're easy to keep, usually eat insects, and almost never tame. A few excpetions like the leopard gecko do, but most always regard humans are big predators. The can often live their whole lives in a 20-gal tank. Medium lizards: These are things like beardies, dwarf monitors (ridge-tails are apparently very cool and rarely top 2 feet), blue-tongue skinks, etc. The diet can be be anything from veggies-only to pure carnivore, with many in-betweens. Most of the lizards in pet shops in this range can be tamed quite well, but require larger cages, though rarely more than about 2 feet by 4 feet, and often about 2/3rds of that. I personally recommend the 3 species I listed above. Blue-tongues and slow, docile, smooth to the touch, but also funny-looking and omnivores. Beardies are higher-energy, but still very tame, a bit spikey but handleable, and omnivorous (moving more towards veggies with age). Ridge-tailled monitors (Varanus acanthurus or "Ackies") are about 2 feet long, high-energy, tameable, and exclusive insectivores/carnivores, but require a larger cage (2 x 4 foot). Large lizards: These are things like igs, rock iguanas, med and large monitors, and tegus. The first two are 100% herbivores, so I don't recommend them. The latter two... They're great animals, they really are. Tame (if you get the right species), interesting, smart, handlable (assuming you get the right species), and often very pretty...and huge eating machines. Monitors and tegus will go through several mice a week (but will readily eat pre-killed), and require *huge* cages. My tegu is in a 3 foot by 6 foot cage (he's 4 feet long), and I feel guilty because I feel I should get him a larger cage. A water monitor will need a cage no less than 4 foot by 8 foot, preferrably around 5 foot by 10 foot. Plus, with large lizards, if you do screw up and get bitten, it causes a lot more damage by far than even medium lizards. A big beardie might break the skin, a big monitor can tear your hand off before you even know what happened. Snakes: In general, the cage should have a perimeter twice the snake's length. A 4 foot snake needs a 3 x1 foot cage, but a 12 foot snake needs a 4 by 8 cage. Also, all commonly availible pet snakes not only will eat dead mice, but *should*; live prey can seriously injure the snake. Boas and pythons are very nice snakes, usually very pretty and often very laid-back (there are some exceptions, like all tree boas/pythons, some retics, and african rocks). However, they're also huge, and require huge cages. Furthermore, handling a truly large snake is actually quite difficult. My boa is almost 9 feet, and he's just at the size that I can deal with; any bigger and I'd need a second person. Even small boas are much stronger than same-size colubrids (advanced snakes, which are basically everything on the pet market that isn't a boa or python); the 4 foot corn snakes in my lab arepositively wimpy compared to the grip of my 3 foot ball python. Small species like Balls can make good pets, but balls tend to go off their food for no reason and for long periods (several months), though they don't seem to suffer as a result. Carpet and diamond pythons are nice, but large and nasty when young. My advice is to avoid this group or, if you get one, handle an adult first to see how hard it'll be. Also, they live for an excedingly long time; 20 years is average, and one ball python lived for 50 years. Colubrids are a very large group, which contain most of the popular pet snakes like kingsnakes, rat snakes, corn snakes, beauty snakes, and such, as well as the vast bulk of the snake species (1700 species out of 2700 snake species). Commonly availible ones, like kings, rats and corns will readily accept dead prey, rarely get to large sizes (most top out at 6 feet), but aren't so small you're afraid to handle them (adults are usually 3-4 feet), aren't anywhere near as strong as same-sized boids, and are usually extremely tame. Babies might need some work, but adult are generally very docile. They're also more active than boas, and tend to move about the cage rather than just sitting there. For snakes, they're the ideal starter pet. Plus, they aren't short-lived; 15 years is average, and they reach adulthood by 2. There's a huge variety availible of all sorts, both in terms of species and unusual pattern variations produced by selective breeding. --------- General stuff aside, I'd recommend either a colubrid like a king or corn snake, or a medium lizard like a bearded dragon. Mokele

Um, you do realize that "fitness", in terms of evolution, means number of surviving offspring, right? It has nothing to do with strength, intellect, diseases, lifespand, quality of life or any of that. It's a strictly reproductive term. Fitness, and the fitness conseuquences of traits, are soley determined by environment. Take Sickle-cell. In the USA, it's a genetic disease, but in Africa, it's adaptation to resist malaria. The adaptive value, and the fitness consequences, are determined by the presense of a particular aspect of the environment. Humans are currently dealing with a novel environment. Gene frequencies will change, as a result. For instance, I predict metabolisms will be higher in the future, since those with high metabolisms are less likely to get fat, a condition with drasticly reduces one's mating opportunities and is therefore maladaptive in terms of sexual selection in the current environment. But, should a giant asteroid then hit earth and cause a global famine, those with low metabolisms will then be selected for, since the environment changed. The evolutionary trend will have reversed itself. There is no over-arching "progess" behind evolution. It's simply adaptation of populations to the current local environmental conditions. If the environment changes, so do selective pressures, and what was good can become bad. The only traits that are absolutely "bad" are those that are lethal or sterilizing, and those will *always* be selected against, no matter what the state of socieity, since, after all, they're lethal or sterilizing. And even *those* could change with advances in medical science. Mokele

Lake Placid. Not 100% (of course), with some concessions to dramatic necessity, but overall it was suprisingly accurate. It was also *very* entertaining; it's a horror-comedy, with the comedy coming from the interactions of the characters. Think "The Mummy" but with a big crocodile instead. Mokele

Two kids want to be pro track stars. One is born in the US, one is born in Angola. The USA kid is from a middle-class family who can afford to hire him a personal trainer from a young age and let him dedicate much of his time to track. The Angolan kid is from a family of poor farmers who need him to work the fields simply in order to keep food in their mouths, and atheltic coaches don't even *exist* as far as he knows. How is that his fault? You could even say the same for a middle-class versus inner-city kid in the US. Where you are born and how much $ your parents have can ensure or prevent any atheltic career at all. Surely this is every bit as unfair as steroids. Mokele

I'm a bit skeptical of this. Source? The problem is that I doubt we'll *ever* be able to do that; there are simply too many variables to be accounted for. Not to mention that ecosystems are not static. Everything in them in continually evolving and changing. By the time you have a handle on species X, species Y has evolved some completely new traits and altered it's ecological interactions. Not to mention those species capable of learning. Also, ecosystems themselves are not stable, not in the long term. Sure, a new species we introduce or create might shake things up. But a natural migration or climatic change or evolutionary innovation of a member of this ecosystem might do the same. Hell, just look at what domestic cats in the US are doing to songbird populations. Or the ecological disruption that happens anyway when we tear down a forest to make a wheat field. There's no way to do *anything*, even breathe, without causing effects. The question is, what level of effects are acceptable. Mokele

Ok, serious question: Would it be possible to simply have a poll, open to everyone, on whether CS should be banned? To "vote him off SFN", in essence? Seriously, the relevant threads were proceding much more smoothly during CS's breif and unfortunately temporary absence. The only difference between him and a common troll is that trolls act on malice, while CS acts on sheer stupidity and delusion. However, regardless of motives, he's a disruption who contributes nothing of worth. I'm sick of him. I know damn sure that a lot of others are sick of him. I'd hazard a guess that *everyone* is sick of him. So why do we still deal with his bullshit? Mokele

If a microchip does have sentience or a spirit, does that mean that making it use Microsoft products is torture, and therefore immoral/criminal? Mokele

Seriously, David, go to Hollywood. Your ideas may have no basis in reality, but they'd be a hell of a lot better than the re-cycled crap they're putting on the screens these days. Mokele

Of course, but that doesn't make it fair. After all, people have been inheriting money for a long time too, so does that make it a fair contest when one of the two can afford an expert trainer and train 24/7, while the other has to self-train in between 3 jobs just to make ends meet? That's my issue: claiming that steroids are "unfair" doesn't make sense given the sheer number of other "unfair" factors that are completely overlooked. Mokele

Proof that I am truly and totally in love with my GF: I'm waiting to see HHGTG until she arrives so we can see it together. But, on that note, I'm dating a beautiful, brilliant woman who loves HHGTG and Terry Pratchett. I win at life! (and if you disagree, you haven't met my GF.) Mokele