More on mice.

Posted by DissidentMan on November 21, 2005, 03:59 PM | #

The pages at this site are not XHTML strict. At least that’s what it says when I click on the XHTML validator link at the bottom. I would like to see compliance myself.

Posted by J Richards on November 21, 2005, 07:56 PM | #

DissidentMan,

The Doc type of the template is XHTML 1.0 Transitional, not Strict.  Anyway, I am aware of a handful of HTML validation errors, but the original template had a lot more validation errors, most of which have been corrected.  Some of the validation errors result from improper coding by the bloggers and commentators (especially involving ampersands and not adding a name attribute to images) and it is unlikely that all of our pages will be free of validation errors, but these validation errors are minor and will not create problems with modern browsers; they will be minimized with time though and the bloggers will be educated about proper coding.

Posted by onetwothree on November 21, 2005, 07:59 PM | #

Don’t worry about the supermice:

http://www.wimp.com/crazykitty/

Posted by Svigor on November 21, 2005, 08:31 PM | #

But, but, Scroob has already assured us that none of this is possible!

Sorry Scroob, I couldn’t resist.

Posted by J Richards on November 21, 2005, 09:31 PM | #

DissidentMan,

I just looked at the template and corrected two very minor HTML validation errors.  Now, the template is clean and all remaining errors are the fault of improper coding by the bloggers and commentators.  I will see what I can do to minimize this problem.

Posted by Svigor on November 21, 2005, 09:51 PM | #

Great work JR, the site looks great…er, except maybe for the blue-green, it seems a tad “institutional.”  Maybe that’s apropos!  :D

Posted by J Richards on November 21, 2005, 10:45 PM | #

Svigor,

I am glad that you like the new design, but whereas the basic layout has been finalized, there is still some tweaking—including some color changes—that needs to be done. 

Søren,

I will point out some related research that is a couple of years old but is no less troubling for leftists.  Basically, scientists have taken a population of inbred mice (not excessively inbred) so as to minimize genetic variability in their sample and then had the mice breed assortatively along the lines of aggressive behavior.  Thus, within a few generations, you end up with two lines of mice from the ancestral population, one line much more aggressive than the other in the same social situations.  This is not all.  Much to the chagrin of social learning theorists, male mice reared to adulthood in isolation are highly likely to attack other male mice the first time they are exposed to them, which surely cannot be blamed on any kind of social learning, and on top of this, if you attempt to teach mice to be more aggressive by exposing them to mice fighting each other, the mice being exposed to the fights actually calm down and are less likely to initiate fighting in provocative situations.  In some hamsters species, the reverse is true, i.e., the hamsters being exposed to other hamsters fighting each other are more likely to engage in aggression themselves.  This difference is related to the nature of the species.  Mice are social animals whereas the hamsters studied (e.g., Syrian hamsters) live mostly in isolation.  Forcing these animals to live unnaturally (mice grown in isolation and hamsters grown in the company of several other hamsters) causes abnormal brain functioning that is completely or partly reversible, depending on the nature and extent of experimental manipulation.

You may want to read the following in regard to the above: 

Cairns, R. B. Aggression from a developmental perspective: genes, environments and interactions. Ciba Foundation Symposium. 1996;194:45-60.

Posted by Kubilai on November 21, 2005, 11:37 PM | #

JR,

Can something be done about the constant typing in of the code word in order to preview and submit comments?

Posted by J Richards on November 22, 2005, 04:20 AM | #

Kubilai,

You do not have to enter the word in the captcha to preview your comment; you need to enter it in order to submit your comment.  I have added a note on this issue right above the captcha on the comments page.  I could add a login facility, which will allow those logged in to post comments without entering a captcha, but the problem is that in order to login, you will have to register with a real email address and then this email address will be displayed for others to see.  A workaround is to just not display the email addresses of the commentators or a commentator could set up an email address for himself just to register with MR.  I have been mulling over this issue and will let Guessedworker decide it.

Posted by Fred Scrooby on November 22, 2005, 09:25 AM | #

“But, but, Scroob has already assured us that none of this is possible!”  (—Svigor)

What I said stands, Svigor.  Experiments like this have been a dime a dozen for fifty years.  They do not mean designer babies are on the horizon or anywhere near it.  Anyone who denies the relevance of immigration policy on grounds of scientists’ supposed emerging or imminent ability to change the race of babies is talking science-fiction nonsense on the level of the Loch Ness monster, Bigfoot, the crop circles in England, and the flying saucers at Roswell.

J. Richards, I think the site’s new look is fantastic, by the way. 
______
Moratorium-plus-Repatriation!

Posted by Svigor on November 22, 2005, 02:51 PM | #

I was kidding Scroob.

Anyone who denies the relevance of immigration policy on grounds of scientists’ supposed emerging or imminent ability to change the race of babies is talking science-fiction nonsense on the level of the Loch Ness monster, Bigfoot, the crop circles in England, and the flying saucers at Roswell.

You’re linking two things that don’t need linking.  It is simple common sense not to put all of one’s eggs into a single basket.  Whether one puts the timeline for genetic engineering at 20 or 50 or 250 years, or predicts probabilities at .001% or 50% or 90% is immaterial in this regard.

Btw, since the inflow of third worlders and hostile aliens (Chinese, subcontinentals, etc.,) substantially lowers said probabilities, one could make the argument that anti-progressives like Bush favor it for “fundamentalist” reasons.

Posted by Svigor on November 22, 2005, 02:56 PM | #

Oh, to the GNXPers of the world - of course no one has done a study to show that the benefits from admitting cognitively elite aliens are outweighed by the costs.

That’s part of my point - we don’t know the costs and benefits of aliens, yet here they are.

Posted by Rushton on December 07, 2005, 05:36 PM | #

A bit off topic; have you heard about the Rushtonian bats http://uk.news.search.yahoo.com/search/news?p=BATS+TESTICLES&ei=UTF-8&meta=vc=&fl=0&fr=fp-tab-web-t-1

Might stimulate heretical thoughts.