Wholly and Solely Denotational Blog Entry Shocks Theoretical Rhetoricians

Posted by Guessedworker on October 04, 2007, 12:42 PM | #

Trodden upon ... it should have been “trodden upon”.

Of course, that’s not to suggest in any way that rats were transported in chains to the Aleutian cotton fields.

Posted by Guessedworker on October 04, 2007, 12:43 PM | #

Actually, they used car-hire.

Posted by 2R on October 04, 2007, 02:40 PM | #

Why don’t they just bring in a whole bunch of cats?

Posted by jp straley on October 04, 2007, 03:43 PM | #

http://www.anonym.to/?http://www.gnxp.com/

Hello:

The New Zealanders and Australians are the worlds best at removing alien species.  For a particularly interesting example, Google “MacQuarie Island Cats.”

Long story shore, they removed the cats and the rat population exploded.  Seabirds are better off than when the cats were on the island, but still under pressure from rats.

JPS

Posted by Fred Scrooby on October 04, 2007, 08:27 PM | #

Prof. Jared Diamond’s theory that men irresponsibly cutting down trees was what denuded Easter Island of its forests has been called into question by new research pointing to huge rat populations on the island, leading to destruction of its forests as famished rats turned to eating all the coconuts and other tree seeds lying on the ground, so no new trees grew.  See here (last paragraph) and here.

Posted by Robert Reis on October 05, 2007, 04:10 AM | #

Tack ska du ha.

RER

Posted by James Bowery on October 05, 2007, 08:18 AM | #

I saw an article in Discover Magazine that talked about all the good things that come from mixing up ecosystems from around the world.  It was the same guy who wrote a book declaring virtually all species, including man, parasites and talking about how good parasites are.  The guy is named Carl Zimmer, IIRC.  I mention the guy’s name because of course he is to be seen as an individual, not a part of a larger group that may be encouraging such ecological panmixia for some strange reason which, if it were know, certainly could not relate to his ethnicity, which we don’t and cannot know.

Posted by Fred Scrooby on October 05, 2007, 09:53 AM | #

In re James’ comment above:  Carl Zimmer is an extremely irritating race-denier and Euro genocide advocate.  I won’t divulge his ethnicity/religious background because my doing so might cause CvH to have conniption fits. 

On second thought, why not?  The ethnicity you are all thinking to yourselves, everybody, is the right one. 

(As the saying goes, Constantin:  “If the conniption fits, wear it!”)

Posted by ape-iarist on October 06, 2007, 01:07 AM | #

Purdue University Researchers Find ‘Mean Gene’ In Africanized ‘Killer’ Honey Bees

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind.—The gene for aggressive stinging behavior in Africanized honey bees—the so-called “killer bees”—has been identified by a group of scientists at three institutions.

Greg Hunt, a bee specialist with the Purdue University Department of Entomology and principal investigator on the research project, says finding the mean gene in honey bees “may help us reduce the occurrence of Africanized bees and prevent the spread of the gene to other bee colonies.”

Although Africanized honey bees are rarely the “killer bees” of 1970s Movie-of-the-Week fame, they are decidedly more aggressive than their European cousins. Research conducted in Venezuela in 1982 found that Africanized honey bees will attack a visual stimulus 20 times faster than European honey bees and that when they attack they deposit about eight times as many stingers in the first 30 seconds.

According to entomologists, though, Africanized honey bees aren’t bad, just misunderstood: “It seems like aggression when a bee stings you, but we call it defensive behavior,” Hunt says. “Different insects use various methods to protect themselves from predators. Bee stings are a response to predation by mammals—bee venom is specialized for causing pain in vertebrates.”

Even without further migration, the Africanized bees still could threaten the bee population throughout North America. “In the tropics the aggressiveness trait is a desired one; we don’t know if it will be a dominant trait in temperate areas, too,” Hunt says. “If it is, the aggressiveness trait could be introduced in northern areas in European bees even if the subspecies of Africanized bees doesn’t expand its territory.”

Also, the mechanism for spreading the trait is already in place. Because of fatal infestations of two parasites, there are almost no wild bees left in North America. Virtually all honey bees are raised by beekeepers who buy their queen bees each spring from large breeders in the southern states near the regions where Africanized honey bees have invaded. These queens could acquire the gene for aggressive behavior and spread the trait to other regions of the country, Hunt says.

This would be bad news for beekeepers, because the Africanized honey bees are quite troublesome. This could cause even more beekeepers to quit their declining ranks. Among the problems:

  * Africanized bees bring concerns about liability if they sting neighbors or livestock or pets. “In the tropics many people have stopped raising bees because of concerns about liability,” Hunt says.
  * Honey bees lose their stingers after an attack, which causes them to die. A very aggressive colony of bees can lose thousands of its bees when they stage an attack.
  * The aggressiveness of Africanized bees forces beekeepers to don protective clothing, which is hot, uncomfortable and cumbersome.
  * Africanized honey bees produce less honey per hive than European breeds.
  * Finally, the Africanized bees are more likely to abscond from the bee keepers when the conditions aren’t to their liking. “The Africanized bees are a very nervous breed,” Hunt says.

Posted by vo on October 06, 2007, 02:09 PM | #

Purpose of appendix believed found!

http://www.cnn.com/2007/HEALTH/10/05/appendix.purpose.ap/index.html

If any MR person can help out with the metaphoricalisms of good/bad bacteria, the flora of bacteria, digestive and immune systems, on and on - das macht mir frei, ich gedenken.