Favorite Villain Re: [scifinoir2] Re: Heroes finale
While they were not necessarily my favorite, I found the Reavers on Firefly pretty scary. I also found three other Whedon Villians interesting. The principal on Buffy, The Law firm on Angel and Jasime (Gina Torres) also from Angel were all pretty interesting --- In scifinoir2@yahoogroups.com, Daryle [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: See? Ya feelin¹ me on the Blake¹s 7! NOBODY had bad guys like Blake¹s 7. And no bad guy has ever dressed as well as Supreme Commander Servalan! On 12/13/07 5:45 PM, Martin [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Speaking of ladies (and using the Wayback Machine), Servalan, from Blake's 7. Tracey de Morsella (formerly Tracey L. Minor) [EMAIL PROTECTED] mailto:tdlists%40multiculturaladvantage.com wrote: Good one. But that reminds me... SCORPIUS!!! I really enjoyed him buky90 wrote: the female commander from farside. just to remind us whos more dangerous of the species, and when she was pregnant she got more vicious On 12/12/07, Martin wrote: IMO, the best kind of villain is the Operative type. A guy who's just doing his job, albeit a job whose morals the masses might call into question. Deity. I just validated Mister Bush. Tracey de Morsella (formerly Tracey L. Minor) [EMAIL PROTECTED] mailto:tdlists%40multiculturaladvantage.com wrote: Buy the way, I love the operative. Sure wish we could see more of him Daryle wrote: Hal not only counts, it counts as the best developed villain of all! Good choice! My short list has to include the Tyrell Corporation (yes, the whole corporation) of ³Blade Runner², The entire cast of ³Blake¹s 7², Elijah from ³Unbreakable², The Operative (Chiwetel Ejiofor¹s character) from ³Serenity², and of course...the Cardassians. On 12/12/07 1:07 PM, Bosco Bosco wrote: There's so many good villains to choose from. I'm a villain lover actually. In no particular order here's some faves off the top of my head. Darth Vader, Baron Harkonnen, The Reavers from Firefly/Serenity, Dr. John Whorfin, Spike, and The Others on Lost. Do Q and Hal count as villains? I count them as such I suppose. Bosco --- Tracey de Morsella (formerly Tracey L. Minor) wrote: One of my favorite villians is Ra's Al Ghul from Batman. He seems to be one of the more fleshed out villains. I love his back flash stories and how they reveal his motivations. his relationship with Batman is never Black and White. Mike Street wrote: I like well developed villains. I think Magneto is excellent cause he has a clear cut purpose, a past, and goal with what he's trying to do. Or the Joker cause he's nut's and can't tell right from wrong anymore. I do think the good guys are to GOOD. I always wanted the Legion of Doom to kick the good guys ass once and a while..just for a reality check. My favorite was when Batman got his ass kicked and was out and the Azreal came in to take his place and was kicking everyone ass. Them stupid Batman comes back to kick his ass. I was like this is bull shit. I personally like the eviler Batman and was hoping that Bruce Wane would retire for good. [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] I got friends who are in prison and Friends who are dead. I'm gonna tell ya something that I've often said. You know these things that happen, That's just the way it's supposed to be. And I can't help but wonder, Don't ya know it coulda been me. __ Be a better friend, newshound, and know-it-all with Yahoo! Mobile. Try it now. http://mobile.yahoo.com/;_ylt=Ahu06i62sR8HDtDypao8Wcj9tAcJ [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] Yahoo! Groups Links There is no reason Good can't triumph over Evil, if only angels will get organized along the lines of the Mafia. -Kurt Vonnegut, A Man Without A Country - Looking for last minute shopping deals? Find them fast with Yahoo! Search. [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] Yahoo! Groups Links There is no reason
[scifinoir2] Movie Reviews: 'I Am Legend'
Movie Reviews: 'I Am Legend' A lot of the reviews of I Am Legend are not about the story or the performances but about the special effects. The film reportedly cost more than $150 million to make, largely due to the intricate, post-apocalyptic effects scenes. Writes Carina Chocano in the Los Angeles Times: The first third of the movie is a high-octane joy ride through post-apocalyptic Manhattan, and you can't stop asking yourself how they did it. How did they do it? Endless swaths of Fifth Avenue are cleared out and rendered feral, with grass poking through the concrete and herds of deer galloping through the canyons. Roger Ebert begins his review in the Chicago Sun Times this way: The opening scenes of I Am Legend have special effects so good that they just about compensate for some later special effects that are dicey. Especially dicey, it seems, is the creation of the film's zombies. Claudia Puig in USA Today comments: The rampaging zombies don't look at all convincing. Instead, they look like escapees from a second-rate video game. Desson Williams in the Washington Post agrees. They are, quite simply, too superhuman, he writes. They move too fast and perfectly. They belong in a video game, but not a big movie. Will Smith gets numerous kudos for essentially playing the only character in the movie. (He is after all, the last man on Earth.) There are not many performers who can make themselves interesting in isolation, without human supporting players, A.O. Scott observes in the New York Times. But it is the charismatic force of [Smith's] personality that makes his character's radical solitude scary and fascinating, as well as strangely appealing. http://www.imdb.com/news/sb/2007-12-14/ Yahoo! Groups Links * To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/scifinoir2/ * Your email settings: Individual Email | Traditional * To change settings online go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/scifinoir2/join (Yahoo! ID required) * To change settings via email: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] * To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] * Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
Re: [scifinoir2] Movie Reviews: 'I Am Legend'
I'm going to see it today On Dec 15, 2007 5:14 AM, Tracey de Morsella (formerly Tracey L. Minor) [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Movie Reviews: 'I Am Legend' A lot of the reviews of I Am Legend are not about the story or the performances but about the special effects. The film reportedly cost more than $150 million to make, largely due to the intricate, post-apocalyptic effects scenes. Writes Carina Chocano in the Los Angeles Times: The first third of the movie is a high-octane joy ride through post-apocalyptic Manhattan, and you can't stop asking yourself how they did it. How did they do it? Endless swaths of Fifth Avenue are cleared out and rendered feral, with grass poking through the concrete and herds of deer galloping through the canyons. Roger Ebert begins his review in the Chicago Sun Times this way: The opening scenes of I Am Legend have special effects so good that they just about compensate for some later special effects that are dicey. Especially dicey, it seems, is the creation of the film's zombies. Claudia Puig in USA Today comments: The rampaging zombies don't look at all convincing. Instead, they look like escapees from a second-rate video game. Desson Williams in the Washington Post agrees. They are, quite simply, too superhuman, he writes. They move too fast and perfectly. They belong in a video game, but not a big movie. Will Smith gets numerous kudos for essentially playing the only character in the movie. (He is after all, the last man on Earth.) There are not many performers who can make themselves interesting in isolation, without human supporting players, A.O. Scott observes in the New York Times. But it is the charismatic force of [Smith's] personality that makes his character's radical solitude scary and fascinating, as well as strangely appealing. http://www.imdb.com/news/sb/2007-12-14/ Yahoo! Groups Links -- -- Blogs: The Greasy Guide http://greasyguide.com Your Online Destination for Urban Information Coming Soon Street Sweet NYC http://www.streetsweetnyc.com Get your fix on cupcake bliss. [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
[scifinoir2] FW: Study finds humans still evolving, and quickly]
Original Message Subject:[AFAMHED] FW: Study finds humans still evolving, and quickly Date: Sat, 15 Dec 2007 08:24:34 -0500 Reply-To: Coates, Rodney D. Dr. [EMAIL PROTECTED] Study finds humans still evolving, and quickly By Karen Kaplan, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer 2:44 PM PST, December 10, 2007 http://www.latimes.com/news/science/la-sci-evolution11dec11,0,5882337.story The pace of human evolution has been increasing at a stunning rate since our ancestors began spreading through Europe, Asia and Africa 40,000 years ago, quickening to 100 times historic levels after agriculture became widespread, according to a study published today. By examining more than 3 million variants of DNA in 269 people, researchers identified about 1,800 genes that have been widely adopted in relatively recent times because they offer some evolutionary benefit. Until recently, anthropologists believed that evolutionary pressures on humans eased after the transition to a more stable agrarian lifestyle. But in the last few years, they realized the opposite was true -- diseases swept through societies in which large groups lived in close quarters for a long period. Altogether, the recent genetic changes account for 7% of the human genome, according to the study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The advantage of all but about 100 of these genes remains a mystery, said University of Wisconsin-Madison anthropologist John Hawks, who led the study. But the research team was able to conclude that infectious diseases and the introduction of new foods were the primary reasons that some genes swept through populations with such speed. If there were not a mismatch between the population and the environment, there wouldn't be any selection, Hawks said. Dietary changes, disease changes -- those create circumstances where selection can happen. One of the most famous examples is the spread of a gene that allows adults to digest milk. Though children were able to drink milk, they typically developed lactose intolerance as they grew up. But after cattle and goats were domesticated in Europe and yaks and mares were domesticated in Asia, adults with a mutation that allowed them to digest milk had a nutritional advantage over those who didn't. As a result, they were more likely to have healthy offspring, prompting the mutation to spread, Hawks said. The mechanism also explains why genetic resistance to malaria has spread among Africans -- who live where disease-carrying mosquitoes are prevalent -- but not among Europeans or Asians. Most of the genetic changes the researchers identified were found in only one geographic group or another. Races as we know them today didn't exist until fewer than 20,000 years ago, when genes involved in skin pigmentation emerged, Hawks said. Paler skin allowed people in northern latitudes to absorb more sunlight to make vitamin D. As populations expanded into new environments, the pressures faced in those environments would have been different, said Noah Rosenberg, a human geneticist at the University of Michigan, who wasn't involved in the study. So it stands to reason that in different parts of the world, different genes will appear to have experienced natural selection. Hawks and his colleagues from UC Irvine, the University of Utah and Santa Clara-based gene chip maker Affymetrix Inc. examined genetic data collected by the International HapMap Consortium, which cataloged single- letter differences among the 3 billion letters of human DNA in people of Nigerian, Japanese, Chinese and European descent. The researchers looked for long stretches of DNA that were identical in many people, suggesting that a gene was widely adopted and that it spread relatively recently, before random mutations among individuals had a chance to occur. They found that the more the population grew, the faster human genes evolved. That's because more people created more opportunities for a beneficial mutation to arise, Hawks said. In the last 5,000 to 10,000 years, as agriculture was able to support increasingly large societies, the rate of evolutionary change rose to more than 100 times historical levels, the study concluded. Among the fastest-evolving genes are those related to brain development, but the researchers aren't sure what made them so desirable, Hawks said. There are other mysteries too. Nobody 10,000 years ago had blue eyes, Hawks said. Why is it that blue-eyed people had a 5% advantage in reproducing compared to non-blue-eyed people? I have no idea. _ [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
Re: [scifinoir2] FW: Study finds humans still evolving, and quickly]
You're gonna have to *prove* that to me, lady. Tracey de Morsella (formerly Tracey L. Minor) [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Original Message Subject: [AFAMHED] FW: Study finds humans still evolving, and quickly Date: Sat, 15 Dec 2007 08:24:34 -0500 Reply-To: Coates, Rodney D. Dr. [EMAIL PROTECTED] Study finds humans still evolving, and quickly By Karen Kaplan, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer 2:44 PM PST, December 10, 2007 http://www.latimes.com/news/science/la-sci-evolution11dec11,0,5882337.story The pace of human evolution has been increasing at a stunning rate since our ancestors began spreading through Europe, Asia and Africa 40,000 years ago, quickening to 100 times historic levels after agriculture became widespread, according to a study published today. By examining more than 3 million variants of DNA in 269 people, researchers identified about 1,800 genes that have been widely adopted in relatively recent times because they offer some evolutionary benefit. Until recently, anthropologists believed that evolutionary pressures on humans eased after the transition to a more stable agrarian lifestyle. But in the last few years, they realized the opposite was true -- diseases swept through societies in which large groups lived in close quarters for a long period. Altogether, the recent genetic changes account for 7% of the human genome, according to the study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The advantage of all but about 100 of these genes remains a mystery, said University of Wisconsin-Madison anthropologist John Hawks, who led the study. But the research team was able to conclude that infectious diseases and the introduction of new foods were the primary reasons that some genes swept through populations with such speed. If there were not a mismatch between the population and the environment, there wouldn't be any selection, Hawks said. Dietary changes, disease changes -- those create circumstances where selection can happen. One of the most famous examples is the spread of a gene that allows adults to digest milk. Though children were able to drink milk, they typically developed lactose intolerance as they grew up. But after cattle and goats were domesticated in Europe and yaks and mares were domesticated in Asia, adults with a mutation that allowed them to digest milk had a nutritional advantage over those who didn't. As a result, they were more likely to have healthy offspring, prompting the mutation to spread, Hawks said. The mechanism also explains why genetic resistance to malaria has spread among Africans -- who live where disease-carrying mosquitoes are prevalent -- but not among Europeans or Asians. Most of the genetic changes the researchers identified were found in only one geographic group or another. Races as we know them today didn't exist until fewer than 20,000 years ago, when genes involved in skin pigmentation emerged, Hawks said. Paler skin allowed people in northern latitudes to absorb more sunlight to make vitamin D. As populations expanded into new environments, the pressures faced in those environments would have been different, said Noah Rosenberg, a human geneticist at the University of Michigan, who wasn't involved in the study. So it stands to reason that in different parts of the world, different genes will appear to have experienced natural selection. Hawks and his colleagues from UC Irvine, the University of Utah and Santa Clara-based gene chip maker Affymetrix Inc. examined genetic data collected by the International HapMap Consortium, which cataloged single- letter differences among the 3 billion letters of human DNA in people of Nigerian, Japanese, Chinese and European descent. The researchers looked for long stretches of DNA that were identical in many people, suggesting that a gene was widely adopted and that it spread relatively recently, before random mutations among individuals had a chance to occur. They found that the more the population grew, the faster human genes evolved. That's because more people created more opportunities for a beneficial mutation to arise, Hawks said. In the last 5,000 to 10,000 years, as agriculture was able to support increasingly large societies, the rate of evolutionary change rose to more than 100 times historical levels, the study concluded. Among the fastest-evolving genes are those related to brain development, but the researchers aren't sure what made them so desirable, Hawks said. There are other mysteries too. Nobody 10,000 years ago had blue eyes, Hawks said. Why is it that blue-eyed people had a 5% advantage in reproducing compared to non-blue-eyed people? I have no idea. _ [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] There is no reason Good can't triumph over Evil, if only angels will get organized along the lines of the Mafia. -Kurt Vonnegut, A Man Without A
Re: [scifinoir2] Television Question
Comcast=Comcrap=EVIL Bosco Bosco [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Hey All I am doing research into cable. It seems like cable is a better deal than satellite and I have heard some unpleasant stories about Satellite service. However, I have no real experience with Satellite. Anyone got any advice, tips, pointers, nightmare stories or pleasant annecdotes? Help Me, I'm TV stupid Bosco __ Be a better friend, newshound, and know-it-all with Yahoo! Mobile. Try it now. http://mobile.yahoo.com/;_ylt=Ahu06i62sR8HDtDypao8Wcj9tAcJ There is no reason Good can't triumph over Evil, if only angels will get organized along the lines of the Mafia. -Kurt Vonnegut, A Man Without A Country - Never miss a thing. Make Yahoo your homepage. [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
Re: [scifinoir2] Television Question
My choices are Dish and Direct TV for Satellite or Time Warner for Cable B --- Martin [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Comcast=Comcrap=EVIL Bosco Bosco [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Hey All I am doing research into cable. It seems like cable is a better deal than satellite and I have heard some unpleasant stories about Satellite service. However, I have no real experience with Satellite. Anyone got any advice, tips, pointers, nightmare stories or pleasant annecdotes? Help Me, I'm TV stupid Bosco __ Be a better friend, newshound, and know-it-all with Yahoo! Mobile. Try it now. http://mobile.yahoo.com/;_ylt=Ahu06i62sR8HDtDypao8Wcj9tAcJ There is no reason Good can't triumph over Evil, if only angels will get organized along the lines of the Mafia. -Kurt Vonnegut, A Man Without A Country - Never miss a thing. Make Yahoo your homepage. [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] I got friends who are in prison and Friends who are dead. I'm gonna tell ya something that I've often said. You know these things that happen, That's just the way it's supposed to be. And I can't help but wonder, Don't ya know it coulda been me. Never miss a thing. Make Yahoo your home page. http://www.yahoo.com/r/hs
Re: [scifinoir2] Re: Who is Your Favorite Joker?
Again with the chimp-hating... g123curious [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:I saw this poll on Scifi. I wanted to know what you guys thought. With Batman Returns about to premier, i wanted to know, Who is Your Favorite Joker? The Original - Cesar Romero Jack Nicholson The Cartoon Joker - Mark Hamil The New Joker - Heath Ledger My favorite Joker has gone by the nicknames Chimpy McFlight-suit and Dubya. George http://ivebeenmugged.typepad.com There is no reason Good can't triumph over Evil, if only angels will get organized along the lines of the Mafia. -Kurt Vonnegut, A Man Without A Country - Be a better friend, newshound, and know-it-all with Yahoo! Mobile. Try it now. [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
Re: [scifinoir2] Re: Does Race Affect Your Intelligence?
Tracey, I have to retract that statement. I was more than a little angry at someone a long way off when I typed it in. I daresay that I'll have to re-examine the article at a later time. Tracey de Morsella (formerly Tracey L. Minor) [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: So you feel the examples and studies provided by the guy below to disprove the the examples and studies the eugenics advocates put out there were poor ones? If so, why, because I thought the were pretty good. If there is something wrong with these examples, please let me know. When these kids come at me with questions, I need to be knowledgeable. Why do you feel the guy below did not get it.Some of the people who you say do not get it are African American. Why would they not get it. I would thing facing it throughout your life would give you some degree of understanding Martin wrote: Tracey, I doubt that they get it themselves. They just saw the chance to sound off, and did so, regardless of the lack of intellectual firepower needed to tackle the subject. Tracey de Morsella (formerly Tracey L. Minor) wrote: Well that is why I liked this article and do not know why everybody is attacking it, since he challenged every so called fact that Slate put out there. This was a rebuttal in the New York Times editorial section. Why attack the person supporting your argument who shows data that contradicts the premise that we are inferior intellectually? As I said, I just don't get it Martin wrote: Tracey, I challenge the scientific in almost anything that Slate pushes onto its web page. I want to see the credentials of the person who wrote that. And, as a mathematician, I can make any batch of numbers say anything I want them to. Tracey de Morsella (formerly Tracey L. Minor) wrote: Here is the thing guys. I'm confused. There was a scientific article on Slate that said that Blacks statistically 15 -20 points dumber than anyone else and the guys had the numbers to support it. So this guy response by tearing about those numbers and showing that those numbers are irrelevant and providing evidence from other tests that disprove his theory and you have a problem with this guy. He is saying that race does not determine intellect in the face of all the scientists that are saying that race determines intellect. Your response baffles me. I got to reread this article Daryle wrote: Key term here: diversionary. I totally agree. Race is the new ³gay marriage². Anti-Christianity is the new ³immigration². We¹ve seen all of this before. Folks who write these articles should be ashamed of themselves. It¹s old hat at this point. Daryle On 12/12/07 2:12 PM, Martin wrote: (standing ovation) ravenadal wrote: I am so tired of this argument because it is diversionary. The truth of the matter is this: the only difference between uneducated white people and uneducated black people is that uneducated white people have jobs. The only difference between educated white people and educated black people is that educated white people have BETTER jobs. ~(no)rave! --- In scifinoir2@yahoogroups.com , Tracey de Morsella (formerly Tracey L. Minor) wrote: All Brains Are the Same Color By RICHARD E. NISBETT http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/09/opinion/09nisbett.html? pagewanted=2_r=1ref=opinion Ann Arbor, Mich. JAMES WATSON, the 1962 Nobel laureate, recently asserted that he was â?1/2inherently gloomy about the prospect of Africaâ?? and its citizens because â?1/2all our social policies are based on the fact that their intelligence is the same as ours â? whereas all the testing says not really.â?? Dr. Watsonâ?^(TM)s remarks created a huge stir because they implied that blacks were genetically inferior to whites, and the controversy resulted in his resignation as chancellor of Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory. But was he right? Is there a genetic difference between blacks and whites that condemns blacks in perpetuity to be less intelligent? The first notable public airing of the scientific question came in a 1969 article in The Harvard Educational Review by Arthur Jensen, a psychologist at the University of California, Berkeley. Dr. Jensen maintained that a 15-point difference in I.Q. between blacks and whites was mostly due to a genetic difference between the races that could never be erased. But his argument gave a misleading account of the evidence. And others who later made the same argument â? Richard Herrnstein and Charles Murray in â?1/2The Bell Curve,â?? in 1994, for example, and just recently, William Saletan in a series of articles on Slate â? have made the same mistake.
[scifinoir2] [Rumour] Tennant 'is leaving Doctor Who'
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/7145965.stm Tennant 'is leaving Doctor Who' Catherine Tate has suggested that the next series of Doctor Who could be the last for actor David Tennant. The comedian, speaking on Radio 2's Jonathan Ross programme, said: I think it's maybe David's last series. The BBC refused to comment on Mr Tennant's future as the show's star. Tate, who first appeared in the 2006 Christmas special, is to return as the doctor's assistant, Donna, for the entire run of the fourth series. She will also be joined for several episodes by the doctor's former companion Martha Jones, played by Freema Agyeman. When pressed on whether Tennant would return to play the timelord in special Dr Who shows in future, Tate replied: Possibly. The comedian also confirmed that the forthcoming series would be her last. Tate made her Doctor Who debut last year as a runaway bride who found herself transported into the Tardis as she prepared for her wedding on Christmas Eve. The episode attracted an audience of 9.4 million when it was screened on BBC One on Christmas Day. This year's Christmas special, starring Kylie Minogue, is due to be screened at 1850 GMT on 25 December. Speaking to Doctor Who magazine, the pop star said appearing in the show was like stepping back in time. I really felt at home being back in the world of TV, she added. I've definitely got the acting bug again!
Re: [scifinoir2] FW: Study finds humans still evolving, and quickly]
i wonder if any of the changes will allow us to live longer, become stronger, faster, or smarter? Or, are there those among us with a mutant resistance to pollution, mercury, steroids, etc., who can tolerate the jacked-up environment more? Maybe one day clean air, water, and blue skies will be anathema to some. -- Original message -- From: Tracey de Morsella (formerly Tracey L. Minor) [EMAIL PROTECTED] Original Message Subject: [AFAMHED] FW: Study finds humans still evolving, and quickly Date: Sat, 15 Dec 2007 08:24:34 -0500 Reply-To: Coates, Rodney D. Dr. [EMAIL PROTECTED] Study finds humans still evolving, and quickly By Karen Kaplan, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer 2:44 PM PST, December 10, 2007 http://www.latimes.com/news/science/la-sci-evolution11dec11,0,5882337.story The pace of human evolution has been increasing at a stunning rate since our ancestors began spreading through Europe, Asia and Africa 40,000 years ago, quickening to 100 times historic levels after agriculture became widespread, according to a study published today. By examining more than 3 million variants of DNA in 269 people, researchers identified about 1,800 genes that have been widely adopted in relatively recent times because they offer some evolutionary benefit. Until recently, anthropologists believed that evolutionary pressures on humans eased after the transition to a more stable agrarian lifestyle. But in the last few years, they realized the opposite was true -- diseases swept through societies in which large groups lived in close quarters for a long period. Altogether, the recent genetic changes account for 7% of the human genome, according to the study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The advantage of all but about 100 of these genes remains a mystery, said University of Wisconsin-Madison anthropologist John Hawks, who led the study. But the research team was able to conclude that infectious diseases and the introduction of new foods were the primary reasons that some genes swept through populations with such speed. If there were not a mismatch between the population and the environment, there wouldn't be any selection, Hawks said. Dietary changes, disease changes -- those create circumstances where selection can happen. One of the most famous examples is the spread of a gene that allows adults to digest milk. Though children were able to drink milk, they typically developed lactose intolerance as they grew up. But after cattle and goats were domesticated in Europe and yaks and mares were domesticated in Asia, adults with a mutation that allowed them to digest milk had a nutritional advantage over those who didn't. As a result, they were more likely to have healthy offspring, prompting the mutation to spread, Hawks said. The mechanism also explains why genetic resistance to malaria has spread among Africans -- who live where disease-carrying mosquitoes are prevalent -- but not among Europeans or Asians. Most of the genetic changes the researchers identified were found in only one geographic group or another. Races as we know them today didn't exist until fewer than 20,000 years ago, when genes involved in skin pigmentation emerged, Hawks said. Paler skin allowed people in northern latitudes to absorb more sunlight to make vitamin D. As populations expanded into new environments, the pressures faced in those environments would have been different, said Noah Rosenberg, a human geneticist at the University of Michigan, who wasn't involved in the study. So it stands to reason that in different parts of the world, different genes will appear to have experienced natural selection. Hawks and his colleagues from UC Irvine, the University of Utah and Santa Clara-based gene chip maker Affymetrix Inc. examined genetic data collected by the International HapMap Consortium, which cataloged single- letter differences among the 3 billion letters of human DNA in people of Nigerian, Japanese, Chinese and European descent. The researchers looked for long stretches of DNA that were identical in many people, suggesting that a gene was widely adopted and that it spread relatively recently, before random mutations among individuals had a chance to occur. They found that the more the population grew, the faster human genes evolved. That's because more people created more opportunities for a beneficial mutation to arise, Hawks said. In the last 5,000 to 10,000 years, as agriculture was able to support increasingly large societies, the rate of evolutionary change rose to more than 100 times historical levels, the study concluded. Among the fastest-evolving genes are those related to brain development, but the researchers aren't sure what made them so desirable, Hawks said. There are other mysteries too. Nobody 10,000 years ago had blue eyes, Hawks said. Why is it that blue-eyed people had a 5% advantage in reproducing compared to non-blue-eyed
[scifinoir2] On Choosing Cable or Satellite - Consumer Reports Overview
I forget who asked the question about choosing satellite or cable. But the following is some info from Consumer Reports on what to think about when choosing cable or satellite. It list general facts about each. They haven't done a recent comparative review of the two choices, though, to tell you which is the better deal, but that seems to depend on your needs (for basic channels vs. HD, costs, premium on-demand, etc). I use Consumer Reports quite a bit for an early source of info when i'm making buying choices. I'll see what other reliable sources of advice may be out there. This info is up-to-date, published October of this year. There is a nice pros-and-cons summary at the end that might help. keith ** I. Television service - How to choose among cable, satellite, or fiber optic TV service providers Even if you're not in the market for a new TV, you might be wondering whether it's time to change your TV service. Ads from cable and satellite companies promising more HD programming, improved picture quality, easy recording, and more could tempt you to upgrade your package or even switch providers. Phone companies might be pitching you TV service too. Over the last year, Verizon and ATT began slowly rolling out fiber-optic networks that can handle TV services along with voice calls and Internet access. Verizon's service is called FiOS, and ATT's is U-verse. You might see such services referred to generically as fiber to the home, or FTTH. Verizon and ATT are now selling TV service in limited areas. It's unclear whether they'll ultimately offer it in all the markets where they sell phone service. Still, the prospect of more choices for viewers, plus more competition for cable and satellite providers, is a plus for consumers. Many cable customers might welcome another alternative, given their gripes over rising rates. Cable rates have almost doubled over the last decade, according to the Federal Communications Commission. Increases were lowest in the few markets with more than one cable company. Price isn't the only bone of contention for consumers. Despite the steady increase in HD availability, there still isn't enough programming for HDTV owners. Nearly 70 percent of the cable and satellite subscribers we surveyed characterized availability of HD content as average or poor and only 7 percent said it was excellent. In contrast, the vast majority of respondents were very satisfied with the quality of HD programming they get from cable or satellite. Those findings send a message: HD quality is fine but give us more channels. II. TV Service Providers - How to Choose Here are some factors that could make one service more suitable for your needs than another: Availability. Cable is widely available in most parts of the country, except for some rural regions. But only 2 percent of markets are served by more than one cable company, so you have no choice if you want cable but don't like your provider. Satellite service is available nationwide from DirecTV and Dish Network. You must be able to mount a dish antenna with an unobstructed view of the southern horizon. Fiber-optic service remains limited in availability. In 2007, Verizon's FiOS TV was offered in parts of California, Delaware, Florida, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Texas, and Virginia. ATT's U-verse service was available in 21 metropolitan areas in California, Connecticut, Indiana, Kansas, Michigan, Texas, and Wisconsin. The latest programming services' expansion is being slowed by the need to build the costly infrastructure for the fiber-optic service. Also, like the cable companies, they must apply for a franchise in each market. But that's starting to change. Several states have passed legislation allowing statewide service filings and Congress is debating a law that would allow nationwide filings. Consumer advocates--including Consumers Union, the nonprofit publisher of Consumer Reports--are concerned that a move away from local control might allow phone companies to offer TV service in only selected parts of a market. Equipment costs. Only satellite has an up-front expense. With cable, there's nothing to buy. You rent a set-top box or CableCard from the cable company. HD digital-cable boxes usually rent for $5 to $10 a month, often the same as a standard-definition digital box. CableCards cost about $2 a month; you can use them only with a digital-cable-ready TV. One negative: CableCards don't support interactive services such as video on demand. Instead of a regular digital-cable box, you can rent one with an integrated digital video recorder, often for the same fee plus a $10-a-month programming charge. Most DVRs record about 30 hours or so of HD (more of standard definition) on a hard drive. You can pause and rewind, then fast-forward live TV or previously recorded shows. Renting gear rather than buying eliminates
[scifinoir2] Charisma Carpenter Says WGA Strike Hurting Her Income
Okay, here's a side effect of the writers' strike I couldn't have anticipated... *** Carpenter Says She Needs Help from Estranged Husband According to Charisma Carpenter, the writers strike is slaying her earning capacity.The former Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel star claims that the ongoing Writers Guild of America walkout has left her unemployed, and therefore without the means to afford the attorneys' fees pertaining to her current divorce proceedings, according to court documents filed Dec. 4.In turn, Carpenter has requested that estranged hubby Damian Hardy be required to pay her legal bills.Per her declaration, the last work the 37-year-old actress had was a Nov. 26 appearance on a TV show that has not yet been renewed or picked up. The nearly seven-week-long strike could go on for months and, even if it ends, the Screen Actors Guild contract is up for renewal in June and could prompt further labor action, she said. Carpenter briefly guest-starred on Fox's Back to You as the single mother of a bully who has been terrorizing the daughter of the bickering news anchors played by Patricia Heaton and Kelsey Grammar. Grammar's character, Chuck, wants to give the kid's mom a piece of his mind until he sees how hot she is, of course.The sitcom's status is still up in the air, along with the fate of myriad other freshman series, thanks to the strike. At the present time, [Hardy] has the ability to work full time and make more money than I am currently making, Carpenter states. [He] should be paying my attorneys' fees and costs. The court should uphold the spousal support waiver, but if it does not do so, it should award spousal support to me. The 2004 Playboy cover girl says that her and Hardy's prenup includes a waiver of spousal support by both sides in the event that their marriage fails to last seven years.But Hardy, who stated in a declaration filed Nov. 27 that he quit working for awhile to be a stay-at-home dad for their four-year-old son, Donovan Charles Hardy, maintains that he wasn't fully aware of what he was getting into before he agreed to the premarital arrangement. I do not recall any discussion regarding the waiver of spousal support, and no one explained to me what rights I was giving up regarding spousal support by signing the premarital agreement, Hardy stated.He claims that before the couple swapped vows in October 2002 he earned $18,000 a year working as a hotel bellman and supervisor. Meanwhile, Hardy stated, Carpenter is capable of making up to $500,000 a year (what he says she earned in 2004) as an actress. I have recently returned to work, but I am making less than $2,000 per month and I cannot afford to go to school at this time, Hardy, a high school graduate, said. A hearing on custody and financial issues is scheduled for Jan. 9 [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
