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Kitzyma
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Likes it here |
Registered: March 2012
Messages: 215
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Although I often don't like other programs by the same presenter, I found the whole BBC series "Countdown to Life: The Extraordinary Making of You" to be fascinating. For those interested in the origins and development of sexuality, the second episode would probably be most interesting.
<http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b06dsmn1>
e.g. Particularly enlightening for me were:
The village where about one in ten 'girls' turn into boys at puberty.
and
The effect of hormones on development of sex organs occur at different time than their effect on the nervous system. That may influence whether or not we're gay. It may also be one reason for 'gender dysphoria' and may be why some children with physical sexual characteristics of one gender feel they are mentally of the other gender.
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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13751
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It shows that we understand a little about a lot, and not a lot about this, doesn't it?
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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Kitzyma
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Likes it here |
Registered: March 2012
Messages: 215
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Quote:timmy wrote on Fri, 09 October 2015 18:57It shows that we understand a little about a lot, and not a lot about this, doesn't it?
--
And just when we think we know what's going on, something else turns up to show that a lot of what we think we know is plain wrong and most of the rest is just the tip of the iceberg.
For example, the 'DNA story' seemed simply to imply a nurture or nature dichotomy until it was found that much of the code could be switched on and off by environmental factors. Now it appears some traits can be inherited from the birth mother even though the egg was donated by another woman. That's because it appears the mother who didn't contribute any DNA can switch on/off bits of the baby's DNA. It seemed that DNA was passed on from one generation to the next, with changes occasionally caused merely by random mutation, but now there is evidence that viruses have actually altered the DNA of our proto-human ancestors and helped us to evolve.
That's why I love science. But not the modern pseudo-science in which pseudo-scientists find an apparent correlation and then proceed to put their forward their own pet theories as absolute truth and tell us, for example, that all saturated fats should be avoided like the plague. The science I love is that in which we put forward our tentative theories (stories) and find delight when some new observation shows that those theories/stories are wrong but the new theories generated are even more wonderful and beautiful.
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