Slashdot Mirror
Children Help Their Mothers for Decades
Itninja writes "NPR reported this morning on some interesting findings regarding mothers and their children. From the article: 'Some scientists have proposed that when a woman has a baby, she gets not just a son or a daughter, but a gift of cells that stays behind and protects her for the rest of her life. That's because a baby's cells linger in its mom's body for decades and -- like stem cells -- may help to repair damage when she gets sick. It's such an enticing idea that even the scientists who came up with the idea worry that it may be too beautiful to be true.'"
From a evolution and survival of the species standpoint, it makes sense. Since the offspring is so dependant on the mother for food for many years after birth, the species needs to ensure that the mother lives to provide.
The whole thing is written in that horrible style that you get in magazines called things like "You and Your Baby". I can almost smell the perfumed baby products wafting up from the text.
I think I'd rather read Creationist writing.
"The White House is not an intelligence-gathering agency," -- Scott McClellan, Whitehouse spokesman.
Since that's never been observed (and I'm sure someone has looked at the stats, it's such an easy study), this can't be true.
I suspect these so-called "scientists"
You go on and ASSUME something, and then you put "scientists" in quotes.
Because, clearly, the master of assumptions is more of a scientist than these lab-coat wearing bozos!
You can't take the sky from me...
Hey, you know what, you're right. The professional researchers who did this work must have overlooked it. All that work wasted!
Seriously.. why is it that with every science story that comes on here, there's some tool who says "Hey, what about [ridiculously simple and/or well-known concept]?"
How do you think these people get to be researchers? Lotto?
Actually, I disagree here. Men do more dangerous things because we are more capable of doing more dangerous things successfully. This isn't just bravado. There is a certain amount of risk assessment to every action a person takes. And depending on how active a person is dictates their self awareness as well as how capable they are of performing a given feat. A given act may be considered objectively dangerous but every act danger level is subjective to the person performing the act.
Men seem to do more dangerous things because they are more likely to survive the 'dangerous' activity. This should balance out the lifespan issue at least somewhat. Plus in modern life the average person isn't excatly the daredevil risk taker, yet the lifespan discrepency remains.
A more interesting study would be comparing the lifespans of women with certain numbers of children. Spinsters, vs. one child, vs. 2 children and so on. It is not just many vs. none since there is also an inherent risk in the act of birthing achild. I would think so anyway. Of course, it might be difficult to separate lifestyle and environment from those studies, but who knows?
When I read the title "Children Help Their Mothers for Decades" my first thought was "yea, she knows how to take you on a helluva guilt trip."
God help you if you forget Mother's Day.
and FYI to the Slashdot crowd: Valentine's Day is coming up. Send your mother some flowers. Think of it as building up karma... because you're going to need something to burn next time she thinks you ignored her.
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!
That could explain why men are about 4x more likely to be killed by lightning strikes than women:. pdf
http://www.nws.noaa.gov/om/severe_weather/light04