Glenn Hauman: View From Above

We’re Getting Healthier. Period. :

Is there a positive social change agent behind teen pregnancy?

Maybe.

Better health is causal factor behind the biological capability to become pregnant. Quick refresher course for those who slept through biology:
Androgens released during adrenarche causea the secretion of hormones (estrogen) at the onset of puberty. Estrogen causes thelarche, the visible indicator of estrogen secretion (yes a fancy word for %u2018boobs%u2019). There are other possible indicators of estrogen secretion including body fat distribution and bone maturation and other correlates with the start of puberty, such as body water content and critical lean body weight.

Therefore, healthier girls have their first period at a younger age and worldwide we have seen a decline in the age of menarche accompanying improved nutrition and sanitation.

According to David Weil, in South Korea, the average age dropped from 16.8 to 12.7 between 1958 and 1998.

While few would argue that a pregnant twelve year-old a positive change, that girls are healthy enough to be biologically capable of carrying a child is an improvement.

In the recent study %u2018Accounting for the Effect of Health on Economic Growth%u2018 microeconomic estimates of the effect of health on individual outcomes were used to construct macroeconomic estimates of the proximate effect of health on GDP per capita.

Based on this study, the average age of menarche dropped from about 17 to 12.8 during the period 1830-1962. The rate of decline was 4 months per decade.

While, %u201CThe most widely held belief is that the trend has occurred due to improved nutrition. Children today are bigger and heavier than in the past. Improved nutrition allows for normal growth. Lower classes and rural children have also seen a drop in the age of onset of puberty.%u201D

So, it%u2019s important to keep in mind possible other causes such as natural selection (genetic isolates), less disease,
fat kids obesity (since the onset of menarche has a correlation with the body fat percentage), chemicals which mimic sex hormones (DDE, PCBs and phthalates), and hormones in meat and dairy products.

And this:

65 girls pregnant at one high school: video games to blame? – Joystiq – www.joystiq.com:

65 out of 490 young ladies who attend Timkin High School in Canton, Ohio are preggers, and video games may be to blame, according to a local Ohio newspaper, which had this to say on the subject:

Whose fault is it that more than 13 percent of Timken%u2019s girls are with child? Some would say fault-finding isn%u2019t a fruitful exercise, but in this case, it%u2019s critical. Suspects range from movies, TV and video games to lazy parents and lax discipline. Only one thing is sure: Schools don%u2019t impregnate children.

Hey, I%u2019m just a blogger and not a doctor, but I thought for sure that games can%u2019t impregnate children either.

Movie & TV News @ IMDb.com – WENN – 24 August 2005:

Maverick film-maker Michael Moore has enrolled on a crash course at a $3,800-a-week celebrity fat farm in a bid to loose weight.

…this one’s for you: On Monday, Sept. 12th at 7:00 PM the Free Library of Philadelphia is hosting a debate between Dave Silverman, national spokesman for the American Atheists and Bill Devlin, founder of the conservative Urban Family Council.

The debate is titled CULTURE WARS, and will cover such topics as Creationism, Family Values, Faith-based intitatives, etc.

…but that doesn’t mean colleges have to accept you.

Blatantly stealing an idea from the comments section at Slate, I hereby call on all universities to reject high school biology credits for students educated in states where creationism or intelligent design is taught. “If you need three years of sciences courses to get into college and you have them, but one of them was in biology in Kansas, you’re out of luck. It’s community college time for you, at least until you get that deficiency remediated.”

Seriously. In fact, I’m actually amazed the Ivy League hasn’t adopted this already. Of course, they do each have their own divinity schools and religious studies programs, so maybe not. Nevertheless, students are denied admission on the basis of inadequate learning all the time. Why not this? It’s not like they aren’t picky enough, acceptance rates are already as low as 10% at some Ivies.

If every student from, say, Kansas was going to be rejected from MIT or USC because they were taught poorly, the curriculum would change within a month. So let’s see the colleges make a stand against the anti-education forces. If you know anyone in power at any college, feel free to make a push.

UPDATE: Seems like Lindsay and I are on the same wavelength.

Rerunning tonight at midnight EDT on MSNBC.

I saw this at the halftime show for Boston’s recent Worldcon (from backstage) and enjoyed it. Now showing in NYC, just down the street from Virgil’s BBQ and St. Andrews Pub. Give it a shot, if you like that kind of thing.

There are those folks who say I don’t spend enough time listening to the other side of a conversation. In an attempt to remedy that, I offer you this.

Witness The Political Teen:

I haven’t really touched bases on Intelligent Design, but I really don’t see the problem with teaching it. It won’t be taught as though it was a fact, but it will be taught as an idea. Intelligent Design will be presented the same way evolution is, as “something to think about”. Of course as soon as President Bush announced his support for Intelligent Design we hear from liberals that he is trying to institute religion in curriculum. Too bad there is nothing about God or Jesus, but about a “higher being”.

You know, I was ignorant when I was a teenager too. But I didn’t go out of my way to learn things that were wrong.

If we’re talking about a higher being that isn’t God, then who? Aliens? Let’s play that game too, shall we?

Sigh…

TV producers seek to keep politics out of war (Reuters)

(Via Yahoo! News: Entertainment – Television.)

Seriously– what do they think war is about, if not politics?

V for Vendetta Pushed Back To 2006:

V for Vendetta, originally slated to open on Nov. 4, has been pushed back to next March, a Warner Brothers spokesperson told SCI FI Wire. In a statement, Warner said: “We have moved the release date of V for Vendetta to March 17, 2006, to accommodate the movie’s post-production schedule.”

The spokesperson, who spoke only on condition of anonymity, denied that the delay had anything to do with the movie’s subject matter or the current political climate. V for Vendetta has come under scrutiny for the coincidence of its subject matter and the recent terrorist bombings in London.

(Via Sci Fi Wire.)

And if you believe politics had nothing to do with it, I have some fine land in Nevada for you to buy.

This film was going to be a tough sell under any circumstances, if it was going to remain faithful to the original work. But this action fills me with foreboding for the final product. I find it very hard to believe that WB would happily remove the association with the 400th anniversary of Guy Fawkes if they didn’t have to.

This takes a lot of guts:

Comic legend John Cleese is to undergo surgery on his colon to alleviate diverticulitis – and he plans to auction the parts of his anatomy surgeons remove on his personal website.