A job by any other name
“Who’s the best person for the job? Given our gender stereotypes, somewhat disturbingly, that might depend on what the job is called,” says The Boston Globe. “Researchers in the business school at UCLA randomly paired men and women to work on a paper-folding task or a weaving task. The paper-folding task was labelled as either a ‘Building Project’ or an ‘Art Project,’ while the weaving task was labelled as either a ‘Knot-Tying Task’ or a ‘Hair-Braiding Task.’ Even though the actual task was the same, the more feminine name for the task caused women to be seen as more competent in the task and caused them to be more likely to speak up and exhibit leadership.”
Boy walks to school
“A 10-year-old boy has been walking to and from school on his hands every day for the last four years,” reports Orange News UK. “Yan Yuhong, of Jiaba village, Yibin, in China’s Hubei province, was left partly paralyzed by a childhood illness. He initially crawled to get around but learned to walk on his hands when he was just four years old. Yan has to get up much earlier than his classmates – as his journey takes him an hour and a half each way. He can also get about with crutches but says he can walk much faster on his hands. His father is also disabled, leaving his mother as the sole bread-winner, but Yan is determined to finish his schooling. ‘I don’t want to quit,’ he said. ‘I want to study hard, and support myself in the future.’”
Storms that go on and on
“They are, simply, freaks of nature,” says The South Florida Sun-Sentinel. “Since 1851, when tropical record-keeping started, only 11 storms – out of 1,490 – have lasted more than 21 days. The top among them, the San Ciriaco hurricane, existed an astonishing 33 days in 1899. On average, systems last about seven days. … September is prime time for such storms, with eight of the 11 longest emerging then. The reason: Ocean waters are warmest, tropical waves still are rolling off the coast of Africa and steering currents are weak.”
The shape of land to come
“Amasia – named for the crash and subsequent connection of the Americas and Asia – will fuse in 100 million years,” says National Geographic magazine. “It won’t be a first. The Earth’s land masses are constantly shifting, all together – a supercontinent – then apart again, no faster than a fingernail grows. The most recent convergence, Pangaea, formed 300 million years ago; Rodinia, 1.1 billion; Nuna, 1.8 billion. Most theories of Amasia’s creation show the Atlantic seafloor stretching or being swallowed, but geologist Ross Mitchell’s model, using paleomagnetic data from ancient rocks, predicts the Arctic Ocean will close up instead, the supercontinent sliding north into its place. Where the rebroken land goes from there is unknown.”
Malaria in Alaskan birds
“A new study reports that a form of malaria, generally considered a tropical disease, is being contracted by birds as far north as Fairbanks,” says The Anchorage Daily News. “The report was published in the science journal PLoS ONE [last week]. ‘It is predicted that malaria parasites will spread to both higher altitudes and latitudes with global warming,’ it says. That may not be as alarming as it sounds. Avian malaria cannot be transmitted to people. … Nonetheless, a press release from San Francisco State University [says] that the data may ‘provide clues as to how malaria might spread in humans as a result of global warming.’”
Thought du jour
The message I would give to young people is: Don’t be the best in your class. If you’re the best in your class you’re in the wrong class.
James Watson, American co-discoverer of DNA’s structure (1928- )
