Nature: July 2007 Archive Page

Statistics collected over two decades show an alarming decline in the performance of America's boys--in some respects, a virtual free fall. Boys were doing poorly in school, abusing drugs, committing violent crimes and engaging in promiscuous sex. Young males lost ground by many behavioral indicators at some point in the 1980s and '90s: sharp plunges on some scales, long erosions on others. I was forced to confront a fact that I had secretly known all along: that teens of 30 years ago--my generation--were the leading edge of an epidemic of thugs, dolts and cads.

No wonder so many writers began calling for change in the late 1990s. Reliable social-science data often lag a couple of years behind the calendar; it takes time to gather and compile a nation's worth of numbers. Stories about social trends that you read today may be describing the reality of 2004 or 2005. The groundbreaking boy books were a response to statistics portraying the worst of a physical, mental and moral health crisis.

There's more to the story, however. That downward slide has leveled off--and in many cases, turned around. Boys today look pretty good compared with their dads and older cousins. By some measures, our boys are doing better than ever. --David Von Drehle --The Boys are All Right (Time)

I've blogged about the "boy crisis" before, and this is a thoughtful, moderating rebuttal.

Sometimes called the reptilian brain because its basic structure dates back to our reptile ancestors, the brain stem is largely devoted to our most primal instincts, far removed from the complex, higher-brain skills that allow us to understand humor. And yet somehow, in this primitive region, we find the urge to laugh. --Steven Johnson --What's So Friggin' Funny? (Discover)

"At first I didn't believe a seagull was capable of stealing crisps. But I saw it with my own eyes and I was surprised. He's very good at it." --Seagull becomes crisp shoplifter (BBC)

Very strange. My brother-in-law Robert sent it to me.

"I have never forgotten the magic night that my own father, like his father and his father's father before him, gently woke me, bundled me up in a warm blanket and quietly led me outside to see the Northern Lights for the first time," said the elder Meier, dejectedly sipping a cup of hot cocoa on the back porch as his uninterested son ran back inside to his Sony PlayStation. "It was a moment I'd always looked forward to sharing with my own son."

"Well, so much for that dream," added Meier, heading to the kitchen to pour the boy's untouched mug of cocoa into the sink. --Child Unimpressed With Aurora Borealis After Whole Day Of Tekken 3 (The Onion (Satire))

I used to think that things like rocks and buildings and my own skeleton were fairly solid. But they're made up of atoms, and atoms, as you can see here, contain so little actual material that they can barely be said to exist.

We are all phantoms. --Hydrogen Atom Scale Model (Phrenopolis)

'One approach to seeing the future is through scenarios -- carefully crafted "what if?" stories that let us imagine several different outcomes', the book says. It suggests holding a 'scenario party' (seriously) where you can 'pool the imaginations and experiences of your friends'. In short: we have no idea what the future will look like, but let's knock about some shocking 'what if?' scenarios over a glass of wine to make ourselves feel simultaneously terrified/terrifically important. It's the closest you'll get to a naked admission from the climate change lobby that its warnings of floods and pestilence and swarms of locusts are based on its members' own fevered, teenage imaginings rather than a scientifically revealed forecast of what is to come. --Brendan O'Neill --The planet's burning. Let's party!  (Spiked Online)

A snarky, class-focused review of The Live Earth Global Warming Survival Handbook.

The armada of 29,000 plastic yellow ducks, blue turtles and green frogs broke free from a cargo ship 15 years ago.

Since then they have travelled 17,000 miles, floating over the site where the Titanic sank, landing in Hawaii and even spending years frozen in an Arctic ice pack. --Ben Clerkin --Thousands of rubber ducks to land on British shores after 15 year journey (Daily Mail)

Behavioural experts have found that infants begin to lie from as young as six months. Simple fibs help to train them for more complex deceptions in later life.

Infants quickly learnt that using tactics such as fake crying and pretend laughing could win them attention. By eight months, more difficult deceptions became apparent, such as concealing forbidden activities or trying to distract parents' attention. --Richard Gray -- Babies not as innocent as they pretend (Telegraph)

Is "fake crying" really the same thing as "lying"? It's a form of communication that serves a social purpose, like saying "thank you" when you don't really feel grateful.

It seems like the real news here is not that researchers discovered new details about cognitive development, but rather the application of a new shading for the concept of deception.

I guess it's a little late for a link to the Will Farrell baby landlord skit, but finally it seems appropriate.