“What You Think, You Become.” Wow! Really? | Secret Life of Scientists & Engineers | PBS

“What You Think, You Become.” Wow! Really? | Secret Life of Scientists & Engineers | PBS

Are we there now?

In The Demon-Haunted World, Carl Sagan wrote:

Science is more than a body of knowledge; it is a way of thinking. I have a foreboding of an America in my children's or grandchildren's time -- when the United States is a service and information economy; when nearly all the key manufacturing industries have slipped away to other countries; when awesome technological powers are in the hands of a very few, and no one representing the public interest can even grasp the issues; when the people have lost the ability to set their own agendas or knowledgeably question those in authority; when, clutching our crystals and nervously consulting our horoscopes, our critical faculties in decline, unable to distinguish between what feels good and what's true, we slide, almost without noticing, back into superstition and darkness.

Pronghorn Declines in Texas

The Pronghorn is one of the iconic mammals of the West in North America. Often referred to as 'antelope,' Antilocapra americana is the sole survivor of twelve species that roamed the North American continent before one of the Great Extinctions (Pleistocene) 10,000-12,000 years ago. (Unlike the pronghorn, true antelopes are a member of the cattle family and are not native to North America. Pronghorns have forked horns; antelopes have unforked horns.) Early observations recounted pronghorns covering the grassy plains. Their traditional range was documented reaching from south-central Canada down into Texas and northern Mexico, and west to Baja, California.

Observations of declines in pronghorn populations were noted in the early 1900's; hunting pressure reduced their population to 13,000 in the 1920's. Disease, especially Blue Tongue, also contributed to reductions. Luckily, conservation efforts helped to restore populations: 500,000 to 1,000,000 across the continent. However, local populations that rebounded have recently declined again. West Texas is one of those areas.

Similar to nationwide trends, overall declines in Texas have paralleled loss of habitat. Only two regions now support pronghorns: the Panhandle and Trans-Pecos areas. The latter has declined faster over the last 150 years, and has recently accelerated. Population fluctuations usually follow changes in water and forage availability, so decreases during years of drought are not surprising. Herds typically rebound by improved reproduction and survival with more favorable weather and food availability, as they did after the drought of the 1990's. However, population estimates of pronghorns in the Trans-Pecos region have continued to decline despite more favorable forage availability during the last three years. In fact, these populations are the lowest since the 1970's. The question is: why?

In 2007, state parks and wildlife officials, hunters, and landowners that profit from hunting licenses began to sit up and take notice of pronghorn populations. Based on preliminary studies and data collection, two hypotheses predominate: internal parasites and predation. The Borderlands Research Institute (BRI) at Sul Ross State University collected a few hundred samples since 2009. They discovered a high load of a common internal stomach parasite, the roundworm, in both hunter-harvested and regional habitat-dwelling animals. A high parasite burden can cause anemia (low red blood cell count), weakening an animal and increasing susceptibility to disease, predation and other stresses. Reproduction can also be affected contributing to decreases on populations. 

Predation is always the favored target of declining populations involving any mammalian species valued by human economics, especially livestock and hunting-target species. Although predators occupy a practical and valuable niche in mammalian ecosystems, large predators have historically served as an easy scapegoat for unexplained deaths. Regardless, considering the overall increasing urban and rural populations of coyotes, investigation into the role of predation on the Texas pronghorn is valid. Although the adult pronghorn can outrun a coyote and cougar, even a cheetah, fawns are more susceptible to predation.

The recruitment into a herd of pronghorn by growing fawns, called 'fawn recruitment,' is commonly a preferred determinant of populations than mortality of adults. This measure more realistically reflects the reproductive capacity of does as well as predation pressure, since they are the typical target by predators: mostly coyotes, cougars, eagles. The major predator of adult pronghorns is Man. 

A 1948-1977 summary of fawn recruitment rates in Canada and the U.S. varied from 43 (fawns per 100 does) in Texas to highs of 105 in South Dakota. More recent pooled data - 1978-2008 - revealed that despite fluctuations in numbers, fawn recruitment continued to decline in most of the same areas as the previous study. The data also revealed differences in fawn recruitment associated with vegetation communities. An independent study of fawn recruitment and forage availability in Arizona showed an increase in fawn recruitment parallel with forage conditions. Their findings strongly suggested that a diversity of plant species is optimal pronghorn habitat and maintenance of habitat diversity is important. This, along with supporting evidence from other independent studies, demonstrates differences in fawn survival may depend on the diets of adults as well as offspring. 

Despite increases in rainfall over the past three years and subsequent increases in forage availability, an important component may be missing: accessibility. The pronghorn display an unusual behavior apart all other wild ungulates: they are not good jumpers. They are disinclined to jump even a low brush fence over three feet high. Small bands of pronghorn have been known to almost starve within a fenced enclosure while plenty of food is available on the outside. When hardpressed, they can jump over moderately high obstructions, but fences will alter their ranges and access to forage. They have been observed to crawl under or between wires of barbed-wire fences, prompting many conservation cooperatives to remove the bottom wire or replace it with a barbless wire. 

The major factor in determining animal populations across the continent during modern times is habitat changes. Land use patterns, including development, resource extraction, and traffic, have changed not only the topographical features but also water and food availability and accessibility. Entire ecosystems are changing. As habitats shrink, many species are competing for the same food and water resources. Migration routes are cut off or severely restricted across the country. Along with habitat changes are subsequent down-stream pressures: increased density of animals and parasite loads, disease exposure, local vegetation exhaustion, decreased vegetation to hide from predators, traffic mortality increases, reductions in reproduction and subsequent offspring survival. Whether these factors have been taken into account in Texas pronghorn performance and survivability is unknown.

Last September the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department (TPWD) awarded a 3 year $111,210 grant to the BRI at Sul Ross State University in Alpine, TX. Their research aims to evaluate the two competing hypotheses described above, regarding pronghorn survival and productivity in the Trans-Pecos area. Meanwhile, the Trans-Pecos Pronghorn Working Group, a group of West Texas landowners, outfitters, TPWD biologists, BRI personnel and wildlife veterinarians, decided to transfer several hundred pronghorn adults from the Texas Panhandle area to West Texas. My objection to this move is that moving healthy animals to locations where populations are inexplicably and rapidly declining is premature and possibly deleterious to the health of the transplanted animals.

Because the decline of the Panhandle pronghorn population appears to be less than that in the Trans-Pecos area, I hope that those involved in this move have considered using the Panhandle population, and others living in similar habitats as those in the Trans-Pecos region, as controls. I also hope that those involved in this research expand their consideration of factors that govern population performance, including population displacement and decline. Rather than address the Trans-Pecos problem from a 'Band-aid' approach, and jeopardizing the lives of transplanted animals at the expense of another population, a thoroughly planned investigation based on scientific principles should precede premature and possibly detrimental short-term fixes.

Other regions have and continue to study and address pronghorn population declines. Several organizations -local, state and federal- are cooperatively working to facilitate habitat preservation. Even migration corridors are being preserved and maintained in several states, such as Montana and southern Canada. Many ranches in Oregon and Arizona are removing unnecessary fence lines and installing barbless wire, especially on bottom lines. Natural gas companies in Wyoming are cooperatively working with organizations to alter gas pads and traffic in order to preserve migration corridors and habitat. Underpasses are being constructed across major highways to divert migration routes away from fences and traffic. Ranches in the upper Great Plains are cooperatively restoring overgrazed ranges for pronghorn forage.

Maybe it is time for Texas to rejoin the Union to help explore and solve its problems. At the very least, they can expand their considerations from a few trees and to the entire forest. Animal populations exist in an interconnected community and system, and problems should be considering holistically. Let's all focus on finding answers to the questions and then examining long-term solutions. 

Pronghorn benefit a huge success; release set for late February

Climate Change Cometh

Loosely following the debate, discourse and arguments surrounding climate change, sometimes I just have to look away. Like watching a bad wreck. A very complex subject, where there are no accurate and reliable models and predictions. The projections fit into a very wide area under the curve and outliers will probably be shifting that range more than not. More than regional, even global, this is a solar system-dependent phenomenon.

Anyone denying climate change during our lifetime is more than ignorant; it is stupidity. I understand that humans do not like change, but to base ignorance in a belief system that climate change is not eminent is truly stupidity. The evidence is not only a well-documented scientific observation, it is an experience at our personal level. The real issues are not if climate change is real, but how much of that change is attributable to anthropogenic causes. 

With any knowledge of geological and geographical history at a middle school level, we know that global and regional climate and weather change. To disbelieve and/or deny that is unacceptable. Supplementing that knowledge with how regional and global climate is influenced by long-term subtle and traumatic events - volcanic explosions, rampant wildfires, asteroid collisions, sunspots, changes in ecosystems, etc - will aid understanding the connections between systems on and above this planet. Now add centuries of human intervention and technological contributions, sometimes rapid, to changes in regional and global-wide systems. To deny anthropogenic impact on our planetary systems is inexcusable.

The question that remains, and which may remain unanswerable, is the degree of human impact. At this point in time, the question may remain moot. The question requiring attention is how we can reduce our impact.

Weather and climate have a long history of cyclic changes, as long as the life of this planet and our solar system. We cannot deny our current climate change. Unfortunately, the politically hot term that is mistakenly embroiled world-wide, 'global warming,' has been misconceived. But the damage is done. Now we must move beyond that and accept that climate change, with possible accompanying extremes of hot and cold weather, is here. We are feeling the impact. Now.

Yet, like little ants, we continue to embroil ourselves in useless arguments and self-serving blame and flame throwing. This gets us nowhere. It's time to discard the disbelief, bottle the self-serving useless tirades, promote more accurate and constructive discourse; it is time to act and prepare ourselves for cooperation and adaptation. Reduce our contributions to climate change and learn to adapt to the global-changing weather patterns as a global community.

I was somewhat encouraged to read on a more-than-useless forum  debate the following intelligent post:

I know many weather and climate factors are the product of non-man based cycles. We cannot stop major long-run Global and Solar cycles, but the sudden changes we are seeing the last 50 years seem to be producing a lot more energy due to how quick the changes are occurring. (aka more instability)

However we do need to recognize that warming is a serious issue -- and one that Man likely cannot stop. But instead of trying to prepare and do what we can to slow it --- We are accelerating it now, and have a whole contingent of Americans that believe we should just ignore it --- which just seems foolish.

Man didn't cause all the European Glaciers to severely melt 4000 years ago. (see what's happened in Africa and the Middle East as all the Glacial-melt-fed Rivers dried up --- It's amazing to try to think of Iraq and Egypt as fertile plains, not dust-bowls.)

So we know climate change is a real threat regardless of Man -- but exacerbating it, certainly seems to be ignorant and foolish, just as much as thinking we can fully control it.

 Let's put aside our ignorance, our self-serving demonstrations, and join as a community to reduce human impact and adapt to the coming changes.

When immune systems run amok

"...epidemiologist Thomas Reichert of the Entropy Research Institute in Lincoln, Massachusetts, finds Polack's hypothesis completely plausible. There's not much that could cause this kind of lung damage except an invasion of T lymphocytes (the immune system's "warrior cells"), he says, and Polack found no evidence of that. The immune system's overreaction, says Reichert, is "kind of a last-ditch way of handling something. ... If we can't identify you specifically enough, but we know there's a lot of you, we're just going to blow the whole damn place up."

How Swine Flu Killed the Healthy - ScienceNOW 

Crosses

How do I silence
The tugging heart strings
the tickling sadness
the fleeting joy.
How do I quiet
the repressed longing
the remembered images
that play through my head.
How do I mediate
this battle raging inside
when I am both sides of the war.
This lake of unspoken confusion and emotions
damned by martyred morals
and past experience.
All threatening to overflow
with tidal waves.
Crushing you and I below.
Why does this have to be my cross to bear
Again.
I can't speak it
my voice is frozen.

Truth and Consequences

The truth that makes men free is for the most part the truth which men prefer not to hear.
- Herbert Agar

Loving Warriors We Are

"Some people mistake being loving for being a sap. Quite the contrary, the most loving people are often the most fierce and the most acutely armed for battle... for they care about preserving and protecting poetry, symphonic song, ideas, the elements, creatures, inventions, hopes and dreams, dances and holiness... those goodly endeavors that cannot be allowed to perish from this earth, else humanity itself would perish..."
- Clarissa Pinkola Estés, from The Dangerous Old Woman

Relativity is Very Special

I have a love/hate relationship with fysiks (aka physics), that other 'f' word.

I'm a 'conceptual physics lover', 'calculated fysiks hater'. I read 'Physics for Biologists' and the 'Tao of Physics'. But I hated my physics text book.

Physicists are obsessed for finding the 'Theory of Everything'. As if there was 'one' theory for anything. To me, physics is modeling for probabilities. Not to be confused with 'anything is possible.' But probabilities are what reality is made of, each having a different weight. Many theories in physics can be modeled by mathematics but not tested in the 'real world'. Nevertheless, sometimes that's all we have.

I have followed with the interest, curiosity and amusement of a physics novice the rapidly changinng theories of late: string, relativity, origins of the universe (and it's many components), and Farscape. Okay, the latter is more for entertainment.

So now we have physicists challenging Einstien's special theory of relativity with.........
very special theory of relativity [1].

Is it clear in color? Does it require a helmet? I bet it rides a magic bus.

Time for all us Observers to get on our Neutrinos and ride!

[1] Article in New Scientist (Jan. 20, 2007; vol. 193, No. 2587).
Letter by Andrew Cohen in Physical Review Letters (97, 021601; 2006).

Finally......

Eccentricity is not, as dull people would have us believe, a form of madness. It is often a kind of innocent pride, and the man of genius and the aristocrat are frequently regarded as eccentrics because genius and aristocrat are entirely unafraid of and uninfluenced by the opinions and vagaries of the crowd.
- Edith Sitwell

I was recently seduced to the Electronic Dark Side and bought an iPod.
Now I have a direct circuit into my brain feeding me not only music
but podcasts (and podbooks, ohmygodno!). I still want a flash drive
for my brain......

I listened to a weekly update from SEED on the train this morning
which included the excerpt below. I know this topic has surfaced
before, so here's the 'latest':

Go In With a Bang
Athletes need energy. They need fire. They need power. They need, um,
spunk. And plenty of athletes hope to build their supply by abstaining
from sex for days, weeks or months before a big sporting event.
According to scientists, however, a little pre-gaming may not be such
a bad thing. Some studies indicate that sex may raise testosterone
levels and therefore actually help performance on the field.[3]

Italian professor of endocrinology Emmanuele A. Jannini says three
months of abstinence can cause testosterone to drop to children's
levels, which is probably none too helpful in maintaining the
aggression needed for boxing or football. Sexual activity also doesn't
leave participants drained of their vigor: A roll in the hay usually
only costs 25 to 50 calories per person [1], fewer than the calories
in a single Oreo cookie.

In women, sex produces a neuropeptide that can block pain for up to a
day, allowing female athletes to play through muscle pain[2]. So start
your warm-ups early, kids. Science knows best.
(source: National Geographic News)

[1] I disaggree with this assertion (energy expenditure per 'roll in
the hay'). I am devilishly curious about the sample pool from which
these data and statistics were derived. Obviously a pool of
conservative elderly........

[2] This reference to a gender dimorphic response is intriguing.
Parallel with my interest in that topic, I will see if I can track
down this information.

[3] A few recent studies coming out of the psychology field suggests
that not just any type of sex may have the same effects. Two recent
studies suggest that coitus induces a more robust physiological and
psychological response than either oral or masturbation. (one measured
ability to cope with acute environmental stress, the other examined a
few select hormones - which they had analyzed a greater selection)
(for quick summary of the latter: Fun with Brains. )


Recent literature also demonstrated that sex can mediate and moderate situational stress response for up to 24 hours after the sex act. That I don't find newsbreaking. We all know that sex raises endorphins and other 'feel good' hormones and neurotransmitters. It even relaxes muscles.

So women who claim to have headaches to abstain from sex can't use that as an excuse anymore. Sex can actually alleviate or dispel headaches.

Storms Within

Come
Take me
Cauterize my bleeding heart
Cover my silence with your mouth
My breath is yours
Your taste is mine
As you lose yourself
Inside me.

Close
The gap
The chasm widens deeper
Always reaching
And pulling back
Afraid to give each other
Echoes of yesterday foul
Our todays.

Touching
Not embracing
Fear dictates the tempest
The emptiness inside us
Fleeting whispers
Tentative words
Storms reflected in
our eyes.

My First Law

A friend suggested I post my Laws. So I shall.

First Law: Where there's a positive, there is a negative.

Everything operates in systems; everything is a trade-off. My first law parallels one of the most basic laws of nature: the conservation of energy. It cannot be created or destroyed. It simply flows from one system to another in a variety of forms.

As British scientist and author C. P. Snow interprets the First Law of Thermodynamics [1]:

"You cannot win (that is, you cannot get something for nothing, because matter and energy are conserved)."

This of course precludes its sibling, the Second Law of Thermodynamics, addressing the direction of that conservation. Again, in the words of Snow:

"You cannot break even (you cannot return to the same energy state, because there is always an increase in disorder; entropy always increases)."

Natural proccesses that involve energy transfer go in one direction and that process is irreversible. Steven Hawking explains it thusly using time as an example: when time moves in a foward direction and one breaks a cup of coffee on the floor, no matter what happens, in our universe, one will never see the cup reform. Cups are breaking all the time, but never reforming.

Another parallel is Newton's Third Law of Motion: For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. Forces always involve interactions and they always come in pairs - equal and opposite action-reaction force pairs. Examples of this law abound in nature: the wings of a bird push air downwards. In turn, the air reacts by pushing the bird upwards.

Thus the Tao of physics, the yin and yang. Yet it is not a simple Descartian duality for which there is an invisible division. Opposites are always in motion, transitioning from one to the other; it is the complementation of natural proccesses.

The natural order requires complementation between the harmonious rule of order and a continuing respect for the fertility of chaos. Order needs to be at all times suppliant and responsive to fertile transition so that new order can emerge from the natural ferment of chaos.

Our reality is a paradoxical complement of our subjective consciousness and the physical universe. That physical universe is itself a paradox of relativity and quantum uncertainty in which the future and the past become lost in probabilities. The description of physical reality is no more and no less than a narrative told about the stabilities and correspondences of our conscious experience.

Thus the philosophy that attempts to understand the fundamental nature of all reality, whether visible or invisible; it seeks a description so basic, so essentially simple, so all-inclusive that it applies to everything: metaphysics.

This is the First Law. It is the Tao.

Quantum physics will always be controversial, it hinges on the metaphysical thus it is almost like trying to describe God.

[1] The Two Cultures and the Scientific Revolution (1959)

Know Thine Enemy.....

...and you will know yourself. Are we our worst enemy? We don't have to be.

No, I think we are all bozos on this bus of life [1].

“Imagine a universe in which your feelings, thoughts, and memories are not your enemy. They are your history brought into the current context, and your own history is not your enemy.”
- Steven Hayes, psychologist

[1] Referencing Firesign Theater's last (1971) 'early' production , I Think We Are All Bozos On This Bus. For the underlying meaning of the reference, visit this website for the CD liner notes, especially those written by Phil Austin.

Who's Weird?

I never set out to be weird. It was always the other people who called me weird.
-- Frank Zappa, to The Baltimore Sun, October 12, 1986

Darwin's Challenge on Sex and Selection

And a challenge for all of us to think outside our boxes.

Joan Roughgarden, a Stanford University biologist, challenges classical Darwinian sexual selection theory with her book Evolution's Rainbow and paper, "Reproductive social behavior: cooperative games to replace sexual selection," published last February in Science. She and co-authors propose an alternative model based on game theory to replace Darwin's Venus and Mars sexual selection theory. The classic model of men want sex and women want to cuddle pervades our culture and perhaps it dictates our biology and what we are without questioning if it is the only valid model.

But what about the prevalence of 'aberrant' sex? Horny women, bi- and homosexuality, and polygamy.....Oh my!! Unquestionably branded as aberrant sexual behavior in human culture, it is not uncommon in other species. The current issue of SEED lists 450 species, as a matter of fact. Raising various mammalian specimens myself (rats, mice, dogs, cat, sheep, horses, rabbits...) over a lifetime, I questioned the omnipotence of the classical sexual selection model based on observation of these species, including our own.

Roughgarden's paper expectantly caused a disturbance in the arena of biologists with a barrage of rebuttals and letters to the editor (see link below) and elsewhere. While Roughgarden proposes to replace Darwin's classical theory, perhaps expanding upon it would be more productive and reflective of the real world.

In a discussion appearing in SEED of Roughgarden's proposed model and the controversy*, author Jonah Lehrer aptly writes:

"Roughgarden's cataloging of sexual diversity has challenged a fundamental biological theory. If Darwinian sexual selection -whatever its current variant- —is to survive, it must adapt to this new data and come up with convincing explanations for why a host of animals just aren't like peacocks."

Time for all biologists to step outside their box for a moment and consider Roughgarden's points.

* The Gay Animal Kingdom, online article and in the June/July 2006 printed issue.

Abstract for Roughgarden et. al. paper and listing of published rebuttals in Science .

Science Idol: the Scientific Integrity Editorial Cartoon Contest

Here's your chance, all you budding cartoonists!

The Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) birthed a brainstorm for a contest to speak out. Using satire in the form of cartoons, contestants are invited to take meaningful pot shots at the current US administration's track record on science. Aptly named "Science Idol", contestants can make fun of the administration's attempts at control and distortion of science.

Two categories allow amateur and professional cartoonists to submit their entries which are due by July 31, 2006. Twelve finalists will be selected by celebrity judges and these will be judged by the public for the winners.

For more information on entries and prizes, visit the UCS website.

I hope Gahan Wilson submits an entry.

Blog cloning

In the spirit of yin and yang, I have two blog sites. Thinking back to little more than a year ago, this activity began reluctantly as an experiment recommended by a friend to help me overcome a bad case of writer's block. Being a freelance writer, such an obstruction can be deleterious to not only supplemental income but the mind. Writing is like singing, painting, dancing, and telling stories: it is a form of expression of the heart and soul. When a writer has writer’s block it is akin to “I have no mouth and I must scream”. *

My problem is I can't type fast enough or access to a medium is unavailable when needed the most. I am waiting for technology to develop a flash drive that can be inserted directly into the brain and to which I can download my thoughts, remove later and upload to my computer. Reading the weekly science and technology news, that may happen soon; I'll be the first to volunteer testing a prototype.

The experiment simultaneously succeeded and backfired. Writer's block is gone and my writing expression has evolved and blossomed. I've published several works since then, even delving into other genres under a pseudonym (don't ask; I'm not telling). Unfortunately deadlines continue to hover over me and I'm just as much a procrastinator as before. The two books I am working on still progress at a snail's pace.

My passion is life, although what you mostly read here in these two blogs are two special passions: science and riding motorcycles. In some ways the two are similar: journeys into the unknown. Both science and riding involve destinations, technology and processes. Yet a component of both many don’t consider is the journey; the journey of discovery. That is an important common denominator and a recurring feature that winds its way in and around these blog posts. (Did the word ‘cloning’ in the title give you a clue?)

Because the motorcycle posts have become more frequent, I decided to devote a new blog site to them: Meanderings on Two Wheels. Over time I will be moving the bike and riding content from the original blog site (Whose Reality is This?) to the newer bike site. I will leave some of the original bike posts where they were originally posted, but not all. As I move them I will post an update in the bike site. Otherwise they will be hidden in the archives. If any code monkeys out there know how I can add a function to a side bar for recently added posts independently from the date, help would be appreciated. Until then, watch for notices of posts moved from this site.

Recently moved:
My Zen of Motorcycle Riding
Walkabout
April's Fool Day

* Short story by the same name by science fiction and commentator Harlan Ellison. Be forewarned if you read this story; it is highly emotive and powerful. It may birth nightmares.

If I Were Head of State: Due Parte

I would proclaim and enforce a fee of a dime for every vehicle turning and not using their turn signal. I suspect the national deficit would be eliminated in one year.

Snot Rockets

I have of late spent most of my rare time at home mowing the flora on my five acres of Solitude in Central Texas. Thanks to modern technology and Sears, a tractor with a 48" mowing deck is my saviour. Despite my raging torment of unattaching and removing the deck to extract a wayward rope that had entwined itself around the blades, and then putting it all back together, I love my mower. Mowing the property serves as a relaxing activity while I play patterns and games with the terrain, mower heights, tractor speed and the obstacle course that I live on (thorny mesquite bushes, pond, etc). The challenge of mowing a pattern that is as efficient as possible is akin to a chess game. I lose sometimes.

A major obstacle is my allergy to grass pollen. Those tiny misshaped granules that help procreate the many species of grasses wreck havoc on my immune system. The little mast cells that are the soldiers in the first line of defence in the mucus membranes bombard my nose, eyes and skin with histamine, setting off a cascade of mucus production.

"Attack!!!!"

Membrane cells secrete that viscous sticky stuff called 'mucus', chock full of proteoglycans, salts and enzymes that trap and degrade small foreign particles and agents as a protective mechanism. Yet, a hypersensivity to certain allergens such as grass pollen can elicit mucus production like no tomorrow and the nose becomes a running faucet. In that instance, it becomes less of a friendly 'protective' evolutionary function and more a nuisance and downright pain in the nose. It rightly earns the name: 'snot'.

This leads to the question: What does one do when he/she encounters an attack on all fronts by enemy allergens and the battle wages to the point where you can't keep up with the mucus production by snuffling it back up your sinuses?

Well, the old remedy that all outdoorsy people are familiar with: the 'snot rocket'.
Just aim well.

I read the following this morning in my recent issue of New Scientist in the section: The Last Word, where readers submit questions which are answered by other readers. Here it was; the 'snot rocket'.

Is it coincidence a human finger fits exactly into a human nostril. If not, why does my mum tell me not to do it?

Your mother may not approve, but there is a way to clear your nose without sticking anything inside it. It's called the "snot rocket". Just push against the side of one nostril to close it off, take a deep breath, close your mouth and exhale as hard and sharply as you can through your other nostril. You'll be amazed how fast the contents shoot out. Just make sure you tilt your head away from your body to avoid peppering yourself.

Nose-clearing tactics like the snot rocket mean there is no life-or-death reason for the co-evolution of digging digits and large, inviting nostrils. After all, nose blockage is easily managed by breathing through your mouth. In fact, a blocked nose is really only a problem if something gets lodged near your nasal bones, where it is dangerously close to your brain. That is a region where human fingers are too podgy to be of any use. A rather thrilling story of a primatologist, some tweezers and an engorged Ugandan tick comes to mind.

Sexual selection might have favoured the relationship of finger to nostril if, say, females in the Pleistocene preferred mating with males who picked their noses, or if males and females picked each other's noses in a courtship ritual. However, that would be taking reciprocal grooming a little far.

So we must conclude that, yes, it is mere coincidence that your fingers fit so nicely into your nostrils. I doubt the made-for-each-other argument is going to change your mum's opinion of rhinotillexomania. I suggest you demonstrate the snot rocket instead and see what she says.

Holly Dunsworth, State College, Pennsylvania, US

Note: I recall commenting to a close friend once "You know how close and trusting we are when I can pick the buggers from your nose." Better all out of the nose than half out........