sexuality
dr. dolittle | May 17, 2013I was just digitally flipping through a new book called "Crime Against Nature", which describes various reproductive behaviors in the animal kingdom. It is written by an artist, Gwenn Seemel, not a scientist, so I cannot vouch for the scientific accuracy of the book as a whole. However, the illustrations are quite nice and the content is seemingly scandalous, which makes for an interesting read.
For example, did you know that male Dayak fruit bats can lactate to feed their young (True according to this article in Nature)?
Image from "Crime Against Nature", written and illustrated by Gwenn…
gregladen | September 8, 2011Why is it so hard to understand a commonplace thing like orgasms?I think I know why science does not understand the female orgasm. It is because science excels when it breaks free of context, history, human complexities and anthropology, but when a topic requires one to grasp context, history, human complexities and anthropology, then science, especially the hard sciences, can fall short. Also, the nature of the female orgasm is a comparative question, but human sexuality is highly (but not entirely) derived; It is difficult to make a sensible graph or table comparing aspects of sexuality…
sa smith | May 15, 2011Amanda Marcotte, big internet name in skepticism and feminism just put up an article on The Guardian blag:The soft underbelly of the right's hard abs
...
...
... I dont get it.
Or rather, I 'get it', but I find it distasteful, and I dont 'get' why she thought it was appropriate for her to post that.At first, the June cover of Men's Health seems par for the course for a magazine that aims to stoke male anxieties about physical perfection to sell products to men the same way that the beauty industry has done to women for decades:
Umm... Its not a magazine about knitting or fly fishing. Its a…
grrlscientist | July 14, 2010tags: Yummy Old Spice Man Delivers Marriage Proposal, television, celebrity gossip, humor, funny, comedy, Old Spice Man, Man on a Horse, Isaiah Mustafa, streaming video
This video is totally cheesy, except for a couple things: first, the impetus for it was a tweet from a guy asking the Old Spice Man to deliver a marriage proposal to his girlfriend and second, well, it features another look at the very yummy Old Spice Man, Isaiah Mustafa. This sweet video is a perfect blend of romantic cheese, humor and good old-fashioned lust. I wish I had a marriage proposal delivered by him .. squeeeeee!!
grrlscientist | July 10, 2010tags: Stephen Fry on Catholicism, Intelligence Squared Debate, religion, catholicism, Catholic Church, poverty, sexuality,homosexuality, AIDS, HIV, condoms, pedophilia, child rape, culture, Stephen Fry, streaming video
Stephen Fry provides his very articulate and thoughtful opinion on Catholicism and the Catholic Church at the Intelligence Squared Debate.
grrlscientist | June 27, 2010tags: The Stork Is Real!, religion, sex, sexuality, funny, humor, comedy, satire, fucking hilarious, social commentary, Edward Current, streaming video
Do you really believe that precious life comes from disgusting body fluids? The Truth is, babies are brought into the world by a pure white angel, the Stork.
grrlscientist | June 15, 2010tags: Earthworm Porn, animals, annelids, mating habits, reproductive behavior, sexuality, Isabella Rossellini, streaming video
This video is a look at Isabella Rossellini's bizarre and hilarious look at sex in the natural world as she explores the mating habits of those naughty earthworms.
sa smith | June 7, 2010The key to my obnoxious cheerfulness are my expectations. They are very low. I expect nothing from anyone. Thus when they fail miserably (say, the BP clean up) Im not disappointed. And, when people accomplish even the most menial tasks, Im happy.
That being said, the Oklahoma City Council actually approved, 8:1, an OKC Gay Pride Parade.
:-D YAAAAY!!!
Wow, gay pride parade in OKC! What a time we live in!... But what about that one dissenter. Whos that one "NO!" vote...? That fellows name is Brian Walters. Im sure you all have NO IDEA why he voted against it:The reason I voted no on…
grrlscientist | June 7, 2010tags: Natural Harvest: A Collection of Semen-Based Recipes, cookbooks, food, humor, weird, strange, wow, books
I thought I'd read or heard of absolutely everything, but apparently, this is not the case. It turns out that the spousal unit found a cookbook that he thinks is "hilarious" .. which means that he has to share it with me, too. Being a bibliophile, I always appreciate learning about new titles on the market, but this book surely is the strangest ever!
The author (whom I do not know), Fotie Photenhauer, writes:
Semen is not only nutritious, but it also has a wonderful texture and…
grrlscientist | June 4, 2010tags: Elementary Dating, humor, funny, comedy, silly, offbeat, Rowan Atkinson, streaming video
This Silly Saturday video features the brilliant actor, Rowan Atkinson, giving men a few important pointers about going out on a first date without looking like a complete moron (well, mostly).
I will share a secret: I made things easy for Mr GrrlScientist by kissing him while we were sitting on the stairwell of the youth hostel we were staying at, since he was yackyackyacking until 3am. I thought kissing him would shut him up. It did, but he turned red and almost passed out. But at least I got a…
grrlscientist | June 1, 2010tags: Why Twilight is Popular, epipheo studios, social commentary, entertainment, books, Twilight series, successful book formula, streaming video
This amusing animated video describes why Twilight books are so popular. For those who don't know, the Twilight series is the story of a "regular girl" who is dating a vampire -- the typical "girl meets boy and falls in love" story.
This video was created by epipheo studios, which has a video-filled site that you will find interesting.
The author's discussion of her Twilight book series, how she came up with the idea and other details (including…
cagapakis | May 31, 2010I love this quote from the XKCD blog:
The role of gender in society is the most complicated thing I've ever spent a lot of time learning about, and I've spent a lot of time learning about quantum mechanics.
Many scientists try very hard to de-emphasize this complexity, trying to reduce "human nature" down to parts and genes and behaviors that can be explained by evolutionary mechanisms, by hormones, by genetics. It's not nature vs. nurture and it's not just male and female, it's nature and nurture and infinite variations along a culturally and biologically mediated gender continuum. By…
gregladen | April 28, 2010Well, OK, technically if a man is wearing chains he's not really naked. Whatever. The question at hand is, was sex in skepticism before women showed up? And, when they showed up with their bobbies and all, did they ruin it for everyone?
Read more.
grrlscientist | April 14, 2010tags: The REAL Gay Agenda, gays, lesbians, bisexuals, transgender, LGBT, politics, cultural observation, social commentary, humor, funny, satire, fucking hilarious, streaming video
You hear a lot about the gay agenda in political talk. If you ever wondered what the hell they were talking about, well, watch this revealing video (apparently, it is based upon a real-life email string).
This video (which forgot to mention cruising gay bars and watching porn) was created by Sean Chapin.
grrlscientist | March 24, 2010tags: condoms, manufacturing, technology, factory, education, streaming video
Well, now this is an interesting video: how condoms are made. The manufacturing process is actually quite interesting, and my favorite part was stress-testing the condoms. I wonder what the people who work in that factory say when asked at a dinner party what they do for a living?
grrlscientist | March 12, 2010tags: evolution, evolutionary biology, gynandromorph, bilateral gynandromorph bird, half-sider, mixed-sex chimaera, sex determination, molecular biology, genetics, developmental biology, endocrinology, birds, chicken, Gallus gallus, ornithology, researchblogging.org,peer-reviewed research, peer-reviewed paper, journal club
Half-sider.
Almost exactly one year ago, hundreds of American birders
were thrilled by sightings and photographs of this remarkable
Northern Cardinal, or Redbird, Cardinalis cardinalis,
photographed in Warrenton, VA.
Image: DW Maiden, 2 March 2009.
I'll never forget the…
grrlscientist | February 23, 2010tags: Old Spice commercial, manmercial, television, Superbowl, advertizing, technology, computer-generated imagery, CGI, wow, I'm on a Horse, Isaiah Mustafa, funny, humor, streaming video
Daily, men ask themselves, What do women want? We want a gorgeous bare-chested man with a beautiful voice on a horse, that's what! And this is exactly what Old Spice gave us with bare-chested Isaiah Mustafa, a TV actor and former NFL player, in their "manmercial" that first aired during the Superbowl. But how was that amazing commercial made? Maybe you think it was stitched together from a lot of separate '…
grrlscientist | February 11, 2010tags: NASA Scientists Plan To Approach Girl By 2018, scientists, geeks, nerds, pencilheads, ONN, Onion News Network, comedy, humor, satire, fucking hilarious, streaming video
President Obama recently increased funding to all science organizations, including NASA. According to this news report, it appears that NASA has already budgeted their share of the money to support their plan to approach a girl at the laundromat by 2018. This amusing video is a commentary on male scientists, geeks, nerds and other types of pencilheads. It actually looks to be rather close to the truth.
grrlscientist | February 7, 2010tags: gay adoption, United States, equality, religion, children, religion, hypocrisy, Dan+Savage, streaming video
Unlike straight parents, gay parents cannot go out one night, get drunk and adopt. Unlike straight parents, gay parents have children because they are wanted and planned for. Certainly this was the situation for my (straight) so-called parents, who not only didn't plan for me and didn't want me, but they were horribly abusive and neglectful after I was born, and after they'd finished trying to destroy me, they gave me up to the state when I was a teen-ager. I would love to have…
gregladen | January 3, 2010In a recent study, 56 percent of the women interviewed in a sample of 1800 claimed that they had a "g-spot" which is an area inside the vagina with increased sensitivity with respect to sexual arousal.
(Added: See THIS write up of the original research)
But a twin study showed that when one twin claimed whether or not to have a g-spot, the other twin did not make the same claim at the frequency one would expect if the g-spot was the expression of a genetic trait with straight forward Mendelian inheritance.
Therefore, the scientists conclude, the g-spot does not exist. At all.
How can this…