Internet Nazis bitterly divided on the sexbot question

@Dalillama

Well, depends on who in the Church of England you’re talking about. 😛

History Nerd:

I get the feeling that militant atheism in the UK is more anti-leftist, while left-wing atheists there don’t really care as much about promoting atheism. There are more progressive/liberal militant atheists in the US because we have the Religious Right.

Remember, atheism is unexceptional here in the UK. The majority of Brits are non-religious, especially so among the young and the educated. Being non-religious simply isn’t something most of us feel a need to make a noise about, because, in our milieu, it’s the default.

Our leading campaign group is Humanists UK, formerly the British Humanist Association, and I think most people would agree that it’s a progressive group, not “anti-leftist”. Whether it would meet your criteria for militancy, I don’t know; it’s a very polite organisation.

Unaffiliated online atheism in the UK has always mostly been about poking fun at believers, I think. The main target used to be the reliably ridiculous creationists, particularly American creationists (the level of religiosity in the US is endlessly fascinating). But, in more recent years, these atheists have increasingly targeted Islam, so I think it’s almost inevitable that they would drift to the right.

It’s similar in the US. “Humanists” are almost always liberal/progressive, while those associated with “New Atheists” (especially Christopher Hitchens and Sam Harris) and “Rationalists” are centrist to far right. I’d say Humanists tend to bash religion less.

@ mildlymagnificent

Even women who didn’t labour in the fields needed pretty strong musculature

I’d never even thought of that, although it’s obvious now you mention it. There’s a lot of interesting archeology that uses bone development to infer lifestyles. It’s how we ‘know’ neanderthals were apparently predominantly left handed (I’m not so sure about that though). But there’s some fascinating stuff around weapon usage, especially longbowmen.

But I’m curious now about whether anyone’s looked at how stong women must have ended up in the pre industrial age. I’ve got a mate who’s an osteo-archelogist. Time to pester her I think.

ETA: I’ve just dropped her a message. On a related note I noticed our most recent chatting session. I’d asked about whether you could detect indicators of ‘stress’ archaeologically and this was her response. Interestingly she seems to be suggesting that in early development, females are more robust than males. At least that’s my take, but I could be misinterpreting her answer:

Hi – big can of worms that question – what do you mean by stress? I will presume -you thinking about bone/tooth indicators of physiological response be it to psychological stress or disease processes, malnutrition etc? In utero stress on the mother and foetus – often malnutrition or maybe even thing like foetal alcohol syndrome (produces specific problems – some skeletal i.e. pinched face, wide set eyes) Other defects – often midline defects – so maybe a consequence of lack of folic acid – spina bifida, cleft palate – big and obvious expressions – but also other midline defects like semi-vertebrae – not visible or of consequence necessarily and those effected may not know about it as no other side effects) During growth and maturation – period of stress (disease/psychological e.g. growing up under conflict, domestic violence etc) big indicators are the teeth (usually the permanent teeth) showing enamel hypoplasia and the tibias (harris lines). Enamel hypoplasia -teeth develop in incremental rings, so any ‘stress’ means the body reserves or uses its resources to maintain the body and not to continue with growth and development – so less emamel laid down and shows up as rings on the teeth once they erupt. – can be useful to show chronological timing i.e. state of tooth development happens within known range – young babies maybe show evidence of weening stress – ie. the timing of the EH is inline with this period in a child;s life. Harris line also similar basis – transverse lines visible on x-ray of the shaft of the tibias – shows up even during adulthood – lines correspond to cessation in growth of the developing skeleton- like EH some chronological estimation of the timing of these periods of ‘stress’ can be estimated. Other stress indicators – tho there is some debate – cribra orbitalia and porotic hypersostosis – likely link to iron deficiency anaemia. Body proportionally may indicate growing up under stress (conflict for e.g.)more affluence in general correlates with better diet – life expectations etc and longer leg to trunk ratio than poorer folk….. usually effects males more readily than females – male physiologically less robust during growth and maturation – basic biology need females to carry the next generation one male to many females will work as well as many males…..Adult stress indicators on the skeleton – this would be more grey area – as we are more likely to look for underlying illnesses that may in turn have an effect on the skeleton. Link to a paper by Mary Lewis here if you need to read more – prob this is only a pub quiz question and this level of detail unnecessary…….

Regarding sexual selection – I just finished an enjoyable book, “Nature’s Nether Regions”. The details of reproductive technologies was dazzling; I learned more about beetle genitalia than I knew there was to know. The intricacies of human reproduction are also covered in a degree of detail that would give any MRA the screaming fantods.
Basic message – in species with two sexes, both evolve to maximize the effectiveness of their reproductive strategies. Whether it’s roundworms, honeybees, or humans, it’s more complex and complicated than most of us realize.

Alan

But I’m curious now about whether anyone’s looked at how stong women must have ended up in the pre industrial age.

Not necessarily pre-industrial, just agricultural. I remember vividly being told about my paternal grandmother (born 1896). She began working when she was 14 on a sheep farm. When shearing was on, she’d have to get up before 4 am to get the wood stove working in time to give the workers a cup of tea before they started before 6ish. Then she’d have to start setting up for hearty breakfasts of chops and eggs and heapings of toast served around 8am. After which she’d immediately clear the table and get on with morning tea – basically a couple of (or more) roasting pans worth of scones.

Then lunch. Then – and this was when it hit me just how hard and heavy the work was – she’d mix, by hand, a huge plain buttercake mixture which was then divided into 4, four!, one plain, one with lemon flavouring, one with caraway seeds, one with sultanas or currants and bake them for afternoon tea. Think about the size of the mixing bowl held against one side of the body while you vigorously whip all the ingredients with a wooden spoon with the other arm. Makes my wrist-arm-shoulder ache just thinking about it.

In between times, she’d be chopping kindling and wood for the fire, refilling the “fountain” for boiling water on the stove, washing dishes, and peeling mountains of veg for lunches and evening meals. Shearers were like miners – they needed massive doses of calories+protein just to be able to do the work. Even with modern equipment and better training, it’s still pretty demanding.

I don’t know whether she was also responsible for laundry – pretty hard to fit in a whole morning standing over a wood fire and lifting boiling clothes with a pot-stick with all that other work needing to be done.

Or when you want to take a bath, and you have to heat the water in a kettle over the hearth or, if you’re lucky, on the wood stove. We take so much for granted.

@guest – please keep in mind that Darwin had no idea how genetics worked. Mendel was starting the science of genetics around the same time, but was not widely published in his lifetime.

For example, we now know that most genes are shared by male and female humans; the Y chromosome is much smaller than the others. (BTW, this applies to mammals; non-mammals have different methods of sex-determination)

Sexual selection can work differently on the male and female of a species – though probably less on pair-bonding, low-sexual-dimorphism humans than on some other species.

But it does not work on one sex wholly disconnected from its effects on the other, and internet misogynists sometimes seem to think.

Darwin’s ideas on how sexual selection worked in animals are now thought to be partly right and a bit too simple.