Appropriate religion
Kate Douglas’s article discussing the use and importance of rituals in different types of religion (19 December 2009, p 62) reminded me of a recent paper claiming that the evolution of religion could be intimately related to the cost imposed by religious rituals on the believers who practise them.
The paper, by Joe Henrich from the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada (), suggests that the costly rituals, such as scarification, act as “credibility enhancing displays” (CREDs) that serve to intensify the belief of those partaking in, watching or even hearing about the rituals.
The idea is a plausible and interesting one that ties in nicely with the model developed by Harvey Whitehouse, which forms the theme of Douglas’s article. Henrich’s CREDs explain how the religious rituals evolved in the first place; Whitehouse offers a mechanism by which CREDs work to promote religion.
Presence of presents
In his article on gift-giving, Robert Rowland Smith states that the tradition is based on the Christian nativity story describing the gifts given to the baby Jesus by the three wise men (19 December 2009, p 34).
Customs vary from place to place, but originally gifts were often given on 6 December, St Nicholas’s day. After the Reformation, Protestant areas found it unacceptable to give gifts in honour of a saint, so shifted the custom to Christmas day.
In many parts of the world, the gifts are attributed to the Christ child himself; the three wise men were invoked later and only locally. As the wise men are supposed to have taken some time to reach Bethlehem, their arrival is often considered to be 6 January. If gift-giving were based on their story, it should happen on that date.
The history of Christmas customs is often at least as interesting and complicated as the psychological dimensions discussed by Smith.
From Dean Conrad
Robert Rowland Smith’s charming essay on the social and economic vicissitudes of gift-giving omits to mention the emotional value of home-made or hard-to-find, yet cheap, personal gifts.
However, I am grateful to Smith for inspiring my presents for next Christmas: a framed copy of this essay on the perils of giving.
Hessle, East Yorkshire, UK
Diverge from IQ
Dave Boothman notes that factors that could be regarded as strong indicators of intelligence, such as the number of patents awarded and performance at university, do not necessarily correlate well, which leads him to conclude that IQ is not a good measure of intelligence (19 December 2009, p 30). He is right.
Tests of any description follow a convergent model, in which the answer must be either right or wrong. Yet one of the key components of high ability is the capacity to diverge. Coming up with a different answer from everyone else does not get you marks in an IQ test, but it is precisely what is needed to innovate. As divergent responses cannot be marked right or wrong, tests do not reflect this vital dimension of mental functioning.
The existence of a test for divergence could make a difference to our ability to identify those who have a particular aptitude for innovation.
Mite-y foe
Paul Monaghan criticised negative comments about the film Vanishing of the Bees, but his calls for research into the impact of neonicotinoid pesticides on colonies misses the point (12 December 2009, p 29).
While bee health in many countries around the world is indeed very poor, it is not pesticides but the spread of treatment-resistant varroa mites that is to blame. This was confirmed in November 2008 by a (AFSSA), which found that “factors identified [as] responsible for high mortality in colonies have been mostly biological, particularly the varroasis agent”.
This did “not confirm the hypothesis of a predominant role attributed to pesticides by bee-keeping professionals in French bee colony mortality”, the study concluded.
From William Summers
Jim Ring describes his experience of a varroa mite infestation in his local honeybee population by relating the apparently minimal effect on pollination in his New Zealand garden (12 December 2009, p 29).
However, honeybees do not normally pollinate the kiwi fruit or strawberries he mentions as the crops affected. These plants do not exude enough nectar to make it worth their while. Commercial farmers can only induce honeybees to pollinate these plants by giving them sugar syrup to fulfil their need for a food source. The honeybees will then go to kiwi fruit and strawberry plants just for the pollen, provided they are nearby.
The opinion piece to which the letter related, which claimed that honeybee disappearance is not a global trend (24 October 2009, p 26), and indeed the letter itself, cause me to view New 杏吧原创 as a honeybee-demise denier. While it is good to see received wisdom tackled, this should only be with greater wisdom.
Sturminster Newton, Dorset, UK
Skilled cleaning
In his article on the science of slipping, Michael Brooks states: “It’s a funny old world, where PhD scientists teach restaurant cleaners how to clean floors” (19 December 2009, p 49). What is not so funny is the low status and low pay accorded to cleaners everywhere.
We would surely see far fewer deaths from hospital infections if cleaners were given the status and pay their work really deserves. The widespread misconception that anyone can clean to a professional standard, and that they can do so on the cheap, has brought pain and tragedy into too many lives.
Breeding the beasts
In his letter, Collyn Rivers informed us of his experiences of tame cheetahs, to which Henry Nicholls replied that attempts to breed them in captivity have failed (31 October 2009, p 28).
This is not entirely true. The Taronga Western Plains Zoo in Dubbo, New South Wales, Australia, has , including two cubs born in 2009. In the wild the two sexes spend much of their time apart. I believe the zoo’s success was in realising this and keeping them in separate enclosures.
Dementia treatment
Arran Frood’s article on the use of trepanation to treat dementia (13 June 2009, p 33) made me think back to 2001 when my mother was diagnosed with acute-onset dementia. In a few weeks she went from a balanced, composed lady who looked after herself to a completely uninhibited, unrecognisable woman who at times did not even remember her children.
I noticed that some weeks earlier her diabetes specialist had, for sound reasons, withdrawn the anti-inflammatory medication she had been taking on a daily basis for the previous 25 years. After the mental disturbances appeared, she was put on a low daily dose of slow release aspirin 鈥� on the basis that it was unlikely to cause harm.
She started to improve, and six weeks after starting to take the aspirin she was back to her placid, calm and normal self, able to look after herself again. She lived until 2007, during which time she suffered no further mental disturbances.
I am convinced her dementia was the result of decreased blood flow to the brain caused by the sudden cessation of her anti-inflammatory medication, which has the effect of thinning the blood. Subsequently increasing blood flow by giving her a blood thinner 鈥� aspirin 鈥� brought about the miracle recovery. Maybe it is worth looking into this; it would certainly be preferable to invasive procedures like trepanation.
Reassigned phrasing
Your generally well-written piece about the concerns many people have with the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders mentions its effect on transgender people (12 December 2009, p 38).
The article is let down in this regard by the use of the phrase “sex-change surgery”. Not only is this term often used pejoratively, it is also misleading as it reduces a complex set of procedures, which may not involve actual surgery, to a lurid soundbite. The term “gender reassignment” would better suit your purposes.
Managers manage?
Mark Buchanan’s article discussing strategies for selecting staff for promotion mentioned the idea of choosing unsuccessful people so as to ensure that they are not stranded in jobs they cannot perform well (19 December 2009, p 68). The article implies that this is an unacceptable idea that cannot be implemented, but many of those who work on the shop floor suspect it is already common practice.
The premise is that the most ineffective workers are systematically moved to the place where they can do the least damage: management. Known as the Dilbert principle, it was developed by Dilbert cartoonist Scott Adams as a satirical response to the popularity of the Peter principle.
From Anthony Williams
Mark Buchanan discusses managerial ineptitude, stating that a lengthy stint in a particular role will impair an employee’s performance because “people eventually become bogged down by their own incompetence”.
In my experience, the explanation for this is, in fact, slightly different. People usually start a job with a fresh perspective, lots of ideas and a huge amount of enthusiasm. As the years go by, the ideas have been implemented, the perspective becomes set in a rut, and the enthusiasm is replaced by the boredom of a familiar routine.
The conundrum of how to maintain motivation and drive in long-serving managers is one of the headaches of senior management.
High Peak, Derbyshire, UK
For the record
鈥� The correct reference for the study which compared the incidence of heart attacks in London bus drivers and conductors is (9 January, p 34).