Fairy Tales: Attraction and Stereotypes in Same-Gender Relationships

We examine the process of romantic attraction in same-gender relationships using open and closed-ended questionnaire data from a sample of 120 men and women in Northern California. Agreeableness (e.g., kind, supportive) and Extraversion (e.g., fun, sense of humor) are the two most prominent bases of attraction, followed by Physical Attractiveness (e.g., appearance, sexy). The least important attractors represent traits associated with material success (e.g., financially secure, nice house). We also find evidence of seemingly contradictory attraction processes documented previously in heterosexual romantic relationships, in which individuals become disillusioned with the qualities in a partner that were initially appealing. Our findings challenge common stereotypes of same-gender relationships. The results document broad similarities between same-gender and cross-gender couples in attraction

The genetic architecture of the human cerebral cortex

The cerebral cortex underlies our complex cognitive capabilities, yet little is known about the specific genetic loci that influence human cortical structure. To identify genetic variants that affect cortical structure, we conducted a genome-wide association meta-analysis of brain magnetic resonance imaging data from 51,665 individuals. We analyzed the surface area and average thickness of the whole cortex and 34 regions with known functional specializations. We identified 199 significant loci and found significant enrichment for loci influencing total surface area within regulatory elements that are active during prenatal cortical development, supporting the radial unit hypothesis. Loci that affect regional surface area cluster near genes in Wnt signaling pathways, which influence progenitor expansion and areal identity. Variation in cortical structure is genetically correlated with cognitive function, Parkinson's disease, insomnia, depression, neuroticism, and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder

Finishing the euchromatic sequence of the human genome

The sequence of the human genome encodes the genetic instructions for human physiology, as well as rich information about human evolution. In 2001, the International Human Genome Sequencing Consortium reported a draft sequence of the euchromatic portion of the human genome. Since then, the international collaboration has worked to convert this draft into a genome sequence with high accuracy and nearly complete coverage. Here, we report the result of this finishing process. The current genome sequence (Build 35) contains 2.85 billion nucleotides interrupted by only 341 gaps. It covers ∼99% of the euchromatic genome and is accurate to an error rate of ∼1 event per 100,000 bases. Many of the remaining euchromatic gaps are associated with segmental duplications and will require focused work with new methods. The near-complete sequence, the first for a vertebrate, greatly improves the precision of biological analyses of the human genome including studies of gene number, birth and death. Notably, the human enome seems to encode only 20,000-25,000 protein-coding genes. The genome sequence reported here should serve as a firm foundation for biomedical research in the decades ahead

Heretical reading: freedom as question and process in postmodern American novel and technological pedagogy

textMy dissertation describes a method of reading with literary, disciplinary, and pedagogical implications. In literary terms, heretical reading refers to the way that the postmodern novelists Thomas Pynchon, Vladimir Nabokov, and Philip K. Dick read and appropriate Gnosticism in order to construct narratives about the struggle to regain freedom in novels such as Gravity’s Rainbow, Invitation to a Beheading, and VALIS. On a disciplinary level, heretical reading is an interpretative method I exert to foreground possibilities of freedom within postmodern fiction that intrude into the background of the poststructuralist definition of the world but ultimately transcend it. These four forms of freedom are freedom as presence and transcendence, as liberating knowledge, as a spirituality constituting self-awareness, and as choice conceived navigationally rather than hierarchically. Postmodern authors imply these possibilities consciously and metafictionally, but heretical reading is also my way of foregrounding and intensifying them. I put this theoretical program into practice through the pedagogical use of hypertext and interactive fiction. Students compose interpretative essays that make a “heretical” interpretative choice by choosing a path through the text that has been closed off by a previous group of interpreters. This path consists of the linkages between “sparks”—passages that stand out with particular imaginative and intuitive significance against a background of indeterminacy. Students know these sparks as non-totalizing intimations of presence that their own non-totalizing selves respond to in order to offer a sense of “interior direction” required to navigate through the composition of an essay. I then describe a final pedagogical extension of heretical reading focused around a type of computer game called interactive fiction. Heretical reading seeks to transform printed novels into interactive fictions in order to encourage freedom in the form of interaction, allowing classroom discussion to change the ways the text is imagined and experienced. The convictions underlying heretical reading function within the classroom as a set of rules, but these rules are designed to open up, not to constrain; to energetically orient, not to govern; to yield satisfactions at the expressive level, not to conclude.Englis

Seeing More than Earth and Sky: The Rise of a Great Aesthetic

Sometime in the 1880s, Sallie Cover, a Nebraska settler in Garfield County, painted a picture of the homestead of her neighbor, Ellsworth L. Ball. This attractive primitive painting can be seen in the Nebraska State Historical Society in Lincoln. Various authorities have asserted that it is the first known painting by a local Nebraska artist. 1 Although we know very little about Mrs. Cover, the painting suggests that she liked her neighbor\u27s rational and neat homestead. She painted the earth rich and black, the grass healthy green, and flowers along the front path. New trees have been planted, but some small fruit trees are already in blossom. Three men, one woman, and one child, not lined up or posing in a stiff way, are scattered in the larger scene that includes horses and cattle, a field of ripening grain, stacks of older hay, and a fine bam. A big clear sky looms above the peaceful, orderly, and fertile scene

THE IMPACT OF THE MILWAUKEE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM\u27S DESEGREGATION PLAN ON BLACK STUDENTS AND THE BLACK COMMUNITY (1976 - 1982) (WISCONSIN)

The legal effort to desegregate the Milwaukee Public School System (MPS) began in 1965 when Attorney Lloyd Barbee filed a class action suit against MPS. The case, Craig Amos et al v. the Board of School Directors of the City of Milwaukee, finally came to trial in 1973. MPS was charged with systematically discriminating against blacks and carrying out policies that consciously maintained all white schools and all black schools, thereby creating unequal educational opportunities for black children. In 1976 Federal court Judge John Reynolds found in favor of the complainants and ordered MPS to develop and implement a school desegregation plan. MPS fought the decision until 1979 when Judge Reynolds approved a consent decree in the case. The decree established guidelines that were to be used by MPS in implementing the desegregation effort in Milwaukee\u27s public schools. The problem that was studied in this dissertation focused on the issue of whether or not the Milwaukee desegregation effort in essence discriminated against black students and the black community. The study was aimed at reaching some conclusions as to whether or not MPS used discriminatory practices in the very process that supposedly had been instituted to end racial discrimination in Milwaukee public schools. The study was designed to answer the following questions: (1) Did the desegregation program of MPS result in (a) a disproportionate number of black students being denied educational access to their neighborhood schools, and (b) a disproportionate number of black students being bused out of their neighborhoods to attend school. (2) Did MPS use (a) a pattern of school closings, and (b) decisions about the locations of specialty schools in a manner that resulted in a disproportionate burden of dislocations being placed on black students. The study focused on the movement of black and white elementary, middle, and high school students enrolled in the Milwaukee Public School System. The methodology used consisted of a comparison of raw numbers, percentages, and proportions of the movement of black and white students out of their attendance areas to other attendance areas or city-wide specialty schools. The analysis of the data led to the following conclusions: (1) There was a significantly disproportionate number of black students denied access to their neighborhood schools. (2) A disproportionate number of black students were bused out of their neighborhoods. This was true even when allowances were made for differences in the size of the white and black attendance area population. (3) There was a clear pattern of school closings and decisions about the locations of specialty schools such that a disproportionate burden of dislocations was placed on black students