More new from The Future!

Cheers to meico for linking to this video, which shows people talking and moving just through the power of their mind:

All of which brings to mind the theory that our ideas of magic and fantasy are, in fact, visions of the future...

bottle...open, genies...everywhere

Over here there's a New Scientist article on a Swedish study of 552 people, their marital state, and gene RS3 334.

RS3 334 is linked with vasopressin receptors.  These have been linked to monogamy (prairie voles are monogamous, meadow voles are polygynous -  meadow voles genetically modified to have vasopressin receptor genes become monogamous).

To quote from the article:

They found that variation in a section of the gene called RS3 334 was linked to how men bond with their partners. Men can have none, one or two copies of the RS3 334 section, and the higher the number of copies, the worse men scored on a measure of pair bonding.

Not only that, men with two copies of RS3 334 were more likely to be unmarried than men with one or none, and if they were married, they were twice as likely to have a marital crisis.

[Poll #1252958]

More thoughts

Following on from discussion in the last post (and chatting to Julie on my lunch break), a couple more thoughts:

1) Of course we know that genes merely provide tendencies - starting grooves and patterns for you to grow from.  So you can't actually blame your genes for _making_ you do something.  But on the other hand you might feel less guilty about not being monogamous - or feel less pressure to act as if you wanted to be monogamous - if you knew there was a genetic component.

2) Society being what it is (see The Rules) many people will instantly base everything on a simplistic marker or method.  Which means that you'll see some people demanding tests (or sneaking them) and basing everything on them (rather than just adding them to the mix).  I expect to see a book based around this within the next five years, telling girls how they can find the right man, with only a blood sample and a testing kit...

A couple of singles ads from the future:

VP sensitive seeks other for pair-bonding and lifelong commitment. No time-wasters - testing administered on first date.

and

VP-immune seeks many others for fun and frolics, with no strings attached. No moaners!