Malhairia

Yesterday I was writing about the two theories of how humans came to be hairless, or at least mostly hairless. However you may have noticed, as I have, that not everyone is as hairless as each other. Men tend to be hairier than women, and people from certain areas tend to be a lot hairier than people from others. For example, people of Scandinavian descent are quite hair-free whereas people of Greek descent tend to be quite hairy. Well according to Dr Sharon Moalem's book, "Survival of the Sickest", there is a reason. Dense body hair on the exposed parts of the body is generally found in the places where malaria is most common, with the exception of Africa where the heat would discourage such body hair. The dense body hair would have offered some protection against mosquito bites which would carry malaria.

If it's all the same to evolution I'll stick with my anti-malarial pills if I ever venture to such climes.

Women and children first

I shall assume that you are aware that most other mammals are rather hairy, especially our closest relatives, the primates. This does beg the question why humans aren't hairy, presumably at one stage in our evolution we were hairy but somewhere along the line we lost most of our body hair (and in years to come many women will wax, or shave what remains unless it is on top of their heads). The original hypothesis behind this hair loss is known as the "Savanna Hypothesis". In a nutshell this theory claims that humans left the trees for the savanna and new methods of hunting and such required them to stand upright, and because the men got overheated while hunting they gradually lost their hair. However this theory has been challenged by Elaine Morgan and she helped develop the "aquatic ape hypothesis". This theorises that our prehuman ancestors spent time in and around the water, which naturally pushed them towards bipedalism so they could venture deeper and still breathe. Most body hair was lost to allow them to become more streamlined in the water. This also explains our prominent nose, with downward pointing nostrils which allow us to dive.

Of course not everyone is happy with their prominent noses, which is why several millennia later plastic surgeons evolved....

Plagued for Iron

I have to say that I am taking my time spent at home very easy. I am taking the opportunity to catch up on all the books I want to read. I may have only been at home for three days but I have read three books in that time and am now on my fourth. This book is called "Survival of the Sickest" and is about how various genetic illnesses actually played a role in survival. For example there is a disease called hemochromatosis which causes the body to stock up on iron continuously. Unbeknownst to me (well, until now) but iron is essential for all forms of life but too much iron will kill you or at least make you very ill. Hemochromatosis is a hereditary disease and is one of the most common genetic variants in people of Western European descent. According to "Survival of the Sickest" the reason hemochromatosis is so common can be traced back to the fourteenth century Black Death. In people with hemochromatosis the body locks away iron in almost every type of cell, however one type of cell, the macrophages (a type of white blood cell), ends up with less iron than normal. Infectious agents can frequently use the iron inside a macrophage to become stronger. Hence hemochromatic macrophages are much better at dealing with bacteria. Thankfully the bad effects of hemochromatosis are easily combated by blood-letting.

So if you have hemochromatosis you need not fear the Bubonic plague, and to save your life you can give blood and save someone else's while you're at it.

Wind-charmer

As we live in a world in which science can explain many things rationally and prove ancient folk beliefs and remedies to be laughably wrong, we can forget just how much of an effect these old beliefs, myths and legends have had on our culture. Today, for example, I discovered the origin of the phrase "halcyon days". In medieval times the halcyon was a bird that was believed to breed in a nest floating on the sea. In order to do this the bird could charm the wind and the sea so that both would be cam. The halcyon was sometimes identified as a kingfisher, which in Greek is an alkuon. The halcyon days were originally the 14 days of calm weather that were supposed to occur when the halcyon was breeding.

Of course now we know that birds cannot charm the sea so it is calm but this mistaken belief did give rise to a way to speak of the good times of old. Those halcyon days...

Celsus

Yesterday I finished reading "Misquoting Jesus" and one of the things that amused me while reading it was that Christianity had been ridiculed in its early years because it was a religion because it was made up of slaves, women and children. I know a little bit about Greek and Roman society during this period and the only people who had status were free men. Christianity promised a world in which there would be no injustice, or inequality, or suffering, or evil, and where regardless of gender, or status, all would be equal. Naturally this message was attractive to those in society who had no status. Celsus, in particular, was known to have mocked Christianity on these grounds in his work, "The True Word". Somewhat ironically Celsus' work only survives because it was reproduced in a counter-polemic, "Contra Celsus" which set out to refute Celsus' arguments.

In case you're wondering "Contra Celsus" was probably more successful.

Rome today Heretic tomorrow

While travelling around Canada with my sister last summer we called into several bookshops so she could get new books to read. I browsed and several books caught my eye. At Christmas I asked for a book called "Misquoting Jesus" by Bart D. Ehrman. However due to my hectic final year schedule I have only just got around to reading it. The book is about how the Christian Bible came to be fixed in its current form. Ehrman refers to an early Christian, Marcion. He was a prominent philosopher-teacher in 2nd century Rome who was the first (as far as we know) to produce an actual canon of scripture. However Marcion's beliefs are quite different from Christianity today. He believed that there were two different Gods: the God of the Old Testament, who created the world and the law; and the God of Jesus, who sent Christ into the world to save it from the vengeful creator God. Marcion believed that Paul shared his understanding of Jesus.

Understandably Marcion was labelled a heretic by the mainstream Christian church.

Moving on up

Today my father and I caught the ferry back to sunny (actually sunny this time) Northern Ireland. Having made such trips several times over the past five years we know it is always best to get the big P&O ferry as the fast ferries don't usually travel when the Irish sea is rough. Anyway as it was such a pleasant day I went out on deck, as from the passenger deck 4 you can take a stroll outside in the fresh air (and to have a cigarette which rather defeats the purpose). I happened to turn and see another door marked "Access to Observation Deck". I had not known of this deck's existence, which considering the number of times I have been on that ferry is quite shocking. Naturally I climbed up and admired the view of the Scottish coast as it retreated to the horizon.

And yes I got a little lump in my throat.