As an anthropologist who studies geeks, I found this shirt being sold on Cafepress as infintely amusing…

All right… I am ALL for a science focused on wacky, crazy, mysterious, arcane subjects like mammal mating habits:

However, a group of scientists from Atlanta, Georgia, have discovered a way of damping their ardour. Vole reversal, if you like. By injecting them with a so-called “love gene”, the previously sex-mad beasts are transformed into soppily monogamous creatures devoted to and inseparable from their partners.

I am the first to admit this is absurdly fascinating stuff, especially since it has to do with the “VOLE,” a small rodent I had no knowledge of until today…

But the tenor or let’s say the “theraputic desire” of this type of research strikes me a bit odd and (creeping toward politically suspect terrain too). I really don’t think I need to analyse why this is so ( just read the article for yourself or for that matter infer from the title of the piece Tale of vole reversal and a possible cure for promiscuity) because it is obvious that the loose and easy assocations made between ALL ANIMALS and ALL HUMANS (mostly of the male gender, at least in some articles) are going to be suspect to a cultural anthropologist. Not to mention that I find the uber-medicalization of such things distasteful..

Yet, this little slice of news has piqued my interest in animals and their torrid sexual habits. You see, I was also recently introduced to another fine animal specimin, the echidna.

Now given its weird anatomy and features (see below), my question is….

not whether it is monogamous or “fast, loose, and dirty” but how the heck does it *even have sex* in the first place? I mean he can’t even stand up! And from the look on his face, I just know this poor echnida has yet to be deflowered. Poor little one needs some action….

I am in Texazzzzzzzzzzzzz at Rice University for a conference on ethics and politics in information technology organized by chris kelty and Hanna Landeker. I got here a day late (as did everyone else) due to atrocious storms that always leave the city flooded (I have been victim to such Houston floods once before in the past).

I am pretty torn and shred to pieces (from lack of sleep for a week) but this was a fascinating conference that sought to look at the enununciation of ethics in the everyday work of computer scientists as well as recalibrate the way that anthropologists collaborate (the short answer is they don’t). I will hopefully get some time later to post some of my thoughts and comments.

After the conference, I was able to visit the Menil which was outrageously serene. I loved it. I usually don’t like art museums. They overwhelm my soul, my mind, my eyes, yep my being. I feel ragged afterwards, not the way I like to feel after I see some art.

This though was a tiny dose, and really an exquisite range of surrealist and “tribal” art. There was this one room, called the “Witnesses” which was a little strange through stunning. Here is the description from their website:

Already deeply familiar with Cubism and Surrealism, the de Menils began to consider and acquire the art of primitive cultures. They delighted in its conceptual complexity and aesthetic elusiveness; the creative form and style as well as the incomprehensible mystery of these objects engaged them. The influence of tribal art on Surrealism in particular can be seen in

Yea you heard me, Slap Da Penguin in Da Water. So doctored but whatever, life is just one endless stream of deception anyway, we might as well enjoy it.

Younger Cop:

I am one of those freaks of nature that eats no gluten. It is pain but after a while you grow used to it. You always hope that some mad scientist will cook up a glutenious-like substance that can replace the really tasty and binding nature of gluten but you know deep down that if it is too good to be true, it is prolly that, too good be true.

Today I found a pasta substitute Whole Black Pasta and I was actually impressed, as I usually am with the damn mutability of soy. The stuff travels, far, and wide, a true engine of translation, taking such unique form, from ice cream, to nuggets, to pasta, soy is so mutagenic, it is a little errie.

After 9:30 I was so drained and tired tonight that all I did was watch my favorite online movies and clips. They are all worth checking out, deeply clever and humorours, and all pretty short. Enjoy.

First the Linux Parody of Apple. This will only be funny if you know at least a little about free and open source.

Then there is the magically touching Bush Loves Blair and Vice-VersaEndless Love rendition.

And for those who are a bit more on the agro-anarchist-activist side, check out The Fellowship of Free Trade which is very well done.

And finally for those who have a life on IRC or chatting, watch the The Parlor which cleverly recreates an online chat…

So I have one chapter in my dissertation which is on hacker humor. What can I say, I found hackers funny and I must write about it. One of the points of data that I have collected to display this humor has been their email signatures. It has been a long time since I came across one that I found particularily hilarious but this one caught my attention this morning, perhaps because all of a sudden, an image of geeks in mud came to mind:

Arguing with an engineer is like wrestling with a pig in mud.
After a while, you realise the pig is enjoying it.

This fall I watched the Nova Special on String Theory. Aside from bringing back fond childhood memories (Nova was like classically awesome and dramatic for me, especially the intro), it made me realize how much we anthropologists are like the string theorists of culture. We can’t really see it but think it plays “the crucial’ role in universe of the social. Heh.

And though it might not be as totalizing as that (thankfully, though I would like to think of the uNiverse as these little string packest of twanging energy) the economists have recently discovered that “culture” actually plays a role: PHEW. What upligting affirmation. I can go ahead with my research in peace.