Questions From My Wife X: Cravings, fish, and mosquito bites. What? Should there always be a common theme?

Hey all! Here's a longer post to get caught up. I may take a break from writing, but it doesn't mean the wife stops asking questions.

Why do women as a group seem to enjoy chocolate more than men do?

Chocolate is composed of as many as 800 different chemical components, ranging from the good (anti-oxidant catechins) to the not-as-good (the fatty acids in cocoa butter). Thus, it seems likely that one of these compunds may have some influence on the hormones that differentiate men from women. A researcher at the University of Wisconsin-Madison has shown that female rats have heightened cravings for chocolate over their male counterparts. Further studies have shown that eating chocolate activates the hypothalamus (area of the brain that regulates hunger) while inactivating the amygdala (involved in emotion and memory). This finding may reveal why eating chocolate is soothing when upset or depressed.

Another hypothesis is that cravings come and go with increases and decreases in hormones. Progesterone is thought to promote higher body fat levels. As progesterone concentration increases towards the beginnings of menstruation, this may also be why women crave chocolate. However, much of this may be cultural. One study has found that the difference in chocolate craving between women and men in Spain (90 to 78%) is much closer than in American women and men (91 to 59%).

Why do people crave particular foods when they are lacking in nutrients those foods are rich in? How does your body know that food items (on non-food items like dirt for those with pica) have those nutrients?

Pica is a weird disease. It comes from the Latin word for magpie (pica) as these birds are found to collect and eat practically anything. A Missouri psychiatric museum contains a collection of nails, spoons, and pins removed from a female asylum patient's stomach. While large consumption of objects can indicate a type of autism or mental retardation, the most recognized cravings are seen in pregnant women.

Studies from the late 1960s and early 70s revealed that 35-40% of pregnant women consistently craved clay, starch, and soil. Very little research has been done on this disease, but there seems to be a correlation with ingesting of "non-food" with some kind of nutritional deficiency. However, it seems easier to prove that this is the case than to prove why this is the case. Animals made to be deficient in certain essential minerals are more apt to selectively ingest items that contain high quantities of the missing supplement. In people, iron deficiency and anemia seem the most likely to cause pica. Low iron levels have been shown to cause pagophagia, increased ingestion of ice. When the anemia is treated, the craving for ice goes away.

Besides the nutritional explanation, there are psychological and cultural hypotheses as well. For instance, papers by Vermeer and Frate in the late 1970s claim that the practice of clay-eating "ingrained in southern black society" stems from its use in Africa to promote fertility and lactation.

So, as it seems common in these blog posts to say, no one knows the answer to your question and apparently no one is really trying to find it. How the body can "know" that it has certain deficiencies is still a mystery.

Do fish really not feel pain? I never quite bought that -- seems like almost any animal would be evolutionarily able to feel pain for self-preservation.

Ok, I've been typing too much, so this'll be a quick one. Recent studies seem to indicate that, yes, fish feel pain, but this doesn't make them less tasty. They respond negatively to injections of bee venom and vinegar over controls, and may actually be more sensitive than humans. And is this really surprising? Fish are vertebrates and have a relatively complex nervous system in the grand scheme of the phyla charts.

Why do some people get stung by mosquitos a lot while others don't? I definitely fall into the first category, and would love to know how to sic the bugs on other folks for a change.

Female mosquitoes are the biters, and primarily find their victims through a type of smell. It seems possible that different people would have less appealing smells to the buggers and not attract them. Some of the major chemicals that mosquitoes detect are carbon dioxide and lactic acid, key components of respiration. People who sweat less generally get bitten less. Repellents like DEET work by blocking the mosquito's ability to pick up these olfactory signals. So, besides holding your breath whenever outside, just remember to wear plenty of repellent and avoid other floral-based chemical attractants like perfume and sweet-smelling lotions.

Questions From My Wife IX: Ancient Beauty Secrets

Were classic ancient beauties (Cleopatra, Helen of Troy, etc.) really all that hot or did they just have good PR?

Ideals of beauty change over generations, so who's to say if the ancients would find today's supermodels attractive at all. But, in her day, Cleopatra was the rage around the Mediterranean. Cassius Dio, a second century Greek historian, refers to her as "a woman of surpassing beauty, and at that time, when she was in the prime of her youth, she was most striking; she also possessed a most charming voice and a knowledge of how to make herself agreeable to every one." But was she reliant on her looks alone as she sought to diplomatically link to Greece through seducing Julius Caesar and Marc Antony? Plutarch says "[f]or her beauty, as we are told, was in itself not altogether incomparable, nor such as to strike those who saw her; but converse with her had an irresistible charm..." So, maybe she wasn't all that hot. Recently, Roman coins of her likeness have been found, revealing (if this likeness is at all accurate) that she had a small forehead, hooked nose, and a pointed chin. A marble bust possibly sculpted upon her arrival in Rome reveals more soft and rounded features.

Helen of Troy is probably based more in mythology to be considered "accurately beautiful as stated." Though I find it kinda funny that Isaac Asimov defined a measurement of beauty as the ability to launch one ship -- the millihelen.

Why is prostitution called the oldest profession? What were they being paid with? Meat? Fire? Stone wheels? Pterodactyl record player / woolly mammoth shower (think Flintstones)?

Uh, yeah...this one's a doozy. Prostitution, as loosely defined as providing sexual intercourse for some compensation, has probably been around as long as there has been sex and/or compensation. While I couldn't find a good answer to when it was deemed as such, there were brothels in ancient Greek, Aztec, Roman, and Jewish societies. Some theories suggest that prostitution (and adultery) came from the establishment of monogamy as a social norm in humans. Or rather, the conflict between monogamy and the male need to inseminate whatever is possible to pass along the genes. It seems unlikely to me that this would be the "oldest" of all professions. Wasn't Adam a nomenclature zoologist?

Questions From My Wife VIII: Quick Hits #2

Here we go, a bunch of quick answers to get back in the swing of things... As always, these are real questions from my real wife. Do you think I would take the time to come up with random things like this?

Why were so many split level houses built? Were they cheaper than building a regular old two-story house? Did people just really enjoy having random stairs in the middle of their house?

The classic split-level house, in which one side of the home is one-story and situated at a height between the other 2-story side, came into favor in the 1960s. The reason for their construction doesn't seem to be a matter of cost, but rather a way to compress a lot of house into a relatively compact area. Also, it can be a way to use uneven land in a useful manner. During the baby boom 50s, suburb expansion pushed into areas not previously considered appropriate for a neighborhood. It's yet to be determined whether the awkward design or its use as the model for the Brady Bunch house ultimately drove this style out of favor.

What is the evolutionary purpose of allergies? Why do some people have them and other people don't?

Allergies are caused by a hyperstimulation of the immune system by some foreign entity. While it makes sense that the point of evolution would be to continually gain positive characteristics and remove negative ones, this isn't always the case. For instance, some negative mutations, like sickle-cell anemia, are kept in populations because they have other positive benefits. One possibility is that allergies are a side-effect of having a powerful immune system. While annoying, allergies are not generally lethal and would not be eliminated by evolutionary means. As for the second question, that's still a mystery. Scientists assume that genetics may have a role, but allergies are not consistently handed down to offspring. There are a few ideas for why allergies are becoming more common, such as the increased use of chemicals and antibiotics. Recent studies have suggested that as we remove more parasites and other small microbes from our systems, we may be losing subtle immunosuppressants that have previously repulsed allergic reactions. But, to tell you the truth, I'd prefer to get a little stuffed up in the spring than have a hookworm.

At what point in history did people start celebrating birthdays?

Many historians believe that the act of birthday celebration was spread by Roman soldiers practicing Mithraism, a pagan cult dealing in astrology. Not much is really known about how certain pagan holidays morphed into individualistic celebrations. However, in this time from the 1st-4th century, birthday parties became far more common throughout Asia and Europe.

Why does water taste extra cold if you have a peppermint in your mouth? Also, why does peppermint help settle your stomach?

The peppermint plant (above) is a sterile cross of spearmint and watermint, and is believed to have medicinal purposes because of its high menthol content. Menthol activates receptors in your mouth to form a cool sensation; the same cold-sensitive receptors that activate when you eat or drink anything that's cool. This is similar to the heat-sensitive receptors that become active in response to hot stimuli or chili peppers. So, when you drink water with peppermint, the coolness from the water is greatly exaggerated as the menthol is activating the cold receptors. This cooling feeling, along with its properties as a mild analgesic, pushes menthol in the forefront of different natural remedies, including upset stomachs.

Questions From My Wife VII: Not My Wife, Though She Also Asks Me About Poop

Taking another grant writing break to answer a reader's question. Stacy T. writes:

What does whale poop look like?

As far as I can tell, whale poop is a mystical substance. It's mostly water-soluble and appears as a giant cloud in the water. (See the image posted -- the ring shows whale flatulence bubbling to the ocean surface and that cloud is the poop.) Scientists can tell what the whale has been eating based on the poop cloud color -- this one probably had a good meal of bright red krill. Actually, scientists can look at the excrement to learn about the animal's health as well. Since whales poop mostly water (thus the cloud) any solid or waxy chunks indicate that the whale could be sick and not absorbing much of its foods' nutrients. One of the problems in whale research is the inability to observe whale poop. This would allow scientists to track migration habits and population levels over years of study. Interestingly a dog has been trained for the explicit purpose of detecting whale excrement for research.

Ambergris, a sperm whale bile duct excretion, is released from the whale's intestines. While technically not poop, scientists think that whales produce this in order to sweep large foreign items from their digestive system. Ambergris (literally "grey amber") has been used for centuries as a medicine and in perfume. And while gross, it is not actually a controlled substance, as it seen as a natural animal byproduct and has not been regulated since 2001.

Questions From My Wife VI: Myths, Legends, and Other Means of Trickin' Folk

Taking a short break from writing the Postdoctoral Grant of DOOM (ie tricking the government to pay for me feeding a ton of illicit drugs to unsuspecting mice) to bring you another installment of QFMW.

Where did the idea of the unicorn come from? It's nowhere near as interesting as other fantasy creatures, just a horse with a random horn stuck on its head. What creative genius came up with that?

The unicorn is represented in texts as far back as the Old Testament to writings of Leonardo Da Vinci to elementary school folders. Mythologically speaking, the unicorn has a beard, lion's tail and cloven hooves. However, the typical modern view is it is a white horse with a single horn in the middle of its forehead. There are a few current theories on what people were thinking when they came up with the idea, some, as with many mythological beasts, deriving from misinterpreted skeletons.

1) Elasmotherium sibiricum - a large ancient rhinoceros. It is quite possible that skeletal remains of this creature could definitely be thought of as a horse-like creature, with a huge central horn reaching lengths of 7 feet or more.

2) Mutated animals - Gene mutations are always occuring. The possibility that a goat or ox could have developed a single misshapen horn to a recessive gene is very likely. This process has actually been replicated by people that fused together growing horns of young goats or calves.

3) Bizarre interpretations of foreign animals - British monarchs Elizabeth I and James I often told tales of being given unicorn horns from explorers who had spent considerable time in the arctic. Arctic unicorns? Probably just narwhales. Marco Polo depicts a unicorn in his travels as "scarcely smaller than elephants. They have the hair of a buffalo and feet like an elephant's. They have a single large black horn in the middle of the forehead... They have a head like a wild boar's… They spend their time by preference wallowing in mud and slime. They are very ugly brutes to look at." Marco? Maybe you saw a rhino? African antelopes like the oryx are also possibilities for a unicorn-like interpretation if they stand in profile.

Okay then, smart guy, what about the tooth fairy?

Yeah, this one is plain weird. How we're able to convince our kids of this (and were convinced ourselves) remains a complete mystery to me. I remember figuring it out by requesting that the Tooth Fairy sign and date a form for acquisition of my tooth...you know, for proper filing purposes and tax records and whatnot. I totally recognized my dad's handwriting.

The accepted American commercial spiel is that after a kid loses a tooth, it goes under the pillow. The tooth fairy comes in the night, takes the tooth, and rewards the kid monetarily (after signing the necessary paperwork, of course). But other countries have their own traditions. An English tradition is to throw the tooth in a fire to prevent needing to search for it after you die. Vikings gave children cash for teeth in order to make jewelry out of them -- apparently they thought kid parts were sources of great power. Better than toes, I guess. Several countries told stories of giving teeth to mice, and the Spanish equivalent of the tooth fairy is a mouse named Ratoncito Pérez. Which is awesome. These ideas, combined with European folk tales of fairies were combined in the 1949 publication of "The Tooth Fairy" by Lee Rothgow and into American legend.

Questions From My Wife V: Color Evolution

What is the point of hair and eyes coming in different colors? I get the evolutionary reason for different skin shades, but not the hair and eyes.

Actually, the genetics of skin color is very complex and is not yet fully understood. So far 4 genes regulating skin color have been identified, and there may be more yet to be found. There are a few theories for the diversity of skin color, such as the balance between avoiding exposure to ultraviolet radiation and production of Vitamin D. Darker skin has the advantage of blocking UV rays and reduced instances of skin cancer due to increased presence of melanin, but lighter skin lets in more light, which is crucial for the formation of vitamin D. Thus areas with less direct light, such as around the poles, have lighter pigmented skin.

However, many scientists view this idea as too simplistic, as it has obvious flaws. People living in the same latitudes -- the Australian aborigines and the Amazonian tribes; the Inuits and the Swedes -- have widely varying skin coloration. Plus most cancers are rarely factors in evolution -- most cellular damage is done far past prime reproductive age. Even Darwin didn't think natural selection had anything to with geographic variations of beauty traits. Current theories are returning to the viewpoint of Darwin and suggesting the evolution of skin color has more to do with sexual choice and picking partners by physical traits that happen to be socially important, but not much else.

Questions behind variations of eye and hair color are very similar to this. Sure, it could have happened for a reason. Legitimate scientific evidence exists that suggests the color of the iris shapes the ability to see in certain light conditions. But while it is more comforting to assume natural selection is involved, it seems more likely that it is not.

Sexual selection is a complicated theory, and not only attributed by Darwin to be the basis of racial differences, but also the general hairlessness of humans and possibly the creation of humor, music, and art. One theory by John Maynard Smith suggests that the human brain was created to its cumbersome levels by sexual selection -- very much like the plumage of a male peacock.

Questions From My Wife IV: Quickies

A bunch of quick hits:

1) Why does it make you sleepy to be warm?

This basically has to do with the human body's response to overexertion. Increased body temperatures have a tendency to "cook" tissues, so the autonomic nervous system activates a fatigue or tired response. This makes you slow down to hopefully decrease your body temperature to normal levels.

2) When did Sesame Street establish that Snuffleupagus was real and not a figment of Big Bird's imagination?

Aloysius Snuffleupagus was finally revealed to the adults on November 18, 1985. Apparently, according to Wikipedia, "Snuffy's performer, Martin P. Robinson, revealed that Snuffy was finally introduced to the main human cast mainly due to a string of high profile and sometimes graphic stories of pedophila and sexual abuse of children on shows such as 60 Minutes and 20/20. The writers felt that by having the adults refuse to believe Big Bird despite the fact that he was telling the truth, they were scaring children into thinking that their parents would not believe them if they had been sexually abused and that they'd just be better off remaining silent."

3) Why do I get a sinus headache when it's rainy/muggy out?

Apparently if you don't have a sinus infection, you can't really have a sinus headache. What you're experiencing is probably a migraine. Very little is known about this condition (sorry) but sufferers are often hypersensitive to a variety of internal and extrenal stimuli (certain foods, hormonal conditions, stress, and even weather conditions). High humidity and low barometric pressure have been shown to induce the headaches in a large number of migraine sufferers.

Until next time, sports fans.

Questions From My Wife III: Take Me Out to the Jock Jam

A week ago last Thursday, a group of us went to see the local minor league baseball team take on their major league counterparts at the end of spring training. I learned many things:
1) Baseball is kinda boring if you don't have a beer and/or hot dog.
2) I'm not cool because I don't have a strap on my sunglasses so I can wear them backwards around my neck. Actually, I was probably already not cool because I got my sunglasses from a dollar store.
3) People-watching at stadiums comes second maybe to airports, but it's still pretty good.
4) We've run out of sporting event music.

This directly ties in with the third question from my wife:

Are there still people out there recording jock jams? If so, why do they still play "Are You Ready for This" (alternate choice - "Everybody Dance Now") all the time? Were we in high school at the artistic peak of the jock jame genre?

In high school, due to copius supplies of pep rallies, I believe that our bodies and minds were subjugated to higher quantities of the jock jam. We saw countless little bitchy girls get thrown in the air to songs ranging from "It Takes Two (To Make A Thing Go Right and/or Out Of Sight)" to "Rock and Roll Part 2" (or "Hey, We Beat The Hell Out Of You Cause We're Awesome So Suck It"). So maybe one answer is that we're not around high school gymnasiums as much as we used to be.

But you do have a point. Looking at the track listings for ESPN Presents Jock Jams, Volumes One, Two, Three, Four, and even Five reveals the extremely rigorous process a song must go through to be denoted a jam of jock. But seriously, they were really stretching there on volume 5.... "Ray of Light"? Usher? Actually, I have no idea what makes a song escape Billboard's Top 40 to be a tried and true "jock jam." Are there any hits from the last 5 years that are played with reasonable frequency at professional ballpark? Maybe "Hey Ya", but it's getting really close to that 5-year threshold.

So what's the deal? Are people not recording jock jams anymore? Or are announcers too far out of the loop to play anything modern? My guess is that there's a little bit of both. House music just isn't as fashionable as it was in the early 90s. Current songwriters have abandoned exploring what particular dance steps one must undertake to create the Tootsie Roll. Also, I think all the stadiums just have those 5 discs on shuffle. Why mess with what works?

Questions From My Wife II: Sussudio

What is "Su Sussudio"? Why do I hate it so much?

Sussudio is a horrible horrible song written by Phil Collins and released on his 1985 album No Jacket Required. Here you can find the lyrics and wonder to yourself how this man ever made it as a songwriter. Basically, he just sings about how he as a young man longs for an older woman named Sussudio. Over and over. For some reason, this made it to the top of the Billboard charts. But, to give you an idea of what the hell people were thinking in 1985, it followed Bryan Adams' Heaven and preceded Duran Duran's A View To A Kill. True fact: everyone buying music at that time was on some form of cocaine. To further illustrate this point, the lead character in American Psycho alludes to Sussudio as a "personal favorite."

As to why you hate it, I have a few potential answers:
1) It has no story. It's a pop music version of asking someone to go out with them so many times they finally say ok.
2) It's really about a man's love for a horse. Phil Collins got the name Sussudio from one of his daughter's horses.
3) Phil Collins has a whiny voice and stole the main chord progression from Prince's 1999.
4) It makes no sense. Are we supposed to get that Sussudio is someone's name? True fact #2: I can guarantee that it is, in actuality, no one's name.

Questions From My Wife I: Hair Loss?

[A brief intro: My wife likes to ask me questions about anything and everything that pops into her head. I don't mind; she's pretty good about me staring at her with a confused look and no answer in sight. I'lluse this forum as an outlet on attempting to come up with a decent answer for her. And if anyone else has any questions they'd enjoy watching me fumble around on for a few paragraphs, feel free to drop a comment. --G]

You always complain about how much I shed. Why does the hair on some people's heads fall out more often than other people's, but they are not going bald?

Before answering this one, let me give the readers a quick overview of my living condition. I cohabitate with one black cat, one shaggy mutt, and one long-haired wife. It seems as if there is a constant struggle to keep stray hairs off of the bathroom sink and out of the kitchen. I'm constantly finding long dark hairs on my clothing and have recently begun finding them at work attached to my lab coat.

So the question is, where does she keep coming up with new hairs without going bald, and how can we somehow package this and sell it to 40-something execs in sports cars?

On average, the human head contains between 120,000 to 150,000 hairs growing from follicles -- pockets of cells designed to grow individual hairs. This process, like many in the body, takes place in the form of a cycle. First, the hair grows and divides within the follicle, in a process very similar to mitosis. Next, a cellular signal is given and the hair stops being made, and the root is pushed closer to the tissue surface. This is where the hair will fall out. However, the bulb still remains connected to its original location via a series of small nerves and will return to grow another hair in the course of a few months. This cycle can take anywhere from months to years depending on the location, care, and other environmental factors. For instance, eyebrows only take 3-4 months to complete a cycle, whereas it can take scalp hair 3-4 years.

The matter close at hand is it seems like the more hair you have, the more you will lose. Obviously, the longer it is, the more noticeable it is. People lose, on average, around 100 strands of hair a day. Why you don't go bald from it is another issue.

Baldness, or alopecia, isn't well understood. One factor may involve slowing of the hair's growth stage, leading to normal hair loss without rigorous replenishment. This is a reason why chemotherapy leads to hair loss. Cancer drugs keep cells from dividing, and this includes the production of new hair. In addition, the male androgen hormones (testosterone) seem to deplenish hair growth, while female hormones such as estrogen are protectants. Thus, when women have low estrogen levels postpartum or postmenopause, extreme hair loss can occur, similar to male-pattern baldness.

So basically, losing hair is normal. I should just get over it. Interestingly, in my research I found a few theories on why baldness happens in evolutionary terms. Apparently, in gorillas, a large forehead is considered a sign of maturity. The apes with the largest foreheads were seen as the most attractive. Others claim that's it's just a normal process of going from hairy ape to naked man.

So don't despair, balding men. Blame your ancient ancestors.