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Dissecting Jordan Peterson’s latest book – downright draining.

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Biblical approach

A new book by psychologist-turned-YouTuber Jordan Peterson has been published. we wrestle with god It's a work about how ancient myths and legends, if perhaps not literal truths, contain valuable, even universal lessons about life and humanity.

The feedback was also positive. Anthropologists will tell you that there is much to be gained from studying mythology. You can learn about how past societies thought about the relationship between ordinary people and elites, and about humanity's place in the natural world.

But when I reached the last page of the preface, the penny that had been so high somehow fell. This is not a worldwide study. Only Biblical stories are featured, almost entirely from Genesis and Exodus, because the Bible is the “presupposed story of Western civilization” and “the foundation of the West, plain and simple.” The story is featured.

Feedback's grasp of intellectual history is admittedly a little vague, but Western society and modern science, while shaped by Christianity, were also influenced by the ideas of ancient Greeks, Romans, Norsemen, and Arabic scholars. There is no doubt that it is. Fundamentals of scientific revolution, etc.

However, we do not pretend to be experts in Biblical exegesis. I'd like to leave the theological criticism to former Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, who says Peterson “relies heavily on somewhat outdated Christian commentary” and “relentlessly disdains nuance and disagreement.” ” states.

Instead, we unpack small sections where Peterson tries to connect his ideas to human biology (something we know a little about).

eve problem

Chapter 2 tells the story of Adam and Eve being chased out of the Garden of Eden after Eve, tempted by the serpent, eats the forbidden fruit and convinces Adam to do the same.

Peterson says this reflects a fundamental flaw in the minds of men and women. “The temptation that forever faces women,” he writes, “is the idea that maternal benevolence can proudly extend to the whole world, even to the most venomous snakes…even if the position is wrong. He uses her compassion to assert unearned moral virtues and abilities, even when he is wrong.

Men, on the other hand, have “corresponding and equally deadly sins.” It's the belief that “anything you bring before me I can take in, control, name, subdue, and put into proper order” – no matter how “too much” or “That's ridiculous.”

While men must exercise “emergency powers” and decide who deserves help, it is women's role to show compassion and draw men's attention to those who are suffering.

Since the book aims to reveal absolute truths about human nature, feedback relished the lack of reflection on the part about the dangers of “going too far.”

Now, one might expect psychologist Peterson to provide psychological evidence for these differences between men and women. That would be a mistake. But he tries to tie it to the biology of childbirth. Labor is painful and dangerous because human babies' brains have evolved to be larger and they must pass through a narrower birth canal, which otherwise would be “difficult for women to run,” she said. explain.

This caused neurons in the brain to fire due to feedback overload. Peterson restates a hypothesis called the “obstetric dilemma.” Founded in 1960.

Today, it is one of the most controversial concepts in anthropology, and all of its underlying assumptions have been proven false or questionable. The 2018 study was bluntly titled: “There is no such thing as an 'obstetric dilemma'”. 2021 counterattack (Deep breath) “It is unwarranted to completely reject the obstetric dilemma hypothesis, because some of its basic assumptions are not well discounted,'' he said.

Feedback alone is not wise to resolve this sticky dispute. But at least unlike Peterson, we get it. She went on to say that pregnant and breastfeeding women are “increasedly dependent” and cannot compete with men for position, and at this point we have used our emergency powers to stop reading. said.

word of the year

Feedback enjoys the annual ritual in which the dictionary announces the word of the year. That tells us something about changing practices. We are proud of the existence of Macquarie Dictionary, Australia's national language dictionary, and the fact that the word of the year in 2024 is 'Encitization”.

This great term was coined by author Cory Doctorow to describe how companies gradually degrade their service as they squeeze more and more profit out of their customers. He was referring to companies like Google, where search results are full of ads and unreliable AI-generated summaries, and Facebook, where newsfeeds are full of memes and ads and messages from friends and family are barely visible. It means a company.

Ever since I read Doctorow's paper, the word feedback has been around. first essayAnd I'm glad that this work will be accepted by a wider audience.

Have a story for feedback?

You can email your article to Feedback at feedback@newscientist.com. Please enter your home address. This week's and past feedback can be found on our website.

Source: www.newscientist.com

Discovery of 12 human bones in a hidden tomb beneath Petra, Jordan

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The veil of mystery surrounding the Treasury Monument in Petra, Jordan has been lifted once again.

Beneath an ancient building carved out of rock, archaeologists discovered a hidden tomb containing 12 relatively well-preserved human bones and a vast array of grave offerings.

A similar tomb was discovered more than 20 years ago opposite the famous Treasury Building, also known as Al-Khazneh, one of the Seven Wonders of the World and a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Earlier this year, a team of researchers received permission from Jordanian authorities to conduct a week of remote sensing in and around the Treasury, a city center hand-carved into the walls of a desert canyon by the Nabatean people.

“There was always the idea that there might be more graves, but no one has yet been found,” Richard Bates, a geophysicist and professor at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland, said in an email. “The hope was to find an intact grave.”

A joint Jordanian-American team, which also included the Jordanian Department of Antiquities and the Amman-based nonprofit American Research Center, used ground-penetrating radar to detect the cavity and pinpoint its location and depth. Instead of digging straight through, which would have cut through solid rock and damaged parts of the building, Bates said they carefully dug by hand into the cavity from the outside.

Richard Bates. Excavation at the Treasury.
Kindly provided by Professor Richard Bates, University of St Andrews

Inside, in the original burial site, are 12 human bones, one of which is clutching the top of a broken pitcher, most likely dating from the 1st century BC. Bates said the bodies likely included both men and women and ranged in age from children to adults. Although that is not confirmed yet.

“No complete burial has ever been found here before, so this discovery could potentially tell us more about the Nabataean kingdom,” Bates said.

The discovery could also provide new insights into the Treasury itself, whose purpose is still unknown.

“Despite its fame, the Treasury Department remains a mystery to us in many ways,” Pierce Paul Creesman, director of the Center for American Studies, said in an email. “Anything we can do to understand it more deeply is important.”

Visited by more than 1 million visitors a year, the Treasury is the most famous of Petra’s iconic monuments. In Steven Spielberg’s 1989 film Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, it was featured as the resting place of the Holy Grail in the film.

The newly uncovered tomb excavation was featured in a two-part episode of the American reality television series Expedition Unknown, which aired on the Discovery Channel.

Bates said there are signs of other cavities in the area that could be graves.

“It’s very likely that more will be discovered, so we need to get the funding back and continue the research,” he said.

Source: www.nbcnews.com

Insights into large pterosaur flying capabilities revealed by new fossils found in Jordan

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Paleontologists have unearthed the fossils of two different large azhdarchoid pterosaurs. Inabatanin Arabia And previously known species Arambrugiana Philadelphia — Discovered in Upper Cretaceous deposits in Jordan, the fossils have led researchers to hypothesize that not only could the largest pterosaurs fly, but that they may have had a different style of flight.

Inabatanin Arabia (Top) Flying while flapping its wings Arambrugiana Philadelphia (Below) Soaring like a vulture. Image courtesy of Terrill Whitlatch.

Pterosaurs are an extinct group of flying reptiles that existed from the Late Triassic until the mass extinction at the end of the Cretaceous period.

They evolved powered flight about 50 million years before flight feathers appeared in the fossil record, and some achieved wingspans twice that of the largest flying birds (12 metres versus 6 metres).

“Our team was very surprised to find a three-dimensionally preserved pterosaur bone, which is a very rare occurrence,” said University of Michigan paleontologist Kerstin Rosenbach.

“Because pterosaur bones are hollow, they are extremely fragile and, if preserved, are likely to be found flat like a pancake.”

Dr. Rosenbach and his colleagues discovered two azhdarchoid pterosaur specimens in Jordan, one of which corresponds to a giant species. Arambrugiana Philadelphia (wingspan about 10 meters) and the second is a new, smaller species. Inabatanin Arabia (Wingspan approximately 5 meters).

They used high-resolution computed tomography (CT) scans to analyze the internal structure of the wing bones.

“3D preservation is very rare, so we don’t have a lot of information about what the inside of a pterosaur bone looks like, so we wanted to do a CT scan,” Dr Rosenbach said.

“It’s entirely possible that nothing was preserved inside, or that the CT scanner was not sensitive enough to distinguish the fossil bone tissue from the surrounding matrix.”

“But fortunately, what we found was amazing, with exciting internal structures that were not only preserved but could be seen with a CT scanner.”

New specimens Arambrugiana Philadelphia Its wingspan was determined to be 10 metres, and the first details about the reptile’s skeletal structure were revealed.

CT scans revealed that the humerus is hollow inside, with a series of spiral ridges running up and down the bone, similar to the internal structure of a vulture’s wing bones.

The spiral ridges are thought to resist the torsional loads associated with soaring (sustained powered flight that requires flapping wings to launch and maintain).

The Inabutinin Arabian specimen is one of the most complete pterosaurs ever discovered in Afro-Arabia.

CT scans revealed that the structure of its flight bones is completely different from that of Arambourgiania philadelphiae.

The interior of the flight bone was crossed with an arrangement of struts that matched those seen in the wing bones of modern flapping birds.

This indicates that it was adapted to withstand the bending loads associated with flapping flight, and so it is likely that Inabatanin flew in this way, although it does not exclude the possibility that other flight styles may have been used from time to time.

” Inabatanin Arabia “It’s not uncommon, but it’s fun to see,” Dr. Rosenbach said.

” Arambrugiana Philadelphia It was totally unexpected and at first I had no idea what I was looking at.”

“Being able to see the entire 3D model, Arambrugiana PhiladelphiaI was really excited to see the spiral ridges on the humerus.”

The discovery of diverse flight styles among different sized pterosaurs is extremely exciting as it gives clues about how these animals lived.

It also raises intriguing questions, such as to what extent flight style correlates with body size and which flight style is more common among pterosaurs.

“We have very limited information about the internal structure of pterosaur bones over time, so it’s hard to say with any certainty which style of flight emerged first,” Dr Rosenbach said.

“If you look at other groups of flying vertebrates, birds and bats, you’ll find that wing flapping is by far the most common flight behavior.”

“Even soaring and gliding birds need some flapping to take to the air and continue flying.”

“This leads us to suggest that if flapping flight was the default state and was advantageous for a population of pterosaurs in a particular environment, in this case the open ocean, then soaring behaviour probably evolved later.”

a paper The paper on the survey results is Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology.

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Kirsten L. Rosenbach othersNew pterosaur fossils from the Afro-Arabian Late Cretaceous provide insight into the flying capabilities of large pterosaurs. Journal of Vertebrate PaleontologyPublished online September 5, 2024; doi: 10.1080/02724634.2024.2385068

Source: www.sci.news