chadn737

Except that the variance calculated in the paper I cited as evidence was not so simplistic as that. Given how throughly IQ has been criticized and analyzed, I think we should give a little more credit to researchers in the field. The paper I cited in fact references Rogers (1999), who completely reanalyzed Flynn's original data. He discusses in length the various scenarios and potential changes in variance that would lead to observed changes in mean. What he showed, however, was that: "These results suggest strongly that the cause of the Flynn Effect is not an overall change in the variance". The data used by Rogers (1999) was used by Rowe & Rodgers (2002) and again there is little evidence for significant changes in variance that would explain the change in means. You claim that the "increase appears to have been disproportionately in the lower scores"....do you have actual data or evidence that supports this? From the papers I have just cited, there seems to be little evidence of significant change in the variance. If the change in scores occurred disproportionately in one tail of the distribution, as you have just claimed, then this would significantly effect the variance. So yes, I am asking you to back up this claim with an actual paper or data set. How so? You are making allusions to vague environmental factors and claiming these will have an effect. I explained why this would not be the case. Measures of heritability would differ if the variance differed, but there is no evidence that the variance has indeed changed. So I have supported the claim that the Flynn effect will not change heritability measures. So what are all these environmental factors, how have they not been accounted for, etc? The studies conducted to measure heritability are not simplistic or ignorant of potential environmental factors. Thats why they are carefully designed to account for environmental factors and rule them out. I'd actually like to see a detailed explanation of how they have failed to account for the environment when they so clearly have. I understand your skepticism, but you are wrong. Its not simply that they used a dubious heritage like "Scotland". If you really think that the researchers conducting the study used such simplistic methodologies then you have clearly not read the paper. In GWAS studies, it is standard practice to account for population stratification, which can generate false association of genetic variants due to population structure. Robust methods of dealing with this exist and are used in the paper I cited. Since they have GWAS data, they can actually account for heritage, even filtering for degrees of relatedness (also done). As I have pointed out to you in a past, this method is capable of measuring heritability in an assumption free manner, the mathematical case for which is expanded upon in the second paper regarding this method that I cited. If we look at other methods, such as twin studies, there has been in-depth testing of the assumptions made regarding twins and also complex modeling to statistically test the alternatives of environmental influence. So I need a lot more detail and evidence to buy your skepticism of these methods.

Sure, if you go back far enough, but there is a reason why there is genetic structure associated with geography. Since man has left Africa, he has continued to evolve and with that develop regional differences both at the phenotypic and genetic levels. I don't see what is ambiguous about the the term "European". Certainly within the context of the study presented, the definitions are robust enough to show evidence of population continuity and selection. If such population structure did not exist, then there would be no signatures of selection, no evidence for population continuity, etc.

I think this is an unnecessary splitting of hairs. European individuals are those whose ancestors have their point of origin in Europe. This definition is actually very robust and when genetic variation of European populations are informed by geological information and plotted by PCA, amazingly reconstruct a map of Europe. This is only possible because there exists within European populations, stratification of the genetic structure of different populations. As pigmentation is well studied and understood, we know the genes that are involved. All one needs to do then is look for signatures of selection by comparing changes that have occurred in ancestral populations and modern populations. Furthermore, since they have genetic data, they were able to test for the possibility of population continuity from the mitochondrial data. When they did this, they showed that the modern populations tested were most likely descendants of the ancestral populations they tested. Individuals whose ancestors had other points of origin would not demonstrate this continuity based on mitochondrial data. And no, white people are not as white as they always were. The entire point of this paper is showing that the likely ancestors of white Europeans were not white 5000 years ago and the change in pigmentation is something that happened recently and rapidly due to natural selection. This is interesting because the change in pigmentation within European populations occurred very rapidly, which indicates that natural selection was acting very strongly on this trait. Its informative about human evolution in this region of the world. My one caveat to this is that the assumption of population continuity is based on mitochondrial data, whereas the nuclear genome would be even more informative, given the possibility of migration and admixture.

In response to your first caveat This study actually made the distinction between crystalized-type intelligence and fluid-type intelligence. The former being a measure of acquired knowledge, in particular vocabulary. The latter is assessed by abstractions during a timed test and so are not based on acquired knowledge. While I think your argument has some validity regarding crystalized-type intelligence, I think it fails to address the abstract on-the-spot thinking involved in fluid-type intelligence. Secondly, the individuals used in this study are all adults, most having been tested at age 11 and then retested in adulthood. So we are not talking about school kids. I understand that there is much debate over IQ, there has been for decades. Despite all that, it has remained the most reliable and robust measure of intelligence we have. In response to the second point. It does not follow that measures in the 1940s would be more heritable because of the Flynn Effect. To explain to everyone, the Flynn Effect is the observed increase in the mean IQ score over the years. The key word in that description was "mean".....heritability, as both CharonY and myself have explained is about the variance in a measured trait, not the mean. In order for measures of heritability in the 1940s to differ significantly from today, there needs to be a change in the observed variance. So the real question is not whether or not the mean IQ score has changed, but whether or not the variance has changed. Contrary to what one might expect, the empirical data does not support a change in variance of IQ scores even as the mean has changed. So in fact we do not expect measures of heritability to differ greatly due to the Flynn Effect. We might expect them to differ because of methodology, the design of twin studies has change dramatically and the aforementioned study used a method that relies on GWAS data (aka post-human genome) and a technique that was only developed in 2010. In addition, I have reiterate the fact that these adults have been retested. So those who were tested as part of their study cohort back in the 30s or some other time have been tested more recently. Furthermore, the members of these cohorts were all analyzed within the context of their cohort. So those individuals from the various Lothian Birth Cohorts are all born in Scotland and within a year of each other. As a result, you are talking about analysis within a very well defined group, who all share the same cultural norms and birth period. By doing this, you control for the observed increases in mean IQ that go with the years and/or region. In other words you are controlling for the potential environmental factors and biases that you are talking about.

I'm still working through the paper, but I am not fully convinced that they have ruled out the possibility of migration and population discontinuity.

You are talking about a very complex set of biochemical pathways with a high degree of variation and multiple levels of control. This is not really a question that can be answered without digging into the literature and refining exactly at what level you are talking about. In other words you need to be a lot more specific and have a refined question. Also, go to google scholar or pubmed, do some digging around yourself, and show that you have put the effort in to understand it.

Nice explanation of heritability. To add to this, let me make an analogy for why heritability changes depending on environmental/population context. Say you have two buckets. The first you fill halfway with oil, the second you fill 1/4 of the way with oil. The two vary by 50% in total volume and 100% of the variance is due to differences in oil. Now fill the first bucket up the rest of the way with water and the second bucket up to half-way with water. The two still vary by 50%, but now, differences in oil only contribute to 50% of the variance, while water contributes to the other half. Heritability is a ratio. The more equal you make two sources of variance, you necessarily increase the influence of the others. If you have a genetically homogenous population, such as with inbred lines of plants, then you reduce source of genetic variance and the effect of environmental variance increases. Conversely if you grow genetically different plants under exactly the same conditions, then the effects of genetics predominates. This is why it is fallacious to claim that differences of IQ in populations with very different and variable environmental conditions are largely heritable based on measures made in other populations. This can lead to overestimation of heritability and underestimation...the latter being a point often overlooked. The misinterpretation of heritability has been rampant in discussions of race, where people incorrectly apply measures of heritability in one population to another. Lets consider now two groups of two buckets each. In both groups one bucket is half full of oil and the other 1/4 with oil. So the variance in oil is the same in both groups. In group one, we dont fill any of the buckets with water, but in group two we fill the half-full bucket all the way with water and the 1/4 bucket up to 3/8s full the rest of the way with water. The second group has greater variability in volume than the first group, but the the two groups actually have identical differences in the amount of oil, so the variance BETWEEN the two groups of buckets are entirely due to water, not oil. Since heritability is so messy, why bother studying it? Because it actually has importance in terms of evolution. The more heritable a trait is, the stronger its response to selection will be. This is actually known as the Breeders Equation (R=h2*S), because of its use in plant and animal breeding. Ironically, when you talk how things have evolved, often times those traits that have been under the strongest selection during evolution are the least heritable. This is because selection typically eliminates variance, unless it is balancing selection. Strong positive selection will drive an allele to high frequencies in a population, even to fixation. In this case, you have now eliminated the genetic variance in a population because all individuals share the same alleles and so any variance is now due to non-genetic factors. This is not a universal rule, but it is a general trend. Thats why there is a lot more variance for traits like height than there are for traits like how many legs you have. As a note on twin studies, particularly the change of heritability with age, this is actually makes a lot of sense if you think in developmental terms. In adulthood, an individual reaches a point of almost stasis. If we are talking about something like height...that does not change much in adulthood. However, during early development, you are constantly growing and developing. You are also more restricted. You are under the care of parents, guardians, teachers, etc. Children are generally more plastic, while traits solidify, for lack of a better term, in adulthood. The observation that the heritability of IQ increases in age has actually been observed in many studies. Finally, while twin studies have been the predominant means of measuring heritability for many decades, with continued improvement, recently....by which I mean in 2010....a new method of estimating heritability directly from the linkage disequilibrium of SNPs in genome wide association studies has offered a very powerful new way of measuring heritability independent of the issues that often confounded twin or sibling studies. This method continues to be improved and has been shown to be more general in its applicability than previously assumed. This method makes it possible to determine a lower-bound on the heritability. When applied to IQ, it was estimated that heritability of intelligence to be at least ~0.4 for crystalized-type intelligence and ~0.51 for fluid-type intelligence.

I don't know what you mean by "recessives mating with dominants at random, instead of dominants mating with dominants, and recessive with recessive" or by "depleting homogenous genes". Everyone has a lot of different genes and everyone has some alleles that are dominant or recessive, depending on the trait. The terms "dominant" and "recessive" genes do not correspond to behavior or ability, but patterns of inheritance. Now as to your points, generally, when one sex has more control over the reproductive process, this increases the effect of sexual selection because that sex has the ability to be very selective in choice of mate. For instance, the more monogamous species typically have fewer extremes of sexual dimorphism. In seahorse species where males carry the eggs and have more control over the reproductive process, there is almost no signatures of sexual selection.

As CharonY pointed out, there are some false premises at work. The biggest being the idea that evolution has made a "misstep". This implies directionality to evolution. It is entirely possible that civilization and group cooperation could create conditions under which a species enter a mutational meltdown. However, mutational meltdowns and extinction are as much a part of the natural course of evolution as beneficial mutations and increased fitness. Secondly, it also assumes that what was "optimal" for humans 200,000 years ago is "optimal" for humans today. But we live in a very different environment than 200k years ago. Different phenotypes may prove more advantageous today than they did back when modern humans first evolved. Furthermore, as CharonY pointed out, its not a matter of "survival", but of reproduction. Civilization may ensure that the mentally handicapped or physically disabled survive, but it does not guarantee that they will reproduce. Ultimately, that is what matters, reproductive success. We still very much live in a world where the healthier, sexier, smarter, etc that you are...the more chances you will have of having sex. If you are of legal age, just go to a bar on a Friday night. Actually, the real game changer is contraception (and artificial insemination), which really removes reproduction from the act of sex and so has the chance to really skew the reproductive success of various individuals. Thats an entirely different conversation however. My final point is this, the survival and even reproduction of deleterious mutations is really not of significant consequence as long as those deleterious alleles remain rare in the population. With the increase of human population, there has been a subsequent increase in the number of rare deleterious mutations, however, this has had little impact on the actual genetic structure of the human population as a whole. Mutational meltdown, the situation where a population enters a downward spiral to extinction due to an accumulation of deleterious mutations really only happens in small populations, like endangered species, where the effects of genetic drift are more pronounced. That is not the case with humans however, with 6 billion some people. The larger the population, the more effective natural selection is even on slightly deleterious or beneficial mutations. Furthermore, in large populations, allele frequencies typically remain fairly constant if the conditions of Hardy-Weinberg Equilibrium are applicable.

I used to find this problematic as well, except the concept also seems to have found its way into theoretical physics as well. Consider Alexander Vilenkin's models of quantum tunneling from "nothing". If it is possible from the standpoint of physics, then certainly it is possible from the standpoint of God.

If you agree that it had nothing to do with intelligence then your response was out of context to what I said....hence quote mining. My apologies, I confused you with the person posting a video since you responded to my reply on that. Its a bit confusing because you took two different posts in response to two different individuals and responded to them outside of the context in which they were written. I disagree that this is analogous to the specific contexts of sports. Intelligence is a Swiss army knife. It allows a species to adapt to any environment or circumstance. Humans can dive deeper than sperm whales and survive, we can fly higher and faster than any bird, we can survive in everything from the harshest desert to the highest mountains to the most disease ridden tropical forest because we can adapt, thanks to our intelligence. The ability to adapt to any circumstances I think is a general metric that applies to all creatures. Not only can we adapt, but we can be the dominant species in any habitat, reshaping the habitat to our whim. I think that is a very general argument that transcends specific contexts.

There was a lot more context to what I said. The preservation of germplasm does not necessarily entail the preservation of a species in the wild. For example, with plants, it is possible to store seeds for decades or longer. It is possible to preserve sperm and eggs for long periods of time. While a species may go extinct in the wild, preservation of the germplasm could allow future restoration efforts. I'm not even really talking about big showy animals like black rhinos either. As I said before, I think more about plants than I do animals, and the preservation of plant biodiversity is of great interest to me. Not just because of intrinsic value, but also extrinsic as well. Such genetic diversity could be of great value in agriculture or drug development. I understand the limitation of funds, but I don't think this is such a black or white situation. Especially as you pointed out, that you need the poster species to sell conservation efforts.

Indeed, like when you responded to my argument regarding intelligence with the superiority of E. coli: "If you want to measure accomplishments I would say E. coli have us beat. They've been everywhere we have, but have another species do all the work for them. Also, if our bacteria die we die, if we die our bacteria just move." That had nothing to do with intelligence. That being said, yes, memory is a measure of intelligence. I concede that fact to you. But as I said in reply to your video, its a one-dimensional measure that does not factor in other components that compose "general intelligence". We recognize this fact in everyday life. There are people who are store houses of useless knowledge, but who we would not consider "intelligent" or exceptionally so in comparison to other people.

In addition to the obvious strawman that this is, as pointed out by previous posters, there is another problem. Christians are called to follow the example of Christ. Jesus taught us to be self-sacrificing. If somebody takes my cloak, I am commanded to not deny them my coat either. I am commanded to love my fellow man, the ultimate demonstration of which is to lay down my life for them. "Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends." John 15:13. So in contrast, the exact opposite of Christians are expected. In actuality, we are expected to confess our sins and accept the responsibility for them. Nothing could be further from using a "scapegoat".

Nope, I said "by any standard we are the most intelligent". When you take a phrase or sentence out of context, that is the fallacy known as "quote mining." If they were more intelligent than us, then why would hands be a limitation? Shouldn't they be able to overcome that with their amazing problem solving abilities? Faux humility. I honestly don't think you or anyone else here honestly believes that sperm whales are more intelligent than humans. I also don't believe anyone truly believes that a dog or a cat or a deer is their equal or superior. Yet we put on this display of "humility" where we put down human abilities and to what end? Its like if Usain Bolt were to go around saying that he is no faster than anyone else. We all know that its not true. He knows its not true, its faux humility. Superiority is not the same thing as "good". Usain Bolt is a superior runner to nearly every human on Earth. Does that make him a good person? No. Does the fact that humans are the most intelligent creatures and superior to others as a result of their problem solving ability make them "good"...no. Lets not make the logical fallacy of equivocating these two concepts. It goes the other way too in terms of dependence. Most domesticated species that we rely on do not fare well without human intervention. Nearly all domesticated crops would be easily outcompeted by wild species because the adaptations that make them superior domesticated crops (loss of dehiscence, etc) are a severe disadvantage in the wild. I find the "social class" analogy to be rather poor in this respects because you're not really talking about an evolved distinction in ability. The 1% are not in evolutionary terms different in ability than the 99%. If we were to eliminate the 1%, there would arise another 1% from the 99%. If we were to eliminate humans, those domesticated species that we depend on would likely go extinct in the face of competition from wild species. In contrast, we humans do have the ability to develop new resources. We are not dependent upon any one species for food or survival. We are an extremely adaptable species. Thats what we evolved to be. At one time we depended on large wild game. We killed off many of those species, yet we did not go extinct because we changed food sources. If you want to use the social class analogy, if the factory workers go on strike, the big bosses hire scabs to do it for them. I don't think this means that humans are not at risk of destruction, but we are at risk of destruction from ourselves. Sperm whales aren't going to kill of humans.

That's a very one dimensional measure. Memory =/= intelligence.

By any standard we are the most intelligent. No, we can't swim like the fish or fly like the bird, but we can out perform any species when it comes to problem solving. How many birds have gone to space or the depths of the ocean? Maybe we are morons compared to some hypothetical alien species, but that is so hypothetical to not be worth considering. Sperm whales may be intelligent by some standard, but again, no sperm whale has ever discovered General Relativity or gone to space. Sperm whales can dive deep, but man, with his brain, has dived even deeper. Have you watched Sea Quest recently, because this argument reminds me of one of their worst episodes. I don't go in for this faux "humility" etc where we deny obvious facts for no benefit. I understand the reasoning for it. There is this delusion that if we convince ourselves that other species are somehow our equal or superior that we will reach some sort of ecological harmony. Its why in certain environmentalist circles you encounter this idea of "speciesism". Its an attempt to twist the arm of people into a certain mentality. I'm all for conservation, I have been supporting it all my life, but I don't need to buy into obvious falsehoods to encourage me to do this.

The Bible is not a "singular" source. It is a collection of different writings compiled into one book with multiple authors. So the evidence from the Bible actually represents evidence from multiple sources. But lets start with non-Biblical evidence. There is evidence from the Roman historian Tacitus, who was no friend of Christianity and is considered one of the greatest Roman historians. He clearly states that Jesus was executed under Pontius Pilate. There is also Josephus. While one passage in the Antiquities is highly in dispute, there is clear consensus that passages, such as the reference to James, the brother of Jesus, are authentic and genuine. The historical evidence also corroborates the historical setting which the Gospels take place. The reference to political and religious figures, references to historical events other than those associated with Jesus, these all corroborate each other. Within the Bible, we have multiple independent sources, as I mentioned. For instance there is very little doubt about the authorship of the Epistle of James, who claims to be the brother or relative of Jesus. This book, often overlooked given the Gospels and Pauline letters, is one of the most clear pieces of evidence for the existence of Christ. Similarly, we have Jude, who was also a contemporary of Jesus. Luke the evangelist, was the author of Acts and knew the apostles. While not knowing Jesus in person, he was a contemporary and knew the apostles. The same is true of Paul as well. Both of these writers knew the apostles and others who knew Christ personally. We then have the Epistles of John (not the Gospel of John mind you), who there is agreement was written by John the Apostle, who knew Christ personally. Really, the only modern dispute in this is whether or not John the Apostle wrote the Gospel of John as well. Notice the abundant evidence without even beginning to refer to the Gospels themselves. Secondly, lets use some common sense. As far as religious teachings, Christianity is a radical departure from traditional Judaism and also a radical departure from the sort of messianic claims made at the time. All of a sudden, you have a new religion spring up out of nowhere within a few short years that attracts massive followings. There is no historical precedent for Christianity and especially not amongst the Jews who it first arose out of. You have multiple historical sources, not Biblical, who point to the rapid rise and existence of this religion (not just the existence of Christ) at exactly the time and place that Jesus was supposed to have existed. This message is spread by an extremely dedicated core of heavily persecuted individuals who claimed to be disciples of the man they all knew and who died for that belief. Logically, we would conclude that if they claimed that a religious leader named Jesus lived and was executed, that its probably true. Whether or not you believe the claims of miracles is a different matter, but that such a man existed, is the most logical and reasonable conclusion. Its kind of cliche to say it, but there is a reason why the scholarly consensus is that Jesus existed as a real person. In fact, the general consensus amongst certain historical events, such as the calling of the apostles and His execution. Its one thing to deny the miraculous claims, but to deny that He existed seems to me absurd. The evidence for His existence is equal or greater to other figures contemporary with Him, so what is gained in denying He was a historical figure. Its on par with denying the evidence for evolution. You don't like the conclusion, so you deny it, no matter how logical or reasonable it is. Where they really though? Yes, he is mentioned in the works of three different authors, but how trustworthy are the writings of Plato? The oldest text we have of anything written by Plato dates to 900 A.D. That's a full 1200 years after Plato existed. The same is true of Aristophanes' works. Xenophon's writings on Socrates are considered very inaccurate because the events of his life make it impossible to have personally listened to Socrates at the Symposium. In contrast, the oldest fragments of the New Testament date to within a hundred or less years of the existence of Christ. John the Apostle lived with in a couple of decades of the oldest New Testament manuscripts. These are important factors in considering the historicity. The textual evidence. We have an abundance of evidence that dates to with the life time of direct contemporaries of Jesus, whereas all of our evidence for Socrates comes from copies over a thousand years removed from their authors.

Yeah we are superior. Maybe we aren't the fastest or the strongest, but we are the most intelligent and can overcome nearly any disadvantage as a result. I think that makes us superior. Is it arrogant...probably, but who cares, it is what it is. Should we abuse it. No. The advantage of being intelligent is that we can realize the problems with environmental destruction and address it.

Other Y2H screens I have not worked in Yeast. Has anybody made a triple mutant before? Are you sure its not lethal?

I find this argument barely comprehensible. What do you mean "He rigged the vote so that he could become the next God/Man. That was a custom of the God/Emperors." If Constantine wanted to be the "next God/Man" than why didn't he continue the age-old policy of the state religion/worship of the emperor? It also does not follow logically that just because you find the morality taught by Christ to be "unworkable" or "unworthy" that He did not exist. By that logic, anyone that holds to a different morality than yours does not exist? I find Christ's view of divorce to be not only workable, but morally sound. Therefore I do not exist by the reasoning you have just presented. There is plenty of historical evidence for Jesus. There are the letters of apostles and his followers. While some dispute the authorship of some Gospels, there are books such as James or the epistles of John. There is also no doubt about Paul's letters. Furthermore, there are non-Christian records, such as Tacitus, who note that Jesus was executed under Pontius Pilate. Of course, there is also the simple fact that all of a sudden, a new cult sprang-up centered around this guy "Jesus"...where did it come from if Jesus did not really exist? You can reject the miraculous claims made about Jesus, but the rejection of his actual existence is quite frankly non-sense. We have more solid evidence that Jesus existed as a historical figure than we do that Socrates and many other renowned Greek philosophers did.

Just to be clear, I was not accusing Dawkins of taking credit, but the fact that many people simply assume that these are his ideas. This typically comes from the fact that most people have never read the Selfish Gene. Its not quite the same with Darwin though. While Darwin was not the only one to come up with the idea of Natural Selection, his idea of common ancestry was very unique and significant.

Craig Venter has just announced a new company. Human Longevity Inc. that proposes to sequence 40,000 human genomes a year and scale to 100,000 a year to produce the worlds largest human genotype/phenotype database to address issues of aging related diseases. The scale of proposing this amount of data will be insane. Typical GWAS studies have a few thousand genotyped individuals. With this many whole genome sequences, the ability to do association analysis and fine mapping will be incredible. The real question is how the hell they will analyze so much data.

I honestly could care less. Since when did this become about pets? I would disagree with you about dogs anyhow. I have had dogs most of my life. Sure left unchecked these will have an impact on the environment, but responsible owners prevent this. Like all things, there is a tradeoff. I value wild diversity and wild spaces, but I have always been a "consevationist" in the tradition of Aldo Leopold, as opposed to an environmentalist. In other words, my thinking is in terms of practical measures and close working with farmer and other people to promote both conservation of diversity and wild space alongside human use. The best exemplars of this philosophy are groups like Ducks Unlimited and Pheasants Forever, which are primarily made up of hunters who actively work to protect and develop new habitat and so further the conservation of the species they hunt. Those people who actively promote the spaying and neutering of pets is also working in a similar line of thought. I think we should work to reduce greenhouse gass emmissions (I know I am going way off topic now, but its to illustrate my mindset), but quite frankly, the idea that we will reduce everything to pre-industrial levels and create this sort of untarnished world is delusional. Our goal should be to adapt and preserve. You will never get rid of the pet population, so how do you create a more harmonious existence? Exotic pets can be destructive to wild populations. On the other hand, establishment of active breeding programs could be what saves many exotic species. Dogs will never go extinct because people want dogs, they breed them, care for them. Cows will never go extinct despite being slaughtered in the millions. Turning some exotic species into pets may actually be their salvation as a species. I'm all about practical and realistic solutions that seek a middle ground between human usage and preserving the original ecosystem/species. I guess years of studying biology has killed this delusion in my mind that "natural habitats" are "forever" unless screwed up by humans. Climate, habitat, species have changed for millions of years before man and for hundreds of thousands with man and they will for millions of years after man. Nothing lasts forever. If a disease wipes out American Chestnuts, then we should get over the delusion of genetic purity and create viable hybrids with introgressed resistant genes or transgenically introduced resistant genes from Asian varieties. The idea of a "pristine" nature has long ago died in my mind to be replaced with a goal of practical preservation and dual usage.

The growing rate of hemp is irrelevant. While trees are slower growing, they produce far more per acre, so when you average out the yield per acre per year, trees still outproduce hemp. This is particularly true of Eucalyptus plantations, which can average anywhere from 16-30 or more tons per acre per year. In contrast, hemp is typically around 5 tons. I also disagree that it requires less maintenance. As an annual, you have to replant every year, prepare the soil, not to mention control weeds, etc. In this it is no different than producing any other annual crop, like corn or soybeans. In reality, with hemp, only ~25% of the dry weight is useful for paper production, the so called "blast fiber". Which would be only ~1 ton per acre per year or less. With wood, ~45-60% is usable for paper production, so the amount produced from wood per acre per year far exceeds that of hemp. You would have to place a lot more acres under tillage to produce the same amount of paper using hemp as you would with wood. Even with Hemp you are not going to avoid pollution, you are talking about a pretty extensive processing system and with the less efficient usage of hemp fibers, I see no evidence that it is superior from any environmental standpoint. I'm not opposed to hemp production or even marijuana usage, but the propaganda about the amazing benefits of hemp is outrageous to tell the truth.