Round-up

Interview with Ricardo Coler. He spent some time among the Mosuo in southern China, where the women dominate. About matriarchy, Coler says: “Women have a different way of dominating. When women rule, it's part of their work. They like it when everything functions and the family is doing well. Amassing wealth or earning lots of money doesn't cross their minds. Capital accumulation seems to be a male thing.”

Here’s an article on how the purchase of eco-friendly products amounts to “competitive altruism”: gaining status by forgoing luxuries, as long as it’s done in public.

Laughing monkeys.

“A group of doctors who worked in Sri Lanka's rebel-held war zone are being held on suspicion of collaborating with Tamil rebels, the government says.” Terrible. After all the noble work they did, this is what they get in return.

Article on the close relationship of musical ability and social bonding. “When the researchers scanned the volunteers' genes, they found that two variants of the gene AVPR1A correlated strongly with musical ability. AVPR1A codes for a receptor for the hormone arginine vasopressin and has been linked with bonding, love and altruism in people.”