Is it lust, love, natural selection, or just spring?

Jacques-Louis David, "The Love of Helen and Paris," Wikipedia

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An old saw now, Tennyson's assertion in "Locksley Hall" that

In the spring a young man's fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love

may be scientifically true. In the New York Times this article by Natalie Angier "Seasons Sway Human Birth Rates" says

In the new study, the scientists scrutinized birth records of 166 countries, representing tens of millions of births. Studying the United States and Europe and the other countries of the temperate zone in the Northern Hemisphere the researchers found there are two annual conception peaks, which continue today but were especially notable before the era of extensive industrialization.

One statistical spike occurs around the spring equinox, in March, resulting in a spate of births in late December or early January. The second arrives in autumn, around October or November, leading to a slight glut of babies arriving in mid-summer.

A member of the study team, Dr. Roenneberg, adds that "The effects of climate and day length are becoming less effective in the modern world, because we're always indoors, and the lighting and temperature are controlled." You can find a summary of the article at SAGE journals.

This study, and others, raise the question: are we in control of our own passions or controlled by factors outside ourselves? Personally, I would say that few control his/her passions. What we desire just is and you either go with it or run in the opposite direction. Just my opinion.

But if you find you can't stop thinking of a special one, it's probably time to ask yourself--is it lust or love? Dr. Judith Orloff gives some practical advice in "Tips to Identify the Difference Between Love and Lust."

If it is lust, why this particular person? And why am I so confused? Dr. Helen E. Fisher, writing at Dana Foundation, asserts "Brains Do It: Lust, Attraction, and Attachment."

If all this is just too cerebral for you, blame your fatal attraction on Darwin's theory of natural selection. This interesting discussion is taking place at a thread under Reddit's explain like I'm five: If being attractive is an important aspect of sexual attraction, why hasn't natural selection turned us all into super models?.

-- Marge

Communal Living 2014

What with recent graduates and young families in need of financial help moving back in with parents, and many sharing apartments to help with expenses, the concept of communal is becoming attractive again.  In the U.S. communes were big in the '60s and '70s, but fell out of favor.  The article on communes at Wikipedia notes:

Andrew Jacobs of The New York Times wrote that, contrary to popular misconceptions, "most communes of the '90s are not free-love refuges for flower children, but well-ordered, financially solvent cooperatives where pragmatics, not psychedelics, rule the day." There are many contemporary intentional communities all over the world, a list of which can be found at the Fellowship for Intentional Community (FIC).

Huffington Post has a section on Communal Living.  The video below was found there.

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BBC's article, "Living the communal life," gives some interesting insights into why people decide to share their living space.

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Living the communal life, BBC (Julius Schrank/www.juliusschrank.de)

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This Washington Post article also has some good insights:  A new generation of 'Golden Girls'. And this thread at Reddit caught my attention: Want to live in eco-village/hippie commune.. help!

Lisa Law's history the '60s counterculture and  of communal living at Smithsonian's site gives a detailed account of how and why they lived on that frontier.

-- Marge

April Fools' pranks 2013

Now that the air has cleared, and the infamous day is over, here are some of the "15 Best April Fools Pranks From Around The Web 2013." They were identified by We Know Memes, a meme generator.   Here goes --

Google's latest product:

A treasure hunt in San Francisco from Google Maps:

Twitter's new service(s):

Deviant Art's DeviantHeart:

Reddit's new acquisition:

If you notice, one of Reddit's comments cites BBC's 2012 April Fools' prank as a favorite.  Since the article is no longer available at BBC (because it never existed there), here's Gothamist's update on it.  The original article is titled "The Earth has exploded, killing everyone."

What would Grandma say?

-- Marge