Study Pinpoits Genome Markers that Predicts Male Sexual Orientation

A study at the School of Medicine of the University of California, Los Angeles, provides more bad news for the Christofascists and the bitter, closet old men at the Vatican.  These knuckle draggers - and in the case of the Vatican, proponents of 13th century knowledge - continue to whine and state that sexual orientation is a choice and make spittle flecked rants that there is "no gay gene."  Thus, being gay and having gay relationships is a "sin" in their ignorance embracing views.  The new study found that just  nine regions of the human genome predict the sexual orientation of males with up to 70 percent accuracy.  Obviously, none of us "chose" to change are DNA.  A press release outlines the findings that underscore that sexual orientation is NOT a choice.  Here are highlights:

An algorithm using epigenetic information from just nine regions of the human genome can predict the sexual orientation of males with up to 70 percent accuracy, according to research presented at the American Society of Human Genetics (ASHG) 2015 Annual Meeting in Baltimore.

"To our knowledge, this is the first example of a predictive model for sexual orientation based on molecular markers," said Tuck C. Ngun, PhD, first author on the study and a postdoctoral researcher at the David Geffen School of Medicine of the University of California, Los Angeles.

Beyond the genetic information contained in DNA, the researchers examined patterns of DNA methylation - a molecular modification to DNA that affects when and how strongly a gene is expressed - across the genome in pairs of identical male twins.

They found that methylation patterns in nine small regions, scattered across the genome, could be used to predict study participants' sexual orientation with 70 percent accuracy.

"Previous studies had identified broader regions of chromosomes that were involved in sexual orientation, but we were able to define these areas down to the base pair level with our approach," Dr. Ngun said. He noted that it will take additional research to explain how DNA methylation in those regions may be related to sexual orientation. The researchers are currently testing the algorithm's accuracy in a more general population of men.

"Sexual attraction is such a fundamental part of life, but it's not something we know a lot about at the genetic and molecular level. I hope that this research helps us understand ourselves better and why we are the way we are," Dr. Ngun said.

Ask any gay - or at least those not afflicted by religious brainwashing and associated guilt - and they will tell you that they never chose their sexual orientation.  To the extent there is any choice involved, it is merely the choice of how long one is willing to lie to themselves and others. 

The Bible Unearthed - New Archeological Study Undermines the Bible

In follow up to the last post, a new book, "The Bible Unearthed," will not be warmly greeted by Christofascists and charlatans who use the pulpit to shake down the ignorant and gullible for money.  The authors of the book, two archaeologists, use archaeological discoveries and analysis to disprove many of the main stories of the Old Testament and instead describe the Bible's Old Testament  as a contrived and manipulated set of ancestor stories aimed at meeting the needs of seventh-century-B.C. Judah and its quest for a unified kingdom.   As one book review notes:

Their detailed analysis yields conclusions that are startling to the uninitiated: the search for the historical ancestors has failed; the Exodus did not happen as described; the violent, swift and total conquest of Canaan never took place; the picture of judges leading tribes in battle against enemies does not fit the data; David and Solomon existed in the 10th century B.C. but as ''little more than hill country chieftains.'' There was no golden age of a united kingdom, a magnificent capital and an extended empire.

A small nation with big plans could use a grand story. In constructing it, authors and editors drew on many diverse and conflicting traditions, which they embellished and elaborated. The intent was ideological and theological -- not to record history (in the modern sense) but to appropriate the past for the present. The epic that emerged was edited and added to in subsequent centuries to become the powerful saga we know as the Hebrew Bible. Unequaled in the ancient world, it articulated a national and social compact for an entire people under God. Finkelstein and Silberman leave no doubt of their reverence for it. In their view, however, it is ''not a miraculous revelation, but a brilliant product of the human imagination.'' 

Drawing on new methods, excavations (even of old sites) and assumptions, they turn the traditional argument on its head. Archaeological studies, they argue, undercut rather than support the historicity of biblical traditions about the origin and rise of Israel. 

The take away?  The Bible is anything but inerrant and it is anything but the "inspired word of God."  It was written to serve the political and theological needs of an upstart kingdom that needed to support its boasts of special divine guidance and superiority over others.   It is little wonder that the Bible is so popular among the GOP base which likewise feels compelled to claim that America is under divine guidance and superior.  27 centuries later and the same mindset and agenda are alive and well.