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Tonight's cuppa: peppermint tea

When I'm not watching TV for fun and profit, I'm a gardener. I wasn't always one. When I was young, I was very good at killing plants, until I realized that I didn't know anything and started reading books on the subject and then doing what the books told me to do.

Of course, like any gardener, every now I and then I get puffed up with confidence about my ability to beat nature at her own game, and need a harsh reminder (as chronicled in this blog post) to go with the natural flow.

We humans may think we're the kings and queens of Earth, and that we make the natural world bend to our will, but as often as not, the reverse is probably true.

If you look at the criteria of abundance and distribution of a species as marks of evolutionary success, then we've been at least as good for dogs, cats, horses, cows, chickens, hamsters, camels, pigs, corn, wheat and soybeans as they've been for us, and we definitely come out on the short end of the stick with cockroaches, rats, crabgrass and bedbugs.

We evolved on Planet Earth too, and as far as we try to remove ourselves from nature, it's temporary at best and usually just an illusion.

On Wednesday, Oct. 28, PBS premieres "The Botany of Desire," based on the book of the same name by author and avid gardener Michael Pollan (BTW, it's an absorbing, thoughtful and entertaining read, and I recommend it whether or not you watch the special).

The two-hour documentary looks at four of our favorite plants -- apples, tulips, cannabis and potatoes -- and examines how their natural histories have become entwined with our desires for, respectively, sweetness, beauty, intoxication and control.

As it turns out, the familiar apple is an honest-to-goodness wild thing, made to breed true only by cloning; our housing boom and bust are nothing compared to the Dutch tulip mania of 1637; cannabis' complex molecules have a surprising relationship to our brains; and potatoes are a whole lot more than a McDonald's french fry.

Even watched on my laptop screen earlier tonight because of a power outage in windy Los Angeles (I understand it hit CBS' Craig Ferguson during taping of his show), "The Botany of Desire" is a gorgeous piece of filmmaking, and Pollan is an engaging and non-stuffy guide to a world he evidently loves (honestly, read the book for the bit on the, to put it mildly, eccentric John "Johnny Appleseed" Chapman, if nothing else).

I guarantee that if you read, watch or both, you may never look at plants quite the same way again. I'm not talking about a "Little Shop of Horrors" man-eating plant moment or anything like that, but you may rethink who's evolving whom, here.

After all, you don't fool with Mother Nature -- she fools with you.

Tonight's cuppa: haven't decided yet -- check back with me at the end of the post. Might be hot peppermint tea, might be Irish breakfast, might go nuts and make coffee...

Fans who stay up until 3 a.m. (ET/midnight Pacific -- as for the rest of the nation and world, you're on your own) to see Fox News' comedy/news roundtable show' "RedEye W/Greg Gutfeld" are very familiar with comedian, actor, writer and voice performer Greg Proops, who drops in occasionally to offer witticisms and wry commentary.

He also consistently comes out ahead among the show's regular male guests for best hair and glasses (former CIA agent Mike Baker has equally good hair, but no glasses; comedian Jim Norton has very short hair and no glasses; and musician Andrew W.K. also has great hair, but again, no specs.)

Proops might even accept a bit of credit for the show's recent ratings success.

"I like to be honest," says Proops. "I think people are waiting for me to come on. It's a nice show. I love doing it. Even though it's on Fox News, I love doing it."

But before you assume that Proops is lining up with the White House against the news cablenet, he says, "It's a reminder, a clarification. It's not so much that I think Fox News is pure evil or anything -- I think it's fantastic that they're willing to put on a show that's as irreverent and gag-oriented as that show is.

"They're always accused of having no sense of humor, and I think that show is as funny as any comedy show, frankly, on TV. You don't see any of the big networks trying anything like that, even though it wouldn't cost them anything.

"A little in-house operation like that is a very economical way to fill time in the middle of the night without showing infomercials or something, and it's still funny and informative. Even if you disagree, it's a joke."

Proops' most recent appearance was on Thursday night of last week -- click here to watch -- and this time he was in person, not coming in via satellite from Los Angeles. The occasion was a promotional tour for the quiz show "Head Games," premiering Saturday, Oct. 17, at 9 p.m. ET/PT on both Science Channel and Science Channel HD.

Executive-produced by Whoopi Goldberg and featuring Proops as host, "Head Games" uses humor and technology to test the scientific acumen of ordinary folks in such categories as chemistry, space, biology, animals and physics.

Asked how he'd describe "Head Games" to "RedEye" host Gutfeld and his "disgusting" sidekick Bill Schulz, Proops says, "I would say, 'Greg and Bill, this is a science trivia quiz show, so you guys aren't going to watch, but for the people coherent enough to watch, it's fun for the whole family.'

"We show amazingly weird videos like goats falling over and people charging a dead car battery with red wine -- and then I think you'll see Bill and Greg perk up a bit when I mention charging a battery with red wine, though I don't think they ever drink red wine, because it doesn't have a head on it.

"I'll say, 'You know, red wine, you guys, like we drink in the swirling vortex of baby-killing gay celebrity where I live in Hollywood, that kind of red wine.'

"And then I think the main point for Greg and for Bill, watching a show like 'Head Games,' all the questions are true/false or multiple-choice, so you have a good sporting chance, even if you don't know anything about science."

Proops responds, "Kate, really, isn't it obvious?" to a question about why he was chosen, but seriously, he does think he's the man for the job.

"Hosting is something I do all the time," Proops explains, "and I really love doing it. They always call it, in TV, 'directing traffic,' but I think you can direct traffic with a great deal of humor and fun.

"First of all, I don't like a script. I like spontaneous, and a couple of rules make spontaneity great. We're playing a game, so it's a groovy form for me, because I can extemporize in between the questions, and yet I always have something to go back to.

"So, I'm not going nuts for 15 minutes, but I can go nuts for 30 seconds. I'm the person to do that. I'm the person to keep it light, and I'm also smart enough to sound like I know what I'm talking about even if I don't, and that's the acting part."

As for his own scientific literacy, Proops says, "It could be better, I suppose. I can tell you who Galileo was and Copernicus and stuff like that, but I don't know how exciting that is for people. It doesn't get you the chicks."

And by the way, if you click here, you can play along at home.

Oh, and what's tonight's cuppa? Tomorrow isn't a school day, so I'm going for the full-caf coffee, so if you need to call at 2 a.m., I'll still be up.
 

Tonight's cuppa: decaf Irish breakfast tea

On Sunday, Aug. 30, National Geographic Channel premieres a special called "'The Human Family Tree," which looks at how genetic testing is allowing scientists to trace human migration patterns over thousands of years, all the way back to humanity's origins in Africa (which, in case your mind drifts, the special repeats about 15 or so times).

If you visit the homepage, you can even find out how to test your own DNA -- the maternal lineage for women, and the maternal or paternal lineage for men.

Check out this cool migration map (double-click for a larger view):



I found out that I'm part of Haplogroup T (mitochondrial DNA), which originated around the Fertile Crescent and then spread to Europe.

However, I'm not Haplogroup J, as I said on the radio on Thursday.

I got confused because, according to what I had read in Wikipedia, T was part of JT, which also spawned J. So all those Haplogroup J relations bombarding me with requests for cash, back off! You're not coming to the HapT reunion picnic (it's a big bunch, so the hot rumor is that we're renting Monaco for the day).

Wikipedia also says HapTs are agriculturalists, which may explain why I can't stop growing plants on my balcony no matter how many times pests, Santa Ana winds and the brutal sun of the Los Angeles summer kill them. Bird's gotta fly, fish gotta swim, HapTs gotta plant!

Anyway, I did an email Q&A with population geneticist Spencer Wells, who's featured in the special. And away we go ...

Q: I passed the info to my mother, who does genealogy, and it didn't mean a great deal to her, because it's so generalized. How can you make information like this more relevant to people?

A: Well, your results reveal your deep ancestry along a single line of direct descent (paternal or maternal) and show the migration paths your ancestors followed thousands of years ago.  We pick up where genealogy leaves off -- in that we go much further back!  We test for ancestral lineages and their associated migrations on an anthropological timescale, meaning they provide a window back hundreds, thousands, even tens of thousands of years ago.  The genetic markers we study place everyone on the greater human family tree, rather than the smaller family tree we are generally more familiar with. Your individual results may confirm your expectations of what you believe your deep ancestry to be, or you may be surprised to learn a new story about your genetic background.

Q: Which results have surprised you most in your study, and which confirmed what you already believed to be true?

A: I'm still blown away by how recently our species emerged from Africa -- only in the past 60,000 years.  It's the blink of an eye in an evolutionary sense, and underscores how superficial all of our differences really are.  We're all basically African cousins.

Q: How can women trace their paternal ancestors?

 

A: Females do not possess a Y chromosome, and therefore may only have the mitochondrial DNA test performed (which traces their maternal lineage). However, if you are a female and would like to learn about your paternal lineage, then a male relative--such as a father, a brother, or a paternal blood relative of your father's, such as his brother--can test his Y-chromosome DNA. The results will reveal a female's paternal lineage.

 

Q: Are other scientific specialties - such as anthropology, archaeology or sociology - able to make use of what you have learned about human migratory patterns?

A:  We hope they are all able to apply our research as we have studied and pulled from each of those fields to provide context for the genetic results.
 
Q: What do you most hope people will take away from the project?

A:  That there literally is a single human family tree, and we're all carrying part of the story inside ourselves. Our human species reflects a mixture of ethnic backgrounds and cultural traditions. In a place like Queens, New York, more than half the population is foreign-born, and there are more than 150 different languages spoken there.  As we showed in the film, the diversity we see there represents a microcosm of the world.  Yet when we test their genetic data, we learn that they - like all humans - are 99.9% similar.   We hope viewers of the film take away that there literally is a single human family tree, and we're all carrying part of the story inside ourselves.

Q: What's the next step for your research?

 

A: We anticipate publications from the analysis of this data will continue for several years into the future.

Today's cuppa: PG Tips tea