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Australian ethicist working at the Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics claims that humanity has a “moral obligation” to use in vitro fertilization (IVF) to select the most intelligent embryos for the good of society, with the obvious implication that the less intelligent “surplus” embryos should simply be destroyed. Professor Julian Savulescu of Melbourne made the statement while commenting on an economic modeling research paper by Oxford University ethicists Andres Sandberg and Nick Bostrom, who claim that a rise in humanity’s IQ would result in a reduction in poverty, welfare dependency, crowding of jails, school dropout rates, out-of-wedlock births, and...

VHEMT (pronounced vehement) is a movement not an organization. It’s a movement advanced by people who care about life on planet Earth. We’re not just a bunch of misanthropes and anti-social, Malthusian misfits, taking morbid delight whenever disaster strikes humans. Nothing could be farther from the truth. Voluntary human extinction is the humanitarian alternative to human disasters. We don’t carry on about how the human race has shown itself to be a greedy, amoral parasite on the once-healthy face of this planet. That type of negativity offers no solution to the inexorable horrors which human activity is causing. Rather, The...

After 10 years of careful breeding and research, scientists have developed what could be the world’s most perfect prawn. CSIRO scientists and the prawn industry have bred an improved Black Tiger prawn which is producing record yields in aquaculture farms and winning awards. So good are these prawns that they have won five gold medals at the Sydney Royal Easter Show in the past two years, including ‘Champion of Show’, the highest award possible. The scientists from CSIRO's Food Futures Flagship have used DNA technology to ensure the breeding program captures the very best Black Tiger prawn stocks that nature...

A TINY stallion just 35cm high is thought to be a record breaker as the world's smallest foal. Einstein, a pinto stallion, weighed in at just 2.7kg when he was born last week in the US. Breeder Judy Smith, of Tiz A Miniature Horse Farm, in Barnstead, New Hampshire, told Sky News she thought he was dead when she first saw him. "I have been at this for 20 years plus, but I have never seen one this tiny or even close to it. "At first he didn't move very much. We started rubbing him with a towel and he...

WASHINGTON - The Humane Society of the United States is asking President Barack Obama and Congress to require everyone who raises dogs and cats to be regulated by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, documents show. HSUS also is asking for the creation of an animal protection division within the U.S. Department of Justice that is "similar to the Civil Rights Division, to ensure strong enforcement of federal animal protection laws," thus granting animals rights similar to humans. HSUS also calls for a new position of animal protection liaison in the White House.

Acting as super-predators, humans are forcing changes to body size and reproductive abilities in some species 300 percent faster than would occur naturally, a new study finds. Hunting and fishing by individual sportsmen as well as large-scale commercial fishing are also outpacing other human influences, such as pollution, in effects on the animal kingdom.

Until yesterday you could find White Ibis in small flocks near any water body. Now they are beginning to form larger flocks in preparation for breeding season. The first year birds, with darker plumage, will be left to fend on their own. Momma is going to be busy with new chicks.

Not breeding obvious in splits of human evolution Simon Grose 15 August 2007 ABOUT 353,000 babies will be born into the world today, about 700 of them in Australia. Same as yesterday and same as tomorrow. Many of their parents will worry about being able to properly feed them, or whether they may have contracted HIV in the womb. Whatever circumstances today's new children and their families face, every birth evokes a degree of hope. Firstly, that the baby is fit and well. Beyond that, a myriad of hopes can be evoked to lead their nation, to be rich, beautiful,...

My Great Dane bitch is getting ready to litter. This will be the third generation of the same family of dogs to inhabit my household and be part of my family. The first girl dog we had, Kara, a Saint Dane (combination Great Dane and Saint Bernard) was the bitch of the sire of this generation. She was a great dog and favored a Great Dane in appearance except she was light brown in coloring. She was extremely tall and fast and loved running the deer, but unfortunately she was shot by a hunter early one morning. We're still not...

Giant pandas breeding at Wolong Nature Reserve

Thai zoo to use videos to teach panda to mate Nov. 11, 2006. 07:34 AM REUTERS BANGKOK ? A Thai zoo, which has hosted a couple of pandas for four years, will play "porn" videos for the male next month to encourage them to breed in captivity, the project manager said on Saturday. The pair ? living chastely together at the zoo in the northern city of Chiang Mai since arriving from China in 2003 ? would be separated in December, but stay close enough for occasional glimpses of each other, said panda project chief Prasertsak Buntrakoonpoontawee. "They don't know...

Liberal politics will prove fruitless as long as liberals refuse to multiply. The midterm election looms, and once again efforts begin afresh to increase voter participation. It has become standard wisdom in American politics that voter turnout is synonymous with good citizenship, justifying just about any scheme to get people to the polls. Arizona is even considering a voter lottery, in which all voters are automatically registered for a $1 million giveaway. Polling places and liquor stores in Arizona will now have something in common. On the political left, raising the youth vote is one of the most common goals....

BODIES of extinct Ice Age mammals, such as woolly mammoths, that have been frozen in permafrost for thousands of years may contain viable sperm that could be used to bring them back from the dead, scientists said yesterday. Research has indicated that mammalian sperm can survive being frozen for much longer than was previously thought, suggesting that it could potentially be recovered from species that have died out...

Texas Prof.: 'We're Breeding Our Brains Out'Talk radio and blogs are taking aim at a University of Texas biology professor because of a published report suggesting he advocates death for most of the human population as a means of saving the Earth. However, Eric Pianka says his remarks about his beliefs were taken out of context, that he was just raising a warning that deadly disease epidemics are a threat if population growth isn't contained. "What we really need to do is start thinking about controlling our population before it's too late," he said Monday. "It's already too late, but...

Breederville.com Enjoys a Successful Year with Online Animal Auctions Just over a year ago, a fledgling concept entered the Internet. Online animal auctions. Breederville.com has proudly proven the concept a success with sales ranging from pets to livestock. Breederville.com Enjoys a Successful Year with Online Animal Auctions December 21, 2005 --(PR.COM)-- Breederville.com had its successful launch November 26, 2004. It’s main focus, Online Animal Auctions. Since their sole focus is classified and auction format listings for live animals, the staff is able to spend considerable amounts time with screening users and lending personal assistance. Successful sales have included, pets such...

THE Soviet dictator Josef Stalin ordered the creation of Planet of the Apes-style warriors by crossing humans with apes, according to recently uncovered secret documents. Moscow archives show that in the mid-1920s Russia's top animal breeding scientist, Ilya Ivanov, was ordered to turn his skills from horse and animal work to the quest for a super-warrior. According to Moscow newspapers, Stalin told the scientist: "I want a new invincible human being, insensitive to pain, resistant and indifferent about the quality of food they eat." In 1926 the Politburo in Moscow passed the request to the Academy of Science with the...

The shark may have made the journey to find a mate A great white shark crossed the Indian Ocean from South Africa to Australia and back again within just nine months. It was one of several great whites tagged by researchers in an attempt to improve conservation strategies. Writing in the journal Science, they say the journey is unparalleled among fish - only tuna come close. The mere act of tagging a great white is something of a feat; several people need to hold the creature still while the satellite tracker is attached. EPIC OCEAN JOURNEYIn picturesThe project will inform...

THERE IS A STRANGE PAIRING of positions on the left. The first is that Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda were not connected. The work of Stephen F. Hayes and Thomas Joscelyn in THE WEEKLY STANDARD, which is supported by other serious investigative reporters such as Claudia Rosett has already established beyond any reasonable doubt that there was a web of connections, but the combination of the left's indifference to inconvenient facts and the international version of the soft bigotry of low expectations--an Arab dictator couldn't have had a sophisticated intelligence service capable of hiding such matters--make it an article of...

Scientists have made them walk and talk. There are even robots that can run. But a South Korean professor is poised to take their development several steps further, and give cybersex new meaning. Kim Jong-Hwan, the director of the ITRC-Intelligent Robot Research Centre, has developed a series of artificial chromosomes that, he says, will allow robots to feel lusty, and could eventually lead to them reproducing. He says the software, which will be installed in a robot within the next three months, will give the machines the ability to feel, reason and desire. Kim, a leading authority on technology and...

PITTSBURGH (AP) - A 7 1/2-year-old monster buck named Goliath, allegedly stolen in 1999 and then returned to the ranch where he was raised, has died. The massive deer died Dec. 6; tests will determine the cause. The life span of a deer is 10 to 15 years. "It could have been due to a lot of the stress that he endured from being away from here," said Diane Miller, who raised the buck with her husband at their Wild Bunch Ranch, about 60 miles north of Pittsburgh. "It's just like losing a family member." Goliath, believed to be the...

Maize reveals traces of old breeding project Emma Marris Gene suggests ancient culture selected patterns in its corn. Teosinte grass (left) compared to "reconstructed" primitive maize, created by crossing teosinte with Argentine pop corn. © The Doebley Lab The people of Mesoamerica are largely responsible for the golden corn we grow today, having domesticated tough teosinte grass thousands of years ago and bred it into modern maize. Researchers have now located the gene responsible for some of the traits that the Mesoamericans were selecting. The discovery should help scientists understand how plants develop, and reveals just how strict the ancient...

For education and discussion only. Not for commercial use. What would you give for a simple injection that would stop your lover from cheating? Well, at least it works for meadow voles. A single gene inserted into the brain can change promiscuous male rodents into faithful, monogamous partners, scientists say. It may not be quite that simple to rein in human philanderers- many genes as well as other factors are probably involved in relationships among people. But researchers at the Yerkes National Primate Research Center of Emory University and Atlanta's Centre for Behavioral Neuroscience (CBN) in the United States say...

Herr of the dog has cure for German shepherd March 30, 2004 Defenders of the German shepherd dog are locked in a fierce battle about its future following claims that breeders have made it curvaceous and hopelessly soppy. Helmut Raiser, a former breeder with the German Shepherd Association, says he wants to purify the race and return the animal to its origins as a work dog with a fierce bite and a 48 kmh gallop. "The dog is an anatomical disaster," Mr Raiser said. "Nowadays he might still be a dog at the front, but he's a frog at the...

The Antiwar Movement's Nazi ConnectionBy Ben JohnsonFrontPageMagazine.com | April 25, 2003 In the run-up to the liberation of Iraq, conservatives were tempted to say the entire anti-war movement represented nothing more than a conglomeration of Stalinists, Castroites and Islamists. Such a description would not do justice to the "peace" movement: it would omit the role of vicious anti-Semites. FrontPage Magazine recently exposed the neo-Nazi Bill White’s Overthrow.com ("The Bottom of the Barrel"), but giving White a run for his bile is one Bruce Alan "Vincent" Breeding, a professional anti-Semite and sometime Satan-worshiper whose life’s purpose lies in fighting the Jews....

<p>Domesticated animals look - and act - differently from than their wild counterparts. Why?</p> <p>The experiment was derived out of a discussion student Brian Hare had with his adviser, Michael Tomasello, an expert in primate behavior at Emory University. They were talking about how bad chimpanzees were at understanding human social cues. Despite being the heavyweights of animal intelligence, chimps were insensitive to what seemed to be obvious hints: They failed to pick up a cup hiding food even when the experimenter stared at it, pointed to it, and even tapped it. Tomasello wanted to talk about what this meant about the limits of nonhuman intelligence. Hare, a pet owner, had a down-to-Earth response: ''My dogs can do this.''</p>

Early Canid Domestication: The Farm Fox Experiment Foxes bred for tameability in a 40-year experiment exhibit remarkable transformations that suggest an interplay between behavioral genetics and development. When scientists ponder how animals came to be domesticated, they almost inevitably wind up thinking about dogs. The dog was probably the first domestic animal, and it is the one in which domestication has progressed the furthest - far enough to turn Canis lupus into Canis familiaris. Evolutionary theorists have long speculated about exactly how dogs' association with human beings may have been linked to their divergence from their wild wolf forebears,...

Designing Trees The same, often controversial gene-tweaking techniques that brought uspest-resistant fruits and vegetables now have a new target: trees. By Naomi Lubick Image: Courtesy of S. MerkleUNTIL THE BLIGHT, majestic American Chestnut trees dominated many U.S. forests. This image was taken in 1910 in the Great Smokey Mountains of North Carolina. To gain an appreciation for the promise--and perils--of genetically modified trees, consider the case of the American chestnut. Few trees have had such a remarkable presence and impact on the American landscape and ecosystem as the chestnut. Mature trees grew to 100 feet tall and their trunks...