Sperm pelotons; article in Nature
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Re: Sperm pelotons; article in Nature
 
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Thanks Vladimyr for following up on this discussion
and for the colorful anecdotes. Sounds like you were a
"pump-in-the-spokes" sort of rider - not a tactic I ever employed
myself. I was a category 1 racer (top amateur level for those
unfamiliar) and still hold a licence for that category, though I am much less
serious about it. I've raced several high level pro/am multi-stage and
single day races, including the Cascade Classic, Mt Hood, Grand Prix de
Beauce, among others.
The use of tactics and other pre-planned actions,
as you've identified, do highlight a problem that I will have to
address frequently in promoting my model. Intentional tactical
actions contradict the notion of self-organized principles. I take the
view that, although these intentional actions are obviously a large part of the
sport of cycling, they do not over-ride certain self-organized peloton
phases/pattern formations that occur according to a
tunable power-output parameter. The "tuning" occurs according to the
competitive intentions of riders to increase speed, but self-organized
structures occur as a result. So, I am looking at principles that drive
these self-organized structures, and largely ignore intentional tactics.
This is, in my opinion, one of the main reasons why pelotons are so neglected as
an object of serious scientific investigations - because few can separate the
intentional tactics of riders in the sport of cycling from the
self-organized properties of the dynamical system.
More to come...
Hugh
----- Original Message -----
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Re: Sperm pelotons; article in Nature
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In reply to this post by Hugh Trenchard
Hugh,
I think there is something publishable lurking here. That, and five bucks will buy you a cup of coffee in any restaurant in Santa Fe ... but you better hurry.
Nick
Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Ethology,
Clark University ([hidden email])
http://www.cusf.org [City University of Santa Fe]
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Re: Sperm pelotons; article in Nature
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In reply to this post by Hugh Trenchard
...that said, there is a text-book on game theory
that could be written involving strictly examples of peloton
tactics (I'm no expert in game theory either, but this is apparent
even on a cursory review of basic game theory concepts). And it is
this *combination* of the human factor and self-organized physical principles
that also, in my personal view, makes the peloton a ripe source for economical
analysis too.
Hugh
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Re: Sperm pelotons; article in Nature
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In reply to this post by Douglas Roberts-2
Hi Doug,
I know the feeling, and it is unexplainable to any who have never ridden.
Now using such insight, falling back is not that complicated. You typically find yourself in the lead almost by accident, I never elected it out of ego, it is hard work. Falling back is simply the result of having hit a maximum tolerable limit, if you are stubborn and push too hard you can’t even reliably catch the last rider in the group and find yourself falling out. So you have to drop the lead before you spend everything. The cunning riders peel off very quickly and work themselves back into the pack and try and hang in but out of the inner recycling. The rules are fairly simple if you consider it closely. Only fools voluntarily take the lead or occasionally a sneaky leader just wants to up the pace because he wants to get home for dinner early. I have apologized for falling back especially when the wind is killing everybody and the pack has shrunk to a handful. My pack riding was very obsessed with wind here out on the open prairie. On Sundays we take over the local roads and get flying chevrons with some very weird shapes. If the boundaries of a Uterus can act like highway shoulders then this simulation model is going to be very interesting. Fluid densities and flow patterns should also be explored. But I am very wary of anybody’s notion of “Group”, I suspect it is all artifact of the observer’s prejudicial thinking.
I have watched my son when he first started riding take the lead from the side lines and shout to him to fall back as quick as possible. His ego filled his head and he destroyed his chances of winning a few times before he learned to be cagey.
This peloton is truly an a amazing concept when you start thinking closely. I feel sorry that many people have never had the chance to be inside it. My own daughter who is a very strong creature feared the peloton and seemed to always hang at the outer edges. Like a lot of individuals she invented rationale to justify her loner status and did not win very often except in TT’s
Completely different psychology for the two types of riders.
I rode for years with my kids trying to teach them the rules as I understood them with little real success. Thinking about the twin leads makes me consider how valuable it is to have a partner tell you it is time to drop off. Protecting your partner is a gentleman’s way of protecting yourself. I rode a lot around Winnipeg and while I love mountains I always loved riding into a strong wind relishing the speeds on the return rides. I was always a Clydesdale so I did a lot of pulling in my life. Not much glory in being big, but at least the sprinters were polite at the dinners, I used to box as a heavy weight in University before it became unfashionable. No matter how fast the little buggers were it was not fast enough when off the wheels. But having boxed I was always struck by the audiences perception of the fighters. They believed things about us that just demonstrated complete misunderstanding. Often I was asked how I could work up enough anger to defeat my opponent. I was always dumbfounded, thinking I had no room for anger in the least. I actually liked the guy and we drank together regularly! How one event could lead to such divergent beliefs was always intriguing. The question of observer effects/ interpretations is a constant one I suppose.
I recall working with my riding buddy to catch a peloton of fast riders and working for some 120 kms to make up our 15 minute late arrival at the start line. We spent hours passing the remnants of the starting peloton until we reached clear space and caught the tail end. I died about 10 k before the end and let my partner make the charge into town. At least he had a beer waiting for me. Probably my best ride ever.
I think the simulation should be very interesting, I suspect it will be a major discussion topic on training rides. If you are a strong rider then perhaps you take little notice of the disintegration of the main peloton, again different perspectives yield different interpretations. It might be useful to find other riders who have seen the inside of a peloton under different circumstances.
I used to run the Meat Wagon for many local events and have watched with fascination as a rider goes down, the response time is quite short and if one is within the zone It takes great luck to escape, the size of the zone is clearly a function of velocity and skill levels. Just keeping a meat wagon close without interfering is a trick in itself. I recall an event where one of the team cars was strategically placed to provide wind shadow for riders at quite a distance. Team spokesmen argued about the intention to cheat by creating an invisible cone of less wind. The evidence of a crime was clearly lacking but everybody knew damn well what was going on. I recall the Cubans pissed off the Yanks in that case. I guess the Yanks were miffed they did not figure out the tactic soon enough to use it to their benefit. The judges just refused to act and tolerated the accusations and defensive excuses until the race ended. In that case both sets of observers recognized a reality that no untrained observer could appreciate as having existed. The arguments as to whether or not it was intentional, were beside the point since both sides knew this was a real event in spite of a total lack of evidence. Radios just made strategic actions like this more probable over the years.
Mountain Bike events are quite different having volunteered at both events at the Pan American games I should include Team Track events as well, which are almost too complicated to understand at times.
I should like to encourage the sperm peloton simulation since it brings to a forefront not just complexity but the role of the interpreter of the simulation. I apologize if this discussion degenerates into something like a Jorje LuisBorges’, short story about labrynths.
I guess if the team director makes a bad interpretation of what is happening to the peloton and gives odd instructions then the peloton transforms itself due to a mistake and the results are altered in an apparently unexplainable manner. The scientists observing the event from their couches will never penetrate the reality of the events as long as they attempt to behave as ”Objective Observers”.
Dr.Vladimyr Ivan Burachynsky Ph.D.(Civil Eng.), M.Sc.(Mech.Eng.), M.Sc.(Biology)
120-1053 Beaverhill Blvd. Winnipeg, Manitoba CANADA R2J 3R2 (204) 2548321 Phone/Fax
-----Original Message-----
Hi, Vladimyr,
I've also ridden in pelotons on multi-day longish rides. In spandex.
On those longish 10+ hour per day rides, the pelotons do indeed form, fragment, and then re-form throughout the ride. One element of a functioning peloton that I doubt our teensy counterparts would exhibit is the structured rotation of the head of the pack. As the lead rider tires, he (or they in a 2-abreast pack) peel off and then fall in again at the rear of the pack. That way a peloton can maintain a speed a good 20% above what a single rider could maintain for considerable distances.
I have to confess, however, that frequently I found myself riding in the shadow of the stronger, faster members of the pack. Telling jokes. However, as much as they might have desired, they (like FRIAM) found it was usually more difficult than they might have expected to leave me in the dust.
BTW, for a real thrill you should hitch your wagon to a fast tandom pack just as it crests the pass on day two of the TOSRV West tour, heading down the long, steep stretch to Flathead Lake in Montana. Tears and snot flying off the riders in the brisk morning air of the Bitterroot Mountains as the speeds approach 60 MPH. No sperm, though.
--Doug
On Mon, Mar 29, 2010 at 4:30 PM, Vladimyr Ivan Burachynsky <[hidden email]> wrote: To Hugh and the peloton discussion group,
I did a little riding in spandex and have a small sense of the dynamics inside a peloton. I always thought it a marvelous experience while participating.
The most striking oddity for me about the discussion is the focus on the group concept. Personally it appears an artifact of the human propensity to organize random events into a pattern that may or may not have any meaning, it sounds a lot like an argument about what the shape of a cloud appears to represent. Each individual argues tautologically to support their specific perspective.
The way a peloton transforms over time exchanging members and breaking into subunits then reassembling seems to contradict any notion of group. A group definition dependent on time velocity or orientation is simply an instantaneous attribute and I think misleading.
Hugh’s model should display behaviors that surprise everyone simply because we are trapped by personal perspectives and expectations. A peloton is a merciless entity disposing of riders as callously as wind strips leaves from trees in autumn. Yet occasionally it appears merciful, a weak rider can be hidden in the shadow and carried along until it has healed, its only function to tell jokes. Sprinters are typically delivered to the attack position in such a manner. Often the sprinter in tow is not even related to the mules. The mules or pullers try every tactic possible to rid themselves of the unwanted hanger on. So affinity is not a parameter for apparent cooperaton. That kind of blows the “Genefur” concept out of the water. To the outside observer cooperation seems dominant, to the rider it can be either a pleasant exercise or one filled with dread depending on how close is the finish line. Some pullers will invite a good joker along for the ride knowing full well that he will be dumped when things get serious. I personally have dumped riders who did not do their laundry regularly enough! Yes I pulled ahead and hit his front wheel, Not Nice I admit but he reeked and I could get away with it or so I thought. I had to confess to Friam, how peculiar!
The fixation with sorting based on speed, reserve energy etc. will lead to finding the best rationale to explain that idea. I just wish to insert a new dimension namely that the purpose of a peloton might be to deliver sprinters. Energy optimization is not the goal but simply a tool. The peloton is an artifact of a few cyclists with temporarily synchronous goals. The rewards in the peloton are human constructs, sprinters are evaluated by the trophy and pullers by delivering sprinters. The puller has only to select sprinters with the same logo as he wears, he forces the role of sprinter upon the one they identify as being the most explosive on that particular day. The pullers define the structure of the peloton and determine who becomes identified as a sprinter. The pullers are ruthless, and they rule the roost so to speak. Pullers can be absolute tyrants and discourage any individualism when they sense the target. They amuse themselves with little attacks at various stages to evaluate the strength of each little team. The sorting by velocity is a dangerously biased view of a peloton. It has some merit but underestimates or oversimplifies what might actually be happening.
Let me put it in another context, a peloton is one thing to outside observers and another to the individual riders, it is neither and perhaps it is both. The model that Hugh builds will be watched closely as Hugh seems to be onto something very important. Let the model speak for itself and later we will all argue about the wonderful patterns that appear in the “clouds”. Peloton strategy sessions following a race are intriguing since they typically have both a personal and collective viewpoint. The personal is always the must relevant. Good team leaders play the riders like chess pieces and have no room for sentiment.
If Hugh has time to spare could you please let us lurkers know of some of your progress building the model. I am just getting started myself and am interested in “Group Dynamics” as artifacts of an external perspective.
I hope Hugh has an easier time understanding the peromyscus peloton than was my experience with the local FOG ( Fast Old Guys) riders, I never made the grade!.
My guess towards building a group model of sperm is to program the agents as Tyranical Pullers willing to destroy themselves and everyone around themselves for a programmed goal, the program would be moderated by proximity to the goal. Perhaps they start off simply looking for a shadow behind a stronger rider, when the shadow is inconsistent they switch to a stronger lead wheel, there is no group selection just individual selection for an easy ride. The individual monitors his own energy state and tries to keep expenses at a minimum. He does also recognize is own affinity group based on some markers and attempts to keep them close (just how close is Hugh’s problem) In cycling it is possible to dispose of a follower by simply slowing your pace and letting your back wheel touch the following front wheel. Such dirty tricks are not uncommon. The follower almost always loses control. If not, he will return with a major attitude ! In this case the goal is not to win but to eliminate the opponents. One has to be careful when doing this or the falling rider might take out a group of your affinity clan as well! On the other hand this may be the function of some sperm to eliminate competition from behind.
I will follow your progress Hugh, as you build your model , with much enthusiasm.
I just pumped my skinny tires up and hope to do some lazy riding as spring arrives in Winnipeg.
Dr.Vladimyr Ivan Burachynsky Ph.D.(Civil Eng.), M.Sc.(Mech.Eng.), M.Sc.(Biology)
120-1053 Beaverhill Blvd. Winnipeg, Manitoba CANADA R2J 3R2 (204) 2548321 Phone/Fax
-----Original Message----- Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Sperm pelotons; article in Nature
Thanks Eric for taking the time to look through my post. For Nick's last post, I am not entirely sure what a "genefur" is, although it sounds like it is a reference to an inherent genetic trait, as you also discuss.
Yes, I agree it will help my argument if I hone in more closely on what I mean by fitness, and I will add some description to clarify this. My useage relates to inherent physical fitness in terms of maximum power output capacity. That too needs fine-tuning because I refer to "maximum sustainable output", which is not the same as absolute maximum power output, and I would need to outline more carefully what this means. Regardless, I think there are ways of testing for the actual power-output capacities of individual sperm - I have seen references in the literature to testing procedures for this.
Because I know very little about genetics, for my part I would be treading dangerously to begin describing the process in a gene-related sense (and I would not want to get into discussion about chromosomes), but to address the issue you raise (if I understand it correctly), it would be necessary to measure the power output of the sperm of individual male mice to determine the range of their output capacities and/or the sperms' average output. This is no doubt not easy, but I imagine there would be some sampling size that would provide an accurate indication of the overall output range. And certainly one would want clearly to correspond average sperm outputs and ranges with the genetic descriptions of the various mice tested, but this could be done according to a replication of the Fisher and Hoesktra procedures. It would also be necessary to determine percentages of energy savings that occur when sperm are coupled (if this does in fact occur).
My model assumes that there is a difference in the average power output of individual males' sperm, whether related or unrelated or of the same species or not - a difference sufficiently significant to demonstrate that sorting occurs according to fitness (in the power-output sense) and not according to some mechanism for identifying the genetic relatedness of the sperm, as the authors of the Nature article appear to suggest. The fact that sperm aggregate indicates coupling and energy savings, which is why (in my view) the peloton model applies.
In terms of chance, it seems to me Fisher and Hoekstra have taken a lot of care to establish that there is sorting beyond chance, but implicitly ascribe that sorting to some sensory/perceptual capacity of the sperm to identify related sperm. My model begins with their proven result that there is sorting beyond chance, and asks whether there is some sorting mechanism involved other than an unidentified mechanism to perceive the location of related sperm, which is intuitively problematic because (it seems) sperm do not have a sufficiently developed sensory system (i.e. eyes, ears, or other) to do this.
My model provides a simpler explanation for the sorting process than the Hoekstra & Fisher explanation, because, in my model, sorting occurs according to self-organized energetic principles, and not according to a perceptual/sensory mechanism, as apparently implied by the authors.
I can see how a basic computer simulation would be helpful as a starting point for making predictions according to my model, which I see is really my next step.
Does anyone know how/where one could apply for some funding to resource such a simulation? I could develop it myself (and have developed at least one simulation, but it really needs to be worked through again), but it would happen a whole lot faster if I could engage someone more adept at computer modelling than me.
----- Original Message -----
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Re: Sperm pelotons; article in Nature
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In reply to this post by Hugh Trenchard
Off topic, but only slightly: The particular TOSRV West ride I referred to earlier occurred at a time when:
Any takers on the year? On Mon, Mar 29, 2010 at 6:37 PM, Hugh Trenchard <[hidden email]> wrote:
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Re: Sperm pelotons; article in Nature
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In reply to this post by Hugh Trenchard
Hugh,
This is getting very interesting and it is exactly why I joined this group, “. Intentional tactical actions contradict the notion of self-organized principles.’
, I think this is very important.
I am going to take the position that these “Intentional (self serving my words) tactical actions” are the very principles leading to self organization.
If the model could be built without these I would be indeed surprised beyond measure. So how do you propose to separate the self organizing principles from the dirty tactics> This would be like comparing touch football to the real thing. I also played Go and Chess. I will argue that the more rules of decency you impose the more boring the game. Touch football has more rules than the real thing and both games have more rules than a Friday night bar room fight . and Go has very few compared to Chess.
So Hugh, if I am right the fewer the rules the more complex the behavior. The more rules the less complex. The less complex the behavior the easier it is for humans to imagine the purpose or goals.
Let us say that the game of Go is a complex arena defined by a 19x19 grid and four edges. Each stone has only a very few rules, it must exist on an intersection and secondly it must be connected orthogonally to an open space somewhere else on the board without interruption or discontinuity, in order to exist. If it does not have a life (eye) it is removed from the board by the opponent. Now there are many peculiar group patterns that appear all over a Go board, they exist for variable lengths of time one in particular called Sicho ( the Ladder) appears as a staircase to western observers. It is a beginner’s error to allow such a creation to occur. But it does occasionally happen and can be bent folded and mutilated into many other shapes. In some cases a skillful player will create such a shape intentionally realizing that he has a stone somewhere on the field that he can reach just before annihilation and thereby escape and devour the oppressor. Occasionally a Sicho pattern may be initiated intentionally to guage the level of skill of the opponent. The novice will jump at the opportunity, the more skilled players pause and reflect whether this is real or fake or simply a gentlemen’s way of asking politely “ Just how smart are You sir, your next action will hopefully answer my question, please do not be offended” We can not ask the stone what it thinks is happening it knows nothing except perhaps whether it is alive or dead and even then it can not even anticipate. So Hugh either the sperm is Dumb like the Go Stone or Cunning like the Cyclist? In either case the group behavior is complex. Besides sticking a pump into a wheel is brutally dangerous it was easier to hit the gear change levers on the down tube and keep the pump intact. It doesn’t work with the new integrated shifters and mini pumps! Water bottles are the new weapon of choice last time I checked.
I have a bit of a bone to pick about the concept of “groups and group behavior”. As an entomologist I worked with Ticks, the larvae display very unusual group dynamics. It used to amaze people to watch them organize themselves into nasty little clusters waving the little hooked feet in the air waiting for a ride and free meal. Now I observed that I could pick up the Petri dish and scatter the wee beasties all over the place and it would take hours for them to reassemble into smaller groups. But if I used the old paper liner the scatterlings would recreate exactly the same groups before the disturbance. You guessed it scent trails.
But that is not all of it, perhaps out of malice I placed the open Petri dish in an arena with Peromyscus maniculatus. Lo and behold the wee little guy lunged at the cluster and feasted on the larvae. He gorged himself but a few quick footed ticklets escaped the jaws of death and scurried over the mouse’s face and buried themselves behind the ears. So what do we make of such complex behavior? Clearly the tick larvae are not as smart as our cyclying buddies but are they any smarter than the Go stones?
In the case of the tick larvae the bigger the cluster the longer the time before the mouse would groom off the still wandering larvae and the more time to get well anchored. Most tick larvae are simply expendable bait for a few very quick sprinters, as I think you might imagine yourself on a good day. The rest of a tick’s life cycle is equally unremarkable or fascinating whichever is your prejudice.
I think the peloton group dynamics are much like the transitory patterns seen in a game of Go. I have no agenda believe me, I await the results of the simulations. I should get off the chat circuit and build my own models.
There is also a curious phenomenon about Go, it appears difficult to program and was a type of Holy Grail in the past for aspiring computer programmers that thought it a challenge. It is also curious that some of the best players seem to have a very peculiar notion about winning. They actually don’t seem to care about the concept as normals do. They just focus on a very local kind of assessment to stay a few points ahead in every exchange. This was very difficult for me to understand coming from Chess and Boxing where winning is the whole story and nothing else is even discussed.
By the way I have very very long arms and it always surprised the shorter riders. I ride for fun and enjoy the company when I can get it.
Dr.Vladimyr Ivan Burachynsky Ph.D.(Civil Eng.), M.Sc.(Mech.Eng.), M.Sc.(Biology)
120-1053 Beaverhill Blvd. Winnipeg, Manitoba CANADA R2J 3R2 (204) 2548321 Phone/Fax
-----Original Message-----
Thanks Vladimyr for following up on this discussion and for the colorful anecdotes. Sounds like you were a "pump-in-the-spokes" sort of rider - not a tactic I ever employed myself. I was a category 1 racer (top amateur level for those unfamiliar) and still hold a licence for that category, though I am much less serious about it. I've raced several high level pro/am multi-stage and single day races, including the Cascade Classic, Mt Hood, Grand Prix de Beauce, among others.
The use of tactics and other pre-planned actions, as you've identified, do highlight a problem that I will have to address frequently in promoting my model. Intentional tactical actions contradict the notion of self-organized principles. I take the view that, although these intentional actions are obviously a large part of the sport of cycling, they do not over-ride certain self-organized peloton phases/pattern formations that occur according to a tunable power-output parameter. The "tuning" occurs according to the competitive intentions of riders to increase speed, but self-organized structures occur as a result. So, I am looking at principles that drive these self-organized structures, and largely ignore intentional tactics. This is, in my opinion, one of the main reasons why pelotons are so neglected as an object of serious scientific investigations - because few can separate the intentional tactics of riders in the sport of cycling from the self-organized properties of the dynamical system.
More to come...
Hugh
----- Original Message -----
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Re: Sperm pelotons; article in Nature
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In reply to this post by Vladimyr Burachynsky
Practically my philosophy of life.
No coincidence that Wally (Dilbert comic strip) is my main hero.
On Mon, Mar 29, 2010 at 6:45 PM, Vladimyr Ivan Burachynsky <[hidden email]> wrote:
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Re: [Norton AntiSpam] Re: Sperm pelotons; article in Nature
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In reply to this post by Eric Charles
Nobody is going to pick out single spermatozoa and analyse them individually to prove kin selection is even working considering that these sperm come from the same donor anyway.
Let me present another option, recall I mentioned the Tick larvae clusters, let’s suppose we had two sets of progeny from different mothers. We raise them separately then one day we unceremoniously dump them all into a sack shake, ( with secret Ingredients from the bowels of Vladimyr’s laboratory) and stir and dump them into a clean arena. But only half of the mixed group, the other half we dump into a prepared arena with the paper bits containing the old scents for each group.
At the end of the day we examine if there is any kin selection operating or if each little beasty just follows the strongest trail . It could be embellished a little with ultraviolet tracer pigments and the entire race video taped with dramatic sound back drops with drum rolls every once in a while. Jeez guys we don’t even have to count the buggers we just use the image processing software to count pixels containing tracer colors. It would be a lazy man’s few days of work. The ticks will do this trick over and over again until they all die of boredom.
If we have the ticks start at a start line we might even get crowding and peloton like groupings. Hey we could have a little (very little) breeze to screw with the ticks and see what shapes they take on. This is just like burning ants with a magnifying glass, do you think the SPCA will object? We could sculpt the arena floor with junk just to further our reputation as troublemakers.
I have $50 for a wager but I am thinking about the exact terms of the bet>>>
Dr.Vladimyr Ivan Burachynsky Ph.D.(Civil Eng.), M.Sc.(Mech.Eng.), M.Sc.(Biology)
120-1053 Beaverhill Blvd. Winnipeg, Manitoba CANADA R2J 3R2 (204) 2548321 Phone/Fax
-----Original Message-----
But Nick, Hugh,
I yield to no man in my ignorance of subject we are talking about. However, two points:
The term "genefur" is one I use to remind myself (and anyone who happens to be listening) that the common expression, "a gene for", (as in "a gene for blue eyes" or "a gene for prostate cancer" is deeply problematic. I should probably say something with more words, such as, "a gene for peletonizing, whatever the hell that might mean." Although we know that the path from a trait in parents to the same trait in an offspring is much more tortured than a Dawkinsian argument requires, and that the material basis for parent-offspring is not as "atomic" as the expression "a gene for" implies, we continue to need a term for a unit of inheritance and "genefur" is a quietly ironic way to speak of units of inheritance while acknowledging that that sort of speech is silly.
As I understand this discussion it has a lot to do with the group/individual selection argument. Think of it this way. Think of a bike race containing 20 riders from 5 teams. Let it be the case that the winning TEAM takes down all the prize money but that it is shared unequally by members of the team, with half taken by the winning rider, a quarter by the second rider, and the an eighth by the 3rd rider, and the balance by the fourth, etc. Now we have set up a conflict between group level and individual level success.
My comments on fitness are only to remind us that "fitness" in a Darwinian conversation means winning the race by any means. In your terms, "fitness" means using your resources to produce the maximum output. Call these "fitnessD" and "fitnessT". One could be "fitT" all by oneself on a stationary bike. However, as the scene in Breaking Away demonstrates, there are lots of way to be "fitD" without being "FitT".
I wish we could engage David Sloan Wilson in this discussion, but he is too damned busy running around the world being famous and talking about the evolution of religion. Gawd I hate when that happens.
Nick
Nicholas S. Thompson Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Ethology, Clark University (nthompson@...) <a href="http://home.earthlink.net/%7Enickthompson/naturaldesigns/" onclick="window.open('http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/');return false;">http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/ <a href="http://www.cusf.org" onclick="window.open('http://www.cusf.org');return false;">http://www.cusf.org [City University of Santa Fe]
============================================================FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listservMeets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's Collegelectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.orgEric Charles ============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org |
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