Singapore, and many other Asian contries, forbid gender selection using scientific methods, unless there are exceptional conditions, such as health risks based on gender. Link
I think it is a good thing. As I said before choosing baby gender would lead to disasters to humanity in the future. The gender balanace established by nature should not be messed with.
According to this press release, a company called Consumer Genetics has a kit that can determine baby gender after 7 weeks. It involves taking your own blood by poking a finger and sending it to the lab. For a cool $200 you can have the results back in 3 to 5 business days. And they offer money back guarantee if they are wrong.
My question is, why would you want to spend $200 if you can wait another 10 weeks and get an ultrasound for free (well, paid by your medical insurance)? Seriously, if poking your finger with sharp objects and squizing out blood sounds like fun to you, do it. Otherwise, wait for the ultrasound.
Our society is getting increasingly impatient. Fast food, fast diets, fast, fast, fast… Take a deep breath and wait for the ultrasound.
Guess what? You can now choose the gender of your baby before conception using a controversial practices employed by some US clinics using IVF. David and Victoria Beckham are doing it link.
There are many things wrong with this. And the most important is that it will lead to a dislocation of the natural balance between genders. 70% of families would like their first child to be a girl (see article above). What would all these girls do when they grow up and face with the shortage of boys to date, marry and have kids with?
This practice should be illegal not for ideological or religious reasons, but for practical. For the sake of maintaining the balance between men and women, we should not allow selection of baby gender.
Finally scientists decoded a full human genome of a woman with cancer. And they found out that there are 8 new genes that have not been seen before. Unfortunatly these genes do not match genes taking from tumors of other people which suggests that cancer is a complicated matter and can occur from many different mutations. Does not sound promising for creating effective cancer treatments. However, scientists said that with enough samples (genome sequences) they might be able to find the earliest signs of mutations and produce drugs that stop those mutations before they develop into abnormal cells.
This is not really related to gender prediction, but genes and genome sequencing was always interesting to me. Genes describes a living organizm and the ability to understand and even manipulate them opens up incredible opportunities for good and evil applications.
This is not really related to gender prediction but I just wanted to get it out there. If you live in California, on November 4th you will, hopefully, go and cast the vote on 11 propositions and for the president. Vote “No” on proposition 8. This proposition contains a constitutional amendment that will redefine a marriage as the union between man and woman. Ask yourself, what is wrong if two dudes or ladies want to get married and enjoy all the “perks” that come with it? And don’t believe those commercials about kids learning about marriage. Nobody teaches kids about marriage in schools. Think back when you were a kid, did you learn about marriage from school or from your parents? I bet your parents taught you.
Anyways, enjoy exersicing your constitutional rights and Vote!
This post is not really about gender prediction, but something I have read recently.
According to a study published in Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine, having fan on during sleep reduces risk of SIDS by 72 percent. That is a LARGE precentage. They interviewed parents whose babies died of SIDS and parents whose babies did not die, and determined that, among other factors such as sleeping position, surface, pacifier use, the fan use plays a large role in preventing SIDS.
The scientists explain that high concentration of carbon dioxide (the gas humans exhale) accumulates in bedding and other materials, can contribute to SIDS. Babies’ immature lungs cannot deal with high amounts of the gas. Fans improve air circulation and prevent accumulation of carbon dioxide.
Interesting stuff. Read more here
Intersting piece of information I came across recently. Every fetus begins life as female. Crazy, isn’t? I did not believe it myself, but after a quick research I came across enough scientific evidence confirming this fact.
As I explained before, mother has two female chromosomes (XX), while father has one male and one female (XY). With such obundance of female chromosomes, no wonder a fetus starts out as female.
Let’s talk a little about something else rather than gender prediction. The ratio between available, heterosexual boys and girls. I’d like to emphasize “heterosexual” because I’m mainly focused on procreation.
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Gender Ratio
Can expectant mothers use their intuition to find out baby’s gender? According to a study conducted by Dr. Shamas and University of Arizona, mothers guess the correct gender 70% of the time. Not exactly reliable method considering the worst they can do is 50%. Quote:
MOTHER KNOWS BEST: Expectant mothers can use the power of intuition to learn the sex of their unborn babies, says a University of Arizona study. Women who claimed to have an intuition about the gender of their child made the right choice 70% of the time. A survey of college students also found 80% believe their mothers are more intuitive than their fathers.
But it’s not much worse than other gender prediction methods such as Chinese chart or old wife’s tale.
Interesting fact, according to web page hosted by students at Harvard University, one of the sites that’s blocked in Saudi Arabia is online gender predictor. Why? I can only speculate. In some cultures babies of one gender (for example boys) are preferred over the opposite gender.
