Heinlein was partly right

Pioneers have more children.

Heinlein's stuff about people wanting to maximize their number of children never sounded right to me in general, but I thought it might be true of pioneers.

The study, published November 4 in Science, analyzed the genealogies of settlers in Canada's Charlevoix Saguenay Lac-Saint-Jean region, northeast of Quebec. Since the colony's initiation in 1608, it underwent several waves of geographic expansion. The researchers, led by population geneticist Laurent Excoffier from the University of Montreal, looked at the colony's marriage and birth records between 1686 and 1960. The analysis found that families living on the edges of the expansions had 20 percent more children than families living at the core of the settlement. They also married one year earlier, on average, and contributed up to four times more genes to the region's current population.

I'm surprised, though, that the effect isn't huge in the short run-- only 20% more children. It's not something like having seven kids instead of four.

Link thanks to Marginal Revolution.

Please pre-order your buttons for Philcon and Darkover

I will be at the conventions, but I won't be selling. That part of the business is in hibernation for now.

If you want buttons, please order from my website or email me at NancyL (at) panix (dot) com.

There are 50 new slogans at the site:

I work well with others. Others. Not you.

I *do* have a clue. I just don't want to wear it out.

Bodies are complicated! And tech support doesn't answer the phone!

Please smother yourself in delicious sauces and await further instructions

I'll recognize corporations as people when Texas executes an innocent one

A clean house is a sign of a broken computer

I stopped fighting my inner demons. We're on the same side now.

"Expecting the world to entertain you leads to boredom and sloth. Expecting to entertain the world leads to bright clothes, odd graffiti and amazing grace while running for the bus."

You don't have a freedom until you can be a damn fool with it.

Contrary to Occam's Razor, patients can have as many diseases as they damn well please.

"Would you like to carry on disagreeing with half my sentence, or would you like to hear the other half now?"

"Before the development of 'gaydar' people had to determine gayness by the stars, using a same-sextant."

People say English isn't a tonal language, but duuuude....

SUBliminal message

Why can't anyone tell I'm wearing this business suit ironically?

Suffering from insufficient blood chocolate

Only one thing is impossible for God: to find any sense in any copyright law on the planet. ---Mark Twain

It's all right, we weren't using those civil liberties anyway

Sacrificing minions-- is there any problem it *can't* solve?

Bad things happen to good people because bad things don't like good people

Matter cannot be created or destroyed or returned without proper receipt

I'm new at this. If you want someone more experienced next year, be nice to me.

The laws are not the government. The government is not the country. The holy text is not the religion.

In pig years, I'd be a football

Tune it or die

Your key or mine?

Forgiveness may heal a wounded soul, but it will never replace REVENGE [first word in white, last word in red, rest in black, background is gray]

Functioning within normal parameters

DANCE like you have health insurance
LOVE like you have a right to privacy
WORK like your money won't be spent on war, corporate welfare, and arbitrary incarceration

What are we going to do when the constitution is gone and we still have a drug problem?

I feel like I'm trapped in a Klein bottle-- I must have woken up on the wrong side of the Moebius strip

I fight entropy. It's great job security

It takes a village to kill a zombie

Looking for massage victim

I don't just have issues, I have a subscription

Sometimes the best answer is a more interesting question

I shot the serif. [picture of large capital S with a hole in a serif]

You have the right to remain silent, but I wouldn't recommend it.

I cannot remake the universe, and must therefore put up with this one

My name is Flamingo Montoya. I stand on one foot. Prepare to die.

Oh crap, now you're going to try and cheer me up, aren't you?

Real life lacks narrative tension, that's why we go to the movies

I don't know whether to award you with an internet or thump you with it

There is nothing better than a friend, unless it is a friend with chocolate.

Never piss off a writer. Anyone else will only kill you; I can make you IMMORTAL.

The confidence of amateurs is the envy of professionals