X RATED

摘要

Last january harvard University president Lawrence Summers hypothesized that women may be innately less scientifically inclined than men. Not long after the ensuing uproar, researchers announced the sequencing of the human X chromosome. The project was hailed as a great leap forward in decoding the differences between men and women, at least from a biological perspective. While it did nothing to calm the maelstrom swirling around Summers, the new understanding of the chromosome revealed tantalizing clues to the role genes might play in shaping cognitive differences between the sexes. And while these differences seem to be largely to the female's advantage, permutations during the genetic recombina- tion of the X chromosome may confer to a few men a substantial intellectual edge.