links for 2009-09-09

• Why scientists may need to pay women for their eggs.
  scientists have discovered a way to replace the nucleus of an egg. Thus, there would be three parents: the nuclear mother, the sperm father and the mitochondrial/cytoplasm mother. This was done with monkeys. Now they want to move to humans (the main purported benefit would be to prevent people being born with mitochondrial disease). However, there are ethical and legal concerns.
  (tags: genetics ethics sex biology science law)
• The powerful and mysterious brain circuitry that makes us love Google, Twitter, and texting. – By Emily Yoffe – Slate Magazine
  How our brain is hard-wired to "seek"… and how modern ICT and web2.0 give us the perfect tools. However, since this "seeking system" is outside of the reward system, we could go on seeking pointlessly.
  (tags: brain psychology technology search google culture internet twitter)
• A $9 Trillion Question: Did the World Get Muhammad Yunus Wrong? | Foreign Policy
  says combine de Soto's call for poor people formalizing their property and Yunus's microcredit: Micro-mortgages.
  "[T]here is viable market-based approach that would create a deep pool of capital the poor could tap: the provision of micromortgages, or secured, long-term, low-interest rate microloans. [..Governments] would only have to make narrowly focused legal and regulatory changes; then, [..] licensing private firms to prepare applications for the registration of informal property. [T]he micromortgage process could become self-funding, helping grow the pool of credit.

  How would it work? Let's consider a poor individual living in a house without a title or even an address in Mexico. [..H]e visits a local bank to apply to register his property. [T]he bank has incentive to research his claim, help him map his land, assess any improvements, and submit his information to the registry. The bank would do this in return for his loan business and a fee to cover costs. "

  (tags: poverty development microcredit business economy MuhammadYunus HernandoDeSoto economics credit)
• The Manila Times Internet Edition | OPINION >Helping MSMEs grow
  on an ngo offering BDSs to MSMEs in the philippines
  (tags: philippines sme development economic BDS capacity_development)