This, is really a nice phrase.
"Her existence revolves around the fact that Mathematics is the key to the universe, and that she alone is the square root of all evil."
Great read by the way, although I must disagree on this part ( which isn't in the linked article, but one of the articles. This one
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/issue/17/3)
"Our fear of snakes is in our genes.."
This means a lot of things on the gentic field. First of all, I'd really like to know which genes code for "fear of snakes".
Secondly, if this were true it would mean that our genes change according to our environment, which is how things are generaly assumed but totally false. By "changes according to our environment" I mean that our genes will adapt, so that they best suit our needs for our survival in a certain environment. An example would be someone telling me "I'm quite sure people in alaska have thicker skin, which allows better heat conservation, than people living in the desert. That's because it's colder in Alaska than in the Sahara, so they need to keep all the heat they have as best as possible. This led them to evolve thicker skin.".
That claim is complete crap. An example on how evolution works. In the early 19th century in Manchester we studied the changes in population of white moth. These moth would hide on trees with white truncs and braches during the day, which would camouflage them from birds and other predators. We discovered a genetical default in these moth: a small percentage of them were born black. These "black" moth died far quicker then the white ones because birds would see them hiding on the white trees. This was consider as a handicap.
But with the Industrial Revolution, and the polution coming from the coal, the white trees turned black. So now, it was the white moth who would get spotted far easier that the black ones. So all the white ones were eaten, and became the minority. Being a black moth, then, was not considered a handicap anymore, but an aid. So the moth did not evolve to become black because the trees became black, but most of the white ones died because the trees became black.
To complete the alaskian analogy, let's say 10 people went to colonize alaska 2 million years ago. out of those 10 people 3 of them had thick skin. During the harsh alaskian winter,6 of the others, with their fragile skin, all died of cold, while all the ones with thick skins survived. There remainded 4 people, 3 with thick skin, and 1 with fragile skin. These people had children, which in their turn had children and so forth, all passing their gene of thick and fragile skin. The descendents of the one with fragile skin had less of a change to survive, that's why people most people now have thick skin in alaska.
So, there is no way you can alter your genetic code, there is no way you can print in your code "be afraid of snakes" just because you should be. It's not because it's cold that you'll evolve thicker skin, and it's not because tree truncs turn black that moths do as well. If we could evolve like that, I'd never be hungry, never be cold, never be tired and so forth...