Afarensis is a 3.5-2.8 million year old hominin from the Kada Hadar member of the Hadar formation in the Middle Awash, Ethiopia. He is approximately 41 inches tall, weighs approximately 60 pounds and has a cranial capacity of a whopping 410 cc (approximately). Afarensis is currently considered to be transitional between apes and humans and displays some traits of both. Since he spends a lot of time on the couch watching monster movies, some observers question whether he is an obligate biped (although no one has observed him climbing a tree). He also has a blog called 
Like Chad at Uncertain Principles I also promised to review the book 100 Science Words Every College Graduate Should Know.
Since my blog is primarily concerned with anthropology the first thing I did was look for all the anthropology related terms and found seven that could relate to anthropology, ranging from hominin to protolanguages. I was somewhat surprised at the number but a little disappointed by the choices, for example, neanderthal is defined but "Mitochondrial Eve" isn't (although perhaps out- of -Africa or multiregional continuity would have been better). The point being that this is one of the key debates in paleoanthropology - and one that gets a lot of press. Also, I would have liked to have seen "common ancestry" included, certainly these are two words every college graduate should know (and the same could be said for abiogenesis or maybe OOL) - especially if you are going to bill the book as one that provides the "...vocabulary needed to understand the fundamental concepts of modern science" (and what's up with evolution and natural selection not being included, surely these are fundamental concepts?)
I found the definitions to be easily understandable and liked the fact that etymologies were provided, as well as a pronunciation key. The book was kind of fun to read and I am happy to report that I knew all the definitions. Unfortunately, I did not break down the words by science like Chad did, but I suspect that if I did my list would be somewhat different and am interested to see how others might break them down (might be a good Friday experiment for Cognitive Daily). Overall, I think the book might be more appropriate for incoming freshman rather than college graduates. Given the state of science knowledge among the general public I think the book might be useful there as well, or perhaps Houghton-Mifflin can do a companion volume along the lines of 100 Science Words Everyone Should Know...
Comments
What is OOL? Origins Of Life? Order of Ornithologists and Loons?
Object Oriented Learning? Order of Orangutans and Lemurs? Out-Of-Line
xml? Origins Of Laughter? Organs Of Lust? Obfuscate Our Loins? Just wondering.
Posted by: llewelly | May 9, 2006 4:36 PM
See, that's why it needs to be in the dictionary...it stands for origins of life, but Order of Ornithologists and Loons? Order of Orangutans and Lemurs? Organs Of Lust? Obfuscate Our Loins? are all good if you ask me (especially Order of Orangutans and Lemurs)!
Posted by: afarensis, FCD | May 9, 2006 5:58 PM