Darwin
Category archives for Darwin
Pagel on Darwin
Posted by Greg Laden on February 12, 2009 Mark Pagel, evolutionary theorist extraordinaire, has published an Insight piece in Nature on Natural selection 150 years on. Pagel, well known for myriad projects in natural selecition theory and adaptation, and for developing with Harvey the widely used statistical phylogenetic method (and for being a reader of my thesis) wishes Charles Darwin a happy 200th…
Elephants and Horses
Posted by Greg Laden on February 12, 2009 In 1833, Darwin spent a fair amount of time on the East Coast of South America, including in the Pampas, where he had access to abundant fossil material. Here I’d like to examine his writings about some of the megafauna, including Toxodon, Mastodon, and horses, and his further considerations of biogeography and evolution.
Rheas and the Birth of Evolutionary Theory
Posted by Greg Laden on February 11, 2009 Everyone knows about Darwin’s Finches, of the Galapagos Islands. But of course, Darwin made observations of birds throughout his travels on The Beagle. Here, I present a number of passages from The Voyage that include some of these observations.
Fossil Quadrupeds
Posted by Greg Laden on February 10, 2009 Charles Darwin wrote a book called Geological Observations on South America. Since Fitzroy needed to carry out intensive and extensive coastal mapping in South America, and Darwin was, at heart, a geologist more than anything else (at least during the Beagle’s voyage), this meant that Darwin would become the world’s expert on South American geology.…
Darwin Day Party
Posted by Greg Laden on February 10, 2009 Thursday, February 12, 2009, 7 to 9 p.m. Bell Museum Auditorium $10/ free to museum members and University students The speakers will present in the auditorium from 7 to 8 pm. Birthday cake and refreshments are served after the presentations. Celebrate the 200th anniversary of Charles Darwin’s birthday! Part of a world wide celebration, the…
Darwin and The Gauchos
Posted by Greg Laden on February 9, 2009 We’re half way through Darwin Month, and only a tiny ways through the voyage. Need to hurry up! So, let’s skip ahead a bit and hit the Gauchos….
Darwin South of the Tropics
Posted by Greg Laden on February 9, 2009 Eventually, the Beagle headed south to the area of Uruguay and Argentina, still on the Atlantic Coast, where extensive mapping of the coastal waters was required.
Bugs (Darwin)
Posted by Greg Laden on February 9, 2009 When reading the Voyage, it is impossible to miss the observation that much of the time Darwin was engaged in adolescent boy behavior: Pulling the heads off insects, noting how long they would wiggle after cut in half, closely examining the ooze and guts, occupied much of his time. Obviously, careful observation and a strong…
Sunday Darwin Talk Radio Podcast
Posted by Greg Laden on February 8, 2009 The podcast of this morning’s radio show with Stephanie Zvan, Lynne Felman, Don Luce and Yours Truly is now up, here: “Celebrating Darwin and Evolution at the Bell Museum” Atheists Talk #56 February 8, 2008 Lynne and Don read a book on the radio (that was cool) and Lynne asked me a bunch of good…
South America on Five Dollars a Day
Posted by Greg Laden on February 6, 2009 What do you eat when you are traveling the world in search of truth about the natural world? Most of the time Darwin ate pretty well…
Darwin Gets his Wellies Wet
Posted by Greg Laden on February 5, 2009 I became acquainted with an Englishman who was going to visit his estate … more than a hundred miles [north] of Cape Frio. As I was quite unused to travelling, I gladly accepted his kind offer of allowing me to accompany him. And so was the case with a number of Darwin’s excursions into the…
Charles Darwin and the Rain Forest
Posted by Greg Laden on February 5, 2009 The first time I read the following passage from The Voyage, I was reminded of my own first experience in a rain forest (in Zaire, not Congo). Evident in this passage is at least a glimmering of Darwin’s appreciation for the complexity of ecosystems. Darwin could be considered the first scientific ecologist. But enough of…
Darwin Crossing The Atlantic
Posted by Greg Laden on February 5, 2009 Behold this humble passage by Darwin, which is what immediately follows his discussion of the octopus. This passage is a touchstone to several important aspects of what Darwin was doing and thinking, and is a poignant link to what Darwin did not know:
The Voyage of the Beagle
Posted by Greg Laden on February 4, 2009 Of his time on the Beagle (1832 – 1836), Darwin wrote, “The voyage of the Beagle has been by far the most important event in my life and has determined my whole career.” Of the manuscript describing that voyage, he wrote, “The success of this my first literary child always tickles my vanity more than…
Homeschooling Carnival Up
Posted by Greg Laden on January 12, 2009 Homeschool Showcase (Formerly The Carnival of Cool Homeschoolers) #15 is up at Weird, Unsocialized Homeschoolers. I’ve got an item listed in the carnival, which is typical (I often send potentially useful science content material to the homeschooling carnivals.) While you’re studying Earth science, you may want to check out Nature’s Evolutionary Gems posted by Greg…
The Abington Park Museum of Northhampton, UK, Requires Your Assistance …
Posted by Greg Laden on August 31, 2008 … in regards to its exhibit on Darwin. A creationist visiting the museum objected to phrases regarding evolution on the Darwin Exhibit (Hat Tip: Pharyngula). This led the museum to cover up the offending language. Clearly, the government unit that runs this museum, and the museum itself, needs support. They need letters, emails, and phone…
Darwin Literature Podcast
Posted by Greg Laden on August 8, 2008 Check out this podcast from the Institute for Humanist Studies. In this month’s audio podcast we are dedicating the entire program to one story. During the 1970s, P. Thomas Carroll read and transcribed hundreds of Charles Darwin’s personal correspondences for research purposes. Carroll shares his story of becoming intimately familiar with the great 19th century…
Darwin and Wallace 1858
Posted by Greg Laden on July 14, 2008 Darwin and Wallace, chillin’ Let’s talk about Darwin and Wallace’s joint presentation on Natural Selection in 1858. It is not usually the case that I write a blog post for a carnival. I usually just write for the blog, then now and then sit down and figure out which posts should go to with carnivals.…
Happy Birthday Natural Selection. You had mondo relative fitness as an idea!
Posted by Greg Laden on July 1, 2008 Natural Selection was proposed jointly by Alfred Russel Wallace and Charles Darwin on this day 150 years ago. Darwin discovered the principle of Natural Selection, and worked it out, over several decades prior. Meanwhile A.R. Wallace also came up with Natural Selection as the mechanism for what he was seeing in the wild. Some time…
Flock of Dodos
Posted by Greg Laden on April 27, 2008 With all this talk about Expelled!, the creationist movie, I thought it was about time to resurrect the review I wrote many moons ago of Flock of Dodos by Randy Olson, along with some updated information. Flock of Dodos is a much better film than Expelled!, and explores the same issue, with somewhat different conclusions.…
Expelled Dishonesty and Darwin
Posted by Greg Laden on April 20, 2008 Steve Mirsky does a little Darwin Quote Mining reversal exercise in a recent post called “Never You Mine: Ben Stein’s Selective Quoting of Darwin:” One of the many egregious moments in the new Ben Stein anti-evolution film “Expelled” is the truncation of a quote from Charles Darwin so that it makes him appear to give…
What’s in the air?
Posted by Greg Laden on April 18, 2008 Good question … what IS in the air? The simple answer is that the air … the Earth’s atmosphere … is about 78% nitrogen, 21% oxygen, with a tiny amount of some other gases including water vapor. Then, there’s dirt. I want to talk a little about the oxygen, one of the other gases (carbon…
Myers-Dawkins-Expelled-gate: Mooney and Nisbet, Framers of the Absurd, Have Stepped Over a Line and Owe an Apology
Posted by Greg Laden on March 24, 2008 Myers? Myers? …. Myers? ….. Myers? (He’s not here, Ben … Your producer threw him out.)You know about the incredibly ironic dust up, whereby Expelled! producers kicked PZ myers out of line at a pre-release showing, but failed to notice that Richard Dawkins was standing right next to him. The evidence suggests that this major…
The Language of Evolution: Do we want to use the d-word?
Posted by Greg Laden on February 23, 2008 PZ Myers notes that Ken Miller is making a case for the term design in evolutionary biology. Miller simply claims that “design” comes from the usual, expected evolutionary processes (Natural Selection, etc.). PZ is not buying this bill of goods, and neither am I. One way to address this question might be to ask: “What…
Darwin and the Voyage: 11 ~ Elephants and Horses
Posted by Greg Laden on February 22, 2008 In 1833, Darwin spent a fair amount of time on the East Coast of South America, including in the Pampas, where he had access to abundant fossil material. Here I’d like to examine his writings about some of the megafauna, including Toxodon, Mastodon, and horses, and his further considerations of biogeography and evolution.
Darwin and the Voyage: 10 ~ Rheas and the Birth of Evolutionary Theory
Posted by Greg Laden on February 20, 2008 Everyone knows about Darwin’s Finches, of the Galapagos Islands. But of course, Darwin made observations of birds throughout his travels on The Beagle. Here, I present a number of passages from The Voyage that include some of these observations.
Darwin and the Voyage: 09 ~ Fossil Quadrupeds
Posted by Greg Laden on February 18, 2008 Charles Darwin wrote a book called Geological Observations on South America. Since Fitzroy needed to carry out intensive and extensive coastal mapping in South America, and Darwin was, at heart, a geologist more than anything else (at least during the Beagle’s voyage), this meant that Darwin would become the world’s expert on South American geology.…
Darwin and the Voyage: 08 ~ The Gauchos
Posted by Greg Laden on February 17, 2008 We’re half way through Darwin Month, and only a tiny ways through the voyage. Need to hurry up! So, let’s skip ahead a bit and hit the Gauchos…. (This is a modified version of a post from my old blog).
Artificial and Natural Selection in Cosmos
Posted by Greg Laden on February 15, 2008 A classic:
, which is now available for the 
