A blog about life, past and future
Carl Zimmer is a science writer. His articles appear in the New York Times and many magazines. He is also the author of six books about science. Send messages to blog/ at/ carlzimmer/ dot/ com
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"...among the joyous, heartless, ever-juvenile eternities, Pip saw the multitudinous, God-omnipresent, coral insects, that out of the firmament of waters, heaved the colossal orbs. He saw God's foot upon the treadle of the loom, and spoke it; and therefore his shipmates called him mad."
--Moby Dick
February 27, 2006
Category: Evolution
This image came out a couple months ago in Nature, but I just came across it today. I quite like the way it sums up the history of life--something that's maddening hard to do, since the time scales are so...
Posted by Carl Zimmer at 3:04 PM • 15 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
February 22, 2006
Category: Evolution
Go back far enough in our history--maybe about 650 million years--and you come to a time when our ancestors were still invertebrates. That is, they had no skulls, teeth, or other bones. They didn't even have a brain. How invertebrates...
Posted by Carl Zimmer at 2:25 PM • 25 Comments • 2 TrackBacks
February 21, 2006
Category: Evolution
This is why I was so lucky to get Carl Buell to illustrate my first book....
Posted by Carl Zimmer at 9:52 AM • 1 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
February 20, 2006
Category: Evolution
In tomorrow's New York Times, I have an article about how new species evolve. It describes new research into how a population can split into two species. The idea that species can evolve when populations get geographically isolated is well-supported...
Posted by Carl Zimmer at 11:03 PM • 16 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Evolution
You and an oak tree have something in common: you're both big. Unlike viruses and bacteria, you and an oak tree are both made up of trillions of cells. There's something else you and an oak tree have in common:...
Posted by Carl Zimmer at 10:20 AM • 4 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
February 17, 2006
Category: Evolution
Randy Olson, director of the movie, Flock of Dodos has sent in some thoughts regarding the ongoing conversation here about his movie. A lot of commenters were offering opinions on how evolutionary biologists should communicate with the rest of us....
Posted by Carl Zimmer at 9:46 AM • 120 Comments • 6 TrackBacks
February 16, 2006
The nominees for the 2005 Koufax Awards: Best Expert Blog have been posted. Many thanks to whoever put the Loom on the list. The voting hasn't started yet, but please keep this blog in mind when it does. I don't...
Posted by Carl Zimmer at 11:49 PM • 0 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
February 14, 2006
Category: The Parasite Files
My post on zombie roaches and brain surgeon wasps seems to have hit a nerve. There have been well over 100,000 hits on that post alone, and 175 comments have been posted. I imagine that most people haven't read through...
Posted by Carl Zimmer at 1:46 AM • 4 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Evolution
Last night I drove into New Haven, Connecticut, to catch an advanced screening of Flock of Dodos, a movie about evolution and intelligent design. Afterwards I took part in a panel discussion. It was an interesting evening, not only because...
Posted by Carl Zimmer at 1:28 AM • 20 Comments • 4 TrackBacks
February 11, 2006
Category: General
Over at DailyKos, DarkSyde has been interviewing science bloggers. Here's our exchange. Greetings to visitors from DailyKos--make yourself at home. If you're looking for a few samplers of the stuff I write, you may want to check out the "Starting...
Posted by Carl Zimmer at 9:17 AM • 8 Comments • 1 TrackBacks
February 10, 2006
Category: General
Congratulations to Dan Vergano of USA Today, Michelle Nijhuis of High Country News for winning the 2006 journalism awards from the American Geophysical Union. The AGU is the country's leading organization of Earth scientists. Both reporters won for articles on...
Posted by Carl Zimmer at 10:26 AM • 3 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
February 9, 2006
Category: Evolution
Or at least at the bottom of a movie poster....
Posted by Carl Zimmer at 12:51 PM • 3 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
February 8, 2006
Category: Hobbits (Homo floresiensis)
Peter Brown, one of the discoverers of Homo floresiensis a k a the Hobbit (previous posts here), had a few interesting remarks in an article in today's Oregon Daily Emerald: Though the hobbit people were very small -- the adult...
Posted by Carl Zimmer at 11:02 PM • 16 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Evolution
The movie Flock of Dodos, which takes a look at the evolution-creationism struggle, will have a free showing on Monday in New Haven, Connecticut. I'll be there as part of a panel discussion after the movie, moderated by Michael J....
Posted by Carl Zimmer at 3:08 PM • 3 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Evolution
Dinosaur paleontologists don't look for fossils simply because dinosaurs are cool. They want to solve evolutionary mysteries. Like all living things, dinosaurs form groups of species. You've got your long-necked sauropods, your head-shield-sporting ceratopsians, and so on. The distinctiveness of...
Posted by Carl Zimmer at 10:01 AM • 10 Comments • 1 TrackBacks
February 7, 2006
Category: Evolution
Don't insult leeches....
Posted by Carl Zimmer at 7:19 PM • 1 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
February 6, 2006
I know what you're thinking. You're thinking, I need more stories about leeches. I want to find out what scientists are learning about how leeches evolved. And I know that's not all you want. You want to watch a leech...
Posted by Carl Zimmer at 10:57 PM • 8 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
February 2, 2006
Category: The Parasite Files
I collect tales of parasites the way some people collect Star Trek plates. And having filled an entire book with them, I thought I had pretty much collected the whole set. But until now I had somehow missed the gruesome...
Posted by Carl Zimmer at 9:43 AM • 212 Comments • 12 TrackBacks
